Forward Depth

[Lafleurs Guy]

Not comparing the guys. Comparing the arguments.

And by the way, Chucky was only dropped from the top two lines after 15 games under Julien, about 22 games after his return and struggles.

Galchenyuk's usage was horrible from day one. We're talking apples and oranges here.

 

[BaseballCoach]

Yeah, he's not a bust, I'll give him that. But since you asked, I'll stop the presses for the 93rd ranked scorer in the NHL this year.

R E S U L T S

93rd scorer, 82nd among forwards, in a league where there are 186 top-6ers?

Who said to stop the presses? Just recognize reality for what it is, not more like some do, and not less like you have.

 

[BaseballCoach]

Galchenyuk's usage was horrible from day one. We're talking apples and oranges here.

Again, that was not the point. The point was that people were saying, "give Chucky our best wingers and he'll give you 60 points per year". Would those same people say the same for Danault? Or do they still resent that Therrien carried his bag for him the day he arrived?

 

[Sorinth]

I didn't say it doesn't count.

I said he's been put in a position to succeed - and he's succeeding. But as I said, he's traditionally been a .5 per game player. For about 20 games this year he scored over a point per game. To me, that's a hot streak.

As I said, I'll re-evaluate as we continue on. If he goes back to .5 per game player using our best wingers then yeah, I'll continue to think he's a third line guy. If he continues on this higher pace then I'll be happy to change my mind.

Well only 72 forwards last year produced 41 EVP last season, so the idea that any third line guy could produce his numbers if they get to play on the top line with the teams best players is just preposterous.

If he continues his production then he'd be a 1st liner, so the real question is what would he have to do to be a 2nd liner? Because two years ago he finished 72 in the league for forwards in EVP, the year after he had a similar pace but missed a bunch of games, and this year he's 39th. He's been producing like a low end 1st liner/high end 2nd liner for the past 3 seasons (Including this one), but somehow you need more time to call him more then a 3rd line guy?

 

[Sorinth]

Galchenyuk's usage was horrible from day one. We're talking apples and oranges here.

Yet when played with our best players on the top line he produced similar to what Danault is producing on the top line with our best players. So either Galchenyuk was nothing more then a 3rd liner who benefited from playing on the top line with our best players to inflate his stats or Danault is more then a 3rd liner.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

Again, that was not the point. The point was that people were saying, "give Chucky our best wingers and he'll give you 60 points per year". Would those same people say the same for Danault? Or do they still resent that Therrien carried his bag for him the day he arrived?

It's not about resentment... it's just about how the team has been run.

We f***ed up Chuck's development. Nobody will ever change my mind on that. I'm not sure why he's being brought up now though as he's not on the club any longer.

Well only 72 forwards last year produced 41 EVP last season, so the idea that any third line guy could produce his numbers if they get to play on the top line with the teams best players is just preposterous.

If he continues his production then he'd be a 1st liner, so the real question is what would he have to do to be a 2nd liner? Because two years ago he finished 72 in the league for forwards in EVP, the year after he had a similar pace but missed a bunch of games, and this year he's 39th. He's been producing like a low end 1st liner/high end 2nd liner for the past 3 seasons (Including this one), but somehow you need more time to call him more then a 3rd line guy?

We're talking two different things here though...

Was Koivu a 1st liner? Sure. But he was a bottom third first liner. If he's your first liner you're in trouble.

And that's how I feel with most of our players right now. Who's our best guy? Domi? Is he really a legit first line guy? I don't think so. I think he'd be a great 2nd line guy just like I think Danno would ideally be my third line guy.

Danno has been used mostly as a first line player (minus the PP time) for most of the time he's been here and he's a .5 ppg player. And I'd say that's misusing him except we had Chuck (who was hurt a lot) and Plekanec who was washed up.

To me he's a lot better suited to the 3rd line than the 2nd. That's what he'd be on a strong team anyway.

