Hockey

Pictures of Matchstick Men – ’19–’20 Blackhawks Player Previews – Brent Seabrook

By John Pullega 2004 0

Five more years.

2018–19 Stats

78 GP – 5 G, 23 A, 28 P

46.77 CF% (-3.5 CF% Rel), 49.8 oZS%

46.46 GF% (-5.92 Rel GF%), 45.32 xGF% (0.45 Rel xGF%)

Avg. TOI 19:06

A Brief History: There are so many ways to measure what a negative effect Seabrook had when he was on the ice last year. Let’s start at the most obvious, which is his defense.

All Charts by Micah Blake McCurdy (@IneffectiveMath)

On the left is WITH Seabrook. On the right is WITHOUT. Both are bad. But it’s somehow and exceedingly worse when he’s out there. The analysis here is simple: Seabrook gets mauled when he’s forced to play in his own end.

The only Blackhawk D-man whose threat percentage while on the ice was higher than Seabrook’s (higher is worse on defense) was Gustav Forsling, and he won’t ever see the ice inside PNC Arena, barring a glut of Hurricanes injuries. Defensively, Seabrook is slightly better than Gustav Forsling. Ringing endorsement.

Worse than being bad by yourself is making your teammates worse. Seabrook excels at this aspect of the game.

This chart shows score-adjusted shots per 60 minutes, both against (inverted y-axis) and for (x-axis). That red diagonal line is the 50% point for shots for and shots against (i.e., the breakeven point). The blob of blue in the middle is Seabrook on his own, which leans toward bad. The black squares are a given player WITH Seabrook. The red squares are the given player WITHOUT Seabrook.

Aside from reiterating how bad this team is at defense as a whole, this shows that when Seabrook is on the ice, opponents take more shots than give up. When you take Seabrook off the ice, literally every single Blackhawk ends up facing fewer shots.

In short, Seabrook is a black hole for defensive performance, and there’s nowhere to hide him. He sucks so much that he has his own fucking event horizon. That’s fucking something.

You bet your sweet crimson ass there is. Perhaps the worst part of Seabrook’s game is his penalty killing.

Jesus Christ, just look at how bad the PK is when Seabrook is on the ice (left). He played just 21 seconds fewer than the Hawks’s leading PK time getter, Duncan Keith, on by far the worst PK in the league. This is an utter dereliction of duty on Colliton’s part. There might not be a worse regular-time-getting penalty killer in the league than Brent Seabrook, and yet there he is, almost leading the team in playing time out there.

Maybe you’re sitting there buying the myth that he’s still useful on offense. But guess what?

That’s not really true. In terms of shots at 5v5, Seabrook is entirely replaceable. The offensive threat (higher is better on offense) is the same whether he’s on the ice or not. Combine this with his GF%, and it’s even worse. Of Hawks who played at least 41 games, only Gustav Forsling (there’s that name again) had a worse GF% among Hawks D-men.

“Well, he’s still got a booming shot and can be useful on the power play,” you might say.

Pretty much any power play with Seabrook on it dies on this “still useful, booming” shot of his. This shot directly produced AT BEST 10 power play goals if you want to include the possibility of tips (two goals, three first assists, five second assists). That’s not nearly useful enough to make up for everything else he makes bad.

The only positive thing that happened with him last year is that he played under 20 minutes per game on average. That’s a start, but he really should be playing about 20 games per year.

It Was the Best of Times: Boqvist breaks camp and takes Seabrook’s spot. Seabrook plays 20 games all year as a 7th D-man, along with Dahlstrom.

It Was the BLURST of Times: Seabrook plays more than 20 games.

Prediction: Seabrook’s gonna get second-pairing minutes and look terrible doing it. Everyone’s gonna keep going back to the undefinable “leadership” he brings, saying, “You just can’t understand it unless you’re in the locker room.” Everyone will make excuse after excuse for his performance. It will be agony because none of this is really Seabrook’s fault.

This is just what he is now: a bad all-around hockey player. As much as I want to hem and haw about how a real leader would take himself off the ice, that’s not fair. It’s stupid, in fact. Instead, that’s a decision his coach—a man who likely has the same sort of respectability in Seabrook’s eyes as a soiled diaper—needs the stones to make. But Colliton probably doesn’t have the stones to do what anyone with even a cursory understanding of hockey would do: scratch Seabrook more often than not.

The only thing that Colliton, Bowman, and every other decision maker should be afraid of regarding Seabrook is how much damage he does to the Hawks as a direct result of playing ice hockey. It doesn’t matter how you slice it. Brent Seabrook is not a good hockey player anymore. He’s a sunk cost. You get nothing for continuing to ice him, except a below-replacement-level performance.

They’ll retire his number one day because he deserves it. We’ll revere him as a cornerstone of the Hawks revival, because he is, was, and always will be. The first time he comes back after his retirement, he will get the raucous standing ovation he’s owed. That’s what makes watching him be quite possibly the worst regularly playing defenseman in the NHL today as agonizing as it is.

We’re just as tired of this as you are. And it really doesn’t have to be this way.

Five more years.

Stats from HockeyViz.com, hockey-reference.com, NaturalStatTrick.com, and Corsica.hockey.

Previous Previews

Robin Lehner

Corey Crawford

Adam Boqvist

Carl Dahlstrom

Calvin de Haan

Erik Gustafsson

Duncan Keith

Slater Koekkoek

Olli Maatta

Connor Murphy

Hockey

Pictures of Matchstick Men – ’19–’20 Blackhawks Player Previews – Connor Murphy

By John Pullega 1716 0

Since that fateful day when Stan Bowman pulled Quenneville’s heart of out his ass and made him sniff it with the Hjalmarsson trade, Connor Murphy’s performance has been a consistent curiosity. He’s often looked like the best Hawks D-man on the ice when he’s healthy. But when you pan out for a longer view of the defense, it’s always felt like being the best of this bunch is like beating a two-legged dog at a digging contest. This year, Murphy will likely need to shoulder the burden of being the only passable defensive defenseman on the Hawks, at least until de Haan gets back.

2018–19 Stats

52 GP – 5 G, 8 A, 13 P

48.63 CF% (-0.4 CF% Rel), 38.8 oZS%

54.67 GF% (1.29 Rel GF%), 44.44 xGF% (-1.08 Rel xGF%)

Avg. TOI 19:29

A Brief History: We’ve always liked Connor Murphy around here, and we all thought we were getting a younger, cheaper Hjalmarsson in him. In some ways, that’s been true. Over the last two years, each has missed extended time due to injury (Murphy last year, Hjalmarsson in 18). They’ve been fairly comparable in those two years, though Hjalmarsson has had an overall edge in defensive play.

