Everything Else

High On The Hog: Down A Pair

By Jon Fromi 1710 0

The Rockford IceHogs headed to Texas this weekend looking to take at least a game at the HEB Center to open the Western Conference Final with the Stars. That didn’t happen.

The first two games were rife with opportunity. However, Rockford dropped Game 1 on Friday and Game 2 Sunday. Texas leads the series 2-0 as the action now shifts to Winnebago County for the next three games.

The BMO could be the difference maker for the IceHogs, though Texas earned their advantage with some hard work around the net. Greasy goals did the trick in a 4-2 Stars win Friday night. A put back in overtime made Texas 3-2 winners Sunday.

 

Game 1

Friday, May 18-Texas 4, Rockford 2

Game 1 of the Western Conference Final did not turn out the way the Hogs wanted. Rockford was outworked in front of the net, dropping its first postseason game.

Texas was active around the net early. After Dillon Heatherington caught a post on a shot attempt, the Stars swarmed the crease of Hogs goalie Collin Delia. Curtis McKenzie knocked in a loose puck 4:22 into the contest to give the Stars a 1-0 advantage.

The Hogs responded midway through the first period on the power play. Carl Dahlstrom took a page from fellow blueliner Cody Franson’s book to tie the game. As opposed to Franson’s happy place, the left dot, Dahlstrom sent his left-handed shot from the right dot, one-timing Chris DiDomenico’s pass into the Stars cage at the 11:19 mark.

The Texas response was quick. Roope Hintz, who had gained separation from Rockford defenseman Gustav Forsling, took a stretch pass from Denis Gurianov and entered the IceHogs zone on a breakaway. Hintz was able to five-hole Delia and the Stars led 2-1 at 12:37 of the first. Texas took that lead into the locker room.

DiDomenico evened the score for Rockford early in the second stanza. Darren Raddysh fired toward the Texas net from just inside of the Stars blueline. Lance Bouma got a stick on the puck in front of the net, sending it over to DiDomenico at the bottom of the left circle. The attempt beat Texas goalie Mike McKenna and nestled into the ropes at 4:35 to make it a 2-2 game.

The Stars regained the lead at the tail end of a power play a few minutes later. Remi Elie finished off the scoring play by knocking another loose puck in behind Delia 8:47 into the second. The IceHogs kept the pressure on the Texas defense but couldn’t solve McKenna and entered the second intermission on the short end of the scoreboard for the first time this postseason.

Rockford gave up a key goal 7:18 into the final frame after a Sheldon Dries pass attempt was broken up in the slot by Viktor Svedberg. The loose puck came back out to Dries at the left dot. The rookie forward settled the puck and backhanded a shot toward goal. The attempt got the best of Delia, who appeared to have an obstructed view courtesy of Stars forward Jason Dickinson. The puck got through on the far side of Delia’s net to make the score 4-2 Stars.

That was too much for Rockford, who mustered only five shots in the final 20 minutes after sending 28 McKenna’s way in the first two periods. The Stars goalie stopped 31 of 33 shots on the night.

Lines (Starters in italics)

John Hayden-Tyler Sikura-Andreas Martinsen (A)

Chris DiDomenico-David Kampf-Lance Bouma

William Pelletier-Tanner Kero-Anthony Louis

Matthew Highmore-Victor Ejdsell-Luke Johnson

Cody Franson (A)-Viktor Svedberg (A)

Adam Clendening-Carl Dahlstrom

Gustav Frosling-Darren Raddysh

Collin Delia

Power Play (1-4)

DiDomenico-Johnson-Sikura-Franson-Clendening

Highmore-Ejdsell-Louis-Bouma-Dahlstrom (Clendening was in for Louis when Dahlstrom scored)

Penalty Kill (Stars were 1-4)

Kampf-Bouma-Franson-Svedberg

Kero-Pelletier-Raddysh-Forsling

Johnson-Martinsen-Clendening-Dahlstrom

 

Game 2

Sunday, May 20-Texas 3, Rockford 2 (OT)

Too much time in the box did in the piglets in Game 2. Collin Delia stopped 34 shots but it wasn’t enough to keep Texas from going up 2-0 in the Western Conference Final.

Rockford got on the board at 6:09 of the opening period. Andreas Martinsen got the scoring play started when he won control of the puck behind the Stars net. He sent it out to Adam Clendening at the right point, who then got it back to Martinsen at the right dot.

John Hayden was in front of the net waiting for a centering pass…and got it. Whiffing on his initial attempt, Hayden slid home the lamp-lighter under Texas goalie Mike McKenna for a 1-0 Hogs advantage.

Texas scored the next two goals in the first half of the second period. Jason Dickinson struck from the right dot after getting a cross-ice pass from Matt Mangene at the 2:45 mark. The Stars took a 2-1 lead after a shot from Brent Regner pinballed off the stick of Luke Johnson, the ice surface and the right post before settling into the net for a power play goal at 8:15.

