Player Discussion Jesse Puljujarvi Discussion Part 4 [UPD: Nov 24th Recalled]

[Aerrol]

Its war and peace, my lord. almost impossible to wade through all that. The difficulty is when one goes into the degree of minutiae you did there its beyond discussion and starts to resemble legal articling One would have to be intimately familiar with every argument, and sub argument referred to to even follow along.

That said there is a particular distortion contained in your Book of Puljujarvi, and its comparison bias. That the comparisons picked are of course arbitrary, but not exactly random, because the comparisons picked are largely successful NHL players that are being, for some reason, equated to Puljujarvi. Theres a lot longer lists of players who struggled to produce in first few years that simply vanished from the NHL landscape. That would be much more the normal curve distribution Pulju is on. The Wheeler prognosis would be outlier projection at this point. One of the few that would have struggled early and then succeeded greatly.

My own take is that Pulju may go on to pound out 40pt seasons and 20 goal seasons but right now its hard to see more than that in terms of what he has actually brought.


The reality is that the argument people are bestowing on Pulju, that he could be a wheeler, could be made in relation to any struggling player. So that a Spooner could be X great player, Rattie could be an undeveloped 60pt player etc.

Its pie in the sky comparison. Its simple distortion hand selecting the players you WANT to compare to Pulju and has no relation to Pulju, or HIS actual development.

The point of the comparisons at the outset was that there are multiple examples of bigger wingers taking longer to figure it out, and so there's still room to be hopeful about the player. To pull a quote out of my novel for you, these are my own rough estimates for likely outcomes:

"As for likelihood of development, I do think it’s in the very unlikely category that Puljujarvi develops into a star. I’d say if I were to estimate right now, I’d put it at 10% chance of total back-to-Europe bust ala Yakupov, 40% chance of turning into a Paajarvi type player, 30% chance of becoming a valuable but ultimately disappointing 3rd line checking winger, and 20% chance of turning into a legitimate top-6 forward."

edit: And the Rattie example shows you're missing the central point - Pulju is still young. Rattie is significantly further along in his NHL career and is unlikely to keep growing at this point. Pulju is still much earlier on. Time will tell where he ends up.

 

[Aerrol]

No way am I going to chew through all of that, but late bloomers coming out of College is a far more common phenomenon than it is from players following a development path like Jesse's. I believe that is correct practice based on historical precedents to read more into what Jesse's numbers at this age have been given the development path, than it would be to read into a 20 year old College players numbers. Not saying that either definitively tells what a player is capable of becoming, just that Jesse's stats should have a higher correlation to his future capabilities.

Also in comparing players across leagues I think a tool such as Desjardins or Vollman's NHL equivalency numbers can be somewhat illuminating in how players are tracking.

Like using Vollman's NHLe numbers for Wheeler his D+2 number was 0.26 Pts/per game compared to Jesse's actual NHL number of 0.31 at the same juncture. Wheeler's D+3 NHL equivalency number was 0.38 Pts/per game to Jesse's current 0.17Pts/per game. I didn't do Wheeler's Draft +1 season cause I didn't see an equivalency number for the USHL. Wheelers NHL equivalency numbers didn't match up very closely with the level of impact he had in first season, but in other cases it was quite on the mark.

For example Gaudreau'ss Vollman NHL equivalency based on an 82 game season would of put him at 30 points in his draft +1, 44 points in his draft +2, 61 points in his draft +3 and the reality was he got 64 points in his draft +4 rookie NHL season.


One aside that has been going around in this thread not necessarily directed at you is the assumption that a player is superior or ahead in development cause they made the NHL quicker, I think is a false statement some teams just choose different development paths for their players or for College players many will turn down offers to go pro cause they want to stay for one more year in College. Like I have little doubt that the post draft+3 Gaudreau would outperform Pulju at the same point of development if he chose to go pro one year sooner.

Some of this I agree with - development absolutely isn't so simple as "who got to the NHL first?". I also like equivalency numbers - do you have a good resource for those?