But last year wasn’t particularly kind to our Large Irish Son. He missed 30 games due to a back injury, which is never good for a 6’4” skater. We saw him skating up at the blue line at times as Colliton’s man defense went through what we can only pray is growing pains. His possession metrics, both vanilla (48.63%) and high-danger varieties (39.34%), were underwater on the year, though you might expect that given his zone starts.

And yet, Murphy was relatively fine next to Carl Dahlstrom. They were the “shutdown pair” for a time, and compared to everyone else on the Hawks’s blue line, the ice was least dangerous when Murphy was out there. Maybe the most interesting stat about Murphy last year is that despite starting in his own zone about 62% of the time, his GF% was second among Hawks D-men who played at least 41 games, second only to Duncan Keith (58 oZS%).

It Was the Best of Times: Murphy stays healthy and jumps into the top-pairing role with Gustafsson. Hell, you can play them both on their off sides and see what happens. Gus scored 60 on his off side, and Murphy never looked too out of place on his, so whatever. Fuck it. Putting Murphy and Gus together hedges Gus’s awfulness in his own zone. Might as well try it, since the only other true shutdown guy on this team, Calvin de Haan, won’t be around for a month or so.

It Was the BLURST of Times: Murphy’s back keeps him off the ice for 40% of the year. For all the bitching we’ve done about Murphy’s use since his arrival, Colliton has upped the time we see Murphy on the ice consistently. It’s unlikely we’ll see him with any less than second-pairing minutes. So, aside from injury—which is still a distinct possibility for a man of his significant vertical carriage—the worst scenario is that Murphy can’t adapt to whatever it is that Colliton’s defensive scheme wants him to do, which, based on last year, seems to ask defensemen to skate around the blue line in their own zone.

Prediction: Murphy continues to toil in the dungeon shifts. When de Haan comes back healthy, he finally gets to play with a worthwhile partner, and the Hawks have a true shutdown pairing. He and de Haan also round out the PK1 unit, which is a vast improvement over Keith–Seabrook. The PK still finishes toward the top of the bottom half of the league (say, 18th), but not because of anything Murphy does. Murphy continues to go underappreciated for the cardinal sin of not being Niklas Hjalmarsson.

Murphy’s never going to give you sexy numbers, unless, like, a 69 dZS% tickles you. He’s about as representative a defenseman as you’ll find. But with the offensive threats the Hawks have, that’s really all they need.

Stats from hockey-reference.com, NaturalStatTrick.com, and Corsica.hockey.

Previous Previews

Robin Lehner

Corey Crawford

Adam Boqvist

Carl Dahlstrom

Calvin de Haan

Erik Gustafsson

Duncan Keith

Slater Koekkoek

Olli Maatta

Hockey

Pictures of Matchstick Men – ’19–’20 Blackhawks Player Previews – Erik Gustafsson

By John Pullega 1826 0

Sixty points. First-pairing minutes. A league-leading power play from middle December onward. A $1.2 million cap hit. These are some of the statistics that surround Erik Gustafsson. He’s the center of gravity that draws analytics nerds, construction-working meatballs, GMs, coaches, and agents alike to ask, “Just what the fuck are we looking at here?” Is Gus the future bedrock on the backend or is he a bum in a talented man’s clothes?

2018–19 Stats

79 GP – 17 G, 43 A, 60 P

50.24 CF% (2.1 CF% Rel), 60.8 oZS%

53.24 GF% (5.37 Rel GF%), 45.5 xGF% (0.64 Rel xGF% )

Avg. TOI 22:35

FFUD Review of 2018–19 Erik Gustafsson

A Brief History: Erik Gustafsson led all Blackhawks D-men in goals, assists, and points, both at even strength and on the PP. Of Hawks D-men who played at least 41 games (so, minus Jokiharju and Koekkoek), he led in CF% and CF% Rel. Only five D-men in the NHL scored more points than Gustafsson last year. And of course, upon his insertion as the #1 PP unit’s quarterback on December 18, 2018, no team had a higher PP% than the Blackhawks.

No matter how you slice it, Erik Gustafsson was an offensive force last year. You don’t need a map to find that.

But his offensiveness extended to his defense—you know, the very title of his position—because he was a botched graveside burial in his own zone. This is where we need a couple maps to understand just how fucking awful Gus was on the defensive side of the puck.

A3Z tool from Corey Sznajder (@ShutdownLine) and CJ Turtoro (@CJTDevil)

This tool is fairly forgiving to Gus. The offense and own-zone exit ability are on full display. Now, look at the ENTRY DEFENSE section.

The only thing objectively bad about it is his breakups per 60 minutes. What this means is that when opposing skaters go directly at Gus with the puck, more likely than not, he won’t break the entry up. On the plus side, Gus doesn’t allow too many opposing skaters to skate into the zone with possession (i.e., not dumping it in), in terms of both raw possession entries (PossEntriesAllowed60) and the percentage of entries with possession allowed (PossEntry% Allowed).

We can’t say the same about his partner, Duncan Keith. Last year, teams tended to attack Keith on the entry with better success. This means that generally, opponents got into the zone with possession on Keith’s side rather than Gus’s.

Why talk about Keith though? Does that mean that Gus is better on defense than we give him credit for? Are we deflecting by using Keith as a comp? Do you think I’d be doing all this if that were the case, dear reader?

Charts by Micah Blake McCurdy (@IneffectiveMath)

So, we’ve established that Keith is more of a hole in terms of possession entries than Gus. It’s what happens after Gus gets stuck in his own zone that’s the menace.

These two heatmaps compare opponent shot rates with Gus on the ice (left) vs. without Gus on the ice (right). More red means more opponent shots in that area.

Both are really red, because the Blackhawks defense—and I cannot and will not ever stress this enough—is more embarrassing than having your first period in white pants. But it somehow got worse with Gus on the ice.

With Gus on defense, you’re looking at a higher concentration of high-danger shots AND more shots from the top of the circle on the side Gus plays on. Recall too that the only D-man on the ice for more high-danger goals than Gus last year was his partner, Duncan Keith. And though Keith’s heatmaps were bad, they weren’t this bad. (You can guess whose were worst on the team overall.)

In short, last year saw opponents enter the zone on Keith’s side and do a ton of damage on Gus’s side. This is their top pairing. Very good, very conducive to winning.

This is what we’ve been saying about Gus for a while. The offense and creativity are all there, but he’s stagnant ditch water in his own zone. The question is, which side of the coin has more weight?

