Player Discussion Jonathan Drouin - So comman Edition

[Miller Time]

Going to guess you're referring to Drouin here...

Why crap on Drouin because you're upset about the trade?

I thought the comparing to Larkin interesting because that poster views him as an elite 1st line C...

Meanwhile, his production so far is nearly identical to Drouin's.

It'll be interesting to see the views on Drouin should he have a bounce back season like Larkin had this year.

I don't it's "crapping on a player" to acknowledge he is a lesser asset than a more valuable one.

Sergachev is a better asset than Drouin
PK than Weber
Markov than cap space
Et. Et.

If anything, that acknowledgment simply points out the error in judgment by the person responsible. Drouin didn't trade himself & shouldn't be criticized on those grounds. I don't believe I ever have.

So, the polarizing hyperbole aside, I don't know enough about Larkin's overall game to comment on the Drouin comparison as far as value as a #1C.

Your comment I responded to was regarding the fan reaction. I was pointing out that the negative reaction tied to Drouin has more to do with how he was acquired than with his, albeit sup-par (based on draft pedigree/expectations), performance as a third year player.

Also, ppg is hardly the only variable to consider for a top line (or any line) C... Is Larkin as poor defensively & as limited in his overall gamr as Drouin? Those may be other considerations in comparing fan interest in the player.

 

[NotProkofievian]

Lmao what even is this thread?

Guys, it's all everyone and everything else's fault that Johnny 13 goals can't score. Everyone knows you can't score goals from the center ice position. It was just lucky that Johnny 13 goals could manage to produce assists at the same rate as he did in Tampa Bay both at even strength and on the power play with his boat anchor linemates and with the cross of the center ice position on his back.

Truly a Giroux level talent.

 

[Kriss E]

I think a lot of Drouins "effort" on the ice was due to him trying to be in position playing center. I've seen plenty of Drouin before last year, and never before did I see the floating that we all witnessed before then.

Hmm..Drouin was specifically sent down because of his play without the puck. He was lazy and a liability, just as much as he was here.
I think his play reflected the concerns many people had. I think he can play better on the wing, but his effort pretty much fell inline with what I expected from him.
Bad efforts are just always more evident when the team sucks.

 

[Kent Nilsson]

I was one of the biggest Drouin detractors but I don't understand this reasoning. What does it matter when and in what situations a player scores his points as long as he scores them. IF JD is a PP specialist and plays excellent defensively 5v5, who cares? The problem with JD was that he was atrocious on the defensive side, didn't know how to play center and had a serious attitude problem. If he fixes those three problems I could care less if he scored ALL his points on the PP.

Because PP time is a limited resource and it is far easier for any offensive player to score on the PP than 5v5.

Im baffled this has to be explained.

 

[CauZuki]

While I don't agree with the trade since we traded from an area of weakness to fill an area where we actually have depth.
I'm still waiting to see him at LW for a lengthy amount of time before I judge his career trajectory or whether I like him as a player.

 

[Habs Icing]

Because PP time is a limited resource and it is far easier for any offensive player to score on the PP than 5v5.

Im baffled this has to be explained.

That's effing nonsense. Everything is a limited resource even 5 on 5. The game only lasts 60 minutes and most forwrads only get about 15 ES time.. That's one nonsense you just spouted. Another is if it is far easier for offensive players to score on the PP then why don't they all do it? Why do some take advantage of their PP opportunities and others don't?

The previous poster compared Larkin and Drouin and remarked that they had the same points but took marks away from Drouin because he scored his points on the PP. Did the NHL start scoring PP goals at half the value of ES goals? When they start doing that I'll worry away Drouin being a PP specialist. Before that happens I'd worry about Drouin's more relevant flaws.

 

[Perrah]

That's effing nonsense. Everything is a limited resource even 5 on 5. The game only lasts 60 minutes and most forwrads only get about 15 ES time.. That's one nonsense you just spouted. Another is if it is far easier for offensive players to score on the PP then why don't they all do it? Why do some take advantage of their PP opportunities and others don't?

The previous poster compared Larkin and Drouin and remarked that they had the same points but took marks away from Drouin because he scored his points on the PP. Did the NHL start scoring PP goals at half the value of ES goals? When they start doing that I'll worry away Drouin being a PP specialist. Before that happens I'd worry about Drouin's more relevant flaws.

Playoffs, less PP's, less time and space and teams can really focus in on how to stop a PP compared to the regular season.

 

[417]

Larkin is an interesting tale to follow as it relates to Drouin...

He had barely played any center before this past year and responded with 63pts after struggling the year prior on the wing.

