henchman21
Mr. Meeseeks
- Feb 24, 2012
- 63,785
- 48,705
The exception to that being the penalty kill. I believe it's very valuable to have the lower line/pairing guys be able to effectively kill penalties, so the higher line/pairing guys don't have to get worn out doing it.
Absolutely a fair point. PK guys are fairly easy to find for those duties... see Cliche and Guenin.
I can't disagree more.
Mitchell is an average 3rd line center, it's simply giving him too much credit to say otherwise. Talbot is a good defensive winger and PKer that provides very little offense, and isn't that quick. McLeod is an ok defensive winger that provides even less offense. Cliche is a pretty good 4th line defensive center that has one career NHL goal. Bordy is better than most goons offensively and defensively, but is still worse than all the previous guys. Malone is a rookie that hasn't been able to stick in the NHL and has one NHL goal, and Carey has never played an NHL game before.
That is a very poor bottom six to rely on in the playoffs.
This is probably pointless... but oh well I have some time.
Solid=Average
Everything that you said there points out it is an average bottom 6. There will be some better and some worse.
There are 30 teams in the league, so by some reasoning the 181-270 ranked forwards in the league are your 3rd line players. The 181st ranked forward scorer (in 11-12) that played 82 games was Brandon Sutter with 32 points. The 270th ranked was Craig Adams with 18. The median at 225 was Mikkel Bodker at 24. This year Mitchell is the 203rd forward (with 23 points) and Talbot is 216th (with 21 points). They are above the median 3rd liners, or above average offensively. The third line is just supposed to add a mild amount of offense with good defense. A McLeod/whoever-Mitchell-Talbot line can do that. I will admit that McLeod needs to step up though. He will be given a lot more minutes and will need to be a more effective player than he has this year.\
Anything a 4th line contributes offensively is supposed to just be extra, they are not supposed to be goal scorers. That is why their goal scoring totals don't matter in the least. Just play solid defense and bring a physical element. A Malone/Carey-Cliche-Bordy line can do that.
Then when it comes to PK ability, Mitchell, Talbot, Cliche, and McLeod have proven they can do a good job. Malone/Carey have the ability, but have yet to prove it. So at least two units of forwards can be formed to rest the top players.