It Was the Best of Times: Gustafsson pairs with Connor Murphy and continues his incredible offensive output. He vastly outpaces his xGF% just like last year, and the PP ranks in the top five based on Gustafsson’s vision and creativity at the point—both of which are direct results of playing with Patrick Kane more than everyone, just like last year. Murphy cancels out Gustafsson’s complete lack of ability in his own zone, and Gus’s offense far outweighs his poor defense. He scores 55 points. Essentially, the Hawks get Brent Burns lite.

It Was the BLURST of Times: Gus doesn’t spend most of his time with Patrick Kane, and he regresses to the mean. Opponents wait just a second longer to catch Gus on some of his ill-advised own-zone dangles and exploit his John Wayne tendencies. He and Keith continue to get buried in their own zone. The power play flattens out, but this time, it isn’t a result of Patrick Kane running on fumes.

Prediction: Gustafsson is an offensive powerhouse. He continues to outperform his xGF% and doesn’t see an offensive regression. The same power play unit that came to life after Gus became THE GUY continues to run roughshod, finishing in the top 10 on the year. (There’s a concern that it won’t produce, based on how the PP finished last year. I think that’s a valid concern, but I also think that it was more a result of Kane running on fumes than anything.)

There’s one huge caveat to this: Patrick Kane must stay healthy. Kane has the same sort of gap between GF% and xGF% throughout his career that we saw from Gus last year. And Gus’s performance correlates with whether he’s playing with Kane.

  • When Gus plays with Kane at 5v5, his GF% is 57.69. Without Kane, it’s 46.09.
  • When Gus plays with Kane at 5v5, his SCGF% is 56.34. Without, it’s 47.17.
  • Of Gus’s 60 points last year, his breakdown was:
    • 60 total points. 42 of them (70%) came playing with Kane
    • 42 even-strength points. 25 of them (59.5%) came playing with Kane
    • 18 PP points. 17 of them (94%) came playing with Kane

You can see similar performance tracks when Gus plays with Toews, DeBrincat, and Strome in similar situations, but they aren’t quite as extreme. All this is to say that Gus doesn’t carry it by himself. When he plays with top-tier talent, he looks like a top-tier player. When he doesn’t, he doesn’t. What’s that worth to you?

So, what the fuck are we looking at with Gus? An outstanding complementary player. A good, creative play maker. Good enough to score 60 points with the right teammates, but not good enough to create by himself. Reliant on a generational talent. A farce in his own zone. Probably most valuable as a trade piece.

In other words, we’re looking at the Blackhawks’s next 6 x $6 million man.

Stats from hockey-reference.com, NaturalStatTrick.com, Corsica.hockey, NHL.com, HockeyViz.com, and the Sznajder–Turtoro A3Z Player Comp Tool

Previous Previews

Robin Lehner

Corey Crawford

Adam Boqvist

Carl Dahlstrom

Calvin de Haan

Hockey

Pictures of Matchstick Men – ’19–’20 Blackhawks Player Previews – Calvin de Haan

By John Pullega 1777 0

After last year’s personal affront of a blue line made it easier than ever to forget that just three years ago the Blackhawks were having a parade, Stan Bowman knew he had to answer for his backend farce. The answer he came up with was Calvin de Haan, a defensive defenseman who will probably miss the first month or two while rehabbing a major shoulder surgery. But the Hawks got him for a song, and when he’s healthy he’s effective, so there’s something to look forward to.

2018–19 Stats

74 GP – 1 G, 13 A, 14 P

55.64 CF%, 56.41 oZS%

47.06 GF% (-5.88 Rel GF%), 55.12 xGF% (-1.62 xGF% Rel)

Avg. TOI 18:31

Canes Country Review of Calvin de Haan

A Brief History: The most important thing to remember about Calvin de Haan is that he’s very unlikely to start the season on the ice. He had off-season surgery on his right shoulder in May and had a 4–6-month recovery timetable. It’s looking more likely that he’ll fall closer to the end of that recovery projection, meaning that he probably won’t be back until November. On top of that, de Haan has had surgery on his left shoulder a few times in the past. But Bowman got de Haan for Anton Forsberg and Gustav Forsling. So, de Haan could miss the entire 2019–20 season and the Hawks still likely win the trade.

History of shoulder problems aside, de Haan had a pretty good year last year for a defensive defenseman. His possession numbers were excellent in Carolina, even when you account for how much time he spent in the offensive zone. That 47.06 goals-for percentage (GF%) doesn’t inspire confidence on its face, but it could be a function of the fact that Carolina is more of a possession juggernaut than a pure offensive power. Expect that to rise if the Hawks’s offense is still clicking, and there’s no reason to think it won’t.

In addition to his strong possession numbers, de Haan played second-pairing minutes for the eighth-ranked Hurricanes PK. He played about 147 minutes on the PK last year and was on the ice for 20 goals, which is generally fine. It’s definitely better than what Keith (166 minutes, 31 GA) and Seabrook (166 minutes, 29 GA) did last year.

In short, de Haan is a stay-at-home defenseman who, when healthy, can make the Hawks blue line a bit stouter than it was last year. He also played over 300 minutes with TvR last year, a primer for what playing with the Hawks will be like.

It Was the Best of Times: de Haan comes back in early November and pairs with a waiting Adam Boqvist. That’s the role de Haan typically played in Carolina, where he spent most of his time paired with Justin Faulk, another offensively minded, defensively stunted defenseman. Given his stay-at-home tendencies and Boqvist’s NHL-ready offense, these two seem destined to come together at some point. Might as well be as soon as possible.

On the PK, de Haan and Murphy take over the first-pairing duties, sparing us the horror of watching that Keith–Seabrook snuff film, at least until the second unit comes out.

It Was the BLURST of Times: de Haan comes back to pair with Erik Gustafsson on the top pairing, because this is the reality the Brain Trust wants. Gustafsson gets exposed as little more than a third-pairing bum slayer, and de Haan floats between covering for Gus, Seabrook, and Maatta, sometimes all in the same game. Then, de Haan ends up on a PK unit BEHIND Keith–Seabrook.

Alternatively, de Haan’s shoulders are in worse shape than anticipated, and he misses most of the 19–20 season. Any “The Hawks have an outside shot at the playoffs” talk turns to ash in our mouths as we watch Keith and Seabrook get mutilated all year again.

Prediction: de Haan is the consummate babysitter and as close as the Hawks will ever again get to having Hjalmarsson on the team. The problem is that the Hawks have three D-men who need to be babysat for each babysitter they have. Murphy and de Haan can’t cover for all of Keith, Gus, Seabrook, Dahlstrom, Maatta, and Boqvist (if he makes it here) at the same time.