The part I disagree with, or perhaps am not yet convinced of, is the suggestion that College Players are more likely to be late bloomers. I'm not certain I buy that - there might be some correlation between going to College and taking longer to be an NHL star, but is that correlation or causation? And even then, you have the same gamut of players coming out of college and blowing up (Eichel, Gaudreau, Guentzel) to coming out of college and being pretty meh (Caggiula, Jimmy Vesey) to outright busting/failing. Do you have any numbers to actually show that college players have a higher rate of being 'late bloomers' than other prospects?

 

[Bryanbryoil]

Looking like he might get a chance with RNH and Connor, that's a dream spot for him I'd think.

 

[Aerrol]

Looking like he might get a chance with RNH and Connor, that's a dream spot for him I'd think.

Part of me worries if it's too much too fast but there's no bigger chance than this he'll get on the team. I hope he runs with it.

 

[Bryanbryoil]

Part of me worries if it's too much too fast but there's no bigger chance than this he'll get on the team. I hope he runs with it.

Work hard along the boards and defensively, get open and crash the net. IMO he's in a great position right now.

 

[Hopelesslucicfan]

Looking like he might get a chance with RNH and Connor, that's a dream spot for him I'd think.

If he keeps playing the way he has been, forechecking like a madman, finding those open spaces to shoot, and going to the front of the net, he could have a lot of success with that duo.

I think this is going to be Jesse's first real top line shot assuming this lineup is the gameday lineup.

He may have spent a shift or 2 there before, but knowing his coach has his back, and seeing his confidence growing recently make me think this will be a Jesse we've never seen before in a scoring role.

 

[Hopelesslucicfan]

Part of me worries if it's too much too fast but there's no bigger chance than this he'll get on the team. I hope he runs with it.

I think this may be why hitch hasn't put him on the pp yet. He's slowly upping his es icetime to see how far he can go and continue his improved play. So a first line spot may mean an extra 5 or 6 shifts at even strength, and if he shows he can handle that, then he can increase that time even further to be used on the pp.

I like hitchs approach to be honest. He didn't just come in and throw Jesse on the top line and top pp unit like some (including myself) probably would have done.

He's slowly building him back up as a player, all while re assuring him he wants to help him be the best he can be. Its got to be nice to feel like your solid play is being recognized, and is clearly making Jesse hungry for more.

 

[Bryanbryoil]

I think this may be why hitch hasn't put him on the pp yet. He's slowly upping his es icetime to see how far he can go and continue his improved play. So a first line spot may mean an extra 5 or 6 shifts at even strength, and if he shows he can handle that, then he can increase that time even further to be used on the pp.

I like hitchs approach to be honest. He didn't just come in and throw Jesse on the top line and top pp unit like some (including myself) probably would have done.

He's slowly building him back up as a player, all while re assuring him he wants to help him be the best he can be. Its got to be nice to feel like your solid play is being recognized, and is clearly making Jesse hungry for more.

There's a clear plan with Jesse from this coach. Must make Jesse pretty pleased to have a coach with his best interests in mind.

 

[780il]

There's a clear plan with Jesse from this coach. Must make Jesse pretty pleased to have a coach with his best interests in mind.

It's not just in the best interest of Hitch for Jesse to succeed. It's in the best interest of the team. We badly need talented wingers.

 

[Hopelesslucicfan]

There's a clear plan with Jesse from this coach. Must make Jesse pretty pleased to have a coach with his best interests in mind.

I'm beginning to re think what makes a good coach in the modern NHL.

Someone like Tmac seemed to focus on a one size fits all approach, that may have worked for guys who are already sure of their roles and who can basically coach themselves (the veteran sharks team, McDavid, drai, rnh, Lars, etc), the depth guys would just get lost in the shuffle.

Where as hitch seems to be more focused on maximizing what we can get from the players who aren't normally counted on for producing. Things like giving the identity line an identity, and being willing to publicly back a player like Jesse who doesn't seem to have had a coach on his side lately are huge.

The top guys are going to score, and going to bring essentially the same thing night in and night out. You obviously still communicate with them, but those are the guys you don't need to worry about.