The power play allowed Rockford to even the score less than two minutes later. After a 5-on-3 chance ended, Cody Franson threaded a circle-to-circle pass to Chris DiDomenico. Streaking to the far side of the right circle, DiDomenico sniped the equalizer past McKenna at 11:09 to make it a 2-2 game.

Despite the Stars dominating the third period, Hogs goalie Collin Delia kept his team in contention, anchoring a Rockford penalty kill unit that negated four Texas chances. The IceHogs were out shot 12-4 but took the game into overtime with a chance to steal Game 2.

Alas, it wasn’t to be.

Rockford let a huge opportunity to end the game slip away when Victor Ejdsell started a 2-on-1 rush with DiDomenico five minutes into the extra session. Ejdsell tried to make a late pass which was broken up by McKenna’s stick, ending the threat.

Curtis McKenzie was tripped by Gustav Forsling 10:08 into overtime, leading to the game-winner. McKenzie did the honors on the subsequent power play, knocking in a rebound of a Brian Flynn shot to end the contest.

Lines (Starters in italics)

Matthew Highmore-Victor Ejdsell-Luke Johnson

John Hayden-Tyler Sikura-Andreas Martinsen (A)

Chris DiDomenico-David Kampf-Lance Bouma

William Pelletier-Tanner Kero-Anthony Louis

Adam Clendening-Carl Dahlstrom

Cody Franson (A)-Viktor Svedberg (A)

Gustav Frosling-Darren Raddysh

Collin Delia

Power Play (1-5)

DiDomenico-Johnson-Sikura-Franson-Clendening

Highmore-Ejdsell-Louis-Bouma-Dahlstrom

Penalty Kill (Stars were 2-7)

Kampf-Bouma-Franson-Svedberg

Kero-Pelletier-Raddysh-Forsling

Johnson-Martinsen-Clendening-Dahlstrom

 

Back To The BMO

Game 3 will be at the BMO Harris Bank Center on Tuesday night. Game 4 is set for Thursday with Game 5 the following night provided the Hogs pick up a win in this series.

Follow me on twitter @JonFromi for thoughts on Rockford’s postseason run.

Everything Else

Well Pilgrim, Not Until You Eat The Peanuts Outta My…- FFUD’s Player Reviews: Anthony Duclair and Dylan Sikura or I Want You To Show Me

By Adam Hess 2002 0

Anthony Duclair’s career thus far has a slight “Over Promise, Under Deliver” to it. He was considered a pretty good prospect before got to the NHL, one with high offensive upside because of his speed and shot. And while he does still flash that speed and shot occasionally, he’s only scored 37 goals in 213 NHL games thus far, and 2o of those goals game in 2015-16. Let’s take a look at his most recent campaign.

Anthony Duclair

Total – 56 games, 11 goals, 12 assists, 23 points, -5, 16 PIM

With Hawks – 23 games, 2 goals, 6 assists, 8 points, Even, 6 PIM

50.51 CF%, 1.99 CF% rel, 45.97 xGF%, 0.42 xGF% rel, 53.12 ZSR

Duclair wasn’t exactly over-the-top impressive this season, in general nor when he came to Chicago in exchange for drunk trespasser Richard Panik, but he was certainly not bad. His speed is evident the moment you lay eyes on him on the ice, and he puts it to work well at both ends of the ice. He’s got a decent frame for being for 5’11”, 191 lbs, so he’s able to cause some issues with that speed and his body in transition offensively, as well as defensively on the forecheck and backcheck. One of the podcast guys mentioned a while back that he has some Hossa-esque qualities to his defensive style, and at times that 91 on his jersey might make you think it’s Hossa’s 81.

While Duclair hasn’t exactly lit up score sheets so far in his NHL career, it doesn’t take too much investigating to fine out why – he doesn’t shoot enough. In his 56 appearances last year, Duclair only got 97 shots on goal total. He shot 11.3% for the season, not far off his career mark of 12.5%, which is a more than acceptable conversion rate. But it still doesn’t tell the whole story, as that number is buoyed a bit by his 19% rate in 2015-16, his only full season so far and also the one in which he accounted for more than half of his career goals. He followed that up with a tough 2016-17 in which he scored just 5 goals on 6.6% shooting. And even this past year, he shot 13.2% in his 33 games in the desert and just 6.9% (nice) in his 23 games with the Hawks. All of that suggests that we still don’t know what kind of shooter Duclair is, but the only way to really figure that out is going to be him getting more pucks to the net.

Given the positive qualities he possesses, and the fact that he is still just 22 years old, I still think it’s reasonable to believe there is some high-ceiling upside left for Duclair to tap into, but with each passing day the likelihood of him reaching that ceiling shrinks. If he can somehow have a breakout year next year, you might have a 55-point player on your hands. But that’s if you wanna be really optimistic about his climbing the ladder to that ceiling. More likely, you have a 35-45 point third liner on your hands who can contribute defensively, which is perfectly fine.

