kipwinger

Question, in the era of analytics why hasn't plus/minus seen a rehabilitation as a useful stat? The possession argument is basically that if you're on the ice and your team gets a shot, or a shot attempt, or a blocked shot, or a missed shot then you get a "plus" because your team had possession in the offensive zone. Even if you did nothing to contribute to the shot attempt. And if you're on the ice and the opposition gets a shot attempt you get a minus, even if you did nothing to help give up the shot. So why not a goal for vs. a goal against? I never hear analytics bros going to bat for +/- as a stat and I don't understand why?

No idea, I'm just regurgitating what I saw.

I’m paraphrasing here but I read an interview with Alan Walsh, a big time player agent. He said this Canada vs. US debate is blown out of proportion because any agent worth a damn hooks his clients up with accountants than can more or less manage the money such that the tax burden ends up being negligible. Take it for what it’s worth. Here it is. https://x.com/walsha/status/1307480088800182272?s=20

Cooper moved him to the wings in 2015. Five years into his career. That was nine years ago. I'll grant you that he may have played center here and there along the way, but he has never played center consistently under Cooper. Also, he won Cups on the wing. He won Richard trophies at center. One of those things is demonstrably better than the other. https://www.nbcsports.com/nhl/news/coach-cooper-explains-why-stamkos-is-a-winger-now

He won two Cups at center (played in three) and certainly played more at that position than at wing. Neither of those things are true of Stamkos. Stamkos has played the majority of his career at wing and all of his Cup runs were played there. He's neither been a frequent center nor a successful one.

I actually don't. I remember Zetterberg on Datsyuk's wing. Datsyuk broke in at center and played there more or less without interruption for his whole career. If anything I'd argue that Zetterberg was more like Stamkos. He achieved all his best career seasons on the wing AND never won a Cup at center.

Look doofus, if you're dying to win an internet argument about whether Stamkos can play center (despite hardly ever doing so) then go nuts. However, if you sincerely want to make the point that we need an upgrade at center (like your original post tries to do) then Stamkos isn't your guy. You decide what you're trying to accomplish here. Okay, I'll caveat it. Stamkos has not CONSISTENTLY played center in years. You win. If either of you think signing him to play center on THIS team RIGHT NOW is a good idea you're on crack. That's my actual point here.

Lots of people CAN play center. I never said Stamkos CAN'T play there, I said he's not good at it. No surprise that Tampa stopped getting humiliated in the playoffs and started winning Cups once he was moved to the wing. Also, since when you do care about hockey journalists' points of view? I've noticed you doing this a lot lately. Rail against the hockey media and then talk about Selke voting as if guys like Corey Pronman and Scott Wheeler aren't doing the voting. Either they're fools who shouldn't be listened to or they're credible. Pick one.

Dude, for the zillionth time Steven Stamkos hasn't played center in years and wasn't good at it when he did. That's why they moved him to the wing. He didn't play center during any of their Cup runs and has no value there. I agree we need quality centers, but he's not one.

Who cares? I'd rather guys be effective when they DO arrive than guys who are mediocre but in the lineup immediately. Raymond isn't a better player than Seider just because he made it to the NHL as a draft +2 instead of a draft +3 player.

Well sure, some of our better prospects are better than bad NHLers but I don't think that's a good reason to bring them up yet. I think that kills development. I've used this example before but if you're not any good at faceoffs you're probably not going to learn by losing ten of them per night against Brayden Point, Crosby, Barkov, O'Reilly, Larkin, etc. right? Likewise you're not going to learn to shoot well if you come to the NHL and defenders close on you more quickly and you can't get your shot off at all, and when you do you're trying to beat Sorokin, Shesterkin, etc. My philosophy is bring prospects up when they're ready. When you're satisfied with their all around game irrespective of their ceilings. Like, right now Edvinsson and Berggren have nothing else to learn in the AHL. Their all around games are dominant. So bring them up. And then fill the rest of the roster with vets. Kasper isn't even a 1C in the AHL yet and we're really counting on him being a 2C in the NHL one day? Let him be a top guy in GR for a season and work on his game, then see if he's ready. Until then, Copp and Veleno will do. This is just my opinion but I think all guys naturally get "faster" as they gain muscle and develop the lower body strength to move their frames around the ice. Seider is still a young, skinny, kid. Once he's squatting 400 lbs he'll be plenty fast. Different thing than "playing fast" though. And I think this is a more important skill. Moving your feet all the time and playing with "pace" is more important. Look at David Perron. Slow skater but never stops moving so he keeps up. Mark Stone is the king of this. Now compare that to Anthony Mantha. Mantha is a fast, powerful, skater who only really skates in transition. The rest of the time he's coasting, so his speed doesn't really matter much.