 

[ECWHSWI]

And the beat goes on...

So, you're saying he did not try to land Stastny/Tavares.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

Yet when played with our best players on the top line he produced similar to what Danault is producing on the top line with our best players. So either Galchenyuk was nothing more then a 3rd liner who benefited from playing on the top line with our best players to inflate his stats or Danault is more then a 3rd liner.

Again, I'm not sure why we're talking about Chuck here. He was 20 years old and producing pretty well despite being held back on badly coached teams. When he was finally given the gig he was a top five scorer in the NHL and a point per game the following season until he got hurt. He was drafted 3rd overall and has one of the best shots we've seen in a while. What does he have to do with Danno?

 

[ECWHSWI]

Without every prospect rounding out to form, a potential lineup in anywhere from 2-4 years could look like:

Domi - Kotkaniemi - Acquired RW (Stone?)
Drouin - Danault - Gallagher
Tatar - Poehling - Suzuki
Lehkonen - Evans - Byron
Armia

Acquired LD - Weber
Romanov - Brook
Mete - Juulsen/Fleury

*Ideally, Petry used to acquire help at LD.

ALL of Gallagher, Domi, Danault, Byron, Armia, Tatar are re-signed by the Habs.
almost every Habs "important" prospects make it with the CH, hell! they'll make for half the D corp, including half the top 4.


yup, the beat goes on....

 

[BehindTheTimes]

How long are people going to cling to this ppg streak chucky had? This is not who he is, but I hear ppl use it as evidence that this is more representative of who Chucky is as a player than anything that happened before or since. He was never that guy, during his streak he wasn't really generating a large amount of chances compared to the rest of his career, it was always an unsustainable streak. It made him look a little more promising at the time, but everything since has shown this stretch to be nothing more than an aberration.

I wouldn't be completely surprised if the same thing happens to Domi. It's already started.

 

[BaseballCoach]

ALL of Gallagher, Domi, Danault, Byron, Armia, Tatar are re-signed by the Habs.
almost every Habs "important" prospects make it with the CH, hell! they'll make for half the D corp, including half the top 4.
yup, the beat goes on....

I showed yesterday how the cap could be managed, with only one of the prospects making the top 6 or top-4 D and two others making the team over two years. Not unrealistic.

 

[BaseballCoach]

How long are people going to cling to this ppg streak chucky had? This is not who he is, but I hear ppl use it as evidence that this is more representative of who Chucky is as a player than anything that happened before or since. He was never that guy, during his streak he wasn't really generating a large amount of chances compared to the rest of his career, it was always an unsustainable streak. It made him look a little more promising at the time, but everything since has shown this stretch to be nothing more than an aberration.

I wouldn't be completely surprised if the same thing happens to Domi. It's already started.

During his goal-scoring streak in 2015-16 Chucky was shooting over 30%

 

[BehindTheTimes]

During his goal-scoring streak in 2015-16 Chucky was shooting over 30%

Exactly

 

[montreal]

I wouldn't be completely surprised if the same thing happens to Domi. It's already started.

In his first 33 games Domi had 33 pts, in his last 25 games he's got 16 pts. But to be fair that's still impressive as there was no way he was going from a 45 pt season in 82 games to a ppg even with the increased scoring due to the change in goalie equipment (I assume since so many players seem to at higher totals then last year in the league, but haven't actually compared the numbers)

I thought he would be a low 50's pt player for us, but he's on pace to easily break 60 which is impressive but still makes me wonder what he'll be going forward as clearly he has the skill to be at least a 50+ pt guy but can he be a 70 pt guy, which when I saw him in London I would have thought possible. If he can be that's huge for us and would be a nice win for MB in the trade.

