Speculation: 2023-24 Sharks Roster Discussion

[zombie kopitar]

I was watching the broadcast, when we learned that Brad Stuart, Marco Sturm and Wayne Primeau had been scratched.
Not much was said about it until Randy broke the news to fans, Joe Thornton was a Shark. I was running about the house cheering. I had no idea of how much it would bear on this team I love.
Pavelski will always be my favorite Shark because he overcame so much. Jumbo made San Jose a powerhouse for many years. He legitimized a team that needed it. No one will ever tarnish how much I cherish that Joe Thornton was and remains the best Sharks player ever.

facts, by pure luck my mom had already bought tickets for his first game in the tank too (we usually went to 1-3 games a year and CBJ was a cheap draw so had decent seats); it was electric, I remember him losing a tooth and just chirping at the ref for a missed call in the neutral zone while the play moved down to defense; but then the puck popped up to him since he was cherry picking via chirping, and he scored a breakaway goal, so much fun and an instant fan

but since this thread is revisionist history rn, we could have also gotten Neidermeyer or Chara and become a dynasty; like fr not giving Chara the C might be DW's greatest blunder the NHL would have been rewritten

 

[Barrie22]

According to this article, scoring goes down by an average of 4.4% in the playoffs compared to the regular season. Thornton's scoring consistently went down by over 20%. Using the years you cite, Thornton averaged 1.06 points per regular season game from 2006-2016 which dropped to 0.85 points per playoff game: a 20% dropoff.

It's inaccurate to suggest Thornton's dropoff is in line with the average player let alone other superstars. There are many factors that could have caused this, including just plain bad luck, but regardless when your most important offensive player loses 5 times as much of his offense in the playoffs as the average player does you're not going to win the Cup.

Even if that is the case, those three were some of the best all-around, two-way players in the game's history. Thornton, at least in the regular season, was a scoring phenom.


No, this is completely inaccurate and has been debunked half a hundred times. Scoring drops roughly 5% between the season and playoffs.

Overall scoring goes down 4.4-5%, individual scoring goes down between 10-20%

 

[coooldude]

Overall scoring goes down 4.4-5%, individual scoring goes down between 10-20%

Which, of course, implies that depth scoring goes up.

Bringing us back around to the first point which is that over the years DW never really put together a very deep team. The 2016 cup run team was deeper than most (Wardie etc) and even so we got run out of the building by the 3rd line on PIT. Granted... it's hard to feel ashamed at losing to the Malkin-Letang-Crosby-and-friends juggernaut ever. But depth was definitely our persistent weakness.

Anyway, hopefully Grier doesn't make that mistake in 2030 when we're contending again.

 

[OrrNumber4]

Got it. So we can call Crosby a playoff choker then because he's 10.5% lower from regular season to playoff scoring in terms of PPG even though he has 3 Cups. Why have a 1C when they don't play as well come playoff time and all the superlative BS that gets spewed about Thornton.

Crosby has had bad playoff runs and bad playoff series. But he's also had several elite runs...2008, 2009, 2016-2018...

Thornton has had many more bad playoff runs/series and not too many good ones. 2016 (despite him falling flat in the final) is the one great run he had.

Overall scoring goes down 4.4-5%, individual scoring goes down between 10-20%

Which, of course, implies that depth scoring goes up.

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

Thorntons fault

 

[Pavelski2112]

Oh god can we please stop re-litigating this argument

Honestly the worst part of the Thornton trade is that people are going to debate whether not winning a Cup was his fault for the rest of time

 

[Cas]

Ted Williams is still criticized for not winning a World Series.

 

[Juxtaposer]

Oh god can we please stop re-litigating this argument

Honestly the worst part of the Thornton trade is that people are going to debate whether not winning a Cup was his fault for the rest of time

Seriously, it’s not even the off-season yet. Re-hashing the Thornton debate is a time-honored summer tradition, where I can avoid HF for a month without missing anything.

The same people make the same arguments and no one ever changes their mind. It’s literally a pointless debate.

 

[pappaf2]

Man Roloson owned the sharks

 

[coooldude]

My point was if top-end individual scoring goes down, then bottom-end scoring goes up. I don't have any evidence, I may be completely wrong, and I probably misread the original post.

At any rate, it is kind of pointless to re-litigate why Thornton was or wasn't the worst or just mediocre or whether it was depth or the goalie's fault or whether it was something else. We all lived through all the pain, it sucked, it's well over, who cares.

 

[TheBeard]

According to this article, scoring goes down by an average of 4.4% in the playoffs compared to the regular season. Thornton's scoring consistently went down by over 20%. Using the years you cite, Thornton averaged 1.06 points per regular season game from 2006-2016 which dropped to 0.85 points per playoff game: a 20% dropoff.

It's inaccurate to suggest Thornton's dropoff is in line with the average player let alone other superstars. There are many factors that could have caused this, including just plain bad luck, but regardless when your most important offensive player loses 5 times as much of his offense in the playoffs as the average player does you're not going to win the Cup.

