Hockey

You Ain’t Shane, You Ain’t Mook – ’19-’20 NHL Team Previews: New York Islanders

By Sam Fels 1843 0

There was no bigger surprise team than the Islanders last season, as Barry Trotz took a contract dispute from DC up the Acela and then proved he can turn just about anything into a useful team. But his boss, Nosferatu, blames free agency for the global warming he assuredly doesn’t believe in, and the Isles look like they’re just going to count on running it back again. Will it work? It’s hard to think a Trotz team will ever be bad, but catching lightning twice has eluded just about everyone in history. Let’s learn about the Islanders.

2018-2019

48-27-7  103 points (2nd in Metro)

Won 1st round over PIT, lost second round to Carolina

2.72 GF/G (22nd)  2.33 GA/G (1st)

47.8 CF% (26th)  51.2 xGF% (12th)

14.5 PP% (29th)  79.9 PK% (19th)

Goalies: The Islanders lost one half of their tandem that anchored this team last year, as Robin Lehner toddled off here in July. The Islanders are going to attempt to take the whispers of Trotz and Mitch Korn and apply them to Semyon Varlamov. Varlamov was very up and down in Colorado last season, eventually losing his job to Philip Grubauer. That was kind of his whole career in Denver, where he flashed Vezina form at times and then was one of Jack’s French girls at others. But overall, he’s got a career .915 SV%, and considering how all Trotz teams make it easier on goalies, it would be reasonable to expect some good numbers from him.

He’ll pair with Thomas Greiss, who flourished behind this team last year at .927. He and Lehner had high expected-save-percentages thanks to the ultra defensive system, but both exceeded that in actual save-percentages. Greiss has done this before, but hasn’t been able to back it up. He won’t be asked to carry the load here though, and again, goalies under Trotz rarely shit a chicken unless their hip falls off.

Defense: Again, the exact same crew you remember from last year, though this time with a full season from the promising Devon Toews. They’ll hope for another step from Ryan Pulock, as Nick Leddy really struggled for most of the year to push the play. Scott Mayfield and Adam Pelech are about as solid as you can ask for without doing much you’ll remember. Johnny Boychuck will pair with Leddy as he has for the past five seasons, but time seemed to catch up to him last year. As we cannot hammer enough, this defense gets a lot of support from the forwards, but was somewhat exposed by the speed and possession of the Hurricanes last year. Both Trotz and Lamoriello don’t want much to do with puck-moving d-men here, so they’re lucky in that they don’t have a prime one. Still, in a conference that requires you to get past Carolina or Toronto or Boston or Tampa, it probably takes more than obstinance to do so. Maybe Noah Dobson gets a look? That would be a real stretch.

Forwards: Stop us if you’ve heard this before, but it’s the exact same crew as last year. The only addition to it has been Derick Brassard, or whatever pod person is occupying his body now as he hasn’t been productive in the last three seasons at least. Which leaves Mathew Barzal and his missing T to carry the mail on the top line next to Anders Lee and Josh Bailey. Brock Nelson anchors the second line, and after that it’s a whole bunch of grunts and agriculture. Only one Islander forward managed more than 60 points last year (Barzal) and only three had 20 goals or more. And one of those was Casey Cizikas, who shot nearly 20%, and that’s not going to happen again. The Isles will hope to smother and bore their way to a playoff spot again.

Prediction: It’s not wise to go against a Trotz-led team, but the margins are so thin for this bunch. They limit good chances, even if they don’t limit attempts. There’s just so little scoring here, and if they don’t get water-tight defense, the percentages are going to go against them. Neither Varlamov or Greiss is really capable of taking a full starter’s load at this point, so if one falters the whole system might sink underneath them.

Luckily for the Isles, the division blows hardcore. The Caps and Pens are on the downsides of their cycles, with only the Canes looking like their pivoting up beyond the Isles. The Devils day may yet come, but not this season you wouldn’t think. And you can catch a lot of teams cold in January and February when they can’t locate the fucks to give to work hard enough to deal with a Trotz trap. Still looks short to me, but I said that last year too.

Hockey

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

By John Pullega 1939 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

You Ain’t Shane, You Ain’t Mook – ’19-’20 NHL Team Previews: New Jersey Devils

By Sam Fels 1941 0

Perhaps the biggest movers of the offseason, the Devils put themselves in a position to be paid attention to for basically the first time in their history. Even when they were winning Cups, we all pretended it didn’t happen or went about our day doing something else. Is it enough to make them a playoff team? Probably not. But it’s a world where the Devils are fast and interesting, which is the surest sign we’re all imminently doomed. Let’s hop to it.

