Confirmed with Link: Douglas Murray signed 1 year deal ($1.5m)

[LLoyd Christmas I]

what jersey number will Murray wear in Montreal?

He wore both 6 and 41 for a while.

 

[FlyingKostitsyn]

He wore both 6 and 41 for a while.

41 isn't a defensemen number but I'd prefer that to no6. Recent Habs defensemen wearing no 6 have been lackluster to say the least. On the other end Murray's just as slow as the previous number sixes, hopefully he's 100x more intimidating.

 

[LLoyd Christmas I]

41 isn't a defensemen number but I'd prefer that to no6. Recent Habs defensemen wearing no 6 have been lackluster to say the least. On the other end Murray's just as slow as the previous number sixes, hopefully he's 100x more intimidating.

Briere's more intimidating than some of the recent 6s.

 

[Hoople]

The people that were dying to have Artyu, the guys that wanted us to call up Alex Henry when we played Boston, the people that think Shawn freaking Thornton was the reason why Boston won the damn cup. Those guys.

You ignore momentum at your own peril.

 

[MSLs absurd thighs]

There are a number of stay at home defensemen that the micros love. They just aren't the ones that have zero puck skills and skating ability. What the really show is that a lot of these guys are abso-freaking useless at the 180 feet of the ice that aren't right around their own net.

Guys like Fayne, Vlasic, McDonagh, Hamhuis, Garrison, Sarich, Staal, Alzner, Hamonic, Smid, Mitchell, Jackman Beachemin etc. are stay at home guys. But they are ones that actually get results defensively. The problem with guys like Komisarek et al is that because they can't help push play forward they spend to much time with the other side attacking, which leads to more goals against. And if a "defensive" defenseman is bad at keeping goals from happening when he's on the ice, what's the point of him?

Murray used to be a stay at home guy the advanced stats loved. But that was two years ago and his numbers have cratered. Which co-incides with when he lost the ability to skate.

McDonagh is a stay-at-home type now? Vlasic? Hamhuis?... Staal?! Beauchemin? Garrison?

Most of the guys you just enumerated aren't even playing a stay-at-home game. Smid himself has some terrible shot-differential stats when he's on the ice. This Berkshire guy (or whatever his name is) piled up some stats claiming that Scuderi had a negative influence on his team's play in the defensive zone.

The thing is that, you come up with stats on Murray taken completely out of the chart/context itself, you don't mention all of the aberration on these reports, and you make it look like it's rocket science. And some people buy that.

Sorry if I don't. Especially with stats showing a tendency to discredit a lot of what guys like Murray, Regehr and Smid (3 very good d-men in their own style) do.

 

[MSLs absurd thighs]

Briere's more intimidating than some of the recent 6s.

I now want a sitcom featuring Douglas and a gorilla as his best friend.

 

[Talks to Goalposts]

McDonagh is a stay-at-home type now? Vlasic? Hamhuis?... Staal?! Beauchemin? Garrison?

Most of the guys you just enumerated aren't even playing a stay-at-home game. Smid himself has some terrible shot-differential stats when he's on the ice. This Berkshire guy (or whatever his name is) piled up some stats claiming that Scuderi had a negative influence on his team's play in the defensive zone.

The thing is that, you come up with stats on Murray taken completely out of the chart/context itself, you don't mention all of the aberration on these reports, and you make it look like it's rocket science. And some people buy that.

Sorry if I don't. Especially with stats showing a tendency to discredit a lot of what guys like Murray, Regehr and Smid (3 very good d-men in their own style) do.

Shot differential stats love Smid if you factor in he plays for a garbage hockey club. Smid + Petry/Gilbert have been the only pairing worth more than a bucket of spit in Edmonton in recent seasons and that shows up by the numbers, 4 years running he gets near he top of his team in shot differentials.

What the numbers also show is that Murray and Regehr were solid defensive players 2 years ago but they've fallen off a cliff. These were guys the numbers liked back then, albeit not as much as legit two-way defensemen. Its right out in the open that these guys get lit up on the score board. Its easy to see why by watching the games too, they're slow and useless away from defending their own net which ironically ends up leading to lots of goals against.

The fact is, if you want to play real NHL defense, you can't just pound people and guard the front of the net. That results in you getting shelled. The good defensively oriented blueliners are the guys I'm talking about, who have aren't nearly as limited as the old and the slow. Even in the clutch and grab playoffs these guys get bombarded with goals against.

