Player Discussion New Captain- Nick Suzuki

[The Great Weal]

47 goals is. Scoring a third of your teams goals is.

60 points is not. Being 81st in the league for points is not a 1st liner.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

60 points is not. Being 81st in the league for points is not a 1st liner.

I don’t care about 60 points. I care about the 47 goals and 1/3 the goals of his team.

For all your talk about how Nick had nobody to work with it isn’t true. CC on the other hand, scored those goals with an ice cold center.

47 goals is a first line no matter what. That is first line production.

 

[The Great Weal]

I don’t care about 60 points. I care about the 47 goals and 1/3 the goals of his team.

For all your talk about how Nick had nobody to work with it isn’t true. CC on the other hand, scored those goals with an ice cold center.

47 goals is a first line no matter what. That is first line production.

A first liner cannot have 60 points, this is a cold hard fact that you keep ignoring. Your Bondra example was nonsense when one was in the top 30 in the league for production while the other isn't even top 80. Suzuki still outproduced CC by the end of it. You're awfully disingenuous when you say he scored those goals with an ice cold center. He had 15 of his goals during the time Suzuki was on a 90+ point pace. The other 11 was when Suzuki's goalscoring went down and the whole line's production fell off a cliff.

You can't even explain why CC's production fell off a cliff since your main argument is that a star shouldn't depend on others and should still be producing the same.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

A first liner cannot have 60 points,

He can if he’s scoring 1/3 of his team’s goals with an ice cold center and 47 goals.

47 goals is elite. And it’s especially elite on a club like that. Again, you keep saying Nick had no help. You are incorrect. He had one of the highest scoring wingers in the league and still didn’t produce. Cc is the one who had nothing to work with.

And again just so it’s understood- I think CC has been a massive disappointment this year. For whatever the reason he hasn’t come close to scoring at the rate he should. And I certainly think Nick has been our best player this year. I’ll continue to re-evaluate him as I have with Suzuki.

And I have no doubt that if I downgrade CC next year there will be more accusations of ‘bias’ there too.

 

[TT1]

60 points is not. Being 81st in the league for points is not a 1st liner.

Then what does that make Caufield? His only role is being an offensive producer , Suzuki is an all around player that you can use in any situation. Bergeron's production was the icing on the cake on top of everything else he did on the ice, that's why he was an elite forward. If you evaluated Bergeron based on his production alone he obviously wouldn't be an elite player.. but who would do that?

You can be a great or elite player for different reasons, McDavid is elite purely because of his production, another player can be elite because of his production coupled and his dominant physical impact on the game, another player can be elite because of his production coupled with his dominant defensive play etc.

Suzuki's production =/= Caufield, 1 point from Suzuki is greater than 1 point from Caufield because Suzuki is a multidimensional player, there's more to hockey than just points..

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

Then what does that make Caufield? His only role is being an offensive producer , Suzuki is an all around player that you can use in any situation.

Correct. CC’s job is to score goals. That’s his value. If he’s not scoring then he’s not nearly as valuable as Suzuki is.

Suzuki's production =/= Caufield, 1 point from Suzuki is greater than 1 point from Caufield because Suzuki is a multi dimensional player, there's more to hockey than just points..

Correct again. That’s why I used the examples above.

Cc’d value is goals which are very hard to come by.

Let’s use an extreme example Carbonneau vs Hull. If Hull isn’t scoring goals then Carbo is a hell of a lot more valuable if they’re both scoring the same numbers of goals and points.

 

[Tyson]

Correct. CC’s job is to score goals. That’s his value. If he’s not scoring then he’s not nearly as valuable as Suzuki is.

CC better figure out his 5 on 5 game.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

CC better figure out his 5 on 5 game.

Honestly, right now I’d settle for him scoring any way. Sub 8 percent is crazy.

 

[The Great Weal]

He can if he’s scoring 1/3 of his team’s goals with an ice cold center and 47 goals.

47 goals is elite. And it’s especially elite on a club like that. Again, you keep saying Nick had no help. You are incorrect. He had one of the highest scoring wingers in the league and still didn’t produce. Cc is the one who had nothing to work with.

60 points is not elite, far from it when you are outside the top 80. You claim that the team's state and goals don't matter as an elite player will produce elite numbers, and despite scoring at a good goalscoring rate, his lack of assists affected his production drastically which is what you need from a 1st liner. Myself and others have proved through data that the bolded is just flat out wrong. You're using a ridiculously small sample size when the production of everyone fell off a cliff.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

60 points is not elite, far from it when you are outside the top 80. You claim that the team's state and goals don't matter as an elite player will produce elite numbers, and despite scoring at a good goalscoring rate, his lack of assists affected his production drastically which is what you need from a 1st liner. Myself and others have proved through data that the bolded is just flat out wrong. You're using a ridiculously small sample size when the production of everyone fell off a cliff.

47 goals is.

 

[The Great Weal]

47 goals is.

60 points is not and that's what you use to evaluate a pure offense player. Tied for 81st in the league is not 1st line production.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

60 points is not and that's what you use to evaluate a player. Tied for 81st in the league is not 1st line production.