So instead of working on squeezing every last bit of sweat from those guys in hopes that they go from 100point season to 110pt seasons, he's more worried about the team going from a 100 pt season to a 110pt season.

You're only as strong as your worst line these days in hockey imo.

 

[Burnt Biscuits]

Some of this I agree with - development absolutely isn't so simple as "who got to the NHL first?". I also like equivalency numbers - do you have a good resource for those?

The part I disagree with, or perhaps am not yet convinced of, is the suggestion that College Players are more likely to be late bloomers. I'm not certain I buy that - there might be some correlation between going to College and taking longer to be an NHL star, but is that correlation or causation? And even then, you have the same gamut of players coming out of college and blowing up (Eichel, Gaudreau, Guentzel) to coming out of college and being pretty meh (Caggiula, Jimmy Vesey) to outright busting/failing. Do you have any numbers to actually show that college players have a higher rate of being 'late bloomers' than other prospects?

The Vollman equivalencies I used are on this page Updated Translation Factors - Hockey Abstract, a little dated as the numbers are adjusted periodically, but Wheeler came from the WCHA (defunct league, so using the old number seemed appropriate)

Another article I came across via google- Predicting Future NHL Scoring Success with NHLe Thresholds & Related Factors - NHL Numbers , that I didn't have time to parse through in full.

I don't have any study to point to showing that College players are more inclined to being late bloomers, just anecdotal evidence observed from watching the game for many years thinking back to great or really good players who arrived later on the scene than is the norm for players of that talent level e.g. Dan Boyle, Brian Rafalski, Martin St. Louis. It also seems to make logical sense since many college players focus is split between studies and playing hockey more so than players who are in the CHL, AHL, or a European professional league, not to say that players in those other leagues can't be involved in some level of post-secondary education when time permits it's just less common than College players who are all actively engaged in post secondary education, though to be fair many College players will veer into courses that are less academically demanding.

 

[Kaako Kappo]

I wish Todd didn't get to spend two f***ing years with him.

 

[GameChanger]

Khaira's situtation and the 1st line being quieter (as written Drai and even McD maybe getting tired) in the last games were naturally the main reasons for the new lines, but the timing is good because they have a bit of practising time together before the game. It may be coincidence, but it seems like they actually thought about this.

Pulju is now aware that at his best he can create offense outside of McDavid, too, and in any case there's Khaira with whom he's showed good chemistry. That should make this chance mentally easier as he doesn't have to worry failing to grab the chance may start another downward spiral.

 

[Burnt Biscuits]

If he keeps playing the way he has been, forechecking like a madman, finding those open spaces to shoot, and going to the front of the net, he could have a lot of success with that duo.

I think this is going to be Jesse's first real top line shot assuming this lineup is the gameday lineup.

He may have spent a shift or 2 there before, but knowing his coach has his back, and seeing his confidence growing recently make me think this will be a Jesse we've never seen before in a scoring role.

I hold the opinion that any time spent playing with McDavid at 5 on 5 is 1st line time regardless of whomever else is the 3rd member of that line.

In 2016/17 Jesse played 84:01 mins with McDavid about 29% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.
In 2017/18 Jesse played 256:57 mins with McDavid about 32% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.
In 2018.19 Jesse played 26:13 mins with McDavid about 10% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.

Of Jesse's 24 games this season 13 have been under Hitch so he certainly played a role in the 2018/19 number for Pulju and McDavid being so low.

I do think Hitch has shown more confidence in Jesse and has done a better job at keeping his confidence high on top of forming a better framework/gameplan for him being successful, but the narrative of Pulju never getting to play with talented players or being strictly confined to playing with grinders continues to be untrue.

 

[Hopelesslucicfan]

I hold the opinion that any time spent playing with McDavid at 5 on 5 is 1st line time regardless of whomever else is the 3rd member of that line.

In 2016/17 Jesse played 84:01 mins with McDavid about 29% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.
In 2017/18 Jesse played 256:57 mins with McDavid about 32% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.
In 2018.19 Jesse played 26:13 mins with McDavid about 10% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.