So, we’ll see de Haan pair with Murphy on the third pair, because fuck you. They’ll serve as a shutdown pairing, and things will be generally fine when they’re on the ice. But that’ll expose the Keith–Gus and Maatta–Seabrook pairings as the bloated, slow, irresponsible messes that they are, and the Hawks will once again rely on the goaltending to constantly pull their asses out of the sling and the offense to outscore their defensive problems. Colliton will do the right thing and put de Haan on the first PK unit, but it will be with Keith, who couldn’t be bothered to give a shit last year.

On his own, de Haan is a good shutdown D-man at a good price (three more years at $4.55 million per). And he’ll be perfect for when Boqvist makes the jump. But de Haan isn’t a savior. He’s a nice second-pairing D-man on a team that needs a top-pairing guy and has nothing close to one. The problems on the blue line this year are bigger than he can solve alone.

So yeah, he technically makes the blue line “log jam” better, sort of like a plumber who empties a toilet with his bare hands, throws the remains in a garbage can, and doesn’t have the equipment to actually fix the clog.

“Keep on going and fuck everything. Pile misery upon misery, heap it up on a spoon, and dissolve it with a drop of bile.”

Stats from hockey-reference.com, NaturalStatTrick.com, and Corsica.hockey.

Previous Previews

Robin Lehner

Corey Crawford

Adam Boqvist (oh please fucking god let it be so)

Carl Dahlstrom

Hockey

Pictures of Matchstick Men – ’19–’20 Blackhawks Player Previews – Robin Lehner

By John Pullega 2109 0

The one wrinkle that Stan Bowman missed while ironing his brain this summer was signing Robin Lehner. With Corey Crawford in a perpetual state of ouch and a blue line more horrendously conceived than Waldo’s Dad’s wall, finding a Robin for the Batman Bowman thinks this backend is was quite the steal, if not a bit on the nose.

2018–19 Stats

46 GP – 25 W, 13 L, 5 OTL

.930 SV%, 2.13 GAA

.934 EV%, 1.000 PP%, .888 SH%

28.7 Shots Against/Game

A Brief History: Lehner had a career year last year. He won the Jennings after Barry No-Neck reinstituted his “hockey should feel like a botched vasectomy” defense on the Isle/Brooklyn. He won the Masterson for performing well after confronting and addressing the hell of bipolar disorder. And he was second runner-up for the Vezina. For all the pants shitting Bowman did in the off-season, he managed to fling at least one diaper onto Lou Lamoriello’s cue-ball dome by signing Lehner to a one-year, $5 million deal.

Lehner consistently ranked in the top five among goalies in ALL situations last year.

  • Second overall with a .930 SV% (behind only THE BISHOP!)
  • Third overall with a 2.13 GAA
  • Third overall with a .854 HDSV% (high-danger save percentage)

Lehner also only gave up 93 goals on the year against an expected 109 (ALL situations), which simply means he played better than expected.

You may remember that the Blackhawks were the absolute worst team in HDCF% and a bottom-10 team in HDGF% last year, which is just a fancy way to say that their high-danger defense was a plastic bag of sun-drenched mayonnaise. So, that HDSV% should pop out as promising.

Lehner was pretty good on the PK last year, too, with a .888 SV%. For a team that portends to piss itself on the PK again this year, you’ll take any improvement you can get there.

It Was the Best of Times: If Lehner plays at just his career average rate, then the Hawks have a pretty comparable albeit lesser replacement for Corey Crawford.

Career

Games

SV%

SH SV%

5v5 HDCF%

5v5 HDGF%

5v5 HDSV%

Crawford

448

.918

.869

.501*

.529*

.852*

Lehner

265

.918

.892

.498

.479

.825

Postseason not included

* = 2007–19, NaturalStatTrick.com

And over the last four years, Lehner’s been the better of the two on the PK, though inferior in terms of HDSV%.

2015–19

Games

SV%

SH SV%

5v5 HDCF%

5v5 HDGF%

5v5 HDSV%

Crawford

180

.919

.875

.475

.520

.864

Lehner

179

.919

.891

.502

.477

.815

Postseason not included

This will be Lehner’s first real year since 2013–14 behind a team whose offense isn’t reliant on gas station enhancement pills for even a spurt. (Did you know Ottawa had a top-10 offense in terms of goals scored that year? I sure forgot.) Even with all the woe we throw at this team, the offense has been in the top-10 in terms of goals scored four of the last five years.

So, best case, Lehner performs at a career level or better, which improves the PK despite the fact that it’s somehow going to be slower than it was last year. With the Hawks scoring at a top-10 rate, Lehner can hide some of the trouble he’s had in allowing high-danger goals as the Hawks simply go with an air raid strategy all year. Lehner takes a 60/40 split of starts and the Hawks eke out a playoff spot on the backs of their offense and 1A/1B goalie tandem.

It Was the BLURST of Times: Robin Lehner played for one of the best defensive teams last year. You saw the numbers he put up behind that. The year before, he played for one of the worst defensive teams in Buffalo. His results weren’t pretty, as he threw a .908 SV% and 3.01 GAA. His HDSV% was an abysmal .796. The latter is closer to the kind of defense that Lehner can expect coming to Chicago.

Worst case, aside from an injury, is that Lehner can’t make up for how bad the Hawks blue line is. His HDSV% plummets behind a blue line that, again, managed to somehow get slower than it was last year. He drowns even splitting time with Crawford, and when Crow inevitably gets hurt, Lehner turns into the pumpkin we called Cam Ward last year. The Hawks don’t make the playoffs, don’t get a lucky bounce in the lottery, and no one learns anything.

Prediction: Lehner will end up as the 1A goalie as Crow’s tenure as the Hawks’s resident Rodney Dangerfield winds down. He won’t wow like he did last year, but we’ll get a serviceable, slightly-below-career-average line from Lehner. Let’s say, .908 SV%, .880 SH%. But the Hawks blue line and Lehner’s career HDSV% will pair as well as puke on a pile of shit, and none of the problems the Hawks had last year will really be solved.

Here come the Hawks?

Stats from hockey-reference.com and NaturalStatTrick.com

 

Hockey

Summer Doldrums – Projecting How the Blackhawks Will Do This Year

By John Pullega 2255 0

An active first two days of the week with the Dach signing on Monday and the curious-at-best Jokiharju trade Tuesday. The Hawks still haven’t traded Artem Anisimov, and I guess that that’s not horribly urgent, but it would make more sense if they did than if they didn’t. It might be hard for the Hawks to find a trading partner for a plodding third-line center with a $4.55 million per cap hit for the next two years who’s wide dicked his way into 20 goals three times in the past four years. But then again, Brandon Motherfucking Manning DID get a two-year deal for seven figures only to be traded and demoted last year, so I guess anything is possible. BUT THAT’S NOT WHY YOU CALLED.

