Jake Voracek

[flyersjim73]

I'm curious what everyone's thoughts on Jake are. It seemed like he started the season like he did a couple years ago and was exactly what everyone was hoping for, and then the last month or two he has fallen off a cliff. It could just be a slump, everyone goes through them. it seems to me it's not that he's made too many bad plays physically, rather he has just made some awful mental mistakes.

I haven't looked up the regular or advanced stats, so this could all just be in my head... but it seems to me his struggles have directly convinced with the birth of his son. If that is the case, im not judging, he's a dad and he's got responsibilities. Im simply making note that he doesn't seem to be the same. Maybe lack of sleep?

Has anybody else noticed this?

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[renberg]

Injury?

 

[PALE PWNR]

Zone entry god

 

[flyersjim73]

Injury?

Possible, but it doesn't seem like he's struggling physically.... just seems like he's making a ton of terrible decisions to me. I could be wrong though.

 

[Tripod]

He had 20 points in his 1st 24 games....in Oct and Nov.

He has 24 points in his last 25 games....in Dec and Jan.

Maybe your eyes are misleading you. He is also 13th in league scoring....is that bad?

 

[Rebels57]

He had 20 points in his 1st 24 games....in Oct and Nov.

He has 24 points in his last 25 games....in Dec and Jan.

Maybe your eyes are misleading you. He is also 13th in league scoring....is that bad?

He was more dominant early but the points are still coming so he is the least of our concerns.

 

[flyersjim73]

He had 20 points in his 1st 24 games....in Oct and Nov.

He has 24 points in his last 25 games....in Dec and Jan.

Maybe your eyes are misleading you. He is also 13th in league scoring....is that bad?

Perhaps. I guess my bigger concern is that he seems to be making a lot more turnovers causing them to lose possession and give up odd man breaks. Again, this is just by the eye test so I could be wrong, but his decision making seems to have been lacking to me recently. Good to see he's keeping up the points at least.

 

[Appleyard]

I think a lot of it is that while him and Giroux over the course of the season generally have played at a similar level since the start of 2014-15, so are kind of the benchmarks for each other:

But Jake is far more inconsistent. He has twice as many 'amazing' games as Giroux, twice as many 'bad' games as Giroux.

Giroux does not have as many games where he puts the team on his back... but he has fewer games where he stands out with poor play.

 

[Tripod]

Perhaps. I guess my bigger concern is that he seems to be making a lot more turnovers causing them to lose possession and give up odd man breaks. Again, this is just by the eye test so I could be wrong, but his decision making seems to have been lacking to me recently. Good to see he's keeping up the points at least.

I think that a lot of it comes from pressing too much when we are losing. You take yourself out of position trying to do too much.

But even tonight, he made a bad read in that 3 on 3 and lost his man but Mason saved his ass.

 

[flyersjim73]

I think that a lot of it comes from pressing too much when we are losing. You take yourself out of position trying to do too much.

But even tonight, he made a bad read in that 3 on 3 and lost his man but Mason saved his ass.

Yea, I didn't even realize that was him, but good catch. Not specific to tonight's game, but there have been two particular things I have seen him to a lot lately:

1) Blind passes. Specifically, a lot blind passes on his back hand that get picked off and go the other way in a hurry.

2) When they are cycling the puck, he takes the puck up really high to the top of the circle on the boards and a lot of times loses the puck at the top of the circle, instead of just dumping it back behind the net sooner. This is a real dangerous play for several reasons:

First, it puts your defenseman in a tough spot. If you try to pass it to him from only a few feet away, a lot times he has a guy in his face ASAP. Second, if the defenseman tries to break towards the middle and you lose the puck, the opponent has a free lane up the ice. You can try to dump it back down low when you're up that high, but a lot of times the defender is in good position by that time and it gets blocked. You can try to fling it to the middle of the ice, but you better get good wood on it, or it's a turnover waiting to happen. Finally, you can try to skate it to the center of the ice, but you're going to have to get through a lot of defenders to do that. Sometimes it works, and it definitely puts pressure on the defense, but it can also be a disaster.

These are just two things I've noticed him doing in the offensive zone a lot recently that have resulted in the puck going the other way.

By the way Rebel, I agree in general that he is essentially the least of our problems. He's not really a problem. Having said that, Jake at the top of his game can really elevate a team as well.

 

[Larry44]

I'm curious what everyone's thoughts on Jake are. It seemed like he started the season like he did a couple years ago and was exactly what everyone was hoping for, and then the last month or two he has fallen off a cliff. It could just be a slump, everyone goes through them. it seems to me it's not that he's made too many bad plays physically, rather he has just made some awful mental mistakes.

I haven't looked up the regular or advanced stats, so this could all just be in my head... but it seems to me his struggles have directly convinced with the birth of his son. If that is the case, im not judging, he's a dad and he's got responsibilities. Im simply making note that he doesn't seem to be the same. Maybe lack of sleep?

Has anybody else noticed this?

I wouldn't be surprised if both Jake and Mason are suffering from the sleep depravation that accompanies new parenthood. Depending on the baby, you might not get a full night's sleep for months on end when the team is home. Would love to see home-road splits.

 

[Curufinwe]

Voracek is the last guy on the team I'm worried about.

 

[YEM]

He is also 13th in league scoring....is that bad?