I know this isn't a popular opinion, but it's not out of the realm of possibility that Drouin could be better as a center this coming year.

I wouldn't rule it out.

 

[Kent Nilsson]

That's effing nonsense. Everything is a limited resource even 5 on 5. The game only lasts 60 minutes and most forwrads only get about 15 ES time.. That's one nonsense you just spouted. Another is if it is far easier for offensive players to score on the PP then why don't they all do it? Why do some take advantage of their PP opportunities and others don't?

The previous poster compared Larkin and Drouin and remarked that they had the same points but took marks away from Drouin because he scored his points on the PP. Did the NHL start scoring PP goals at half the value of ES goals? When they start doing that I'll worry away Drouin being a PP specialist. Before that happens I'd worry about Drouin's more relevant flaws.

Wow.

There is a lot of demand for PP time but limited supply. If a player is only effective in these conditions he has to be drastically better than another guy who would do roughly the same PP job but with better ES production. Otherwise he is just leeching opportunity for more deserving and useful players. Drouin isnt exactly a world breaker on PP, you could even argue he got some of that time to justify the trade and make the GM not look like the incompetent buffoon that he is.

Seeing a lazy, defensively indifferent guy being sent on the PP is badly regarded by other players and pollutes the locker room.

ES time is just limited by the gross amount of NHL jobs available, there are 4th liners for a reason and not everybody is expected to score. That retort of yours almost made me not respond. Why doesnt everybody score ? Duh... because not everybody is equally good at hockey ? Smh

Damnit I spent 15 minutes typing this.

 

[Video Coach]

Larkin is an interesting tale to follow as it relates to Drouin...

He had barely played any center before this past year and responded with 63pts after struggling the year prior on the wing.

I know this isn't a popular opinion, but it's not out of the realm of possibility that Drouin could be better as a center this coming year.

I wouldn't rule it out.

He was real good to end the year. Unless a trade happens, I would expect him to play there again and I think he'll be good. I still think he'd probably be a more impactful winger than centre but he can be a good centre.

 

[Mario le Magnifique]

Larkin is an interesting tale to follow as it relates to Drouin...

He had barely played any center before this past year and responded with 63pts after struggling the year prior on the wing.

I know this isn't a popular opinion, but it's not out of the realm of possibility that Drouin could be better as a center this coming year.

I wouldn't rule it out.

Problem is, I don't think the Habs are going to be good so this will again reflect on JD's inability to be solid in his own end. Also, on the PP he won't have Weber's powerful shot to setup and who knows where Pacioretty ends up, so as far as shooters we're going to be severely lacking, and it will hurt JD's numbers. This is a team game and our team overall is just plain bad, making JD look badder than he really is.

 

[montreal]

Larkin is an interesting tale to follow as it relates to Drouin...

He had barely played any center before this past year and responded with 63pts after struggling the year prior on the wing.

I know this isn't a popular opinion, but it's not out of the realm of possibility that Drouin could be better as a center this coming year.

I wouldn't rule it out.

it's more then likely he improves but the question is by how much. He made 6.5M to score 13 g and put up 46 pts. He hit a career high in games played with 77 but saw his goal totals drop from 21 to just 13.

I thought he was going to be great for us, but was so disappointed in his play (not that i saw much of the 2nd half where I heard he was better) the problem I had with him was how soft and lazy he looked. That needs to change but will it? Guess we'll see.

 

[JoelWarlord]

Yeah I'm not sure what people are expecting but I have a hard time believing he will be a star player. He scores like a low end 2nd liner or high end 3rd liner at even strength. Don't believe me? He had 24P at even strength, same as Plekanec and 5 less than Byron. I'd be comfortable calling Plekanec a 3rd line scorer and Byron a low end 2nd line scorer, and Drouin doesn't separate himself from those guys. It's not really all about playing center either, he had 27 EVP in his last year in Tampa Bay playing on the wing, still less than what Paul Byron could manage on this gong show of a team in 17-18. He's a perfectly fine player, Drouin is basically a 2nd line RW and he's legitimately excellent on the PP which boosts his value and a 2RW PP specialist is fine value at 5.5M. But a 2RW PP specialist isn't a star player, and if the Habs are expecting him to be our Nylander/Marner, let alone a Kane/Panarin/Kucherov/Gaudreau, it's not going to end well.