Because summer is categorically the worst season of the year, we’re left thinking about all the ways Chicago hockey can either surprise us or go entirely ass up this fall. We’ve done a lot of looking at the ass-up side of things, so maybe we can try to look at potential positives for your 2019–20 Chicago Blackhawks.

We like to lean on advanced stats to make points about why guys who seem underwhelming really aren’t (Brandon Saad) and to bitch about why guys who suck shouldn’t be getting the praise they do (Duncan Keith over the last two years). That’s what we’re going to do for this little exercise, because it’s only fair, and on the off chance that if Pierre McGuire ever reads this his stupid bald head might simply evaporate from his meek and mealy body.

Earlier this week, Sean Tierney (@ChartingHockey) posted a projection model, which you can play around with yourself (phrasing). The model uses WAR (wins above replacement) data from Evolving Wild (@EvolvingWild) and prospect data from Manny Perry (@mannyelk). In short, the model tries to predict a team’s full-season WAR based on different line, pairing, and goalie combinations. It also tries to predict how many points teams might get in the standings based on those lineups.

You bet your ass I played around with shit.

There are countless ways to guess at how the lineup for Beto O’Colliton will shake out. So I compared three potential lineups for the Hawks. I used Scott Powers’s most recent projections for the first one. I used my own projections for the second. And I used what I think would be an ideal lineup, based on the Hawks’s current roster, for the third. As you’ll see, this model gives a ton of room for hope, even if some restrictions apply. I used all the default TOI% projections for forwards and D-men, and adjusted the goalie splits to 50/50 instead of 70/30.

The Powers Projection

For this projection, I used Scott Powers’s most recent predictions for how the lines would shake out. He’s in the know, he’s trustworthy, so this is as good a place to start as any.

The first thing you might notice is that the Hawks project to end up with about 99 points in the standings with the Powers projection. That’s pretty good. In fact, that’s playoff good for last year. Colorado, Vegas, Dallas, and Columbus all made the playoffs with fewer points last year. Winnipeg, Carolina, and St. Louis all made it with 99 points.

There are a few caveats to this projection (and all of them, really).

The first is that we assume that the Bird Boys split time in net perfectly evenly. We’re doing this because that’s the feeling we get about what will happen based on the reports we read and on Crow’s injury history of late. With a perfectly even split, the model prefers Robin Lehner to Crow, likely based on Crow’s relatively poor overall stats over the past two years caused by various head injuries and historically bad defense. Interestingly, the model projects that if Lehner were to get up to 70% of the starts, his ProjFSW climbs all the way up to 8.2. This makes sense, since other than his one dry heave in Buffalo in 2017–18, Lehner’s looked as good or better than Crow statistically over the last four years. In fact, they both have a .918 SV% on their career. So if the end is nigh for Crow, Lehner is a solid—if not better—replacement for him on the ice, even if he is a shithead.

The second assumption is that Dominik Kabulik produces like Dominik Kahun did. Kabulik wasn’t available in this model, so I used Kahun as a stand-in, since Kahun’s 37 points and 0.8 WAR seem entirely conceivable for Kabulik to hit, based on how well the Hawks scout European players.

The Powers projection shows that the Lehner signing could be the difference maker for this team (if we get the version from last year at least) and that if the Hawks are truly committed to playing Seabrook on the third pairing, it will only be a disaster, rather than an unmitigated disaster. As constructed by Powers, this team could make the playoffs if everything goes perfectly.

The Pullega Projection

In this version of reality, we roll with what I think the Hawks will do, based solely on instinct and what I’ve read. Again, pretend Kabulik gives you Kahun numbers coming up. With the recent trade of my sweet boy Henri Jokiharju, it’s much more likely that Brent Seabrook plays more minutes than he should on the second pairing, because more grind something something. That’s also why I think we’ll see Shaw start out on the top line with Toews and Saad, even though Shaw is a better fit on the third line. I’d be surprised if Colliton throws Kabulik on the top line, but then again. With this projected lineup, if everything goes perfectly, the Hawks project to get 95 points, which makes them a bubble team.

 The Ideal Projection

So as I was writing this, Bowman traded Jokiharju, which is an incredibly stupid move given the context of the Hawks’s situation (i.e., the defense is an atrocity and Harju was decent at worst last year. Get red-assed with me here.) This definitely means that the Seabrook playings will continue until morale improves. But just for the hell of it, I plugged in Adam Boqvist. With this lineup, the Hawks project to be a 104-point team, which likely puts them in the playoffs pretty easily.

But as with all ideals, everything has to break perfectly. Kirby Dach has to stay and be good, and there’s no indication that he’ll stay regardless. Shit, Harju got traded for William Nylander’s younger, dumber, lazier younger brother—in what might be Stan’s most meta “getting the band back together” moment ever (Nylander’s father played for the Hawks for a few years in the late 90s–early aughts)—after being the best D-man on the team (small sample sizes be damned) just the other day. And having Boqvist play definitely shuts Seabrook out, which isn’t going to happen, maybe not even after Seabrook’s contract expires. Finally, this model really likes Olli Maatta, which may goose the projections a bit, but that might be confirmation bias on my part. If Maatta’s as good as the projections say, there’s hope with this ideal.

Projections can be fun, but they require a lot of things to go perfectly. And outside the de Haan trade, assuming his shoulder heals nicely and quickly, it’d be really hard to describe this offseason as anything even close to perfect. But we’re trying to be positive, for a change if nothing else.

In all, the forwards project to be good, just like last year. The goaltending projects to be better because of Lehner falling into their laps. And the defense has shown improvement, but we’re still skeptical about a lot of things, particularly de Haan and Maatta’s health, Maatta’s mobility, and the ever-present living eclipse that is Brent Seabrook.

The projections are kind. We can hope the reality reflects it.

Hockey

Stan Bowman Is a Moron and Henri Jokiharju Is Better Off

By John Pullega 11212 0

In case you didn’t know, the Blackhawks are coming off a year in which they iced one of the worst defenses in the NHL. That isn’t hyperbole. Last year, they gave up 292 goals as a team, which is only better than the Senators, who gave up 302. If you are in the realm of the Senators in anything, you fucking suck. Their PK finished dead-ass last at 72.7%, after finishing 20th at 79.1% the year before. They continue to throw Brent Seabrook out there based solely on his contract. They had a chance at Bowen Byram, who will likely be ready to contribute THIS YEAR, and didn’t take it.