2018-2019

31-41-10 72 points (8th in the Metro)

2.67 GF/G (25th)  3.30 GA/G (26th)

46.8 CF% (28th)  48.4 xGF% (19th)

17.7 PP% (21st)  84.3 PK% (4th)

Goalies: It would seem just at the precipice of watching his career dispatched off to the Phantom Zone, Cory Schneider might have played his way back into the starter’s role. He was brilliant after returning from yet another injury in February, where he went for a .921 SV% in 17 games. 17 games doesn’t make for a season, but it sure is a hell of a lot better than the utter disaster he had been for the previous two seasons.

If it’s not him the Devils have been hoping to turn things over to fiendishly named MacKenzie Blackwood, who put up a .918 in his rookie campaign. Not bad for a kid who was 21 when the season started. He’s clearly the goalie of the future, but for now the Devils are probably going to have the two split starts. At least in the season’s first half, until one of them takes it.

Defense: It used to be you couldn’t name any Devils d-man unless you wanted to make it clear to anyone around you had outlived your usefulness to society, if you’d ever had any to begin with. That’s not the case anymore, thanks to the guy attached to Lindsey Vonn. The Devils brought in PK Subban for essentially nothing, and he’ll juice a unit that tried to approach solid but was in desperate need of any dynamism. PK and Sam Vatanen will make for a hell of a power play if nothing else. Andy Greene is somehow still here, because nothing ever dies in New Jersey, it just gets left in a swamp. I’m supposed to say Damon Severson is dependable, except I’m fairly sure he’s just a conspiracy and doesn’t actually exist. Also a joke about Mirco Mueller‘s neck goes somewhere around here, though he was surprisingly effective from a third pairing (+3.22 relative xGF%).

Past Subban there isn’t much here, but he should improve it from the top. That is if he isn’t on the decline, which a lot of experts seem to think he is, because he’s not white. And now he’s motivated, and having a PK that’s determined to fuck the world is a weapon you want to have. The joker card here is if Ty Smith, the Devils best prospect before they took Jack Hughes makes the team or not. He dominated the WHL last year, and most think he can skip the AHL and head straight to the Devils. With Subban, Smith, and Vatanen, that’s a lot of get-up-and-go for a team that wants to play that way.

Forwards: Clearly, all eyes will be on Jack Hughes, who will step right into the #1 center role and hopefully can bat his eyelashes at Taylor Hall enough, and pass him the puck enough, to keep Hall in town past this season. With Nico Hischier being bumped down to the #2 center role, the Devils hope they are set down the middle for the next decade. They were also able to pick up the scraps from Vegas and their unnoticed cap idiocy for Nikita Gusev, whom the Knights had been pumping for a couple years but apparently sucks now that they traded him. If he slots in behind Hall the Devils might have a find here. The two Jespers–Bratt and Boqvist–will bring even more speed to a lineup that was already kind of dripping with it. The Devils have filled their lineup with nippy forwards you don’t necessarily know but are getting past people constantly. You know it because you’ve seen them torch the Hawks the past two seasons.

Prediction: Most seem to think the playoffs are going to be just out of reach for the Devils. It might be, but they’re going to get pretty damn close. Hughes is going to step right in and won’t need much of an adjustment period. They’re likely to get no worse than representative goaltending. And they’re in a division where more teams are heading the wrong way or are just confusing as all hell. Adding 23 points seems like a big ask, but it’s been done before. Of course, the drama over Hall could be a distraction, and if they’re not in the thick of it come February the Devils might decide to cash in on what they can with Hall instead of watching him head for the exit in July. Still, the top line is going to be must-see TV, Smith and PK on the blue line could be a blast. There’s a lot to like here, even if it might need another year to really come together.

 

Hockey

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

By John Pullega 1872 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

You Ain’t Shane, You Ain’t Mook – ’19-’20 NHL Team Previews: Columbus Blue Jackets

By Sam Fels 2071 0

Well, hope it was all worth it.

GM Jarmo Kekkelainen wasn’t going to let his squad go quietly into that goodnight last spring, and went all in at the trade deadline, bringing aboard Matt Duchene and Ryan Dzingel for the Jackets playoff push. It got them a stunning, historic sweep of the historically good Lightning. And that’s it.