Of Jesse's 24 games this season 13 have been under Hitch so he certainly played a role in the 2018/19 number for Pulju and McDavid being so low.

I do think Hitch has shown more confidence in Jesse and has done a better job at keeping his confidence high on top of forming a better framework/gameplan for him being successful, but the narrative of Pulju never getting to play with talented players or being strictly confined to playing with grinders continues to be untrue.

I didn't mean for that to come off as literal, it's more of a case of I feel like this is the first time his first line minutes come from a coach wanting to see him succeed, and willing to help him achieve that.

Tmac may have given him some looks on the top line, but wasn't interested in helping him remain there. Tmac was more interested in switching it up until something worked and riding it out, hitch appears to be into grooming your prospects to take on the role by supporting them as they work their way into that position.

A shot with McDavid when youre afraid to make a play because one giveaway and you're riding pine, is much different than a shot where the coach wants you to succeed, and will give you a chance to grow into the role.

Ive always felt like JP was the type to need to work through his growing pains, and there was no better time to let that happen than the non playoff years. Some prospects react well to benchings and demotions, and obviously you can't throw away a bunch of games to try and make force them to grow into a role that he isn't taking to, but Todd was worried about giving guys like Lucic every chance to take the spot, when he should have been looking to the future for McDavids wingers.

 

[fuswald]

Its war and peace, my lord. almost impossible to wade through all that. The difficulty is when one goes into the degree of minutiae you did there its beyond discussion and starts to resemble legal articling One would have to be intimately familiar with every argument, and sub argument referred to to even follow along.

That said there is a particular distortion contained in your Book of Puljujarvi, and its comparison bias. That the comparisons picked are of course arbitrary, but not exactly random, because the comparisons picked are largely successful NHL players that are being, for some reason, equated to Puljujarvi. Theres a lot longer lists of players who struggled to produce in first few years that simply vanished from the NHL landscape. That would be much more the normal curve distribution Pulju is on. The Wheeler prognosis would be outlier projection at this point. One of the few that would have struggled early and then succeeded greatly.

My own take is that Pulju may go on to pound out 40pt seasons and 20 goal seasons but right now its hard to see more than that in terms of what he has actually brought.


The reality is that the argument people are bestowing on Pulju, that he could be a wheeler, could be made in relation to any struggling player. So that a Spooner could be X great player, Rattie could be an undeveloped 60pt player etc.

Its pie in the sky comparison. Its simple distortion hand selecting the players you WANT to compare to Pulju and has no relation to Pulju, or HIS actual development.

I think this could be whittled down to a couple of sentences.

 

[bobbythebrain]

I hold the opinion that any time spent playing with McDavid at 5 on 5 is 1st line time regardless of whomever else is the 3rd member of that line.

In 2016/17 Jesse played 84:01 mins with McDavid about 29% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.
In 2017/18 Jesse played 256:57 mins with McDavid about 32% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.
In 2018.19 Jesse played 26:13 mins with McDavid about 10% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.

Of Jesse's 24 games this season 13 have been under Hitch so he certainly played a role in the 2018/19 number for Pulju and McDavid being so low.

I do think Hitch has shown more confidence in Jesse and has done a better job at keeping his confidence high on top of forming a better framework/gameplan for him being successful, but the narrative of Pulju never getting to play with talented players or being strictly confined to playing with grinders continues to be untrue.

 

[Drivesaitl]

I think this could be whittled down to a couple of sentences.

In fairness to me I was responding to a ten page essay..

 

[frag2]

I hold the opinion that any time spent playing with McDavid at 5 on 5 is 1st line time regardless of whomever else is the 3rd member of that line.

In 2016/17 Jesse played 84:01 mins with McDavid about 29% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.
In 2017/18 Jesse played 256:57 mins with McDavid about 32% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.
In 2018.19 Jesse played 26:13 mins with McDavid about 10% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.

Of Jesse's 24 games this season 13 have been under Hitch so he certainly played a role in the 2018/19 number for Pulju and McDavid being so low.