 

[McPheesMoustache]

Lesson 1 of narrative theory: They are constructed by individual or a group of individual actors, all of which have their own motivations and interests to promote.
Lesson 2 of narrative theory: As an interpretation of reality, as opposed to a true representation of reality, narratives only represent parts of an event rather than the whole of it.
Lesson 3 narrative theory: Narratives tend to exclude, overlook and deliberately omit aspects of reality that immediately contradict or challenge it.

Lesson 4 of narrative theory: because they are predicated on a set of binary assumptions that are inherently inductive as well as self-serving (as per your lesson 1), the expansion of the narrative's logical argument to a large enough sample of examples will reveal the underlying contradictions of the bias.

e.g.
Mtl lost to Ott because of a lack of toughness...
Toronto took Boston to 7 games because while you may think their dmen are ahl caliber, they are tough and therefore hard to play against...

but...

Pittsburgh annihilated Ottawa based on skill and then got jacked up by Boston based on the same toughness that apparently elevated Toronto to be a much better team than pittsburgh...

But meanwhile that same team toughness was immediately lacking from Ottawas gameplan against pitt?

Point being... taken together all arguments about the importance of toughness are non sequitor out of specific context and a couple of good bounces early in a game/series can completely change the outcome.

If anything, the HABS should try to target "lucky" players, and based on the pics Ive seen of Nordegren, Murray seems to fit the bill

 

[dcyhabs]

The problem is the advanced stats don't show the impact of one or two guys who can hit. You could see it at times with the habs, and more obviously when Emelin was out. The habs would go timidly over the opposition blue line and wait to get hit. Opponents would charge over the habs blue line with no fear.

Tinordi's advanced stats were pretty weak but having him out there changed the way othere teams played.

I suspect Price will look a lot better with a little toughness, too. It must damage his stats to have people push him into the net and then score.

BTW I'm anti-fighting and I prefer to watch skill over clutching and grabbing, but Bettman has bean clear on this. He thinks people want fights and weak hockey (or at least a lack of penalties even if one team constantly deserves them and slows the play to a crawl). No protection for skilled players, either, even the major stars who sell the game.

 

[Lshap]

Lesson 4 of narrative theory: because they are predicated on a set of binary assumptions that are inherently inductive as well as self-serving (as per your lesson 1), the expansion of the narrative's logical argument to a large enough sample of examples will reveal the underlying contradictions of the bias.

e.g.
Mtl lost to Ott because of a lack of toughness...
Toronto took Boston to 7 games because while you may think their dmen are ahl caliber, they are tough and therefore hard to play against...

but...

Pittsburgh annihilated Ottawa based on skill and then got jacked up by Boston based on the same toughness that apparently elevated Toronto to be a much better team than pittsburgh...

But meanwhile that same team toughness was immediately lacking from Ottawas gameplan against pitt?

Point being... taken together all arguments about the importance of toughness are non sequitor out of specific context and a couple of good bounces early in a game/series can completely change the outcome.

If anything, the HABS should try to target "lucky" players, and based on the pics Ive seen of Nordegren, Murray seems to fit the bill

The flourish of pretentious gobbledegook that began your post was rescued by a great punchline at the end. Nice.

 

[Ohashi_Jouzu*]

What the numbers also show is that Murray and Regehr were solid defensive players 2 years ago but they've fallen off a cliff.

Funny, because before this strike shortened season, Murray's PDO was well over 1000 (second highest among Shark defenders), and his on-ice SV% was 0.944. If goalies stop 94.4% of the shots while you're on the ice, and the team is still generating enough offense around you to end up with a >1000 PDO, I don't care what the other micro stats tell you, you're looking at an effective stay-at-home defender.

So all this "decline" has pretty much been observed during the past strike-shortened and condensed season... He has always been slow, and there have always been people who default their thinking to "slow=not good in the nuuuu NHL", but anyone commenting on his diminishing effectiveness starting any earlier simply isn't looking at the right numbers to go with their observation (where applicable... which it often isn't, it would seem).

I didn't end up responding to overlords' post a couple of days ago, but he echoed the same thing I keep reading: "if we get 2009 Murray, it will be worth it". Well, my question is: by the numbers (since this is obviously where overlords/MathMan/etc spend most of their time making decisions/evaluations), how much difference IS there between 2009 Murray and 2010 or 2011 Murray? Seems to me that last year is the only time I've seen both a) periods of being exploited by a small group of faster skaters AND b) seen a corresponding "significant" drop in his numbers (last year was the first time <1000 for his PDO, for example, and the first time that his on-ice SV% didn't rank very highly beside his teammates).

