2021 Roster Thread XVI - Where thoughts are both sweet and sour

[GKJ]

Just because you are pressured to do something doesn't mean you have to bleed value to do it.

Value in this case was in NHL talent. That was more valuable at that moment in time. One 3rd round pick would've been nice, or that there was zero risk, but the team had needs and they had to improve the roster immediately and a 2nd round pick wasn't going to do that and I don't like trading 2nd round picks, but they couldn't come up short.

 

[Beef Invictus]

It’s not defending the signing, it’s not giving not nearly as much of a shit as people who seem like they live to be mad about the Flyers. Anyone still mad about Chris Stewart should go roll a joint or something and smoke it.

I don't know of many Cup winning teams.led by people who go out of their way to shoehorn ECHL players into their NHL roster. And with Prosser, The Flutch demonstrated he didn't learn anything from the experience.

That's relevant. It demonstrates unreformed trash processes at work.

 

[Beef Invictus]

Value in this case was in NHL talent. That was more valuable at that moment in time. One 3rd round pick would've been nice, or that there was zero risk, but the team had needs and they had to improve the roster immediately and a 2nd round pick wasn't going to do that and I don't like trading 2nd round picks, but they couldn't come up short.

But even talent-wise there wasn't a clear upgrade there based on what Niskanen had been. I did not expect much upgrade at all on Gudas, but I did expect better puck moving and and I liked that.

I did not like retaining for free on a deal where value at the time was comparable and we did a divisional team a big cap favor to begin with. At the time, the Caps were hard against the wall and Flutch helped them off of it instead of firing a shot.

 

[Icedog2735]

It’s not defending the signing, it’s not giving not nearly as much of a shit as people who seem like they live to be mad about the Flyers. Anyone still mad about Chris Stewart should go roll a joint or something and smoke it.

 

[Beef Invictus]

TB might be on their way to another Cup because they found a way to get maximum cap efficiency.

Meanwhile the Flyers are far more worried about getting their old washed up pals a paycheck against the cap (and then leading into coaching jobs they have no qualifications for) while doing "rivals" cap favors.

 

[GKJ]

You're missing the overall point. Signing Chris Stewart is getting a full fledged picture of what the management of this team thinks. They didn't just offer him a PTO, they saw how he played and went "yeah he's a + to this team".

And after 16 games they thought he didn't need to play any more NHL games. And there theoretically was even a path for him to stay after Lindblom left the team. He removed Dale Weise and Jori Lehtera too, which no one was willing to do - including Holmgren.

 

[Icedog2735]

I would be interested to hear who the legitimate targets are, UFA or trade, that people here think would be acceptable. Obviously compensation and/or what they give up plays are roll in the overall picture, but all I've seen on here are comments about Eichel and Hamilton. I definitely think they should target arguably the best defenseman and/or forward available, but if those are the only 2 acceptable options to this fanbase, I think many are going to come away disappointed when we get neither, regardless of who is GM'ing the team.

 

[JojoTheWhale]

Brander, Egan and Yeung, Estimating the Effects of Age on NHL player Performance, JQAS 2014..

I don't believe them or any other study I've seen. But if you want to use 22-29 for early arrivers and 24 -31 or so for later arrivals, that's about as reasonable as anything I've seen.

1) studies look at averages, but generally ignore the "early arrivers" and "late arrivers" effect. Early arrivers skew age curve younger, b/c they peak early, and thus are more likely to decline (simply because in a sample of top talents, injury, etc. will cause decay while it's hard for them to improve, it's like the guy who runs a sub-4.00 mile, easier to slow down that to get faster). Later arrivals peak later and then start declining from a later peak.

2) survivor issues, how do you handle players who haven't "declined" but got a serious injury? We're trying to measure decline due to age, not decline due to "events." Since injuries are generally stochastic (with some genetic component) you'd want to cull them from the data.

Though neither Hayes nor Voracek made this list:

Projecting the NHL's 15 Worst Contracts

From a cursory review, there are some key differences between that study and others I've read such as A New Look at Aging Curves for NHL Skaters (part 1).

First and foremost is time period. The BEY paper shows a dataset of 1997-98 through 2011-12. The Hockey Graphs article looks at 2008-20016. I would expect that while the latter is over a significantly smaller period of time, these studies are answering two very different questions. I would assume the scoring peak of NHLers to have lowered considerably from the late 90s/early 2000s as the game has sped up and the salary cap was installed.