Dylan Sikura

College – 35 games, 22 goals, 32 assists, 54 points, +18, 22 PIM

NHL – 5 games, 0 goals, 3 assists, 3 points, +2, 0 PIM

NHL – 42.34 CF%, -4.81 CF% rel, 49.32 xGF%, 7.07 xGF% rel, 64.29 ZSR

Just about any NHL production you get from Dylan Sikura is a net positive, because it’s extremely rare that 6th round draft picks become NHL players. Sikura developed into one of the best college hockey players over the past few years, and he certainly got the Hawks brass excited about him, enough so that they signed his brother to an NHL deal to butter him up and make sure he signed at the conclusion of his college season. We call that the reverse Hayes.

Sikura looked fine when he got to the NHL, I guess. I am not sure how much you can read into five appearances in a lost season on a team made up of a lot of patchwork. His offensive ability was evident in college, and he flashed some of hit when got to Chicago, so we know it’s there. The question is whether or not that will come to mean anything, because we have seen plenty of good college performers become nothing NHL players in the past. I think Sikura can stick, but he probably projects similarly to Duclair – if it all clicks, you maybe have a second liner who will give you 50 points or more, but more than likely you’re looking at a third liner who can create some mismatches and get you 40ish points a year. Next year will be the true barometer for him.

Everything Else

Night Songs – Round 3 Night 8: We’re Not Beyond This?

By Sam Fels 1654 0

You don’t have to analyze last night’s Bolts-Caps game very hard. Andrei Vasilevskiy did to the Caps what Braden Hotlby has done on a few nights this spring, and the Caps–perhaps more predictably than we guessed just four nights ago–handed back their advantage so dominantly attained in Tampa. The Capitals didn’t do anything wrong, and watch in Game 5 how every time Dan Girardi is on the ice which side the Caps choose to try and enter on or dump the puck behind. You won’t be surprised.

So let’s bitch about coverage some more, because they make it so easy. In the 2nd intermission, while they were doing the highlights from the first 40 minutes, Keith Jones and Mike Milbury wanted to highlight Alex Ovechkin. And they wanted to remark upon how locked in they thought he was. And what evidence did they use?

The look on his face in warm-ups.

Actually, that deserves a little more accent: THE LOOK ON HIS FACE IN WARM-UPS.

After learning what Ovie eats before every home game, I’m not convinced the look on his face isn’t just a reaction to his lower intestine exploding, but let’s leave that discussion for another time. Jones and Milbury basically treated Ovechkin like a horse in the fucking paddock. “Ooooh, I like his gait! I’m laying a hundo on that one!”

Perhaps it’s isn’t totally fair to single out hockey doofus Statler and Waldorf for this kind of thing. How many years did we get announcers and analysts reacting to the look on Kobe Bryant’s face? Which Kobe most certainly didn’t rehearse for hours and days leading up to the playoffs to make sure people would notice and then know HOW MUCH IT MEANT TO HIM. I’ll give Ovie credit and say he doesn’t practice his PLAYOFF WARM-UP FACE, because that would be galactically stupid and Ovie is kind of weird-looking as it is anyway.

But this has to be one of the stupidest pieces of analysis from this crew, and yes I recognize the enormity of that statement. Jones and Milbury especially are responsible for the whole “Ovie is a playoff flop narrative” because it either garners attention, they’re too stupid to see what else what wrong for the Caps, or both. Just because Ovie has gotten a few more pucks to go in this spring doesn’t mean he was a sloth in previous springs. He’s just gotten more help this time around, namely Braden Holtby’s .925 SV% and Sergei Bobrovsky’s excellent impression of the Bernie Lean in net.

What does Ovie usually do in warm-ups? Have a smoke and generally look like he’s soaked in ennui? The dude always looks like my dog when I grab the leash, such is his excitement about just about everything. Oh but this time he’s locked in because NBCSN happened to get a good angle of him?

We could use warm-ups as a case-study if Alex…oh I don’t know, actually tried to eat the plexi-glass or kept viciously head-butting the crossbar. This was just an expression, and this is the kind of thing that speaks to color commentators who don’t know anything beyond “PASSIONGRITHEARTFAARRRRRRT.” If you asked either of these dinguses, and I actually have some patience for Keith Jones at times, what Ovie might be doing to open himself up more for better and more chances than he has in the past, they couldn’t tell you. This is the same team that uses one example of Ovie backchecking to indict his entire career, of course.

I shouldn’t be surprised. This is a spring where Pierre McGuire has rushed for the chance to show you Ryan Callahan highlights while Nikita Kucherov is busy nearly tearing the ears off any goalie that happens to have the misfortune of getting in his way on the power play. The Lightning scored one of the prettier collection of goals in a game last night, but let’s get more shots of Cedric Pacquette grappling with Local Oaf, because that has a huge bearing on the game. As mentioned above, why not point out that the Caps enter the offensive zone on Girardi’s side EVERY FUCKING TIME?! Oh, because that would go agains the “warrior” narrative about Girardi that Pierre has been pushing for five years at least even though Girardi is turning odd colors in the sun at this point.