You can yell 60 points as much as you want. 47 goals is elite.

 

[The Great Weal]

You can tell 60 points as much as you want. 47 goals is elite.

60 point 1st liner is unprecedented and I already proved your Bondra comparison from his 1994 season is nonsense. 18 assists in a season is not a 1st liner, there's a reason why it's getting tracked.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

60 point 1st liner is unprecedented and I already proved your Bondra comparison from his 1994 season is nonsense. 18 assists in a season is not a 1st liner, there's a reason why it's getting tracked.

Six guys scored 47 goals or more last year.

Six.

 

[The Great Weal]

Six guys scored 47 goals or more last year.

Six.

Caufield was outside the top 10 for goals by the time he was injured and 81st in points. Pretty much shows that you can't use goal per pace when some of those guys who scored more than Caufield didn't end up scoring 47 or more yet you are guaranteeing that Caufield would have based on nothing.

 

[Rapala]

Six guys scored 47 goals or more last year.

Six.

And none of them were named Cole Caulfield either last year or the year before that and it's looking mighty bleak this year.
You can't just Frankenstein portions of seasons together and expect it to be a realistic metric.
An 82 game season doesn't work that way.
Players are remembered for their season ending stats not cobbled portions of two seasons.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

And none of them were named Cole Caulfield either last year or the year before that and it's looking mighty bleak this year.
You can't just Frankenstein portions of seasons together and expect it to be a realistic metric.
An 82 game season doesn't work that way.
Players are remembered for their season ending stats not cobbled portions of two seasons.

I agree. I’m just rebutting the argument that Nick had nothing to work with. He certainly did.

Bottom line is that he’s never lived up to what I had hoped he’d be. But that’s okay. He’s been really good. I’d put him in the Koivu tier of players. Nothing shabby about that.

 

[Non Player Canadiens]

LG dug himself into a hole, piled the dirt up into a hill, and now he's gonna die on it

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

LG dug himself into a hole, piled the dirt up into a hill, and now he's gonna die on it

Not at all. If Nick starts playing like a true number one, I’ll be the first to say so. I sincerely hope he can find the next gear.

He can start by shooting a lot more.

 

[Rapala]

I agree. I’m just rebutting the argument that Nick had nothing to work with. He certainly did.

Bottom line is that he’s never lived up to what I had hoped he’d be. But that’s okay. He’s been really good. I’d put him in the Koivu tier of players. Nothing shabby about that.

He's everything I expected he would be and he still shows that he is our best player in meaningful games. If he's a Saku Koivu that's fine by me.
Looking at Suzuki's career trajectory he's every bit as productive as Sean Monahan was with a much stronger Calgary Flames team.
If there is one player on our roster who should have more production than he actually does it's Nick Suzuki and most of it is through no fault of his own.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

He's everything I expected he would be and he still shows that he is our best player in meaningful games. If he's a Saku Koivu that's fine by me.

It’s fine by me too.

Looking at Suzuki's career trajectory he's every bit as productive as Sean Monahan was with a much stronger Calgary Flames team.
If there is one player on our roster who should have more production than he actually does it's Nick Suzuki and most of it is through no fault of his own.

I think if he shot the puck more it would make a huge difference. He’s got a great shot. He’s too much of a pass first and teams expect it. If he started shooting more he (and the first line as a whole) would be far less predictable.

I don’t think he should have more production than he does. I think that applies a lot more to Slaf than Nick. Nick’s been in this league a while now and his production is right in line where it’s always been.

 

[Rapala]

You are too much. Slaf is just learning his position and hasn't played a quarter of a season on that line.
In the past two seasons there have been far more opportunities muffed coming off Suzuki set ups than anyone else AINEC.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

You are too much. Slaf is just learning his position and hasn't played a quarter of a season on that line.
In the past two seasons there have been far more opportunities muffed coming off Suzuki set ups than anyone else AINEC.

It will normalize for Slaf. But he’s been ripped off bigly this year.

As for Suzuki, he is what he is.

 

[Sorinth]

Again dude, he had a winger pacing for 50 and still went cold. That wasn’t a support issue.

He’s good but he’s not dominant the way you’d want your number one to be on a consistent basis. He’s always been bottom third in scoring and has never even cracked 70 points. People’s have brought up Bergeron to make the case for his two way game but his CF numbers are in the low 50s. A guy like Bergeron was pushing 60. He’s really good but he doesn’t juice his linemates the way a true number one can. But he does show he can do it in spurts.

If he can string it together consistently- and maybe he will - then I’ll re-evaluate. But he hasn’t proven it.

He’s a 1B.

We saw this year even McDavid goes through cold streaks. Having a cold streak isn't evidence that you aren't an elite player.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

We saw this year even McDavid goes through cold streaks. Having a cold streak isn't evidence that you aren't an elite player.

Absolutely. But McDavid has put consistent seasons together. He’s a really consistent player. Suzuki has been consistently inconsistent.