As for the Larkin comparison, over the past 2 seasons Larkin had 76 EVP in 162 games (~38 per 82GP), and Drouin had 51 in 150 (~28 per 82GP). That's a pretty substantial gap. That's not to say Drouin's points on the PP don't count, and I think Drouin legitimately provides much more marginal value on the PP over the average forward, but it's a lot easier to find good PP specialists than it is to find guys that score at ES. It was a bad trade but Drouin is still a valuable player, he just isn't likely to be a star player and the Habs can't really count on him being an elite player going forward. If he hasn't put it together at even strength after 4 pro seasons I'm not sure how likely it is he will in season 5 or 6.

It's not impossible he breaks out but there really aren't signs he's going to. He'll be more effective on the wing with a good two-way center but that's true of basically every skilled winger in the league, and "he isn't effective but he would be with a high end two way center driving the bus" doesn't exactly scream star player to me.

 

[JoelWarlord]

Wow.

There is a lot of demand for PP time but limited supply. If a player is only effective in these conditions he has to be drastically better than another guy who would do roughly the same PP job but with better ES production. Otherwise he is just leeching opportunity for more deserving and useful players. Drouin isnt exactly a world breaker on PP, you could even argue he got some of that time to justify the trade and make the GM not look like the incompetent buffoon that he is.

I agree with this. It's one of my biggest frustrations in hockey, just looking at raw point totals as "offense" in a vacuum and not accounting for the opportunity cost of one player getting PP time over another, or accounting for the difference between EV and PP scoring. Good example is Gallagher who is criminally underrated, he gets called "a 3rd line RW on a good team" which is just absolute nonsense. In EV goals since he came into the league, Gallagher is 10th among RWs. He is 100% a first line winger and an incredibly effective goal scorer (to say nothing of his shot volume which is dominant and solid defensive play). The only reason his raw stats aren't great is the Habs' mediocre PP during his career due to the Subban/Weber point shot obsession. In reality, his raw stats are lower because he didn't pile up PP points on those bad PPs, and the Habs often deliberately chose to use guys like Desharnais/Gionta/Drouin/Galchenyuk to get value out of them on special teams to compensate for their less effective EV play. But all a lot of fans see is that Gallagher is a "40 point guy" and Drouin/Galchenyuk are "50 point guys" even though Gallagher's 40 points of which 35 are EVP are immensely more valuable than Galchenyuk or Drouin getting 30P on the PP and 20 at EV. Then this year gets treated like some big revelation for Gallagher even though he's been this good his entire career and just didn't get the PP opportunities on a good PP unit.
____________________

My only issue is that I think Drouin genuinely does provide a lot of marginal value on the PP and IMO he's by far the best PP forward (and player) on the team. His net results aren't insane but that's bogged down by the first third of the year or so when the PP strategy seemed to be just have Weber shoot all the time which is dumb (and why Nashville's PP sucks). Once Petry replaced Weber the PP absolutely took off since he had someone else to pass with, and it was mostly Drouin running things, and the Habs had one of the best PP1 units in the league in 2018 and it was mostly Drouin and to a lesser extent Petry driving the bus.

Just in raw PP point rates, Drouin is 30th in PP points/60 over the past two seasons and 20th in PP points between Kane and Marner. I bet those placings would be a tad higher too if they ran Petry over Weber on PP1 all year too. He's not a super elite PP force or anything but he's easily among the top 15 to 30 PP players in the league and that has value. It doesn't make up for his shortcomings at even strength but it makes you more comfortable to have him as a sheltered 2RW and put up with his mediocre ES play. Tampa traded him because they already have elite EV players that are elite on the PP so there's no need to pay for PP specialists, but in lieu of having a Kucherov or Stamkos for the PP it's fine to use a guy like Drouin as your PP specialist and he's genuinely a big marginal value add in that role. This doesn't make the trade good or make him a star, but he is a valuable PP guy and I think he's fine value as a 2RW at 5.5M.

 

[Rosso Scuderia]

Drouin is a "we'll see" player. He's too talented to say that he will suck for sure next season.. until you see him play and get mad at him again..

 

[habmercy]

Weber's shot on the PP was missed a lot last year and would have helped Drouin a lot. I too believe Drouin will start at centre and I hope we give some of these guys time to play together in the preseason. Last year was brutal from the start and if Patches goes than we need to see who works well together. I wouldb't mind seeing Domi get a shot at centre too.

 

[OldCraig71]

Hmm..Drouin was specifically sent down because of his play without the puck. He was lazy and a liability, just as much as he was here.
I think his play reflected the concerns many people had. I think he can play better on the wing, but his effort pretty much fell inline with what I expected from him.
Bad efforts are just always more evident when the team sucks.