I do think Hitch has shown more confidence in Jesse and has done a better job at keeping his confidence high on top of forming a better framework/gameplan for him being successful, but the narrative of Pulju never getting to play with talented players or being strictly confined to playing with grinders continues to be untrue.

IMO, just get some god damn points to prove you belong. His D is average-above average; just need to show them offensive chops in the NHL. It's what the team lacks so poorly since the Hall and Eberle trades.

 

[GameChanger]

I hold the opinion that any time spent playing with McDavid at 5 on 5 is 1st line time regardless of whomever else is the 3rd member of that line.

In 2016/17 Jesse played 84:01 mins with McDavid about 29% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.
In 2017/18 Jesse played 256:57 mins with McDavid about 32% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.
In 2018.19 Jesse played 26:13 mins with McDavid about 10% of Pulju's total 5 on 5 ice-time.

Of Jesse's 24 games this season 13 have been under Hitch so he certainly played a role in the 2018/19 number for Pulju and McDavid being so low.

I do think Hitch has shown more confidence in Jesse and has done a better job at keeping his confidence high on top of forming a better framework/gameplan for him being successful, but the narrative of Pulju never getting to play with talented players or being strictly confined to playing with grinders continues to be untrue.

I've never quite noticed this narrative that some of you have mentioned but maybe I've missed the crucial posts or something. There's been a lot of posts about how many of us would've liked to play Pulju in the top6 more because he managed to produce there and wasn't ready or good enough to do that with worse centers.

Especially the end of the 2nd season would've been a great time to develop him into the top6 (+PP) role and I believe it would've paid off during this season. Now I feel the schedule is lacking a bit unnecessarily.

We've also written a lot about Todd demoting and benching him unnecessarily. I still feel strongly especially two of them were bad and keeping Pulju up for longer could've changed a lot in this story so far, but the one later on in the 2nd season was totally understandable. After all Pulju stopped producing there and the team struggled (though McDavid was obviously sick at that time and played his worst games then).

I think you've written some good thoughts and I agree with many of them, but sometimes a bit less polarization would do wonders IMO. On the other hand I understand you pretty well.

 

[fuswald]

In fairness to me I was responding to a ten page essay..

I started reading that essay and gave up. I'm here for some light reading, that certainly was very excessive.

 

[Panda Bear]

@Burnt Biscuits @bobbythebrain

I really hope that you two recognize that my issue with McLellan isn't that Puljujarvi never spent time with talented players, but that he wasn't given clear development goals, got inconsistent treatment in regards to playing time (e.g. benching), and was treated as an afterthought rather than as a player to coach.

Puljujarvi spent most of his time under McLellan being confused and unsure about his own game because he wasn't handled well, and that translates into not taking advantage of your opportunities if you're a player who doesn't have ironclad self-confidence.

 

[RegDunlop]

Now he has another shot at the big time.
I hope he makes use of it.
I still like him but I'm getting impatient. 3 highlights over 3 years is not enough.

 

[bobbythebrain]

@Burnt Biscuits @bobbythebrain

I really hope that you two recognize that my issue with McLellan isn't that Puljujarvi never spent time with talented players, but that he wasn't given clear development goals, got inconsistent treatment in regards to playing time (e.g. benching), and was treated as an afterthought rather than as a player to coach.

Puljujarvi spent most of his time under McLellan being confused and unsure about his own game because he wasn't handled well, and that translates into not taking advantage of your opportunities if you're a player who doesn't have ironclad self-confidence.

-Both coaches haven given him significant top 6.
-Both coaches talked about his importance to the media, several times
-Both coaches have demoted him
-Both coaches have played blender with him
-Both coaches have not given him significant PP time, or in his "spot", which seems to be the biggest argument

Just throwing this out there prematurely of course, but if Edm loses tomo and JP is demoted yet again, do we get to play the "Blame Hitch's Development" game also?

Just curious. Or is this a purely hypocritical theme against Todd?

I am happy JP gets ANOTHER shot w/ McD of course. Going on his 4th go around I believe

By tomo we get to see if we can blame 1 coach or 2. Exciting times