Is that enough? For a fanbase that had seen their team accomplish exactly dick for their entire existence, it may be. Those memories will last a bit. But not that long, and soon they’re going to crave real success, like a division title or conference championship, two things the Jackets haven’t come within a $50 cab ride of. And neither of those look to be coming any time soon, as the squad that brought a playoff victory for the first time to Ohio has been shorn of three big pieces…and Dzingel. It’s not exactly a husk that’s left…but it’s the h-u-s of that.

Let’s run it through.

2018-2019

47-31-4 98 points (5th in Metro)

3.12 GF/G (12th)  2.82 GA/G (11th)

50.0 CF% (12th)  50.3 xGF% (14th)

15.4 PP% (29th)  85.0 PK% (2nd)

Goalies: Jarmo probably should be sued by the season ticket holders for negligence for heading into the season with Joonas Korpisalo as the starter. The story they’ll try and sell is that Korpisalo is 24, and heading into his prime, so there’s always a chance for a big step forward. It’s going to have to be an awfully big step, because Joonas hasn’t shown much in his brief cameos as Sergei Bobrovsky‘s backup. He’s played 90 games, and has a career .907 SV%, which would be just about league-average now. League-average isn’t going to get it done for this Jackets squad.

The wildcard is Elvis Merzlikins, and no he doesn’t have the traditional back-to-school parade here in Chicago. But I will allow for all the Fu-Schnickens jokes you want to make. Merzlikins was great in the Swiss league the past few years, but it’s impossible to know if that means anything. They seem pretty high on him, but he’s going to have to do an awful lot of heavy lifting if this team is going anywhere. That would also mean Korpisalo snuffed it, which is almost certainly doom for the Jackets.

Defense: The one unit that wasn’t scorched by free agent departures. Columbus can still roll out Seth Jones, Zach Werenski (assuming he ever signs), Ryan Murray, and Markus Nutivaara for two-thirds of the game, which is a nice place to be. It’s not Carolina’s blue line, but it’s still one of the better ones around. And they’re just running it back, as there’s been no additions to it in the offseason. So the top four will still be supported by David Savard, Scott Harrington, Dean Kukan, and Adam Clendening. Or some combo thereof, to be more precise. There’s a chance that Vladislov Gavrikov is part of the equation as well. The Jackets can at least point to this and know what they’ll get, which is more than you can say for the rest of the team.

Forwards: Ouch. At the moment, the Jackets are maybe one line and a lot of questions and hope. Cam Atkinson and Pierre-Luc Dubois are still a formidable tandem, and Atkinson scored before Panarin arrived. They signed Gustav Nyquist possibly to put on that line, but Nyquist is a support-scorer these days, not a main man. Alex Wennberg and and Josh Anderson will probably anchor the second, but that’s where it starts to sound short for the Jackets. Nick Foligno and Brandon Dubinsky are still here to belch and fart and call it leadership, Oliver Bjorkstrand and Boone Jenner are going to have to seriously build on promising seasons from last campaign for the Jackets to score enough, and that’s always a dicey bet. They might need to toss prospect Liam Foudy into the deep end right away to up the amount of skill to even acceptable.

Prediction: The Jackets are in deep. They’re clearly behind the Penguins, Caps, Canes for the automatic spots in the Metro. The Islanders may have fallen farther than they did, which helps, and the Rangers and Devils probably aren’t ready to cycle back up past them just yet. Who ever fucking knows with the Flyers? So that leaves them tangling with the other division for wildcard spots, but there just doesn’t look like there’s enough scoring up front with this lot. And Jarmo already scraped the savings vault to go for it last year.

Hope those Tampa memories keep them warm for a while. It might not be enough to keep Torts from throwing himself off the roof in January.

Hockey

Pictures of Matchstick Men – ’19-’20 Blackhawks Player Previews: Carl Dahlstrom

By Sam Fels 1751 0

Like Boqvist whose preview came before, it could be that Carl Dahlstrom never plays a game for the Hawks this season. But given his proximity to the top six and the likelihood of injuries/incompetence, he most likely will suit up at some point. It won’t be terribly exciting, but it might not be terribly bad either. And for this team, anything above “terribly bad” on the blue line is a step up.

