Beasts of the Blueline

[Gnashville]

http://espn.go.com/nhl/story/_/id/11751793/2014-15-nhl-season-#nhlrank-defensemen#comments

Three Predators in the top 50 in ESPN ranking of defenseman
Weber at #1 Josi #37 Jones #49
Josi is way to low and
Jones makes it due to potential because he has been IMO the fifth best on the team this season.

Click to read more...

 

[CMDEADLY]

http://espn.go.com/nhl/story/_/id/11751793/2014-15-nhl-season-#nhlrank-defensemen#comments

Three Predators in the top 50 in ESPN ranking of defenseman
Weber at #1 Josi #37 Jones #49
Jones makes it due to potential he has been IMO the fifth best on the team this season.

See, I would put Josi somewhere in the 15-25 range. However, obviously I'm not one of their experts. : ) Josi at the moment carries that line at times when Weber is chasing a little. Which I love because it also means that when Josi chases a little Weber holds everything down.

 

[glenngineer]

Jones has no business being on that list and Josi is way too low. How many of the guys ahead of him would you take before Roman? It's a freaking joke if you ask me. Most of those guys are either good offensively or defensively but to me Josi is one of the more complete players on the blue line.

 

[darth5]

Goes to show how little exposure the Preds really get that folks still have not noticed how awesome Josi is and how complete his game is. Agree Jones doesn't really belong there yet.

 

[AtlantaWhaler]

Josi should be 15-20, no Jones, and Ellis should be 40-50. Great to see Weber at 1 at least.

 

[AtlantaWhaler]

ESPN did a similar list of goalies and had Rinne at 8. Joke.

 

[42]

Josi way too low. Ignore ESPN hockey rankings in general.

 

[predfan24]

"panel of experts"

Jones shouldn't be on this list. Josi is way to low. Some of the people in front of him are laughable.

 

[Dave is a killer]

http://espn.go.com/nhl/story/_/id/11751793/2014-15-nhl-season-#nhlrank-defensemen#comments

Three Predators in the top 50 in ESPN ranking of defenseman
Weber at #1 Josi #37 Jones #49
Josi is way to low and
Jones makes it due to potential because he has been IMO the fifth best on the team this season.

In the words of the Columbus Blue Jackets twitter feed ... "Who is this?"

 

[triggrman]

For the record though, Jones is not our 5th defenseman, he has played far better than Ekholm.

Jones gets t h e Klein treatment now I guess

 

[Pred303]

if i were asked to rank overall performance of our d-men so far this year i admit i would probably say;

1)weber
2)josi
3)ellis
4)volchenkov
5)jones
6)eckholm

with weber/josi very close and volchenkov/jones very close as well

 

[deanwormer]

I suspect we tend to notice Ekholm playing poorly more than Jones because Volch covers better for Jones whereas Ellis not-so-much for Ekholm. They both look like 2nd-year guys right now - erratic and inconsistent. Jones obviously has capacity to outplay Ek and will over time, but his early season "goofs" are just as bad as the recent ones from Ek, I think.

 

[CaptainCatfish]

lolESPN, Columbus said it best...
Nashville blueline already look realy good, imagine in 2 years =)
Personally I have only watched the last 5-6 games with Nashville and to me they should be ranked the following.

1. Weber
2. Josi
3. Ellis
4. Jones or Ekholm, realy quiet close I guess. Doesnt seem fair to put the one over the other...
6. Volchenkov, But he Isnt realy that far from Jones or Ekholm so I'd say nashville blueline been realy good from top to bottom especailly when you consider how young many of them are.

 

[NSH615]

lolESPN, Columbus said it best...
Nashville blueline already look realy good, imagine in 2 years =)
Personally I have only watched the last 5-6 games with Nashville and to me they should be ranked the following.

1. Weber
2. Josi
3. Ellis
4. Jones or Ekholm, realy quiet close I guess. Doesnt seem fair to put the one over the other...
6. Volchenkov, But he Isnt realy that far from Jones or Ekholm so I'd say nashville blueline been realy good from top to bottom especailly when you consider how young many of them are.

In 2 years I would imagine that Diaby takes Volchenkov's spot

 

[triggrman]

if i were asked to rank overall performance of our d-men so far this year i admit i would probably say;

1)weber
2)josi
3)ellis
4)volchenkov
5)jones
6)eckholm

with weber/josi very close and volchenkov/jones very close as well

I think it would be close between Jones and Volchenkov but I'd give the edge to Jones. He's used his speed much more this year to shut down guys. He has had some turnovers trying to do too much but he's still miles ahead of Volchenkov with the puck.