I know, shouting at the rain again. We’ll never have hockey analysis that has moved beyond phrenology. Still, this one was particularly special.

Everything Else

Night Songs – Round 3 Night 7: Maybe There’s Just No Fighting It

By Sam Fels 1773 0

As I sat last night trying to figure out what I’d say about Game 3 between the Jets and Knights, it dawned on me that pretty much all of it doesn’t matter. I could sit here and talk about the ridiculous pace the Knights played that thing at last night. And I would say there’s no way that can be sustainable, but that’s kind of been their thing all season. Or I could talk about how the Jets slower d-men…which is basically all of them, kept insisting on taking more time with the puck than they were ever going to get. When the Knights are the opponents, you either gotta skate like your ass hair has been lit on fire or move the puck as soon as you get to it. It feels like the best way to play the Knights when they’re in this mood is maybe to not even pass in your own zone. Just get the puck and fire it around the boards and past their forwards and basically do what they do to you. You can also try and pick your way out, which is what the Hawks did in their prime, but that takes such a level of intricacy and precision I don’t know that any team is capable of it. Especially with the not-quite-that-fast blue line of the Jets. What I do know is that the Jets didn’t have time to contemplate Proust on every retrieval like they were attempting to take last night.

Or I thought I could write about how the Jets eventually did adjust, and slowly took over the 2nd and especially the 3rd. And maybe the Knights punched themselves out in the first half of the game, and maybe that will be a problem going forward.

And then I realized that almost none of it matters.

In a normal world, in a normal playoff game, the Jets probably score three goals in the 3rd period. Maybe six. Even when adjusted for score, the Jets had 13 scoring chances in the 3rd alone last night, which is a stupid number (according to Natural Stat Trick). But there’s Marc-Andre Fleury, and it just fails to be anything. Nothing matters, because he’s playing at Tim Thomas ’11 levels. What do you do?

Look at this shit.

There’s no logic to this. Sometimes he’s not even in good position and can just fling himself everywhere like he’s John Fucking McClane and it works. On that first highlight Scheifele should have scored twice. When he didn’t they should have just canceled the rest of the game. Maybe series.

I don’t want to claim there’s a fix, because if there is it’s on a cosmic level instead of a league level. Everything goes in for the Knights on some nights (UGH), and Fleury then does that. And then we’re forced to read a bunch of “Does Pittsburgh Regret…?” articles, even though the Penguins have/had a younger, cheaper, better goalie the past two years. You now who predicted Fleury doing this? No. One. He wouldn’t have even told you he could do this. This is Arc Of The Covenant shit.

Where this series is, the Jets should still feel pretty good. They just have to get one win in Nevada, and another effort with the last half of Game 3 probably sees them get one. I mean it normally would. But this isn’t normal.

But hey, we got another highlight of Dustin Byfuglien dragging two guys off a pile, which he assuredly isn’t doing for the attention it generates or anything, and certainly doesn’t distract cretin hockey followers from the fact that every time he was on the ice last night the Knights got an odd-man rush the other way. In just the first period, McClure texted me, “I’ve counted three times he’s been forechecking below the goal line.” When and if the Knights win this series, I assure you Byfuglien will be on the ice for the killer goal.

Which is fine, because Jacob Trouba has been even worse. And that’s the real problem for the Jets, is they don’t have a d-man who can consistently stand up to this pressure. Maurice will have to figure something out.

Everything Else

Well Pilgrim, Not Until You Eat The Peanuts Outta My…-FFUD’s Player Reviews: Patrick Kane or The Barometer?

By Sam Fels 1954 0

It was kind of a weird season for Patrick Kane. And not all of it was self-inflicted. But perhaps no player symbolizes what went wrong for the Hawks, and their reaction to it, better than him. Let’s deep dive.

Patrick Kane

27 goals, 49 assists, 76 points, -20, 32 PIM

51.6 CF%, -1.1 CF% Rel, 48.0 xGF%, -2.36 xGF% rel

There are a couple thing to know about Kane before you get into how this season fit. While his previous two MVP-level seasons are the ones that get the most attention, Kane had actually been a point-per-game player for five straight seasons before this one. One was the season-in-a-can of 2013, and the next two were ended prematurely due to injury where he only played 69 and 61 games. So he could have had eye-popping numbers in five seasons instead of the two he did simply due to different fates. So to complain he’d fallen off that a bit this seasons would seem the most petty of tactics, but it’s the standard he set.

Second, it’s important to note that Kane is one of those players that the metrics don’t mean a ton to. He’s never been a great possession player, and has always lagged behind the team rates for the past six years. In fact, his relative marks above are the best he’s had in the past four seasons. Some of that is playing with exclusively offensive players like Panarin or basically glorified obelisks like Artem Anisimov or players needed heavy sheltering like Brad Richards or Michal Handzus (the horror…the horror…) or Andrew Shaw. The roster wonkiness has always seemed to affect Kane most or thereabouts, but it doesn’t matter because he’s going to score anyway.