’18-’19 Stats

38 G – 0 G – 6 A – 6 P   6 PIM

47.4 CF% (-1.08 Relative)  45.3 xGF% (+0.3 Relative)

37.8 Offensive Zone Start %, 62.2 Defensive Zone Start %

A Brief History: For the second straight season, Dahlstrom was called up when the Hawks blue line turned to goo, with the idea that his steady game would help to calm the waters. But unlike his first attempt, this one went well at points. Dahlstrom quickly formed a “shutdown” pairing with Connor Murphy, as they were both marooned in their own zone a ton because there was simply no other d-man who could do it. It was the two of them who saw the last-minute shifts in games the Hawks were leading and had to protect for a stretch in the middle of the season, relegating Marlboro 72 to the bench at a time that used to be their g-spot. Dahlstrom got shifted around a ton via partners and sides, but generally was as solid a defensive players as the Hawks could find. Which says a lot.

It Was The Best Of Times: In all honestly, the best case scenario is that the Hawks have six or seven d-men better than Dahlstrom and he never plays. But that’s not the case, though he might still never play. Dahlstrom is hopefully a #7 or #8 that only comes up for air during injury problems and gets you out of a week or even month with steady if unspectacular play. Perhaps even better is if he plays well enough to entice another team to give up something useful for him, whether that team is having its own injury crisis or talent shortage. Dahlstrom is going to get crowded out anyway (we hope) by Boqvist and Mitchell one day soon, unless the Hawks do some serious clearing of the decks. Maybe then he could man your third-pairing without embarrassing anyone. But you’d like to think we could aim for more here.

It Was The BLURST Of Times: Boqvist is a defensive disaster in camp and is sent down. Olli Maatta can’t prove he can escape his Olli Maatta-ness in the season’s first month or two, and ends up back in the pressbox where the Penguins and Erik Goddamn Gudbanson left him in the first place. Slater Koekkoek still blows chunks. Which means Dahlstrom has to play most every game, probably pairing with de Haan for at least a defensively aware but criminally immobile pairing, Or he reconnects with Murphy to do basically the same thing but with more mobility. Even in the worst-case, Dahlstrom’s play is hardly going to sink you, it’s just the inability to move off that floor that will hold the Hawks back.

Prediction: Maatta would probably have to shoot both Stan and Coach Cool Youth Pastor’s dog to get out of the lineup, and Slater Koekkoek seems to be the new David Rundblad when we didn’t even want the old one. So spots in the lineup are going to be hard to come by for anyone else. It’s likely that Dahlstrom starts the year in Rockford again, but will most likely be the first call-up ahead of Boqvist, enraging a certain portion of Hawks-dom, when it turns out all the above are an affront to the Lord. He’ll play somewhere between 20-30 games to give any sort of stability to a blue line that desperately needs it. de Haan is the souped up version of Dahlstrom, but his iffy health status probably opens the door for Dahlstrom for a stretch. It’s more of the I-90 shuttle for Carl.

Previous Player Previews

Corey Crawford

Robin Lehner

Adam Boqvist

Hockey

Pictures Of Matchstick Men – ’19-’20 Blackhawks Player Previews: Adam Boqvist

By Sam Fels 2289 0

I have a couple friends who like to use the quote, “Be what you want to manifest in the world.” Or something like that. Maybe it’s just “Be what you want to manifest.” Throw those words in some combination, and you’ll get what I’m after here. So though I know, deep in my heart, that it’s most likely Adam Boqvist never plays a game for the Hawks this year, we still have to maintain hope. If we give him the full preview treatment, perhaps we move a little step toward seeing what we want to manifest with the Hawks this year. Let’s be the change! Because if this blue line is going to have any chance to rise above the level of “Complete And Utter Suckbag,” it’s Boqvist who will bring that about.

2018-2019 Stats (in OHL)

54 GP – 20 G – 40 A – 60 P

A Brief History: Before Kirby Dach, Adam Boqvist was the subject of a high first-round pick the Hawks swore they wouldn’t be in position to attain again. Whoops. He was at least an acknowledgement that the Hawks had to get a whole lot faster on the back end, more creative, more dynamic, which the organization promptly forgot about seven minutes later. And this is how you end up with giving up actual good players for Olli Maatta. Boqvist wowed Joel Quenneville in training camp last fall, which considering his tastes in d-men was incredibly surprising. Or Q quickly came to realize how terrible his blue line was and was desperate for any salvation from anyone who could move faster than ennui. Q made noises about trying to keep Boqvist around when the season started…until the Red Wings beat the ever-loving crap out of him in a preseason game and everyone realized it was probably best for him to spend the year racing by children in the OHL.