But the metrics used in the BEY paper also concern me. Part of the calculations use Plus/Minus and raw Points. I would think that what we lose in quantity of data by choosing another study, we more than gain in using better barometers. Especially when I've seen so many people I trust look at it and come out in roughly the same area.

 

[Striiker]

“I’m not defending it, I was just saying why it wasn’t bad for the last few hours.”

 

[Icedog2735]

TB might be on their way to another Cup because they found a way to get maximum cap efficiency.

Meanwhile the Flyers are far more worried about getting their old washed up pals a paycheck against the cap (and then leading into coaching jobs they have no qualifications for) while doing "rivals" cap favors.

While your second point is more than fair and Tampa is a very good team (obviously), they also found a way to loophole the salary cap by hiding $19 million on LTIR all season while those guys practiced and were magically healed for Game 1 of the playoffs when the season actually started to matter for the Lightning.

 

[Beef Invictus]

And after 16 games they thought he didn't need to play any more NHL games. And there theoretically was even a path for him to stay after Lindblom left the team. He removed Dale Weise and Jori Lehtera too, which no one was willing to do - including Holmgren.

The fact that it took 16 games is disturbing.

 

[GKJ]

But even talent-wise there wasn't a clear upgrade there based on what Niskanen had been. I did not expect much upgrade at all on Niskanen, but I did expect better puck moving and and I liked that.

I did not like retaining for free on a deal where value at the time was comparable and we did a divisional team a big cap favor to begin with. At the time, the Caps were hard against the wall and Flutch helped them off of it instead of firing a shot.

He bet on Niskanen rebounding and he did. Was he lucky? Probably. All that mattered is that it worked. Fletcher helped them out because he wanted the player, it wasn't out of the goodness of his heart. Not like the Capitals did anything.

 

[Beef Invictus]

While your second point is more than fair and Tampa is a very good team (obviously), they also found a way to loophole the salary cap by hiding $19 million on LTIR all season while those guys practiced and were magically healed for Game 1 of the playoffs when the season actually started to matter for the Lightning.

Exactly. Cutthroat thinking.

Not country club thinking.

 

[deadhead]

From a cursory review, there are some key differences between that study and others I've read such as A New Look at Aging Curves for NHL Skaters (part 1).

First and foremost is time period. The BEY paper shows a dataset of 1997-98 through 2011-12. The Hockey Graphs article looks at 2008-20016. I would expect that while the latter is over a significantly smaller period of time, these studies are answering two very different questions. I would expect the scoring peak of NHLers to have lowered considerably from the late 90s/early 2000s as the game has sped up and the salary cap was installed.

But the metrics used in the BEY paper also concern me. Part of the calculations use Plus/Minus and raw Points. I would think that what we lose in quantity of data by choosing another study, we more than gain in using better barometers. Especially when I've seen so many people I trust look at it and come out in roughly the same area.

All the studies are flawed. WAR has its own issues, people love it until they see a favorite get trashed or a hated player get boosted.

My general sense is there are two general groups, the early arrivals who have an early peak and a slower decline (self-selected for the most talented in terms of athleticism), and the later arrivals (who will tend to be lower scorers but more well rounded, they made the NHL b/c they've learned to overcome relative athletic limitations).

For top six forwards, I think 30 is probably the last "safe" year but most should be solid through 32, after that buyer beware.
For top four defensemen, they're probably generally safe until 32 and serviceable to 34.
However, usage matters, overwork an older player and you'll have a faster decline in productivity (anyone who's over 30 knows recovery time is one of the first things to go).

 

[Beef Invictus]

He bet on Niskanen rebounding and he did. Was he lucky? Probably. All that mattered is that it worked. Fletcher helped them out because he wanted the player, it wasn't out of the goodness of his heart. Not like the Capitals did anything.

He didn't need to help them more. He was already helping them a ton just by swapping players, before he gave them the free additional help.

Fletcher is soft. This isn't an exception or unusual. In almost everything he does he bleeds away more assets than he should. This was a problem in Minnesota, it's continuing here.