I've like that he's on both the powerplay and the penalty kill. He's becoming what we wanted, an all around good defenseman.

I think overall Jones is having a good learning year. He's getting better at reading on the PK, and is getting more and more defensive zone starts.

 

[Drake744]

The fact that Jones is only 20 (barely) is encouraging to me rather than maybe being down on him. It's not too uncommon for a forward like well, Forsberg for example, to come in and make a big time impact at a young age but as most of us know, defensemen traditionally take longer to develop into those elite-type players. I think what he's learning from Lavy and Housley, who have experience coaching him with Team USA is huge for him as he continues to develop. Sure he's had some lapses here and there, and he's still trying to find his footing in the league, but I can almost guarantee that our coaches are giving him reasons to play with confidence and that'll be big moving forward. There are a large group of teams in this league that would have him somewhere in their top 3 defensemen right now.

 

[PredsV82]

we sometimnes forget that Suter and Weber didnt burst on the scene as top pair defensemen at age 20 either. Jones is on track and doing fine and is going to benefit from the fact that he didnt go to a team that needed him to be a top pair guy right off the bat

 

[Pred303]

i agree with all three of you guys.

trig, you're right jones has made improvements specifically to his defensive zone coverge. and for the first real time he's been getting pp and pk time which in the long run he needed to further develop his growth.

and drake and voldy, you are both right of course, for his age, he has progressed very well. he's actually a better all around player at his age than either weber or suter were.

the areas he still needs to work on to become the really good d-man we want him to be remain;
1)better decision making on the breakout. we now get one awful mental lapse every couple games instead of every game last year on the breakout when under no pressure. most often that mistake has been the lazy pass up the middle of the ice. (which as you can tell drives me nuts).
2)he plays far too small for his size. hopefully as he matures and adds muscle he will begin to use that size and play a more physical game.
3)he's a great puck handler thru the neutral zone, but once he gets there tends to not make decisions fast enough too often right now.
4)use those offensive skills better on the point on the pp. after two years, i still don't really know if he has a slap shot.
5)keep his momma's mouth shut. still bugs me she was *****ing publicly about him not getting first line minutes last year.

i know he has high upside. possibly elite upside. i can be patient waiting for that. however, i do think he will be at risk to be traded in the future because not sure we can tie up that large of a percentage of our payroll (weber) on our blueline. probably poile's mistake in trading stevens might prevent that, but i just don't know.

 

[triggrman]

He chased down a puck a few games ago against I think it was Eberle, that there's no way he should have won the race too, and by the time he actually took possession of the puck, he was few strides ahead.

There can't be many in the NHL with his speed.

 

[Pred303]

no, every game he shows flashes of his potential stick handling or skating in some way, i give you that.

 

[Soundgarden]

Speaking of Jones's play I think he made a nice decision vs. Toronto when we were up 5-0, he was taking the puck up and carrying it towards the offensive zone, when he just slowed down near center and passed it and went back to the blue line instead of wanting to join in on the offense. I just thought that was a good call.

 

[MrJoshua]

I think he's progressing nicely. And the blue line is in good shape for the next several years with Weber basically signed for life, Josi signed until the summer of 2020, Ellis signed until the summer of 2019, and Jones and Ekholm hitting RFA status in the summer of 2016. I could see both of those guys signing bridge-type extensions this off season to extend them about 3 more years. Which means theoretically the team could have an outstanding defense at a very reasonable cap hit for the next 4-5 years. Now after that there might need to be some hard decisions made. But this defensive group could be essentially set for at least the next 4-5 years, by which point they should be the best defense in the NHL if they continue progressing as we hope.

 

[dougie1107]

What frustrates me about Jones is he has all that size and is still trying to finesse everything. If he would just bring more physicality to his game he could be doing sooo much better.

 

[Drake744]

What frustrates me about Jones is he has all that size and is still trying to finesse everything. If he would just bring more physicality to his game he could be doing sooo much better.

He'll always have the smooth, athletic, finesse part to his game I think, but I also think that as he matures that will take care of itself. He hasn't filled out as much as I'm sure he's capable of yet.

 

[NSH615]

What frustrates me about Jones is he has all that size and is still trying to finesse everything. If he would just bring more physicality to his game he could be doing sooo much better.

This is how I feel about Seth as well and what I complain about the most.