He dogged it though, it was obvious, he had Paciorettyittus, say the right things on camera but show anything but when on the ice. 5.5 million should motivate a human being more than Jonathon appeared to be last saison.

 

[nhlfan9191]

Larkin is an interesting tale to follow as it relates to Drouin...

He had barely played any center before this past year and responded with 63pts after struggling the year prior on the wing.

I know this isn't a popular opinion, but it's not out of the realm of possibility that Drouin could be better as a center this coming year.

I wouldn't rule it out.

He’s being given every chance to run with it. He looks like he’s lacking way to many important tools to play the position but I’d gladly buy the biggest spoon available so posters can feed me crow if he does become an effective center.

 

[JoelWarlord]

Weber's shot on the PP was missed a lot last year and would have helped Drouin a lot. I .

Not true actually. The Habs PP was substantially more effective with Petry instead of Weber. The Habs PP1 was mediocre early in the year and one of the best in the league with Petry after Weber's injury. Turns out even the best point shot in the world is less effective than shooting 15ft closer to the net, and having a second zone entry option means teams can't just focus all their attention on Drouin and stop him at the blue line.

The Habs and Preds PP is mediocre for the same reason, both teams are obsessed with the Subban/Weber point shots and it's way too easy to defend against that when the entire PP strategy is telegraphed point shots from 30ft out instead of cross ice passes and quick shots from 10-15ft out.

 

[CHfan1]

Not true actually. The Habs PP was substantially more effective with Petry instead of Weber. The Habs PP1 was mediocre early in the year and one of the best in the league with Petry after Weber's injury. Turns out even the best point shot in the world is less effective than shooting 15ft closer to the net, and having a second zone entry option means teams can't just focus all their attention on Drouin and stop him at the blue line.

The Habs and Preds PP is mediocre for the same reason, both teams are obsessed with the Subban/Weber point shots and it's way too easy to defend against that when the entire PP strategy is telegraphed point shots from 30ft out instead of cross ice passes and quick shots from 10-15ft out.

Below are the power play numbers with Weber and without him.

Montreal’s PP% went up substantially with him out.

2016-2017 PP% 19.7
2017-2018 PP% 21.2

2017-2018 season up until December 16th (last game Weber played) 17.3%

2017-2018 from December 17th on - 24.3%

 

[Belial]

Below are the power play numbers with Weber and without him.

Montreal’s PP% went up substantially with him out.

2016-2017 PP% 19.7
2017-2018 PP% 21.2

2017-2018 season up until December 16th (last game Weber played) 17.3%

2017-2018 from December 17th on - 24.3%

The PP got really hot later in the season, I don't think we can really say that it was better without Weber or not.

But Petry can clearly be a force on the PP.

 

[CHfan1]

The PP got really hot later in the season, I don't think we can really say that it was better without Weber or not.

But Petry can clearly be a force on the PP.

It was really good in the middle of the season, from December 17, 2017 to February 4, 2018 it was clicking at 27.8%.

 

[Belial]

It was really good in the middle of the season, from December 17, 2017 to February 4, 2018 it was clicking at 27.8%.

The PP is really not an issue with this team going forward, with guys like Drouin and Domi that can distribute the puck extremely well and some solid slappers from the blue line we should be fine.

They should fix the PK as it was freaking atrocious last year. Only the Islanders were worst than us...

 

[Kriss E]

He dogged it though, it was obvious, he had Paciorettyittus, say the right things on camera but show anything but when on the ice. 5.5 million should motivate a human being more than Jonathon appeared to be last saison.

It is what it is. I don't think we will see much different from Drouin this coming year.

 

[admiralcadillac]

I don't it's "crapping on a player" to acknowledge he is a lesser asset than a more valuable one.

Sergachev is a better asset than Drouin
PK than Weber
Markov than cap space
Et. Et.

If anything, that acknowledgment simply points out the error in judgment by the person responsible. Drouin didn't trade himself & shouldn't be criticized on those grounds. I don't believe I ever have.

So, the polarizing hyperbole aside, I don't know enough about Larkin's overall game to comment on the Drouin comparison as far as value as a #1C.

Your comment I responded to was regarding the fan reaction. I was pointing out that the negative reaction tied to Drouin has more to do with how he was acquired than with his, albeit sup-par (based on draft pedigree/expectations), performance as a third year player.

Also, ppg is hardly the only variable to consider for a top line (or any line) C... Is Larkin as poor defensively & as limited in his overall gamr as Drouin? Those may be other considerations in comparing fan interest in the player.

Give Drouin this year.. I don't know if he deserves it but...