 

[Kriss E]

Agreed about our very thin D, absolutely. But remember, my depth numbers were NOT focused on 3rd or 4th lines at all. I was measuring top 81 forwards (first liners) and top 155 forwards (top-5 per team). It's easy to say that some of the top-6ers on Boston and LA played better than normal in the years those teams won the Cup, but when you have 4 first liner types and 7 top-5 guys, that can happen to us too. Still, Montreal's chances this year are miniscule. We need Kotkaniemi to become a dominant player, and two top-4 LD, at least one of whom we don't have yet, to have a decent chance in 2020 and/or 2021.

Your stats on top 81 and 155 players...I have no idea how meaningful they are, and when I watch our team play, I think they mean close to nothing.

 

[Sorinth]

How long are people going to cling to this ppg streak chucky had? This is not who he is, but I hear ppl use it as evidence that this is more representative of who Chucky is as a player than anything that happened before or since. He was never that guy, during his streak he wasn't really generating a large amount of chances compared to the rest of his career, it was always an unsustainable streak. It made him look a little more promising at the time, but everything since has shown this stretch to be nothing more than an aberration.

I wouldn't be completely surprised if the same thing happens to Domi. It's already started.

If you combine every single game he played at center going back to his rookie year and look at the stats they show that he had very similar numbers to his streak. In total he ended up with around 120 games at center and was something like a 65 point guy.

It wasn't just one streak where he was hot, it was every single time he was used at center. In fact the only unproductive time he was at center was when he came back from his injury in 2017.

 

[Sorinth]

Your stats on top 81 and 155 players...I have no idea how meaningful they are, and when I watch our team play, I think they mean close to nothing.

There is generally a wide gap within the label 1st line player or top-6 player. So even a team with 3 legit 1st line players won't necessarily match up well against a team whose 1st line players include guys like Kucherov, Stamkos, Point. There's a massive gap between the 65-70 point 1st line player and the guy pace for 130 points.

So we might very well have the correct amount of 1st & 2nd liners, but it's mostly irrelevant because a) They aren't as good as other teams 1st liners, and b) there are teams out there with 4-5 first line quality players.

 

[Goldenhands]

We lack top end talents on our top 6 period.

 

[26Mats]

How long are people going to cling to this ppg streak chucky had? This is not who he is, but I hear ppl use it as evidence that this is more representative of who Chucky is as a player than anything that happened before or since. He was never that guy, during his streak he wasn't really generating a large amount of chances compared to the rest of his career, it was always an unsustainable streak. It made him look a little more promising at the time, but everything since has shown this stretch to be nothing more than an aberration.

I wouldn't be completely surprised if the same thing happens to Domi. It's already started.

Both would benefit from playing with better players than they're currently playing with. In fact, I think a Domi-Galchenyuk duo would be a great combo. Domi's more of a passer, who can also finish. Galchenyuk's more of a finisher, who can also set guys up. Plus, Galchenyuk is a player that's on when he's on - he's much better when he's playing with confidence - he starts "dancing" as Ray Feraro commented. Domi's intensity would help in that relm.

 

[Kriss E]

There is generally a wide gap within the label 1st line player or top-6 player. So even a team with 3 legit 1st line players won't necessarily match up well against a team whose 1st line players include guys like Kucherov, Stamkos, Point. There's a massive gap between the 65-70 point 1st line player and the guy pace for 130 points.

So we might very well have the correct amount of 1st & 2nd liners, but it's mostly irrelevant because a) They aren't as good as other teams 1st liners, and b) there are teams out there with 4-5 first line quality players.

Precisely why I think those stats are meaningless.
If they did, well dang..Habs are one of the best teams in the league, except everyone knows that ain't the case.

 

[Teufelsdreck]

The Habs loaded up with LHDmen in the draft, but those prospects aren't NHL-ready. There's a new deficit==depth at right wing. now that Shaw has been traded. Any suggestions?

 

[lo striver]

The Habs loaded up with LHDmen in the draft, but those prospects aren't NHL-ready. There's a new deficit==depth at right wing. now that Shaw has been traded. Any suggestions?

load up in the next year draft?