It Was The Best Of Times: Boqvist carries the momentum from his Prospects Camp, where he was so far ahead of everyone save Dach it’s a wonder the rest of the crew didn’t just spend the last day scrimmage curled up in the corner rocking gently back and forth singing Gin Blossoms songs (how many of those kids even know who the Gin Blossoms are? Time to move on, Sam), into the Traverse City tourney and then into training camp and makes it utterly impossible for the Hawks to keep him down in Rockford. He finally sentences Brent Seabrook to a life of pressbox popcorn (slathered in jack cheese, I would assume), and from a heavily protected, third-pairing spot is able to give the Hawks some push from the back. He quickly inherits Erik Gustafsson‘s PP QB duties, making Gustafsson expendable at the deadline for the Hawks to get $1.25 on the dollar for him. And Boqvist looks like a Jared Spurgeon-type for the next 10 years.

It Was The BLURST of times: There’s actually a couple options here. One is that Boqvist does all the things mentioned in the first two sentences above, but the Hawks ignore him anyway, terrified of pissing off Seabrook or really believing in Maatta and Koekkoek and the rest of the leaden-footed crew, and Boqvist simply wastes his time and ours in Rockford. And he sits there while the defense continues to get its doors blown off by any team with anything resembling quick forwards. Or Boqvist still looks a complete mess in his own zone in training camp, earns his demotion to Rockford or even back to London, and everyone starts asking serious questions about whether he will ever be what was advertised. And the Hawks blue line continues to be a sculptured representation of confusion made of earwax.

Prediction: Let’s be clear, Boqvist is already the best offensive d-man on the team. It’s not even all that close, and Erik Gustafsson stans can fuck right off. Boqvist’s skating and abilities with the puck are NHL-level right now. And because the Hawks have literally no one else who can do any of that, he should be on the team. But he won’t be to start. Most likely, even after turning more heads in camp, he’ll start the year in Winnebago County. But after the main roster’s defense spends a couple months getting exposed for the tractor-in-the-mud that it is, and Boqvist lighting up the AHL (as Jokiharju did which got him traded, so watch out), the Hawks will have little choice but to call him up somewhere around Christmas. And it’ll be rocky, as Boqvist is never going to be solid in his own zone. But it also be exciting as he’ll make plays on the rush that no Hawks d-man has done since…fuck, Doug Wilson? Nick Leddy like once or twice? I don’t even know.

Of course, Boqvist’s arrival–along with the impending ones of Ian Mitchell and Nicolas Beaudin–will cause something of a fissure in the makeup of the team, as someone will have to sit to accommodate him. Which will take quite the deft hand from a coach who might not be prepared for it. Buy the ticket, take the ride.

Hockey

You Ain’t Shane, You Ain’t Mook – ’19-’20 NHL Team Previews: Carolina Hurricanes

By Sam Fels 2314 0

’18-’19: 46-29-7 (99 points) – Lost in Conference Final

2.98 GF/G (16th)  2.71 GA/G (6th)

17.6 PP% (2oth)   81.6 PK% (8th)

54.6 CF% (2nd)   56.4 xGF% (1st)

Something of the feel good story of last season, the Carolina Hurricanes are essentially going to try and run it back again, counting on maturing from youngsters and what is still the best blue line around. There have been a couple smaller additions, a loss of captain, and what feels like a real missed opportunity for the big splash that would have put this team over the top. But hey, their owner sunk an entire football league just to benefit himself, so is anyone really surprised?

Let’s see what’s under the hood here.

Goalies: The Canes have moved on from their partnership of last year, where they alternated between riding the hot streaks of Petr Mrazek and Curtis McElhinney, and have given the job to Mrazek full-time. That might be a little strange considering that Mrazek’s performance in the playoffs was something you dug out of your ear, but it’s something of Carolina tradition to have a whatsit in goal. Mrazek was very good in the regular season, certainly the best goaltending the Canes have gotten in eons. Mrazek also put up a great season in Detroit once, but there are four seasons of mediocrity in three different places between that and last year, so who is he really?