So why the dip in points this year? Quite simply, luck and linemates. Kane’s personal SH% dropped to 9.5% this year from 11.6% last year and 16% the year before that. Even if 16% is the outlier leading to a 46-goals season we’re probably not going to see again, 9% is low enough below his career 12% mark that you know it’s crap luck. Even that career mark would have seen him score 34 goals this year instead of 27. The team’s overall shooting-percentage when Kane was on the ice dipped from 9.5 to 7.7. That might not sound like a lot but it’s a difference of 12 goals over the season at evens just for Kane’s time on the ice.

And we can boil it down to luck, mostly, because he was getting the same chances as he had the previous seasons. Kane actually had more attempts at evens per 60 minutes this year than he had in five seasons. Some of that could be a product of playing with the pass-happy Schmaltz. Kane got more shots on net than he had in five seasons as well. His individual expected goals was higher than it was the previous two seasons, though not as high as ’15 or ’14. Again, this is where we can’t measure if he somehow lost something off his shot or accuracy, but it’s a good sign he was getting the chances we’re accustomed to seeing.

It would be easy to point to the power play as a points-dipper (phrasing?), but Kane actually only had one less point on the power play than he did last year, though obviously nowhere near the 37 power play points he piled up in his Hart year. But this is where the discussion turns. Because most will tell you the Hawks power play struggles due to it standing around and waiting for Kane to do something. Our argument this  year is Kane is just as much of a problem. The puck dies when it gets to him. It’s isolation basketball, and there’s little temptation for anyone to do anything when that consistently happens. It’s not near the full explanation for why the power play in a constant state of self-fuckery, but it’s one. Going forward, whoever is running it has to get Kane to make decisions quicker and to move around more. The stick-handling at the circle for 10-15 seconds isn’t getting anyone anywhere except closer to the embrace of the reaper.

And this is where we get beyond the stats. There wasn’t anything Kane could do to save this season. A 110-point tour-de-force still lands this team well outside the playoff spots. And there were some nights, or at least periods, where it did seem Kane was trying to salvage everything himself, and drag this team to relevance.

But there were other nights, or shifts, where it was clear Kane couldn’t locate a fuck to give. On some level, you understand. As well-informed about hockey matters as he is, Kane almost assuredly knew this season was toast in January. And in his 12th year, you could understand if a game against Minnesota in February just doesn’t have the same ring as it did when the Hawks were good. Still, that’s not what he’s asked to do. There were lazy passes or changes, a lack of desire to backcheck, or trying shit simply to entertain himself. Cynically looking for his 500th assist when the Hawks were getting clubbed in Arizona was a particular highlight.

He’s not alone. Toews had his nights. So did Keith. When you’ve spent as long at the top as these guys have, finding the same charge when at the bottom is near impossible. They shouldn’t be given a pass but they also shouldn’t just be accepted either.

If the Hawks are going to be good again, they’ll need Kane back at his PPG+ form. And he probably will be with simple luck rebounding. But it would also help if he were there every night, and that can’t be dependent on if he thinks the rest of his team is at his level. Sure, accepting the problems and putting Top Cat on his wing for the 35 goals he could assuredly score with Kane wouldn’t be a bad idea either.

But also, whatever fatigue there is with Joel Quenneville has to be cleared by the team’s veterans. Our suspicions before have been that Kane and Toews have sort of tired of the coach’s voice, but with the Hartman trade it appeared that it was the kids who weren’t really responding. And yet…and yet…

Get to the 5:07 mark of this video, and while dabbling in body language and speech analysis is probably a really dumb thing to do, does this strike you as someone believing in the direction of everything? Something tells me there are interesting times ahead, and that doesn’t necessarily mean smooth.

Everything Else

Night Songs – Round 3 Day 6: Cheat Code

By Sam Fels 1486 0

Lightning 4 – Capitals 2 (Caps lead 2-1)

Well, if any team could blow winning two games on the road to start a series…

In reality, I’m not sure anything fundamentally changed about this one. Victor Hedman got his head out of his ass, which helps a ton. Andrei Vasilevskiy didn’t look like all his gear was covered in ants. The Lightning scored first, which makes a huge difference in these games usually. They got a multi-goal lead, which is an even bigger one given the environment.

Still, it came down to the Lightning getting two power play goals before the Caps scratched. And it was high comedy that the first four goals of this game all came on cross-ice one-timers that you would use in NHL ’95 or ’96 that quite simply couldn’t be stopped. Before that you had to use the breakaway move where you just skated post to post and the goalie never got over. Then there was one variation where if you faked forehand and went backhand or vice versa you always scored. But that’s another discussion for another time. Still, when you have snipers like Kucherov and Stamkos on either side, I’m sort of curious why the TB power play doesn’t clock in at over 30% for a season every season. I’m gonna go with apathy.