Instead, they traded a perfectly serviceable Dominik Kahun for Olli Maatta, who can’t stay healthy and skates like slugs fuck. They then turned around and got Calvin de Haan, who’s a nice second-pairing guy who might not even be ready for the first month due to a major shoulder surgery.

And then, dear reader, they traded Henri Jokiharju—one of the Hawks’s best D-men in limited time last year—for Alex Nylander, a 21-year-old forward whose shitty stats are only outdone by his stagnant-puddle-of-horse-piss work ethic.

If there were any doubt before, we can relieve you of it now: Stan Bowman sucks shit at finding defensemen, and he can’t do a goddamn thing right unless someone else hands it to him. That includes the Lehner signing, so if you want to bring that up, fuck you.

I’m usually not one for palace intrigue, but everything that swirled around Jokiharju last year made a stupid trade like this seem inevitable. I worried about it on a few podcasts recently: Harju was vocally upset when the Hawks sent him to Finland to play in World Juniors. Colliton constantly played him less and less when he got back, despite the fact that his season-long numbers were the best among all Hawks D-men at the time. Harju wasn’t happy when they sent him back down to the AHL when he got back for that very reason. He had every right to be.

It’s simply unfathomable to trade a 20-year-old defenseman who had a 54.3 CF% (5.4 CF% Rel) on a team that couldn’t corral an iron puck with a magnetized stick and not get any defensive help back. Harju may have needed some seasoning. He may have been light in the ass. But he was probably a Top 4 guy on this team, even WITH de Haan and Maatta coming in. He may not have been an in-his-prime Duncan Keith-esque savior, but he could have been very good. His limited stats showed that last year: When he was on the ice, the Hawks had the puck more. When he wasn’t, they didn’t. Guess fucking what? When your team sucks golf balls out of garden hoses on defense, anyone who can possess the puck is valuable. And now, we will have the joy of watching him turn into Buffalo’s #2 next to Rasmus Dahlin, because that’s absolutely going to happen.

This is a move out of fear. Colliton, Bowman, and McDonough are afraid of Brent Seabrook. They’re afraid to scratch him, they’re afraid to platoon him, they’re afraid to even broach the topic with him. They and everyone around them knew that fitting Jokiharju into the lineup would mean pushing him out, and they’re all too fucking cowardly to do that.

The thing that’s most frustrating about this is that for all the shit we gave Quenneville for not giving young guys a chance, he did the exact opposite with Harju. He played him consistently, let him make mistakes, and Harju looked overall fine doing it. The numbers flesh out a better performance than the eye test, but either way, Harju looked decent at worst.

Then along comes Beto Motherfucking O’Colliton, with his shitty man system and recent regurgitations about needing MORE GRIND to the game. I want to have it both ways, wherein Colliton has no say in anything (likely the case) and all of the say in this move, but I know that probably isn’t it. Still, watching Colliton bury Harju on the depth cart in favor of replacement-level guys like Carl Dahlstrom, Slater Koekkoek, Brent Seabrook, and the rest of the defensive Bring Down Bunch makes me wonder if this is Colliton’s first Big Boy Decision. And if it is, that motherfucker needs to put his Pampers back on, because this is shit.

So what did the Hawks get in return? One Alex Nylander, a 21-year-old left wing with 19 NHL games to his name. Right off the bat, he’s not a defenseman, so what the fuck are we even doing here?

Second, his AHL stats aren’t particularly impressive. In 165 games, he has 86 total points, 30 goals. That comes out to .52 points a game. From a guy who’s touted as a skilled shooter. That’s WORSE THAN HENRI JOKIHARJU, who had 17 points in 30 games AS A DEFENSEMAN, which is .56 points a game. I know that’s a stilted comparison, but holy fucking shit what is this trade?

Third, Nylander isn’t good on the defensive side of the puck, which is super great for a team whose possession was verifiable dog shit for most of the season. Where the fuck you gonna put him? On one of Anisimov’s wings? The fourth line is probably set with Caggiula–Carpenter–Kampf. Shaw’s likely gonna be on the top line because fuck you. You’re not breaking up DeBrincat–Strome–Kane. And we haven’t even accounted for Wedin, Kabulik, and Quenneville, all of whom portend to get a shot before Nylander. You gonna put Nylander on the top line with Toews instead of Saad? Holy shit, that’s exactly what they’re gonna do. Pray for Mojo.

Fourth—and you should be furious that we are at a fourth complaint about the return following a trade of the Hawks’s ONLY young, mobile, NHL-ready defenseman—the scuttlebutt is that Nylander has motivation issues, that he half asses it sometimes. So he’ll be a great fucking fit here with Duncan “Fuck You” Keith and Brent “Best Shape of His Life Because Spheres Are Shapes Fuck You” Seabrook, whom the brass is so scared of that they traded Henri Jokiharju for some joker who struggles to compete in the fucking AHL. Good. Very good. Tickets still available.

They’ll call this a swap of prospects, but it is anything but. Harju showed last year that right this instant, he’s at worst a third-pairing bum slayer. Nylander hasn’t shown no one nothing, other than he has an older and much more talented brother playing in New York (or Toronto, if you’re into the whole factual thing -ed.), which is apparently all it takes to become the return on the kind of player the Hawks need right now.

Stan Bowman doesn’t know what he wants. He doesn’t know what he’s doing. He’s afraid of his bloated, angry, shitty #7 D-man, and because he’s a coward, he kowtowed to him. The Hawks defense wasn’t good going into this year, and given two chances to improve it THIS YEAR with Byram and Jokiharju, Bowman completely fucking missed. And for what? A forward with motivation issues whom the Hawks have no need or use for while the core is still intact. What a good offseason for Stan Bowman, master negotiator.

Harju is better off, but that doesn’t do much for us here. You wanna argue that all of Harju, Boqvist, Beaudin, and Mitchell won’t make the team? Fine. But if that’s the argument, then the three that remain better be good, and fast. Stan and his Band seem to think that’s the case, but why should any of us believe that they have any idea what they’re doing with the blue line? What have any of them done to show that they have any fucking idea what they’re doing at all?

They have no plan, and their process is shit. Just cut my fucking head off and kick it into the lake.

Hockey

Hawks Make It Official, Sign Kirby Dach

By John Pullega 2375 0

The Hawks have been conspicuously quiet for the past few days, despite the facts that their blue line still sucks to high heaven and they never really filled the open spot in the top six (and if you think Andrew Shaw is that, please mail me whichever substances you’re using). So, the official signing of Kirby Dach is what we’ll hold onto for now, since he ought to be a top-six solution someday.

