Any insights on Sean Day's rookie season?

[Iridescent*]

16 points in 60 games. -35, and only 34 penalty minutes. The numbers certainly do not appear to indicate he had a good rookie campaign.

Did he look out of place? Just too high of expectations on him given the elite company he's in?

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[DrJenniferHanson]

There's no sugarcoating it -- wasn't a good season statistically.

Lowest +/-% (among D with 25+ GP)
1 Schlichting - 0.35
2 Raycroft - 0.38
3 Haydon - 0.43
4 Blaisdell - 0.47
5 Day - 0.50

That said, Day fought extraneous variables, such as injuries and (obviously) age/maturity. Fabulous skater offensively and still complements his size with nastiness defensively. Despite the statistics, I don't believe Day's career trajectory has altered.

 

[ottawah]

16 points in 60 games. -35, and only 34 penalty minutes. The numbers certainly do not appear to indicate he had a good rookie campaign.

Did he look out of place? Just too high of expectations on him given the elite company he's in?

Too high expectations. Its tough for 16 year old D men, much less 15 year old. I'm far more amazed with what Eckblad did than with what Day did not do.

And aside from that Day was on a terrible team, especially offensively. And the bulk of his negatives came in the first half of the year (-28 in first 31 games, -7 in the next 29). He really seemed to right the ship more in the second half.

He was also the 4th pick. The first D man taken managed less points despite being on a relatively offensive minded team.

So all in all it was a good season for Day. There was improvement through the year, his stats compared to other 97's was pretty good, especially when you consider the talent in front of him.

 

[hockeykid87]

I'm excited to see what he'll do next season.

 

[Torts]

From the standpoint of a Steelheads fan, trying to be as unbiased as possible.

Sean Day at times was the best player on the ice. These times were few and far between but they did come up every now and then. Instances where he would do something you say "WOW" or "How the F?". His skating his off the charts and is probably the best skater on the team as of today.

On the flip side there were the many rookie mistakes and errors that come from being a rookie defencemen in the OHL, also being a year younger then the youngest players. The learning curve was tough and earlier in the season he tried to beat everyone 1 on 1 which rarely worked out for him. To me I'd say you can throw the +/- stat in the garbage. In a league like the OHL where stronger teams sometimes beat weaker teams 8-1 or 9-1 I can't see and might never see it being a very important stat to track at the junior level.

I'd say where he really took a stride forward is the last couple games in the season + our series against Oshawa. He showed a willingness to throw the body around more and was very creative on the back end. Made good first passes out of the zone and other things you see from an experienced 19 year old.

Like McDavid and Ekblad before him his 2nd season will be a crucial one in figuring out where he stands with the rest of his 98 age group and other players in the league. Don't get me wrong Sean had his ups and downs in his rookie season and hopefully will be poised to take a big jump in 14-15 and an even bigger on in 15-16.