I forgot Johansson and agree about him. I don't agree about Kasper or Cossa though. Kasper's offense is very incidental and his shot it underdeveloped. He creates a ton of chances for himself and can't finish many because he can't shoot. He has a tendency to double clutch when he receives a pass and is about to shoot. This gives goalies time to get set and defenders time to close distance. I'd really like to see him get another season in GR to work on getting his shot away more cleanly, otherwise you're going to have another Zadina on your hands (a guy who could find scoring opportunities but not finish them because of a bad shot). Cossa has made huge strides in his game and he's learning that for a big goalie the name of the game is positioning. Where to be in the net and how to present to shooters. But he needs A LOT of reps to make that muscle memory IMO. He's largely split the season with Hutchinson this year and I'd like to see him take another year in GR where he starts about 2/3s of the games. Let him carry the load on a winning team and be "the man". Out of all the guys you mentioned Wallinder is probably the only other one that's close to ready. The only reason he's not popping right now is because he's buried behind Edvinsson in the depth chart. When Simon graduates to the big club Wallinder will get all Simon's minutes (most importantly on the powerplay) and you'll see a huge spike in his production. But I think his transition game and defense are already pretty high level. I'd also be surprised if Tuomisto every plays many NHL games. His feet are sluggish. By that I don't mean he's slow. I mean he pivots and changes direction slowly. For instance, when the opposition dumps the puck into GR's zone he'll go back on retrievals and gather up the puck but it takes FOREVER for him to turn his feet, get facing back up ice, and transition to offense. Forecheckers are going to eat him alive in the NHL. Likewise he doesn't defend well in transition because rushing forwards have no problem crossing him up because his feet suck. He needs a skating coach, big time.

The good news is that Mazur has really taken his game to a different level lately. A month ago I'd have said that Berggren and Edvinsson are the only NHL ready prospects we have. But Mazur is there, or almost there, now. With a full offseason to train I think he easily handles a depth spot in the NHL next season.

I think he 100% DOES think that way. But if that's the case then why bring Sprong, Gost, Fischer, Kane, etc. onto the team and then not trade them? If Larkin is going to be the grizzled vet on the team then why are you acquiring guys older than him to fill spots that younger guys could be filling? I imagine the answer to that question is the same as the answer to the question "if you wanted to get harder to play against why sign Kostin and Holl and then not play them?". It's like they want to have options but don't want to commit to anything. "We wanna be harder to play against but we ALSO want to ice a roster with eight sub-6ft wingers". "We need to play better defense but our defense and goalies are all bargain bin castoffs". "We want to see our young guys develop so we're going to bury them in the depth chart". "We want to make the playoffs but we're not willing to spend 3rd round picks to make it happen". Right now things seem VERY directionless.

Maybe? But sitting in a playoff position through the deadline and then falling apart down the stretch is EXACTLY what happened to this team last year right? So why is our GM content with that outcome again? Worse yet, how is that a goal or an improvement? Also, if SY is okay with getting close but not making it then he should have sold. If his rationale was "the roster is the roster and we win or lose with it", then what does it matter if Berggren is in the lineup instead of Sprong or Edvinsson instead of Gost? Maybe you're marginally more likely to make the playoffs with the vets, but you've already made up your mind that missing the playoffs isn't that big a deal so why not get what you can?

The only time I think it's defensible to do nothing is if you're coming into the deadline as a juggernaut and you don't really need anything to be competitive. Otherwise you need to be playing to win or building. None of that is applicable to what we just did. I'd imagine SY would have had a very different response if we were in the exact same position as we are now, but had a bunch of young guys driving the bus instead of Kane, Sprong, Gost, etc. But then that begs the question, how's that possible if you don't give the young guys who are ready (Berggren, Edvinsson, and maaaaybe Mazur) the opporunity. You have to imagine that the whole point of bringing these vets onto the roster was EITHER to trade them or see if they can get you into the playoffs. SY just decided to fold the season but also not trade them. To me the whole thing just seems directionless. What were the goals going into this season? Im not sure the front office could answer that question easily. Was it to have all the young guys take another step in their development? If so, get them on the roster and get them into prime roles. Why are Seider and Raymond on the second powerplay unit if that's the goal? Why are Veleno and Rasmussen sharing minutes with Copp and Fischer? Why is Maatta on your team at all instead of Edvinsson? Same for Berggren and Sprong. If the point was to make the playoffs then ice the best roster possible, evaluate your team at the deadline and see if that goal is reasonable (it definitely was), and make adjustments to your roster according to your most pressing needs. I'm not sure what SY was trying to accomplish, but it's starting to seem like accomplishing nothing at all is the most likely outcome here.