Also, the dropoff rarely applies to the best players. Crosby maintained his above PPG in the playoffs. Same with Patrick Kane, McKinnon, Kucherov etc. Pavelski seemed to be the only Shark who ever maintained the same or greater production in the postseason.

 

[landshark]

Also, the dropoff rarely applies to the best players. Crosby maintained his above PPG in the playoffs. Same with Patrick Kane, McKinnon, Kucherov etc. Pavelski seemed to be the only Shark who ever maintained the same or greater production in the postseason.

Wasn't Cooter better in ploffs than reg season?

701 pts in 933 reg season games 0.7513397642 PPG
101 pts in 116 ploff games 0.87068965517 PPG

I had the numbers flipped around initially for the ploff figures...

 

[TheBeard]

Wasn't Cooter better in ploffs than reg season?

701 pts in 933 reg season games 0.7513397642 PPG
101 pts in 116 ploff games 0.87068965517 PPG

I had the numbers flipped around initially for the ploff figures...

Good catch. Point is the big guns didn’t show up when we needed them to and if you look at cup winners, it’s as much a case of the big guys playing big as it is the depth players having their own impact.

 

[Bizz]

Ted Williams is still criticized for not winning a World Series.

My two favorite sport athletes of all time are Griffey and Thornton, both had similar careers in their respective sports, but only one gets shit for not winning a championship.

 

[OrrNumber4]

Good catch. Point is the big guns didn’t show up when we needed them to and if you look at cup winners, it’s as much a case of the big guys playing big as it is the depth players having their own impact.

More than that, I think that when your best players are crushing their minutes and driving play, your depth players will simply look better.

 

[TheBeard]

More than that, I think that when your best players are crushing their minutes and driving play, your depth players will simply look better.

I remember that 08-09 team and how their PP was lethal in the regular season and they were like 3 for 30 against Anaheim in the first round upset.

 

[OffSydes]

Thorntons fault

DW looks at this and sees they have Patrick Rissmiller playing in the second OT and thinks "our depth is good"

 

[DG93]

Seriously, it’s not even the off-season yet. Re-hashing the Thornton debate is a time-honored summer tradition, where I can avoid HF for a month without missing anything.

The same people make the same arguments and no one ever changes their mind. It’s literally a pointless debate.

And the best part is that as always, the answer is both! Jumbo was an awesome Shark and a core piece of Sharks hockey but also underperformed significantly (relative to the regular season) in many playoff series + DW as stated many times royally failed at surrounding the Jumbo-led core with depth, goaltending, and coaching.

 

[Juxtaposer]

And the best part is that as always, the answer is both! Jumbo was an awesome Shark and a core piece of Sharks hockey but also underperformed significantly (relative to the regular season) in many playoff series + DW as stated many times royally failed at surrounding the Jumbo-led core with depth, goaltending, and coaching.

Totally. Thornton never took it to the next level but the Sharks would have been irrelevant for the last 20 years without him and DW’s inability to build an even marginally passable bottom-6 forward group and bottom pairing defense while Thornton was in his prime was worse.

I feel like 95% of us agree on those basics. It’s the outliers that make these discussions unbearable.

 

[Gecklund]

I was watching the broadcast, when we learned that Brad Stuart, Marco Sturm and Wayne Primeau had been scratched.
Not much was said about it until Randy broke the news to fans, Joe Thornton was a Shark. I was running about the house cheering. I had no idea of how much it would bear on this team I love.
Pavelski will always be my favorite Shark because he overcame so much. Jumbo made San Jose a powerhouse for many years. He legitimized a team that needed it. No one will ever tarnish how much I cherish that Joe Thornton was and remains the best Sharks player ever.

Unrelated but I absolutely read this as podcast not broadcast and had multiple questions.

 

[Alaskanice]

Questions for me?

 

[sharski]

Jumbo is like the main reason we spent all those years being mad at consistently winning games 3-2 instead of 5-0 like we were all expecting them to... Good times

 

[jMoneyBrah]

Wasn't Cooter better in ploffs than reg season?

701 pts in 933 reg season games 0.7513397642 PPG
101 pts in 116 ploff games 0.87068965517 PPG

I had the numbers flipped around initially for the ploff figures...

I like that these numbers are to the 12th decimal. I might not have been able to accurately compare them if they weren’t

 

[jMoneyBrah]

My two favorite sport athletes of all time are Griffey and Thornton, both had similar careers in their respective sports, but only one gets shit for not winning a championship.

Oh man, Griffey Jr. was the best. It’s a shame his career will be never be properly contextualized because of the PED crazy era he played in.

Also that one time old man Griffey fell asleep in the dugout still cracks me up.

 

[Cas]

Oh man, Griffey Jr. was the best. It’s a shame his career will be never be properly contextualized because of the PED crazy era he played in.

Also that one time old man Griffey fell asleep in the dugout still cracks me up.

I think Griffey is perfectly contextualized - he was a great player with the Mariners, albeit not as good as Bonds was, and then his poor conditioning habits caught up to him in Cincinnati and his value cratered. All in all, a top ten center fielder of all time, but he never really had a case for challenging Willie Mays.