Seravalli: If Capitals retain 50 percent on Dowd, he could be traded for a first round pick

[Beukeboom Fan]

It's the shitty 4cyl with the 3spd auto cinder block of a transmission.

Yeah - but I'm pretty sure that some of them still had the ultra-cheese hood decal!

 

[mr4tno]

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Maybe. Did Chuck Fletcher get another GM job?

 

[RooBicks]

If that's the market for bottom-6 centers, goodbye Scott Laughton

...which is probably why it's not actually the market, tbh. The second people hear this is the kind of ask that is getting taken seriously (if that's even true), you'll see lots more players on the market.

 

[Kalopsia]

Does Dowd have the same sort of d-zone to o-zone flip that Gaustad did? Poile's talked about how they tracked that internally around the league and that was what he was willing to pay to get that skill. Dowd's an excellent defensive player. For two years at $650K for a premium 4th line center, that may have more value than some ho-hum late first rounder.

I answered this in a comment on another Dowd thread back on Jan 20, so I'll just copy that comment here. The numbers are a little different now - Dowd's been pushed up the lineup due to Kuzy being out lately so his OZ Start% has crept above 10%, but the gist of it's the same.

The individual members of that line have started their shifts in the offensive zone 7.98% of the time (NAK), 8.02% of the time (Malenstyn), and 9.29% of the time (Dowd) over ~400 minutes of 5 on 5 play each. As you mentioned, as a unit they've outscored opponents 13-6 at 5 on 5. OZ Start% as a statistic dates back to the 07-08 season, and in that time only one player has posted a sub 10% season while playing at least 300 minutes at 5 on 5: Paul Gaustad in 15/16. He had 5.76% OZ Starts and was outscored 6-21. Coincidentally, Gaustad had been traded with a 4th for a 1st as a pure rental at the 2012 trade deadline, the only 4th line center I can think of who was traded for a 1st rounder. That year he ranked 8th out of 626 skaters with 31.98% OZ Starts. One of the things you notice as you go through OZ Start% year by year is that giving players extreme deployments in one direction or another is a pretty recent phenomenon. In 07/08, the skater with the lowest OZ Start% was Bobby Holik at 29.62%. This season, that number would good for 30th.

Long story short, the Caps 4th line is at the forefront of the current trend of highly specialized deployments, and as a result they're playing quite possibly the most brutal minutes of any line in the history of hockey, on a team that's overall been outscored 71-90 at 5 on 5 (58-84 if you factor their line out)... and they're outscoring their opponents by a 2-1 margin in the process. It's insane, it shouldn't be possible, and yet it's happening. Nic Dowd should've been the Caps' All Star, and he should legitimately be in the Selke conversation.

So long story short, yeah, Dowd's been getting Gaustad-ian deployments and driving the puck the other way. The year Gaustad was traded for a 1st he was getting 32.0% OZ Starts and turning that into a 46.3 GF%. Dowd's numbers this year blow that out of the water.

Gaustad. That was the one that floored me. I don't really think Hartman was ever a 4C. Goodrow was playing over 16 minutes a night. He wasn't a 4C either at the time he was traded.

Goodrow's an interesting comp. Let's do a blind comparison here.

Player A is a center putting up 0.33 PPG while playing 15:42 a night. In the previous season, he set a new career high in points with 25. He's got another year remaining on his contract at 1.3M.

Player B is a center putting up 0.39 PPG while playing 16:23 a night. In the previous season, he set a new career high in points with 17. He's got another year remaining on his contract at 925K.

Which is the guy who was traded for a 1st round pick, and which is the guy for whom it's laughable to think a 1st is remotely possible?

Of course Goodrow was a lot younger at the time of his trade, but Tampa knew when they traded for him that if he worked out they wouldn't be able to re-sign him, so I don't think that's a major factor. What I think is a major factor is that Goodrow wasn't playing the shutdown role at ES (48.6% OZ Starts in 19-20) that Dowd is, and was tilting the ice in the wrong direction (43.5 GF%).

I don't think Hartman's a great comp because he was only 23 when he was traded so there were a lot more years of control there, but at the time he was traded for a 1st he was getting less than 13 minutes a night with the Blackhawks and ranked 11th in average ice time among their forwards, so he was more legitimately a 4th liner than Dowd's a 4th liner for the Caps.

 

[PAZ]

There isn't a team that's complete enough where they can justify spending a 1st on a bottom 6 forward.

Every contender has pretty glaring holes this year.

 

[AlexBrovechkin8]

There isn't a team that's complete enough where they can justify spending a 1st on a bottom 6 forward.

Every contender has pretty glaring holes this year.

Wouldn’t it arguably make more sense in that case? If every contender has glaring holes and you can add arguably the best 4C in the league to make your roster that much deeper, wouldn’t you want to do that? I would hesitate if there was a clear favorite or two but with question marks surrounding most teams I can see a few teams thinking, “why not us?”

 

[Skrudland2Lomakin]

...which is probably why it's not actually the market, tbh. The second people hear this is the kind of ask that is getting taken seriously (if that's even true), you'll see lots more players on the market.

Yes, it's probably Servalli and Friedman who are wrong in understanding what NHL GMs are saying/wanting, not the lauded HFboards Trade Forum.

 

[Midnight Judges]

If the Capitals can get a 1st for Dowd, they can't say no to that.

 

[Skinnyjimmy08]

No he couldn't

 

[The Crypto Guy]

At first round pick you say?

Lou Lamoriello's ears are ringing!

 

[PAZ]

Wouldn’t it arguably make more sense in that case? If every contender has glaring holes and you can add arguably the best 4C in the league to make your roster that much deeper, wouldn’t you want to do that? I would hesitate if there was a clear favorite or two but with question marks surrounding most teams I can see a few teams thinking, “why not us?”

Because a #4C is the least of their worries when you need a 1A/B goalie, top 6 center, top 4 defenseman, or an elite winger.

Teams only have so many assets, they’re going to be using them to fill those major holes. Tampa paid premium prices for role players like Hagel, Goodrow, Coleman, and Jeannot because their top 6 forwards, top 4 defensemen, and #1G were set.

So the teams that think “why not us” are going to go for bigger fish to help bridge the gap, as they’ll have even bigger holes than the contenders.

 

[RooBicks]

Yes, it's probably Servalli and Friedman who are wrong in understanding what NHL GMs are saying/wanting, not the lauded HFboards Trade Forum.

No, their report may be perfectly accurate. They report on what they're hearing about negotiations among gms. Their reporting on those rumors can affect the market, meaning that what they've said may no longer be accurate, as other GMs modify their behavior in light of new information. That's how markets (and economics in general) work.

Players within a market (and particularly one as small as the NHL trade market) will not always behave rationally or be able to take advantage of opportunities when they arise, meaning any projection like the one I made will be probabilistic. Nonetheless, nothing I said involves a direct criticism of the (vaunted apparently, lol) reporting of Seravelli or Friedman.

Education is usually a good first step to take before jumping immediately into snark.

 

[pman25]

Ok some of you aren’t sold on Nic Dowd let’s try to change that. We can also give you all the fancy stats and deployments too

 

[BostonBob]

Any team trading a 1st for Nick Dowd deserves to miss the playoffs

Any team trading for Dowd likely will.

 

[LuLover96]

So glad we got Lindholm early, this is just silly season now.