Much like when a catcher takes a foul tip to a bad spot, when Stamkos or the like are blasting one right by a goalie’s ear, if you look at him at just the right moment you can tell he’s questioning why he ever took this job in the first place. “Here I am trying to slide over to a shot I’m never going to see and the best case scenario is it hits me square in the face. Otherwise I’m just going to glide over to the corner looking like a doofus because no one thought to cover this guy. I should have taken that left at Albuquerque.”

Still, I’m not sure Jon Cooper and his various rings are getting this right. Once again, things happened when Sergachev was on the ice. Again, he got less than eight minutes of even-strength time. Stralman and McDonagh continue to get their heads beaten in, so I don’t know exactly what they’re hanging on to here. Trotz seems to recognize this, or Ovechkin has come for vengeance for all those Capitals-Rangers series (and we all want vengeance for those ever happening and being foisted upon us like it was an actual treat. Curse your heathen gods for that), because they were the exclusive prey for the Caps top line.

Anyway, it’s better to have a series than not, although maybe Cooper thinks because they got Sergachev for Drouin he has to treat him like Drouin too. They have two d-men who can skate themselves out of trouble agains the Caps smash-and-grab forecheck. He’s simply choosing to not play one of them so we can watch life toss an anvil at a drowning Stralman. This will matter soon.

 

Everything Else

Well Pilgrim, Not Until You Eat The Peanuts Outta My…-FFUD’s Player Reviews: David Kampf or All The Jokes We Couldn’t Make

By Sam Fels 1633 0

Ever since the Hawks pipeline started churning out actual players regularly a decade ago, call-ups have followed a pretty familiar pattern. Unless they were really touted prospects with pedigree (Saad, Teuvo, DeBrincat), for the most part they would come up, get a fair amount of games, and a lot of them would merit more affection that they should simply because we were all kinds of bored of all the guys who had been here for years. Some were actually useful like Andrew Shaw or…well, Andrew Shaw. Most fade into the background. David Kampf is one of the weird ones who kind of fits in the middle. He didn’t gain huge fanfare, and it feels like he’s in the background, but he might actually be useful.

David Kampf

46 games, 4 goals, 7 assists, 11 points, 12 PIM, -9

51.9 CF%, -0.09 CF% rel, 47.5 xGF%, -1.83 xGF% rel

There’s not too much point in getting too attached to fourth line centers. There’s only one Marcus Kruger in the world, and we saw how even that went last year. They’re middle relievers, or fourth wide receivers. If you don’t think you have one you can probably find one somewhere pretty easily.

That doesn’t mean Kampf was completely disposable. Defensively, he was actually pretty good when on the ice. He had the second-lowest corsi-against per 60 on the team among forwards (trailing only DeBrincat WHY THE FUCK WAS HE ON THE THIRD LINE MOST OF THE YE….sorry, sorry, tiger got out of the cage there). His xGA/60 only trailed Vinnie Smalls and Jurco among the forwards. And when talking about a fourth line player, the first thing you ask is that they keep it out of your net. Considering the goaltending the Hawks were getting, there wasn’t much Kampf could do about that but he did what he could.

The problem for Kampf might lie on the penalty kill. He was only one of six forwards to be used for more than 50 minutes while shorthanded, but he had the worst metrics of those in terms of attempts and chances against. We’ve never subscribed to the theory that penalty killing should only be done by third and fourth liners, but if you have ones that can’t they tend to be shuffled out for those who can. After all, you can probably find a tomato can who can give you 12 minutes at evens per night and nothing else anywhere. If Kampf is going to stick, that’s going to have to get better.

Outlook: When you look at him, you can’t help but think, “He’s fine, and if he’s the fourth line center at the start of the season I won’t die, but it’s also a spot you can probably improve upon.” If the Hawks are actually a real-ass team next year, Kampf feels like the type who would be doing the Rockford shuffle all year, getting you out of a stretch when injuries and fatigue pile up and providing a spark. It would help if he was lighting it up with the Hogs in their playoff run right now, but he doesn’t have a point in seven games. He’s young, he’s cheap, he’s fast, and those are all things not to be discounted. If Anisimov is traded he probably gets a center spot by default.

But you can’t help but think this is something the Hawks can probably do better in when the time comes. If that “better” is a step forward from Kampf himself, then that’s fine. But for an idea what good teams have at center on their bottom unit, the Jets have Lowry, the Preds have Jarnkrok (when their coach isn’t turning into Dr. Weird), at the moment even the Wild have Jordan Greenway. Do you think Kampf is in that class?

Everything Else

Night Songs – 3rd Round, Day 4: Wrong Plan B

By Sam Fels 1419 0

Knights 3 – Jets 1 (Tied 1-1)

In talking about Game 1 in this series, I wondered what the Knights Plan B would be. Perhaps the better route would have been wondering what Winnipeg’s would be.

This is the third time in a week or so that an opposition has dialed it back a bit in terms of pace and aggression, making their first priority to bottle up the Jets in the neutral zone. The Predators did it by trapping in Games 4 and 6 (though not in Game 7 and now they’re on the couch). The Knights didn’t adopt a full trap, but certainly made the forwards main aim to backcheck furiously and step up the defense ahead of their own line. Squeezing the space made it awfully difficult on the Jets. You may recognize this as something the Hawks based three Cup wins on.