 

[deadhead]

He bet on Niskanen rebounding and he did. Was he lucky? Probably. All that mattered is that it worked. Fletcher helped them out because he wanted the player, it wasn't out of the goodness of his heart. Not like the Capitals did anything.

I don't think he was "lucky," it was an educated guess.

Niskanen did bounce back, and he was a top 3 guy in Washington for their Cap runs, and quite capable of being first pair if you limited him to 20-21 minutes (don't workhorse him). I pointed that out at the time of the trade, it was probably something Fletcher had researched.

Gudas has been a 3rd pair defensemen everywhere he has gone, very good in that role, but no one has seen him as top four talent.

So it was close to a no-brainer given a young defense that needed an anchor.

 

[Math the wild rose]

f***ing give me Provorov ++ for Eichel god damn it

One guy i would like to see with the flyers is Anze kopitar.

 

[Beef Invictus]

One guy i would like to see with the flyers is Anze kopitar.

A 33 year old with a 10 mil cap hit for three more years is not immediately appealing to me

 

[Math the wild rose]

A 33 year old with a 10 mil cap hit for three more years is not immediately appealing to me

but we still have giroux at that cap. and over paid veterans. + Anze is still productive, 70 points a year.

but yes , there still that salary cap problem. Its just that i find our lack of offense at forward position preocupating, you see all the good team what they have. or very well balanced. the mix of youngs guys that could be productive and the unproductive veterans is a major issues with the flyers.

at least if this group cannot perform, something gotta happen.

 

[JojoTheWhale]

All the studies are flawed. WAR has its own issues, people love it until they see a favorite get trashed or a hated player get boosted.

My general sense is there are two general groups, the early arrivals who have an early peak and a slower decline (self-selected for the most talented in terms of athleticism), and the later arrivals (who will tend to be lower scorers but more well rounded, they made the NHL b/c they've learned to overcome relative athletic limitations).

For top six forwards, I think 30 is probably the last "safe" year but most should be solid through 32, after that buyer beware.
For top four defensemen, they're probably generally safe until 32 and serviceable to 34.
However, usage matters, overwork an older player and you'll have a faster decline in productivity (anyone who's over 30 knows recovery time is one of the first things to go).

Of course you know I agree every study that will ever be done is flawed. We're just debating degree.

I realized too late that I should have linked to part 2 as well because it does address a legitimate issue you brought up in survivorship bias. A New Look at Aging Curves for NHL Skaters (part 2)

 

[mize370]

Wait are we really complaining about trading Gudas now? You make that trade just about every time. You cannot blame Fletcher for Niskanen retiring.
Fletcher has made many bad moves but that wasn’t one of them.

I thought Gudas was trash and would have let him walk for free.

 

[Rebels57]

Id trade premium assets for Eichel even if the chances at his career ending were like 75%. Thats how sick of status quo I am.

Might even allow us to move Hayes to the RW where he belongs.

I mean..

1. Eichel
2. Couturier
3. Hayes/Laughton/Frost/Patrick
4. Laughton/Frost/Patrick/Lacyznski

Thats arguable the best C group in the NHL any way it shakes out.

 

[LegionOfDoom91]

Id trade premium assets for Eichel even if the chances at his career ending were like 75%. Thats how sick of status quo I am.

Might even allow us to move Hayes to the RW where he belongs.

I mean..

1. Eichel
2. Couturier
3. Hayes/Laughton/Frost/Patrick
4. Laughton/Frost/Patrick/Lacyznski

Thats arguable the best C group in the NHL any way it shakes out.

$7.1M for a 3C, not saying I don’t want Eichel or anything but f***. Can it get worse with Hayes?

 

[BrindamoursNose]

Id trade premium assets for Eichel even if the chances at his career ending were like 75%. Thats how sick of status quo I am.

Might even allow us to move Hayes to the RW where he belongs.

I mean..

1. Eichel
2. Couturier
3. Hayes/Laughton/Frost/Patrick
4. Laughton/Frost/Patrick/Lacyznski

Thats arguable the best C group in the NHL any way it shakes out.

I'm definitely all-in on Eichel.

And I don't think it'll cost as much as many do...I don't trust Fletch to get it done, but I know he'll at least step up to the plate for a swing.

 

[BlackandOrange]

I loved Gudas when he played here, always thought him and Sanheim made a dope pair.