Mrazek came in over his expected-save-percentage last year (.914 to .916 at evens), and what might be most important is he does that while cheap. Mrazek has only a $3.1M hit, and that matters to Carolina. It’s a shame they didn’t spend it elsewhere that much, though. Still, the Canes make it about as easy as a team can for goalies, as they have the puck all the time. They’ll be counting on that again.

There is a more than decent insurance policy here though in James Reimer. Optimus Reim has an off-year in Florida last season, but had racked up league-average SV%s or better the previous three seasons. He has been a plus-backup for the back half of his career, and the kind that can usurp the top job for a stretch when he gets hot/the starter goes to the zoo for a bit. He has made over 39 starts each of the past three seasons, either due to Luongo’s injury problems or just taking the job, so there is a safety net in net for the Canes. Pretty shrewd here, really.

Defense: Still the team’s strength, even with the subtraction of Calvin de Haan and the addition of Gustav Forsling (assuming he ever gets out of Charlotte, which he shouldn’t). The Canes still roll a top four of Brett Pesce, Justin Faulk, Dougie Hamilton, and Jaccob Slavin (and his superfluous c). You’d be hard-pressed to find a team that can match that top four anywhere, and if the bottom pairing becomes a septic tank accident through some combo of Forsling, Haydn Fleury (and his missing e), Trevor van Riemsdyk and his missing talent, or kid Jake Bean, they can just run the top four out there between 40-45 minutes a night and not get too worried about it.

There will be some drama around Faulk this year, as he enters the last year of his deal and the whole will-he-or-won’t-he be traded or re-signed thing. Considering what the Canes could accomplish this year it would be near farce for them to trade Faulk, but one wonders what the actual budget is here for this team and we know how teams are loathe to lose players for nothing, even if they have everything to gain here. Still, it’s not that hard to make a case for the Canes to be division favorites now, and you don’t maintain that status by losing Faulk in the middle of the season.

That behind us, this unit can do just about everything, whether it’s pushing the play and supporting the offense or locking things down. You wish the Hawks took notes.

Forwards: In a dream world, the Canes would have already offer-sheeted Mitch Marner for $12M a year, and gotten ready to be the East favorite. They thought smaller however, signing Ryan Dzingel and trading for Erik Haula, who is just about the perfect Hurricane. They’ll also get a full season out of Nino Neiderreiter this time, another perfect Cane, and maybe the production they get from those three is enough to offset the retirement of Justin Williams as well as boost an offense that needs to be a touch better.

They’ll also expect a leap forward from Andrei Svechnikov and possibly Martin Necas, who was excellent in the AHL last year. They still seem intent on using Jordan Staal as a #2 center, and that’s simply not what he is anymore and likely never was. He’s a checking center and should be used as such. When the Canes go deadline-shopping, another center probably should be top of the list.

Sebastien Aho is now locked down and flourished moving to the middle last season. Our Dear Sweet Finnish Boy is still here to break our hearts. I’ve never been totally sold on Dzingel, who didn’t do much in Columbus last year after a trade there and his goal-scoring in Ottawa screams “production because someone had to score.” They look a little short on the wing as well, with only Turbo Targaryn, Nino, and Svechnikov feeling like genuine top-six wingers and none really being genuine top-line wingers for a Cup-contender. Marner would have been perfect here, just as Tavares would have been the year before.

Outlook: This is still a great team coached very well by Rod The Bod. It’s hard to see where the goaltending will completely sink them as it has in years past, and there’s no reason to think their possession numbers are going to go anywhere given the defense they sport. The only thing that’s going to nab them is a lack of frontline scoring, and Svechnikov has a chance to remedy that (but not by himself). With the Penguins and Capitals having to be in decline, the Islanders being run by Nosferatu, and the Rangers, Flyers, and Devils still in a rebuild, and the Jackets a complete mess, there’s little reason the Canes can’t take the Metro crown away from the Caps for the first time in eleventy-billion years or whatever it is. They were only five points short of that last year, and that gap is going to shrink if not disappear. There should be no boundaries for this team.

 

Hockey

Pictures of Matchstick Men – ’19-’20 Player Previews – Corey Crawford

By Adam Hess 2085 0

One year after the Hawks spent an entire summer backhandely blaming him for them missing the playoffs in the 2017-18 season, Corey Crawford enters 2019 in something of a goalie competition for the long term. With new signee Robin Lehner coming off a career year an potentially primed to take this job out from under him, and his contract expiring after this year and no extension in place yet (which we will get to), Crawford might have some proving to do this year. Let’s dig in.