This "pattern of decline thing" has been overstated, and is not even in the same realm of alarm that Briere's "decline" is, or Kaberle's was, imo. And just wait until people see how good/smart Murray is at pinching at the offensive blueline to keep pucks in the zone, or forcing the dump in when opposing forwards get to the blueline. That's not showing up in the stats anywhere either, unfortunately, but is another hallmark of a smart player who can make judgements quickly enough to compensate for whatever physical limitations affect execution.

 

[overlords]

Funny, because before this strike shortened season, Murray's PDO was well over 1000 (second highest among Shark defenders), and his on-ice SV% was 0.944. If goalies stop 94.4% of the shots while you're on the ice, and the team is still generating enough offense around you to end up with a >1000 PDO, I don't care what the other micro stats tell you, you're looking at an effective stay-at-home defender.

So all this "decline" has pretty much been observed during the past strike-shortened and condensed season... He has always been slow, and there have always been people who default their thinking to "slow=not good in the nuuuu NHL", but anyone commenting on his diminishing effectiveness starting any earlier simply isn't looking at the right numbers to go with their observation (where applicable... which it often isn't, it would seem).

I didn't end up responding to overlords' post a couple of days ago, but he echoed the same thing I keep reading: "if we get 2009 Murray, it will be worth it". Well, my question is: by the numbers (since this is obviously where overlords/MathMan/etc spend most of their time making decisions/evaluations), how much difference IS there between 2009 Murray and 2010 or 2011 Murray? Seems to me that last year is the only time I've seen both a) periods of being exploited by a small group of faster skaters AND b) seen a corresponding "significant" drop in his numbers (last year was the first time <1000 for his PDO, for example, and the first time that his on-ice SV% didn't rank very highly beside his teammates).

This "pattern of decline thing" has been overstated, and is not even in the same realm of alarm that Briere's "decline" is, or Kaberle's was, imo. And just wait until people see how good/smart Murray is at pinching at the offensive blueline to keep pucks in the zone, or forcing the dump in when opposing forwards get to the blueline. That's not showing up in the stats anywhere either, unfortunately, but is another hallmark of a smart player who can make judgements quickly enough to compensate for whatever physical limitations affect execution.

Jesus. People take this **** personally.

 

[HankyZetts]

Murray used to be a stay at home guy the advanced stats loved. But that was two years ago and his numbers have cratered. Which co-incides with when he lost the ability to skate.

What a ridiculous thing to say.. In one offseason he simply "lost the ability to skate"? There couldn't have been a change in some of the infinite number of other variables? You say 2 years ago as if it were a decade ago. Murray still has some game left, and after Chara, he may be the toughest dman in the league. Whether there is a quantitative stat for it or not, clearing your crease and keeping opponents conscious of the fact they may be knocked unconscious while crossing our blueline, is a very important aspect of the game called hockey. And more importantly, those are two aspects we desperately lacked.

Anyone else still have nightmares of Josh Gorges being pushed around by Kyle Turris?!!

This is one of those Brandon Prust moves. And by that I mean that when the news came through on Twitter, I jumped for joy. There shouldn't be a single person against this move. Like, for real.

Of course. It would be great if he put his high intellect to use on some sort of anti-aging cream that brought back his top-4 effectiveness, but I wouldn't be the one betting 1.5 million dollars on it.

I'm only just a bit more to the negative (regarding the player) than you. I'd say he's more in the 'depth' d-man mold than 'bottom pairing' if he puts up last year's performance again, or god forbid, gets worse. If he improves a bit on last year's performance, yeah I'd say #6 isn't the end of the world at all. I can't wait to see him destroy kessel.

Doug Murray is a perfect "bottom pairing Dman". He's a major need on this team and is simply a better player than Bouillon and DD. If he's #7 on our team, we are in the money.

Shawn freaking Thornton changed nothing. Nothing.

Don't bury your head in the sand man. Thornton definitely wasn't the MVP of that series, but he was certainly one of the turning points. He swung the momentum for them, and that is not quantifiable by any stat.

.....

Great post OJ.

 

[Ohashi_Jouzu*]

Jesus. People take this **** personally.

That's not taking it personally. If 90% of the commentary surrounding Murray's (or any other player's, for that matter) "decline" is mired in the depths of advanced statistics, then the shoe fits.