What made it even more difficult is the Jets insistence to try and kamikaze their way through it, instead of just chipping pucks in beyond it and working hard enough to get it back. Because they can. They’re bigger and faster than the Knights’ blue line and they can cause turnovers that way.

But all night you saw Byfuglien, who was just as bad as he was good in Game 1, or Scheifele or Connor or Ehlers go hero-ball and try and dance their way through three or four checkers. Given the Rockets’ struggles, this was not a banner night for isolation play.

While we’ve remarked that Paul Maurice might have extricated himself from the “Moron” category of coaches in this league and at least could knock on the door of the other category (“Not A Moron”), he doesn’t seem to have any answer for when his opponent doesn’t do the exact same thing they did the last game. The Jets were an overturned turtle in those games against Nashville, and they didn’t look much better last night. Gerard Gallant may not outthink himself at home the way Peter Laviolette did, and would be content to just do this again in Games 3 and 4. What will Maurice’s answer be? It’s easier to play a simpler game on the road of course, and the Predators never asked them to in Nashville. And the Jets won three games there. Not hard to work out.

As we said then, it does reduce the margin for error and Marc-Andre Fleury did give up a softie that probably had the nerves jangling a bit. But that was his only mistake, and Jacob Trouba and Josh Morrissey gave it back minutes later (and they haven’t been good most of the last two rounds, admittedly). Do that for a first goal though and things change. We’ll see how they play it from here.

-A word on analysts. I watched yesterday’s game on the second TV, and hence muted, and it was way better than hearing Joe Michelleti spew whatever hockey-spam he’s got on offer. While I don’t want to always run for comparison’s to the NBA, I’m intrigued by how pretty much every analyst TNT trots out was recently connected to the game and names we know, even if Reggie Miller kind of sucks. Brent Barry, Grant Hill, Greg Anthony, Chris Webber, Candace Parker, Steve Smith, etc. They’re not all great but they at least have fresh voices and are more in tune with the game now.

What does NBCSN give us? McGuire, Michelleti, Jones, Roenick, Olczyk, Milbury. None of these guys have played or coached in years, though I suppose Roenick could claim to. The newer voices they have used, such as Brian Boucher, AJ Meleczko Mike Johnson have at least sounded fresh, if not torn the walls down with analysis. The next interesting thing Michelleti has to say will probably cause me to go into anaphylactic shock. Both physically and mentally Roenick’s jaw looks like it’s trying to swallow the rest of his head.

This is a complaint I seem to lodge once a month, and I know no one’s listening. But fuck, even baseball, perhaps the crustiest sport there is, has welcomed new voices into its prime broadcast booths and been rewarded with Alex Rodriguez and John Smotlz  and Jessica Mendoza and a few others. Hell, Fox was going to chuck Jay Cutler right into the booth, and everyone said he was going to be really good. Jason Whitten is going right from the field to perhaps the most famous chair in the sport, or once was at least.

Is it so much to ask?

Everything Else

Well Pilgrim, Not Until You Eat The Peanuts Outta My… – FFUD’s ’17-’18 Player Reviews – John Hayden or What Is This That Stands Before Me?

By John Pullega 1614 0

There’s a bit of a fuzziness to it, but John Hayden ended up playing more than half of the games on the schedule for the Blackhawks. He was here until January, got sent down to Rockford, then came back up in March. Do you remember much about what he did? Because I sure don’t.

John Hayden

47 GP, 4 Goals, 9 Assists, 13 Points, -4, 54 PIM

47.6 CF% (Evens), -6.4 CF% Rel (Evens), 48.97 SCF% (5v5), 45.06 xGF% (5v5), -5.5 xGF% Rel (5v5)

 44.8% oZ Start (Evens)

What We Said: He probably won’t be more than an answer to a trivia question in a few years (Who was the 20th Yale Bulldog to crack an NHL roster?).  He’s the Atlas Shrugged of hockey players: not nearly as great as his proponents say, an overhyped tome of theoretical muck whose pedigree rests mostly on his size and standing out among the mediocre.

What We Got: Going into the season, we asked, “Who is John Hayden?” Well, he’s not quite a scorer, and he’s not quite a fighter, but man. . . . So to answer the question, I don’t know.

The best answer I can come up with is probably no more than a bottom-six puck absorber. And really, that’s all Hayden will ever have to be on the Hawks. In the time he was up, he spent most of his time with other Blackhawks castoffs, Lance Bouma and Tommy Wingels. You’ll certainly take the 13 points he provided skating primarily with and against the dreck of the league.

The most surprising thing about his year was his zone-start ratio. When we previewed Hayden at the beginning of the season, I wondered whether Hayden was a “start in the offensive zone” kind of guy, and this year showed he wasn’t. He tended to fall more into what would have been a Marcus Kruger–line role. And all of his advanced stats reflect that: His Corsi and expected goals for percentages all reek of a guy who spends most of his time in the ass-end of the ice.