Dach signed a three-year entry-level deal ($925,000 per) today. The signing doesn’t mean too much new, other than the Hawks can now get their hands directly in the dirt of molding him into the Center of the Future™. Of course, Dach gave platitudes about how he wants to make the team out of camp and make management make tough decisions, which is something they’ve never been particularly good at (see Teravainen, Teuvo; Seabrook, Brent post-2015 Cup; Jokiharju, Henri), so tread lightly, Kirby.

As usual, the Hawks will have nine free games to look at Dach before he burns a year off his contract, if they choose. And unless he’s a complete mess throughout camp and the preseason, we’re hoping that the Hawks will play him over the first nine games. Remember that after the season opener against the Flyera in Czech Republic, eight of the nine games they play are at home, which is about as easy a landing as you can imagine getting, provided Beto O’Colliton plays the matchups (something he hasn’t proven to us just yet).

If he does turn out to be a mess, or if/when we start hearing about how versatile Artem Anisimov is on a wing and boy oh boy are we excited for THAT justification, Dach will go back to the WHL because of a weird rule wherein if you’re under 20 and not American, you can’t play in the AHL until either your junior season ends or you turn 20. Based on some of the signings/trades so far (Shaw, Carpenter, Kampf), you have to imagine Dach will need to blow it out of the water to even sniff the nine-game threshold, let alone playing beyond that.

We’re all sitting and hoping the see Dach in the first nine games of the season, but we aren’t holding our breath for it. The Hawks have played around the fringes the last couple of years, so it’ll be surprising if they stray from that conservativeness with Dach. If you see Artem Anisimov in another sweater before camp, things’ll get a little bit more interesting, but until then, it’s hard to see how Dach carves out any spot on the team this year, even if he does look good in camp.

They’ve got contracts and experience to play, after all.

Hockey

A Tale of Two Sh*tties – An All-Too-Early Offseason Assessment

By John Pullega 2632 0

Day 1 of UFA season is in the books. Stan Bowman has made some moves. The moves ranged from “shoring up the blue line” and “adding a top-six forward” to “depth signings” and “signing Robin Lehner.” The general attitude is that the Hawks are now better than they were last year. That’s probably true, but that’s a bar that’s so low you’d likely throw your back out stepping into the divot it makes. The ambitious attitude, such as the one taken by good writer Mark Lazerus, is that “Bowman quietly has retooled the Blackhawks into a playoff-caliber team since the Quenneville firing with his most impressive run as a GM.”

I would like to whole-heartedly disagree with the latter attitude.

Here’s what the Hawks lineup looks like currently, taking some guesses as to where guys will slot.

Saad–Toews–Shaw

DeBrincat–Strome–Kane

Kubalik–Carpenter–Sikura

Caggiula–Kampf–Wedin/Perlini

 

Keith–Gus

de Haan–Seabrook

Maatta–Murphy

 

Crow

Lehner

This is not a playoff team, finishing last season on a 100-point pace be damned.

Shitty Thing 1: The Blue Line Is Still Horrible

Credit StanBo for doing something to address the blue line if you must. But if you’re sitting around thinking that the Hawks’s blue line is even remotely close to acceptable, you might be Peter Chiarelli.

This defensive corps is simply terrible, and it’s going to prevent the Hawks from making the playoffs once again. There isn’t a single first pairing defenseman among them, let alone a #1 guy. And before you try to tell me that Duncan Keith can still be that guy, let me disabuse you of that notion. Let’s start with the nerd stats.

According to Manny Perry’s WAR model on Corsica, Duncan Keith has the absolute worst WAR (wins above replacement) among all qualified D-men over the past three years. He’s been worse than guys like Rasmus Ristolainen, Kevin Bieksa, Brooks Orpik, and Cody Ceci. Now, this does come with a caveat, as a huge chunk of that number comes from the utterly abysmal 2017–18 year, in which Keith had the 10,000-day goal-scoring drought and finished -29. But over each of the past three years, Keith has performed worse than a replacement-level player. Even looking at just Blackhawks from last year, only Gustav Forsling had a worse WAR rating, and he categorically sucks.

When you look at Micah Blake McCurdy’s models, we can see some pretty bad shit when Keith is stuck in his own end, which was par for the course for all Hawks last year.

That graph on the left shows shots-against distributions when Keith is on the ice. The one on the right shows without Keith on the ice. Both have huge red blobs right in the high-danger area regardless. One positive to take from this is that when Keith is on the ice, opponents tend to attack his partner (i.e., Seabrook and Gustafsson), as Keith typically lines up on the left, but not so much as to justify Keith’s performance.

The bigger issue is what it looks like with Keith on the PK.

The one on the left is with Keith; on the right, without. You can see what an unmitigated disaster it was with Keith–Seabrook out there.

And even if nerd stats aren’t your thing, when you watch Keith, the twitch speed just isn’t there anymore, and that’s when Keith can be bothered to give a shit out there. You may remember this turnover, and though one turnover does not a year make, this is the kind of shit we’re talking about when we wonder whether Keith is fully engaged.

Keith will get his statue, his number retired, and all the accolades he deserves. But he is simply not that guy anymore. The sooner everyone admits that, the better.

If Keith isn’t even a top-pairing guy, who is? Gus scored 60 points, but he’s a complete train wreck in his own zone. Murphy isn’t that guy despite being the steadiest of all Hawks D-men, especially as a 6’5” centerfielder with a back surgery under his belt. I’m done talking about Seabrook.

Maatta and de Haan are not top guys, either. Maatta is slow and consistently hurt, having only finished an entire 82-game season once. If you want to buy into the idea that he’s a shot blocker, he’s really not. He blocked 116 shots last year, which would have had him tied at 67th overall with Zach Bogosian, Adam Pelech, and Nick Seeler.

If you’re looking at de Haan as an answer, you better hope his shoulder holds up, because he might not even be available for the first month. Plus, de Haan likely tops out as a second-pairing guy. The de Haan move isn’t bad at all, but if de Haan is your best D-man (and he might be), your blue line fucking sucks.

And this doesn’t even touch the Harju fiasco, which is its own problem altogether.

Shitty Thing 2: The Forwards Aren’t Much Better Than Last Year

I get wanting to keep the powder dry for DeBrincat. You can’t let him get away. But after hardly doing the bare minimum on the blue line, what the Hawks did with their forward corps looks like a lot of standing still. You can live with that if you’re adding a Bowen Byram or Jacob Trouba or P.K. Subban on the blue line. But when the answer to a historically bad blue line is Maatta and an injured de Haan, you’ll pardon me for not being over the moon about Andrew Shaw.