 

[overlords]

That's not taking it personally. If 90% of the commentary surrounding Murray's (or any other player's, for that matter) "decline" is mired in the depths of advanced statistics, then the shoe fits.

I've defended the usage of advanced stats a lot in this thread, but I don't even think I've actually brought any into the conversation. Most if not all my comments on murray were based on viewing. It's just cool that the advanced stats back up what I saw.

Doug Murray is a perfect "bottom pairing Dman". He's a major need on this team and is simply a better player than Bouillon and DD. If he's #7 on our team, we are in the money.

You're not really bringing much in the form of argument here. He's a perfect 'bottom pairing dman'? Well, I'm sold.

I remember when you were telling me that Subban 'simply' wasn't as good as a few other dudes around this time last year, too.

 

[Dr Gonzo]

I've defended the usage of advanced stats a lot in this thread, but I don't even think I've actually brought any into the conversation. Most if not all my comments on murray were based on viewing. It's just cool that the advanced stats back up what I saw.

Wait wait wait...

You mean, you watch the games, and then you look at advanced stats for more information?

That's...crazy.

Admit it, you don't watch the games. Neither does mathman. You guys just wait until behindthenet.ca comes out with numbers, and then you formulate an opinion.

ADMIT IT!

 

[overlords]

Wait wait wait...

You mean, you watch the games, and then you look at advanced stats for more information?

That's...crazy.

Admit it, you don't watch the games. Neither does mathman. You guys just wait until behindthenet.ca comes out with numbers, and then you formulate an opinion.

ADMIT IT!

I stick to stats so much I had to ask Mathman where he got a bunch of his shots on goal stats.

And man, glad I can cancel my hockeystreams account now. You guys just saved me 110$.

 

[HankyZetts]

I've defended the usage of advanced stats a lot in this thread, but I don't even think I've actually brought any into the conversation. Most if not all my comments on murray were based on viewing. It's just cool that the advanced stats back up what I saw.




You're not really bringing much in the form of argument here. He's a perfect 'bottom pairing dman'? Well, I'm sold.

I remember when you were telling me that Subban 'simply' wasn't as good as a few other dudes around this time last year, too.

So, I haven't brought much of an argument but you use something from another thread, another topic and from a year ago to discredit me? Hmm..

Murray is a perfect bottom pairing dman, that's what I've gathered from my viewings of him and my take on Montreals needs. Whether or not you are "sold" is irrelevant. I take it upon myself to counter your disinformation so that the uninformed reader doesn't just believe the "Ahl caliber dman" drivel that's been spewing from this thread.

And Subban, up to the point of the argument we had in the other thread, simply wasn't the same player we saw last year. He continued with his rocket like progression and proved most of my reservations about his game wrong. Good for everyone!

 

[Ohashi_Jouzu*]

I've defended the usage of advanced stats a lot in this thread, but I don't even think I've actually brought any into the conversation. Most if not all my comments on murray were based on viewing. It's just cool that the advanced stats back up what I saw.

They really don't, is the point I just made - last year aside, of course, as explained. You've claimed an observable and sharp decline since 2009. I'd like to see a sample of the statistical "proof" since then that leads you to be concerned about what we're going to get out of a $1.5 million, 1 year investment in Murray.

 

[Forsead]

Funny, because before this strike shortened season, Murray's PDO was well over 1000 (second highest among Shark defenders), and his on-ice SV% was 0.944. If goalies stop 94.4% of the shots while you're on the ice, and the team is still generating enough offense around you to end up with a >1000 PDO, I don't care what the other micro stats tell you, you're looking at an effective stay-at-home defender.

So all this "decline" has pretty much been observed during the past strike-shortened and condensed season... He has always been slow, and there have always been people who default their thinking to "slow=not good in the nuuuu NHL", but anyone commenting on his diminishing effectiveness starting any earlier simply isn't looking at the right numbers to go with their observation (where applicable... which it often isn't, it would seem).

I didn't end up responding to overlords' post a couple of days ago, but he echoed the same thing I keep reading: "if we get 2009 Murray, it will be worth it". Well, my question is: by the numbers (since this is obviously where overlords/MathMan/etc spend most of their time making decisions/evaluations), how much difference IS there between 2009 Murray and 2010 or 2011 Murray? Seems to me that last year is the only time I've seen both a) periods of being exploited by a small group of faster skaters AND b) seen a corresponding "significant" drop in his numbers (last year was the first time <1000 for his PDO, for example, and the first time that his on-ice SV% didn't rank very highly beside his teammates).