Just popping in the set the table. Gotta go take the dogs for a walk. I'll be back to tell you all why you're dumb later.

If you're going to build a winning team you actually have to build on something. If you strategy every year is to strip the team down to a skeleton and start over next season one day you're going to wake up and Moritz Seider is going to be 26, 27, or 28 without ever having played in meaningful games. There's a huge difference between finishing the season strong (even if they lose in the playoffs) and the team looking forward to next season, and falling apart and kicking the can down the road to next season. The ONLY thing we accomplished this season was the wins. We didn't bring rookies in to get more experience. We didn't find long term solutions to any of our roster issues. We didn't clear cap for future contract negotiations. But we DID put ourselves in a position to make the playoffs and now management has thrown cold water on that. If being good and making the playoffs this year wasn't part of the "Yzerplan" they we should have sold. And we certainly shouldn't have acquired dudes like Justin Holl and Jeff Petry. And if making the playoffs this year WAS part of the plan, then Yzerman should have been willing to use a 3rd round pick to shore up our goaltending (for example). It's clear that the front office had no idea what they wanted to accomplish this season and that in their minds there isn't much of a difference between making the playoffs or just missing (again). And so they did nothing...again...except watch their team get a year older.

He had a rough turnover last night for a goal against. He also drew two penalties in a row by moving his feet in the offensive zone, one of which we scored on to tie the game. He's a really good player, but he's still a rookie.

Why's that? The only difference in their games is that Point scores marginally more. Which is to be expected when you play your entire career on a Cup contender with Nikita Kucherov as a linemate. Larkin's been on a rebuilding team his whole career and until this year his best winger was Tyler Bertuzzi. Otherwise they're extremely similar players both in style and in production.

Anybody with Twitter happen to see if Ansar Khan (or anyone else) posted the line combinations today? I'm curious to see who Berggren will play with. I have to imagine it'll be Copp and Sprong but who knows.

It's possible he already did. Lucas Raymond is scoring about as much as Mitch Marner and Nikita Kucherov did at the same age. Seider is playing like an elite 1D, and is probably ahead of where any other "elite" defenseman was at this age. If his point totals don't reflect it that's because he's been asked to eat defensive minutes, against top competition, more than comparable elite players. Victor Hedman wasn't out there starting in the defensive zone 60% of the time when he was Seider's age. Didn't score as well as Seider does either. We've all got this impression that "elite" looks like McDavid, or Mackinnon, or Hughes, or Matthews but it doesn't always. Elite might look like Bergeron and Pastrnak, or Kopitar and Doughty. We'd better hope so anyway. The challenge for Yzerman is to figure out how to build around the talent we do have and not hold out hope for a particular type of talent we don't have. The good news is that we've got a Brayden Point level 1C in Larkin. We've got a Sergachev (or better) in Edvinsson. We've got a Markstrom (or maybe Demko) in Cossa. Maybe we have a Quinn Hughes in ASP. I really do believe that the pieces are there, but I think we've got to start playing winning hockey. Integrating these guys onto winning rosters. Letting them see what it takes to be a playoff team in the NHL on a day by day, game by game basis. And that's not going to happen if we get THIS close to the playoffs and our front office refuses to put their thumb on the scale a push us over the top.

Well we're definitely playing (and losing) important games down the stretch so mission accomplished I guess.

I'm not sure what Berggren and Edvinsson are going to accomplish. We're good on middle six wingers and left handed defensemen. If anything those are strengths of the team. Both those players help in the long term, but neither of them address needs for this team right now. And if you're not trying to improve this team right now then why didn't we just sell?

The more I think about this deadline the more frustrated I get. What was the plan when signing all these free agents? To make the playoffs and try to win a round or two? Or wait and see what happens and then sell them off at the deadline? Because if you're trying to make the playoffs (and create a winning culture) then he sure as h*ll should have bolstered the weak spots in the lineup. And if the idea was to sell for picks then he should have bitten the bullet and sold. What he told the team was, "I don't have enough confidence in you to spend a 3rd round pick on some reinforcements. But I'm also not throwing the towel in because I'd like to see us win...just not enough to do anything to improve the odds of it". The deadline is the absolutely last opportunity to commit to an organizational direction. The league gives you 75% of the season to figure your team out. The front office either doesn't know what this team is, or they don't strongly care enough whether it wins or loses to commit to one direction or the other. Every player on the roster knows it too. If you're a UFA on this this team right now why would you buy in? Managment didn't. These guys are all thinking about next year from here on out. And if you're a core piece it's just more of the same, the losing losers lose again. Managing any organization, but especially a sports team, is as much about psychology as anything else. The front office just told the entire team, we don't really care what happens either way. So why would the players? I'm expecting a serious tumble down the standings over the remainder of the season.