2018-19 Stats

39 GP – 14 W, 18 L, 5 OTL

.908 SV%, 2.93 GAA

.916 SV% – .920 PP SV% – .853 PK SV%

A Brief History: The Hawks placed a lot of hope in Corey Crawford A) not having jelly for a brain after his concussion-riddled 2017-18 season and B) not playing badly after a concussion-riddled season at 33. He started the year pretty well and actually made it up to halfway through December before he got bumrushed in the crease and had his head smash into the goalpost, giving him his second bad concussion in as many seasons and only raising further concerns about potential jelly brain. He missed two and half months after that before returning at the end of February.

Crawford played pretty fine for most of the season, but ended the year with his worst save percentage since 2011-12 and the worst GAA of his career. Which, really, that just says a lot about how fucking good has been throughout his career, but his overall numbers indicated more of a high-caliber backup goalie rather than the goaltender you want behind a Cup contender. Not that the Hawks are any sort of Cup contender, but you know they want to at least think they are.

It Was The Best of Times: Is it too cliche to say that the best case scenario for Crawford is just to make it through 2019-20 without suffering another brain issue? I feel like I’ve been something of a broken record saying this for a year and a half now, but at a certain point there needs to be more consideration for Corey Crawford’s long term health and not what his value is to a hockey team. This isn’t fucking football where players are essentially willingly mortgaging their long term brain health in the pursuit of sports glory. Sure hockey is physical, and as a goalie you do place yourself at a greater risk of head injury, but this guy’s ability to live a long and happy life should be paramount, at least to himself.

Soapbox aside, given the amount and severity of his head injuries recently, I have to admit I am not expecting a huge amount from Crawford this year. I don’t think that in his age-35 season after having missed more than 90 total games in the past two years (via both sitting out and injury), it is reasonable to think he will ever be a .920 guy again. But with the Hawks seemingly set to run the 1A/1B system with Crawford and Robin Lehner, I think if he can be just a little better than he was last year, maybe post a .910-.915 overall SV% while staying healthy, that will be an excellent year for Crawford and might even let the Hawks sneak in the playoffs.

It Was The BLURST of Times: The worst case scenario for Crawford is that he continues down the unfortunate side of being an over-30 NHL player with a tough recent rash (skypoint Marian Hossa) of injuries and misses a big chunk of the season to more ailments. I obviously pray that wouldn’t be another head injury, but being 35 in sports opens the possibility for more physical ailments as well. What would compound this as worse for Crawford (though maybe not for the Hawks) would be if Robin Lehner proves that his 2018-19 campaign was not a fluke and really grabs the Hawks’ crease by the balls, while Collin Delia proves to be a more than adequate backup with an extremely affordable contract, and the Hawks decide they’d rather move on to younger and less broken players. It would be understandable, but still difficult to process.

I truly pray this worst case scenario does not play out because it would result in Crawford getting the big time Jay Cutler teatment here in Chicago – despite being among the best at his position that the city has even seen, he will never have been appreciated as much as he should have been. But like, way better than Cutler ever was, and yet somehow appreciated even less. He was a top-5 goalie in the NHL for years and got none of the recognition either here or nationally, and the organization seems to have more disdain for him than he does for remaining sober at concerts. And the fans never got over the GLOVE SIDE bullshit that became a fucking stupid narrative in 2013 despite him really being their best player in those playoffs. And while Scott Darling did need to save them slightly in 2015, Crawford was dominant after getting the crease back and probably deserved that Conn Smythe as well.

Prediction: Crawford remains mostly healthy and plays at a similar level to last year, finishing with a .907 SV%. Overall he gets outshined by Robin Lehner, and the two combine for a .910 that keeps the Hawks competitive and they slip into the playoffs, where Lehner is the starter and Crawford only gets in if Lehner struggles. The Hawks re-sign Lehner to a longer-term deal and make it clear to Crawford that his roll going forward is as a year-to-year backup, because if we’ve learned anything throughout Stan Bowman’s tenure as GM it’s that he takes care of extensions for guys he thinks will be part of the future early, regardless of the risk (lookin at you, Nacho) and given that Crow hasn’t had that happen yet, the writing is already on the wall.

Stats from NHL.com and NaturalStatTrick.com

Previous Player Previews

Robin Lehner

Hockey

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

By John Pullega 2270 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