This "pattern of decline thing" has been overstated, and is not even in the same realm of alarm that Briere's "decline" is, or Kaberle's was, imo. And just wait until people see how good/smart Murray is at pinching at the offensive blueline to keep pucks in the zone, or forcing the dump in when opposing forwards get to the blueline. That's not showing up in the stats anywhere either, unfortunately, but is another hallmark of a smart player who can make judgements quickly enough to compensate for whatever physical limitations affect execution.

Pretty good post, there's peoples who are freaking out about his decline, but it only ''started'' at the start of the 2012-2013 season (he was a top 4 for the Sharks during all of 2011-2012 on a pretty good team). 50 games isn't alot in hockey and doesn't indicate that much, especially when looking at so many guys career. Even last season Murray played 17 minutes with the Sharks and 18:29 with the Penguins. Then again all his microstats declined for this season, but he was also traded and I think it may be a guy that had a harder time getting to the right speed, something we saw with some olders defensemans this season. Being slow for a big defenseman has being showed again and again that it didn't matter that much, even in the new NHL.

However I think it would be fair to conclude that he isn't very good in the PO, since he seems to have played noticeably worst in the last two times.

Anyway having a mean physical number 6 or 7 defenseman at 1,5 million is a pretty good deal, go compare...and it's possible he could play on a higher level than that. Murray is very intimidating, how many years have passed since that ? I'm happy.

I'm seriously surprised that so many posters doesn't like that move, what choice Bergevin had ? throwing Tinordi at the wolfes by making a rookie D being the only physical force on the backend ? doesn't seems like a good idea, for what I saw I would really prefer he would start in the AHL and completly dominate as a physical force there, before being called up.

They weren't the best, but the team seriously lacked having a physical D squad like in 2005-2006 :

Markov-Komisarek
Rivet-Souray
Dandouillon
Simpson

The crease was clear and the team wasn't getting pushed around too much. I'm not sure about the pairing though.

 

[Sorinth]

There are a number of stay at home defensemen that the micros love. They just aren't the ones that have zero puck skills and skating ability. What the really show is that a lot of these guys are abso-freaking useless at the 180 feet of the ice that aren't right around their own net.

Guys like Fayne, Vlasic, McDonagh, Hamhuis, Garrison, Sarich, Staal, Alzner, Hamonic, Smid, Mitchell, Jackman Beachemin etc. are stay at home guys. But they are ones that actually get results defensively. The problem with guys like Komisarek et al is that because they can't help push play forward they spend to much time with the other side attacking, which leads to more goals against. And if a "defensive" defenseman is bad at keeping goals from happening when he's on the ice, what's the point of him?

Murray used to be a stay at home guy the advanced stats loved. But that was two years ago and his numbers have cratered. Which co-incides with when he lost the ability to skate.

A lot of the guys you listed are 2-way defenceman not stay at home guys. Not too mention for the most part are paid way more than Murray. As for Murray 2 years ago didn't he play with Boyle? So even if he stayed exactly the same his advanced stats would take a beating simply because he no longer had a premiere PMD next to him. If the player can be just as good but still have a wild fluctuation in his advanced stats it brings into question the validity of those stats. Personally I feel much like +/- they inherently favour the offensive guys over the defensive ones.

We had issues closing out games, in the last few minutes of play when the opponent is pressing for the tying goal we are in a defensive mode whether we have a PMD or a Shutdown guy. This is hopefully where Murray will shine and can help the team more than a PMD would.

 

[Ohashi_Jouzu*]

We had issues closing out games, in the last few minutes of play when the opponent is pressing for the tying goal we are in a defensive mode whether we have a PMD or a Shutdown guy. This is hopefully where Murray will shine and can help the team more than a PMD would.

Also, if you want to create an environment where someone like Beaulieu can feel comfortable breaking into the NHL, how about having the choice of Tinordi or Murray to put beside him on a 3rd pairing? All things considered, and in a division that may have just gotten bigger and slower this year, I'm already prepared to chalk this up as a good, nay, great move.

 

[S Bah]

Briere's more intimidating than some of the recent 6s.

Doug is definitely a good presence in the dressing room, very calming and happy.

 

[Andy]

Doug is definitely a good presence in the dressing room, very calming and happy.

You deciphered that from a 3 minute video?

 

[Kenny Powders]

You deciphered that from a 3 minute video?

A lot of people dicephered is play looking only at stats too ...