Stadium Love

Results vs effort and which results or efforts are we talking about? Do we value performance or execution? Do we weight them differently over sample sizes?

LT has chosen to highlight results. Gord awful goals for and against for the bottom six. OP who I believe has an astute eye has zeroed in on McLeod for demotion. Its too early to bang a hard drum on results. In small sample sizes, to start a season, talking mostly veterans and with lots of guys coming back from injuries we should weight process more than results for now. Over a longer stretch, say 12-18 games, results will show a bit better, but even then that’s a small sample size over an 82 game season.

McLeod is running >53% xGF, is rocking a superb 59.2 SCF%, and is tied for the 5th lowest total SCA on the team (he and Brown are tied). Brown is generating CF events on the bubble of a top six pace, he’s rocking a 61.3% SCF%, he’s got a 61.5% SF% which is the highest on the team, and he’s got a 60.4% HDCF%. He’s a little shy on overall HDCF generation. For both players the generation rates for CF, SF, HDCF have been tracking upwards for three games. These guys aren’t getting results but the process numbers are very good.

When I look at these stats and then I watch the lines they match up. The ice is tilted in a good way when these players are on the ice. They are outplaying their opposition by a wide swath most of the time. In a small sample size they are getting goalered 0-2 and 0-4 respectively both with PDO’s in 0.934 range. We can be less than thrilled with the results here, but its very clear theses guys are playing the right way. They are doing what you want them to do and they are clearly beating their opposition.

The results aren’t shocking when we contextualize them with known player attributes and are absolutely no cause for concern until the sample size grows.

McLeod needs to assert himself offensively. That has always been my worry with him. He doesn’t trust his speed, his shot or his own creativity consistently yet especially in a cycle game. He’s been trending up for three games but needs to find another gear. Defensively he’s been excellent and its why the coach has him at a 43% OZS rate. He’s getting more responsibility at other game states and he’s earning that. He needs to add the offensive chunk. He’s done it in spurts, he needs to find the consistency.

Brown scores his goals in tight and through timing plays like the California tips and flybys. He has a good strong shot but its complimentary to how he scores. Scoring goals this way requires tight timing with teammates and of course getting greasy and mucking it up in the battle areas. Both are well known issues for players moving to new teams and players coming back from ACL surgery where they’ve missed a year. Despite those known headwinds, Brown is very clearly outplaying the opposition and in the last three games has started generating CF and SF events at a top six pace. When he starts scoring we’ll notice him taking less stand alone shots less or at least that’s how it will appear.

This is already too long so there’s no time to dig deep into Holloway. He’s playing very well and his for% are very good. He’s more high event than McLeod/Brown which is a function of getting some at bats with the big guys but also an eye test of him being more high event. Very positive arrows for this player. As long known his generation stats are a bit shy so same issues as McLeod re: offensive output. He’s cleaned up his two way game so far this year which is a positive.

These men are playing very good NHL hockey. Yes the results are shy, but the ice is tilted. Three straight games pushing up their shots and chance generation means they aren’t getting frustrated, no they are playing better and hard.

No punishments, nope, nada not now. No callups and no demotions yet.

They are playing the right way and they are winning that time. Be patient.