burstnbloom
Registered User
- Mar 10, 2006
- 4,544
- 3,948
With the big trade yesterday and the rumored 8 year extension for Hampus Lindholm, I thought it made sense to do a deep dive on what the player we acquired can really do. Trigger warning for the punches/60 crowd. There will be a lot of numbers in this post.
TL/DR: His numbers are bad, but they used to be good, and it seems like that maybe wasn't all his fault. Good move, but some significant risk.
Lindholm is a big man. 6'4, 216 pounds and a physical 2 way d. When I say physical, I don't mean he's a banger because he's not. He's not a hitter either, per se, but he definitely uses his size and his body to protect the puck from his opponents and is one of those "lean on em" guys behind the net. He has a good shot, a really good first pass and appears to have a really high hockey IQ. He also has a history of top pair level D play that has severely waned recently. There is some evidence that he will perform to his previous level when put in a new environment. It's been talked about everywhere that he's been stapled to Jaime Drysdale who is super talented but is also unaware their is a defensive zone. He also plays on a team that is prone to giving up a hell of a lot of chances, and he plays super hard competition. That said, its not JUST Drysdale's fault. He's played over 500 minutes the last two seasons w/o Drysdale and his numbers are actually worse. He's also taking an absolutely insane amount of penalties this year, which really hurts his overall numbers in these models. The models do not love him this year:
There is some hope though. His microstats this year are extremely positive:
Corey Sznajder's tireless tracking project shows us exactly who Lindholm is despite his diminished cumulative numbers. It appears that even in a year where his larger numbers are down, He is excellent at defending players entering the zone, he's great at Dzone retreivals, and he's a top tier player when it comes to getting the puck in the D zone and carrying it out. He's also above average at carrying the puck into the ozone, which is a nice surprise. What I find really interesting is how good he appears to be at Shot assists in the neutral zone. If you look at all of those things, you can get a picture at what he is as a player. He will stand up and stop players from entering the zone at an elite level. If they do get in, he retrieves the puck at an elite level, and he's able to carry the puck out of the zone at a well above average rate. Once he's out of the zone, he's looking to transition and his passes result in a player going into the ozone and taking a shot at a very VERY high level (96th percentile.) So even when he's giving up a lot of shots/chances/goals in his larger numbers, these microstats paint the picture of who this guy is on the ice quite nicely.
His new contract will reportedly pay him $6.5m a year until he's 36 years old. The models hate that. One of the challenges is the publicly available data models heavily weight by recency (for good reason) so they are going to extrapolate his poor overall numbers the last two years and project forward. Here is Dom's:
Some reason for optimism though. His deployment and QOT are going to skyrocket on this team. They also play a zone D here, which tends to really help even the squirreliest D have positive numbers. looking at you Forbort! This is who Lindholm USED to be from age 21-25:
So the EH and Top down models are pretty conclusive on Hampus. He was an absolutely elite player for over 200 games before his play began to drop. There are a lot of reasons you can point to for WHY his play dropped, but it doesn't completely explain it all away. I've tried to isolate a more specific cause from all the numbers but there isn't much. His PDO and on ice s% have all dropped since 18-19 (which are not generally controllable by the player) and his ozone deployment dropped a bit in 18/19 but that has recovered since Drysdale. There just isn't one glaring reason for why his numbers have dipped but they definitely have. The bruins are taking a calculated risk here that Lindholm will return to his previous greatness if put into a better position to succeed. I happen to think his player profile (strengths/weaknesses) uniquely benefit from the change in situation and it makes me optimistic that they will get good value out of this trade/contract at least for the first few years.
Conclusion: This isn't a slam dunk, but it feels like a risk worth taking. I don't believe defense was a major need for this roster, but if you're going to spend on one, I kinda like spending on this guy. He didn't cost what a truly elite D costs in terms of assets or contract but you can squint and see him being that player again in this situation. Good move.
TL/DR: His numbers are bad, but they used to be good, and it seems like that maybe wasn't all his fault. Good move, but some significant risk.
Lindholm is a big man. 6'4, 216 pounds and a physical 2 way d. When I say physical, I don't mean he's a banger because he's not. He's not a hitter either, per se, but he definitely uses his size and his body to protect the puck from his opponents and is one of those "lean on em" guys behind the net. He has a good shot, a really good first pass and appears to have a really high hockey IQ. He also has a history of top pair level D play that has severely waned recently. There is some evidence that he will perform to his previous level when put in a new environment. It's been talked about everywhere that he's been stapled to Jaime Drysdale who is super talented but is also unaware their is a defensive zone. He also plays on a team that is prone to giving up a hell of a lot of chances, and he plays super hard competition. That said, its not JUST Drysdale's fault. He's played over 500 minutes the last two seasons w/o Drysdale and his numbers are actually worse. He's also taking an absolutely insane amount of penalties this year, which really hurts his overall numbers in these models. The models do not love him this year:
There is some hope though. His microstats this year are extremely positive:
Corey Sznajder's tireless tracking project shows us exactly who Lindholm is despite his diminished cumulative numbers. It appears that even in a year where his larger numbers are down, He is excellent at defending players entering the zone, he's great at Dzone retreivals, and he's a top tier player when it comes to getting the puck in the D zone and carrying it out. He's also above average at carrying the puck into the ozone, which is a nice surprise. What I find really interesting is how good he appears to be at Shot assists in the neutral zone. If you look at all of those things, you can get a picture at what he is as a player. He will stand up and stop players from entering the zone at an elite level. If they do get in, he retrieves the puck at an elite level, and he's able to carry the puck out of the zone at a well above average rate. Once he's out of the zone, he's looking to transition and his passes result in a player going into the ozone and taking a shot at a very VERY high level (96th percentile.) So even when he's giving up a lot of shots/chances/goals in his larger numbers, these microstats paint the picture of who this guy is on the ice quite nicely.
His new contract will reportedly pay him $6.5m a year until he's 36 years old. The models hate that. One of the challenges is the publicly available data models heavily weight by recency (for good reason) so they are going to extrapolate his poor overall numbers the last two years and project forward. Here is Dom's:
Some reason for optimism though. His deployment and QOT are going to skyrocket on this team. They also play a zone D here, which tends to really help even the squirreliest D have positive numbers. looking at you Forbort! This is who Lindholm USED to be from age 21-25:
So the EH and Top down models are pretty conclusive on Hampus. He was an absolutely elite player for over 200 games before his play began to drop. There are a lot of reasons you can point to for WHY his play dropped, but it doesn't completely explain it all away. I've tried to isolate a more specific cause from all the numbers but there isn't much. His PDO and on ice s% have all dropped since 18-19 (which are not generally controllable by the player) and his ozone deployment dropped a bit in 18/19 but that has recovered since Drysdale. There just isn't one glaring reason for why his numbers have dipped but they definitely have. The bruins are taking a calculated risk here that Lindholm will return to his previous greatness if put into a better position to succeed. I happen to think his player profile (strengths/weaknesses) uniquely benefit from the change in situation and it makes me optimistic that they will get good value out of this trade/contract at least for the first few years.
Conclusion: This isn't a slam dunk, but it feels like a risk worth taking. I don't believe defense was a major need for this roster, but if you're going to spend on one, I kinda like spending on this guy. He didn't cost what a truly elite D costs in terms of assets or contract but you can squint and see him being that player again in this situation. Good move.
