Guess I'll get things started here.
A big Montreal weakness - having two offense-only defensemen who need to be sheltered in the lineup at the same time
Reed Larson and Yuri Liapkin put up great stats, but the awards records indicate that they were never thought of as great defensemen.
First Larson. As always, I'm requiring a minimum of 2 votes for this to count.
Larson's All-Star record: 10, 10, 12, 14
Larson's All-Star record is shockingly bad for a defenseman who put up the stats he did. Compare to NJ's 5th, 6th, and 7th defensemen:
Hatcher All-Star record: 5, 7, 9, 10, 12, 14
Suter All-Star record: 2, 6, 10, 15 (plus a likely top 10 finish in 2013-14)
Van Impe All-Star record: 10, 11, 12, 15, 18
There is very little difference between Reed Larson's All-Star record and that of NJ's #7 defenseman, Ed Van Impe. Now consider the fact that Larson was exactly the type of "big hockey card stats" defenseman who attracted attention based on his numbers alone, while Van Impe was a defensive specialist, and I think there is a very good case that Van Impe was a bigger overall impact defenseman than Reed Larson.
It's easy to guess from the lack of recognition that Larson was very poor in his own zone. But in this case, we have specific information confirming it. From
this thread on the history of hockey board called "How Good was Reed Larson?"
I don't remember him playing forward but he was one of those 'all the tools, but no toolbox' players - like Iafrate.
Great skater, good size, could lay a hit or keep the puck in, had a hard shot and could skate with the puck or lay a nice stretch pass down - just rarely 2 at a time. Lots of dumb penalties from being out of position, constantly. Probably over-forgotten, but nothing really special - just great skill, at times.
RabbinsDuck is a Red Wings fan who would have seen a lot of Larson.
Looking at an article in Sports Special Hockey Spring 1980 entitled Computerized Ratings of NHL Players he rated 15th of 15 defensemen rated with a 30 out of 50. He rated last (mostly tied for lowest) in leadership, strength, shot blocking, skating, passing, and big game. That's 6 of the 10 categories. His best ratings came in move puck out of end, shooting, power play, and durability. The only area where they rated him ahead of Ian Turnball was power play.
My recollection was that Larson had a great deal of talent but the bad luck to end up on the Red Wings at a time when they were truly terrible. Without good coaching, a team system or a long term focus Larson was not properly developed and though he put up decent numbers over the years he never became the player he could have been.
By the time Detroit started figuring out what they were doing Larson was most useful to them as trade bait so he shipped to Boston for the more defensively responsible Mike O'Connell.
There's more in the thread, including posters noting Larson's strong numbers, and seventieslord going through a season by season list of scouting reports.
Liapkin is more of the same, only from the USSR. Great stats, never recognized as one of the best defensemen in the weaker Soviet league. Liapkin was never a 1st Team Soviet league All-Star. We have 2nd and 3rd Teams in the Soviet league for the first half of Liapkin's career... and he was never a 2nd Teamer. A 3rd Teamer just once, in 1972-73, behind Lutchenko, Vasiliev, Tsygankov, and the undrafted Gusev.
Liapkin was great on the PP, and had a great outlet pass (and apparently really good chemistry with Yakusev), but like Larson, he's a guy who really needs to see sheltered minutes in the ATD.
How NJ can take advantage of this
First off, judging from the minutes chart, Montreal is wisely limiting the ice time that Larson and Liapkin are playing at even strength, by playing Talbot more. But that presents its own set of problems - you can't play Larson and Liapkin together, because that would be a goal against waiting to happen. This presents two problems for Montreal:
1) To limit the ice time of both Larson and Liapkin without playing them together is going to require a lot of judging by Montreal, which can throw off chemistry.
2) More importantly, since Larson and Liapkin shouldn't play together, it means that Reed Larson will be on Montreal's 2nd pairing most of the time (occasionally replaced by Talbot). I'm assuming that Montreal wants to use the Bourque-Hitchman pair against NJ's first line.
That leaves Larson out there, seeing major minutes against Peter Forsberg and Gordie Drillon, giving them ample opportunity to abuse his poor play in his own zone. Jacques Laperriere is one of the best defensive defensemen on a 2nd pairing in the draft, but 1 defenseman can't cover the entire ice surface by himself.
Peter Forsberg and Gordie Drillon both have the scoring talent to be first liners
Forsberg is more or less a known commodity by this point, so I'll focus on Gordie Drillon here. Drillon falls because he was terrible defensively, and pretty one dimensional offensive - basically a guy only useful in the offensive zone, one of history's ultimate trash collectors. He needs a two-way center who can carry the play in order to be effective at this level - someone like Peter Forsberg. But once you give Drillon his proper linemates, his offense is lights out, and he could be a 1st line goal scorer with the right linemates:
Goals: 1, 4, 4, 3, 5, 7, 15
Assists: 3, 10, 12, 18
Points: 1, 2, 4, 8, 13, 15, 17
Here is the Top-7 weighted VsX for Right Wings (1926-2013). These are Hockey Outsider's updated numbers.
*The second number for Bill Cook includes his Western years, based on
Dreakmur's consolidation study and is far from precise. Edit: I changed it (see below)
Rank | Player | Rank
1 | Gordie Howe | 126
2 | Jaromir Jagr | 114.6
3 | Maurice Richard | 105.7
4 | Guy Lafleur | 104.9
5 | Andy Bathgate | 101.2
6 | Charlie Conacher | 97.1
7 | Bill Cook | 96.6/101.8*
8 | Mike Bossy | 94.4
9 | Teemu Selanne | 92.9
10 | Martin St. Louis | 92.5
11 | Bernie Geoffrion | 90.2
12 | Mark Recchi | 88.6
13 | Brett Hull | 88.2
14 | Jari Kurri | 88.1
15
|
Gordie Drillon
|
88.1
16 | Jarome Iginla | 87
17 | Pavel Bure | 86
18 | Bryan Hextall | 84.5
19 | Marian Hossa | 82.6
20 | Daniel Alfredsson | 82.6
21 | Theoren Fleury | 82.3
A few pre-1926 players and non-NHLers would push Drillon down, but not all that many. (Off the top of my head, definitely Makarov, probably Mikhailov and Dye, possibly Pitre).
Drillon was a very limited player, but strictly in terms of production, he would be a decent first liner
NJ's 2nd line is one of the most offensively potent in the draft (as is Montreal's), which is ideal for taking advantage of Larson and Liapkin's poor defensive play even if Patrick can get the Bourque pairing out there against NJ's 1st line at all times (no guarantee in itself).
Stability on the NJ blueline (in contrast to Montreal's need to constantly juggle its lower defensive pairs)
NJ has 3 pairs of defensemen who will almost always play together at even strength. The 2nd and 3rd pairing feature a LH-shot with a RH-shot, playing their proper sides.
Kelly is a LH-shot playing the right side, but he's an elite puck handler, even at this level - a quote in his profile says that he can "maneuver the puck with his skates better than most players can with their sticks" - obvious hyperbole, but you get the point. In addition to playing D, Kelly excelled at both LW and C when asked to play them. Basically, I can't see Kelly losing effectiveness, regardless of the side he plays on (I honestly don't know which one he usually did).
I think it's less desirable to have to juggle your defensemen (like Montreal seems to be doing) than it would be for forwards. If your forwards screw up because of lack of familiarity, you are losing a scoring chance. If your defensemen screw up, you are creating a scoring chance against.
Ivan could bench Kevin Hatcher in late in the third period of a game when NJ is defending a 1 goal lead, but that's a far cry from constantly needing to juggle the pairings to shelter two players.