Shaw might be fine, but he’s a glorified third liner. And that’s if he can stay on the ice. Both his health and discipline have been problems since he first left Chicago. If he’s taking the kinds of dumb penalties we’re accustomed to, then you better hope de Haan and Maatta are up to the PK task, and that’s not a bet I’m willing to make. I also don’t buy that Shaw’s 47 points in 63 games is the new norm for him. And it’s going to be a real gut punch if Kahun builds on last year even a little bit, because it’ll likely make the Shaw acquisition an unnecessarily expensive lateral move.

If the idea is to outscore defensive problems, what’s new on this team that makes anyone think they can do it? You’re going to need three 100+-point scorers to outscore the defensive woes, and the Hawks have maybe two in Kane and DeBrincat in their best years. Nothing’s indicated that Dach is going to be ready, and even if he is, it’s farcical to think he can contribute at an outscore-the-defensive-woes level this year. Although we liked what we saw, we aren’t sure what we have in Strome. Toews tops out at 80 points, and that’s if he neglects the defensive side. Brandon Saad will put up a respectable 50 points and good possession numbers, but he won’t ever be the game breaker the Hawks need.

Are you relying on Kubalik to make that scoring up? Or Sikura to find it? Or are you hoping that Carpenter and Kampf churn out Selke-contending seasons? The forwards are mostly fine, but I don’t see much of anything that makes me think it’ll be better (or even as good) as last year. And though the free agent pool wasn’t deep, you wonder what someone like Joonas Donskoi might have done here.

If the Hawks came out and said, “This is a transition year, be patient,” this offseason thus far would make sense. They’ve made a bunch of fringe moves to make the team a bit more watchable. But unless Stan’s got a monumental trade up his sleeve—one that doesn’t involve GRIND and DA FIRE AND DA PASHUN as Jeremy Colliton has reportedly said he wants more of (extreme jerking off motion)—it’s hard to determine what they’re doing here.

But that would imply a plan, dear reader. And we know StanBo has absolutely no fucking plan whatsoever.

Everything Else

Stan’s Off to Market – Free Agent Shopping List: Corey Perry, Toilet Baby

By John Pullega 1766 0

Do you remember the time Stan Bowman signed Brandon Manning and I completely lost my goddamn ass several times about it? Well if you liked that, you’re going to love watching me pull my entrails out of my eye sockets when they sign one of the biggest, dumbest, most useless pieces of shit on ice in Corey Perry.

Just look at what the always wonderful Scott Powers wrote recently:

The Athletic’s Pierre LeBrun reported Tuesday the Blackhawks’ offseason objective now that they’ve signed two defensemen is to find a forward or two who could help on faceoffs and the penalty kill. He also reported they have not contacted Lee’s camp and were likely aligning their cap space to pay for next offseason’s deals. LeBrun did mention Corey Perry as a possibility still. –Scott Powers, The Athletic, 06-26-19

Putting aside the hilarious fact that this implies that StanBo thinks Maatta and de Haan solve the blue line problems (they don’t), that Corey Perry is even a possibility is dumbfounding. So great, now we have to dive into this fucking toilet.

Physical Stats

Height: Taller than shit should be allowed to stack; Weight: As in, “Wait! Don’t sign Corey Perry!”

Age: 34; Shot: None

On-Ice Stats (2018–19)

Team: Ducks Position: Horse’s Ass

WHO GP, FUCKING G, CARES A, AT P, ALL PIM

Corey CF%, Perry xGF%, Sucks oZS%

Why the Hawks Should Sign Him

The Hawks should sign Corey Perry if they are looking for an excuse to fire Stan Bowman immediately.

Why the Hawks Shouldn’t Sign Him

Holy shit, where do you start? Corey Perry is a 34-year-old pylon who can’t skate, can’t score, and can’t contribute in any meaningful way. They already have Brent Seabrook doing that, but at least with Seabrook, there’s the veneer of leadership and memory of three Cups that we like to think about as we await the heat death of the universe that is the end of his contract.

Perry does literally nothing anymore. Last year, he played 31 games, scored six goals, and had 10 points overall. His 47 CF% was not only bad in a vacuum but also bad relative to his team (-2.1 CF% Rel), which was the fifth-worst possession team in the NHL last year. As mentioned in our Pavelski preview, the Hawks weren’t particularly good in possession or transition last year, and Corey Perry will only make them worse.

If you think that’s bad, check this out:

Games Played CF% CF% Rel oZS%
Ryan Kesler (C) 60 44.3 -5.1 37.7
Brian Gibbons (C) 44 44.7 -3.4 53.8
Cam Fowler (D) 59 45.1 -2.6 53.0
Corey Perry (Asshole) 31 47.0 -2.1 55.2

This is the list of guys who played at least 31 games and had worse possession rates than Perry on the Ducks. Kesler’s sort of makes sense, given his evaporated hip and hilariously low offensive zone start rate. If the Hawks signed someone like Brian Gibbons, you’d likely ask, “Who?” or “Why?” And Cam Fowler can’t be bothered to give a shit. On top of everything, Perry got hammock shifts and still sucked out loud in possession. That’s some good company to be in if you want to make a run at the #1 pick.

There is no conceivable situation in which Corey Perry fits. And even if there were, Perry’s held together by a combination of tape, spit, and shit. And let’s just pretend that the Hawks manage to make the playoffs this year. Are you ready to ride the Micheal Haley Experience, wherein a shitty, no-good, non-contributor finds himself on the ice in meaningful situations? Ask Sharks fans how that fucking worked out.

Perry doesn’t even fit the definition of the type of forward StanBo said he was looking for! Holy shit! Throughout his 14-year career, Perry has taken exactly 263 faceoffs and won 75 of them. That’s a 29% win percentage. Over the past two years, Perry has averaged 1.5 seconds on the penalty kill. That’s right: One point fucking five seconds. So if the Hawks are looking for faceoff and/or PK specialists, Corey Perry is not the motherfucker you’re looking for.

You wanna talk about how he won the Hart and Richard in 2011? Fuck you, it’s 2019. You wanna talk about how he’s a four-time All Star? Fuck you, I don’t care, the last time he made the All Star Team John Scott was on it. You wanna talk about how he’d come cheap and only for a year? Fucking sign Matt McClure if that’s the logic. He plays beer league. He’s tall. He can contribute at a similar rate as 2019 Perry. We did this with Sharp, Ladd, Oduya, and others, but at least with those guys, there were warm feelings to sort of mask the poor performances. Not so with Perry, who is a relentless and useless prick.

Verdict

No. Perry has all the appeal of a puddle of sundried sperm. If Bowman signs him, he should be fired out of a cannon into the sun and stripped of all his banners and rings. If you ever wondered how Bowman could cock up a free agent signing worse than Brandon Motherfucking Manning, I present to you Corey Perry, Toilet Baby.