13th in the league in late January, 40th in the league today

7 more years @ 8.25 million against the cap...

 

[imfree19]

Good player. Hes definitely valuable to us. But he is very very inconsistent.

Not worth his contract.

 

[Magua]

Voracek worry meter: 3/10

 

[Rebels57]

Like every other forward on the Flyers, he is on a badly coached team with a brutal defense that can't transition to offense or support the offense.

New coach + improved defense = more production from top 6 forwards

 

[tymed]

Most people outspoken in detriment of Jake don't think he sucks, they think he's not worth 8.25M/per year, which is true.

 

[Hiesenberg]

This season came back down to defense. The defense mostly consisted of:

1 Good Dman: Gudas
1 Sophmore Dman who struggled: Ghost
1 Rookie Dman who's 19: Provy

3-5 ****** god awful dmen that shouldn't have been playing: Amac/Streit/Schultz/Manning/MDZ

And the worst part is Hakstol destroyed every pairing by putting 1 bad dmen with 1 good one.

He should've front loaded them and had a dumpster fire pairing that he protected.

 

[Rebels57]

This season came back down to defense. The defense mostly consisted of:

1 Good Dman: Gudas
1 Sophmore Dman who struggled: Ghost
1 Rookie Dman who's 19: Provy

3-5 ****** god awful dmen that shouldn't have been playing: Amac/Streit/Schultz/Manning/MDZ

And the worst part is Hakstol destroyed every pairing by putting 1 bad dmen with 1 good one.

He should've front loaded them and had a dumpster fire pairing that he protected.

Yup. If Laviolette had the same concept of how to construct a defense, our 09-10 unit would have looked something like this:

Pronger - Carle
Krajicek - Timonen
Coburn - Parent

But Laviolette wasn't a complete moron, so he didn't do that.

All Hak to do was..

Provorov - Gudas
MacDonald - Ghost (who played together in 15-16 down the stretch when the Flyers were winning a lot so we know it is a sufficient enough pairing)
Del Zotto/Schultz - Streit/Manning (aka Trash City)

 

[Striiker]

Voracek worry meter: 3/10

Wow dude relax...




Voracek worry meter: 2.9/10

 

[Rebels57]

Jake just needs to score 70 points to be worth that contract in today's NHL. He is only 10 points off that pace this season on a bad team. As we improve, I expect he will earn his keep for the next few years. The days of 80 point players left and right are pretty much over.

There are only 7 players in the league that will finish with 80+ points this season and only 20 or so that will finish with 70+ points. If Jake gets back to that 70 point plateau next season and is top 20 in scoring, then all is well.

 

[Magua]

Voracek-Couturier-Schenn

Do it. Each player does better with Couturier than anyone else on the team, so logic says........do it.

 

[Rebels57]

Voracek-Couturier-Schenn

Do it.

That could be something. Coots has good chemistry with both. If all 3 can come together harmoniously then watch out.

I wouldn't mind giving Lindblom - Giroux - Konecny a look next season either, with Weal - Filppula - Simmonds staying together as the 3rd line.

 

[deadhead]

Jake has been falling off by every measure the last two years, but the biggest problem is 2014-15 was a fluke, not his norm. Looking at his career, he's a 20-40 60 guy with average defense, i.e., a forward who should be on a 5 year $30M contract, not an 8 year $66M deal which just started this year.

Last 3 seasons:
CF rel 7.3 / 3.5 / 1.3
+/- 1 / -5 / -24
E +/- 14.7 / 6.7 / - 1.5

1 point in 6 playoff games last year

 

[Ghosts Beer]

I've been posting about Voracek a lot the last week or two -- in that the team really needs to consider trading him.

This thread is a good place to summarize why.

1. Virtually everyone acknowledged that Voracek's 2015-16 season was terrible. Unfortunately, we assumed it was an outlier. Voracek hasn't been any better this season, as his horrendous play since mid-December canceled out his great first two months.

2015-16: 73 games, 55 points (.75 ppg), -5.
2016-16: 80 games, 60 points (.75 ppg), -24 (team worst)

2. Since Feb. 1, in 29 games Jake has only 15 points -- 5th on the team behind Schenn, Couturier, Giroux, and Ghost -- and -12, which is by far the worst on the team. To compare, Manning is 2nd worst at -6, Couturier and Gudas are +13 and +11, respectively, and Schenn, Giroux, and Ghost are -1, -2, and -2. This really paints a picture of how utterly bad Jake has been the last two months, to the point of being a liability.

3. Jake's Home/Road splits this year suggest he, along with goaltending, are the biggest contributors to this team's monster struggles away from the WFC.

Home: 39 games, 13 goals, 23 assists, 36 pts, -1, 156 shots
Road: 41 games, 6 goals, 18 assists, 24 pts, -23, 92 shots

When you add in to the above that Voracek is a black hole on the PP who actually hurts PP1 because teams can shade away from him without repercussion, and also factor that the Flyers are stacked at RW, especially with Schenn being 10x better at ES on the right side and with Konecny also being much better on RW and better off returning there, I come to the following conclusion:

Jake's problems are unacceptable for his $8.2M contract; 2nd highest paid player on the Flyers; around 12th highest in the league; we have to stop making excuses for him -- he is what he is, a maddeningly inconsistent, mistake-prone forward; and the Flyers would be wise to explore the market for him.