Hayden also played the role of tenured fighter, leading the team with four fights. I had always held out hope that with his improved skating, Hayden could be a sneaky scorer on the bottom half, but it looks like the Blackhawks expect him to be the guy who initiates fights for HOCKEY REASONS. Much like every Yale graduate ever, the idea of John Hayden being more than an exhausting waste of time and money always flatters to deceive.

Where We Go From Here: Assuming Hayden doesn’t get traded to a team looking for some dick-swinging grit (looking at you, Tom Dundon), he’ll likely do the same thing he did last year. He’ll putter around on the fourth line, have a few fights, then play a few shifts with Toews because he’s DA BIG BODY WIT A BIG HEART DEY NEED IN FRUNNA DA NET. We’ll see a few flashes of skill from him before he bares his red, overeducated ass, because the myth of the rough-edged hockey fighter scraping out a living despite the odds gives no quarter.

Ideally, we’ll see Hayden on the fourth line with guys like Kampf, Wingels, and Highmore. He’s a useful guy if you’re looking to build a line that acts as a big meat slab, which looks like the direction the Hawks are going to go with him, judging by his fancy stats and zone starts. He might even be able to find a home next to guys like Ejdsell and Sikura, and that might work out too. He’s got just enough skill to run with guys like them, and doing it on the bottom lines might open the Hawks up to some much needed depth scoring.

At the end of the day, John Hayden is like the Kevin Orie or Jorge Fabregas of the Blackhawks: Just good enough to stick around, but never much more than a hazy memory.

Everything Else

Night Songs – Conference Final Weekend Wrap: So That Happened

By Sam Fels 1710 0

One in a state of shock, one game went exactly as planned. It’s the NHL on NBC!

Capitals 2-0 Lightning

I guess this is what everyone else felt last year when watching the Preds roll over the Hawks from the outside. But I think that made more sense than this. At least Game 1 of that series was close. The Lightning haven’t even been in the same zip code as the Capitals. And I can’t believe I wrote that sentence.

I suppose if there’s one thing we can point to, it’s that the Lightning’s blue line was overhyped. But it mostly didn’t matter because their forwards were so good, and there was “God Mode” within Victor Hedman to cancel it out even further. You saw in ’15. So you know it’s there. Well, the Caps don’t seem to care, and have greatly exposed Stralman, Girardi, Coburn and even McDonagh–who’s a good defensive guy but has never been a mover and that’s getting wildly demonstrated. Meanwhile Hedman has been tentative and unnoticeable, which is just really weird. The only d-man who seems to be able to survive the Caps’ forecheck is Sergachev, mostly because he’s fearless and not having to see the best the Caps have to offer. Stralman and Girardi look like they just discovered there’s a bear in their breakfast nook.

It hasn’t helped that Cooper has coached this series with both hands around his neck instead of his usual postgame belt in the shower. His team look completely shell-shocked, and they seem to be playing right into the Caps hands by either not bypassing the forecheck as the Penguins did the past two years or having his forwards help out. Then when the Caps set up three at their own line every Bolt seems content to just charge headfirst into it and lose the puck and the whole thing starts over. And then they panic, and their defense goes charging everywhere in the offensive zone and they’re giving up an odd-man rush a minute.

If there’s one team that could surrender this momentum it’s the Caps. But man they would really have to like, shit themselves to a dysentery-like level. Because it’s one thing to disrupt and it’s another to cash in, and right now at Ovechkin and Kuzentsov and Eller and Beagle, they all can’t miss. It’s been astonishing.

Jets 1-0 Knights

This was more to form, though only one game. But in Game 1, the Knights saw what was always going to be their biggest problem. A team that can play their game, is willing to, and can do it with better talent. The thing with the Knights during the season is it’s hard to find a team in February and January that’s going to want to skate back as hard to catch them going forward. It’s easier to inspire players to bust it up the ice during the season than it is to inspire them to bust it back. Think the mid-2ooos Suns. Or why Tom Thibodeau’s teams want to murder him by Valentine’s Day.

Well, inspiration isn’t a problem in the conference final. The Jets smell it. So they can get back and negate the get-it-the-fuck-up-there ways of the Knights by getting the fuck back there. How many passes did they pick off on what Knights players thought were odd-man rushes only to find a backchecking forward closing it off? That’s how the Knights get you, and if they don’t have it they’re proper fucked.

I don’t know what to make of Byfuglien. Everyone knows I’m probably the polar opposite of his fan but he was marvelous in Game 1. Then again the Knights didn’t try and get him off his game which is so easily done and it was so fast it didn’t matter that he was rarely where he needed to be defensively and he was making so much happen at the other end. Maybe you just accept the show. Anyway, if the Jets get Game 2 tonight in any sort of similar fashion as Game 1 you can start penciling them in. I don’t know what Vegas’s Plan B could possibly be.