The All-Purpose Sprong Thread

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Dipsy Doodle

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again, there are VERY few people here who don't want him to get that chance. I don't think many people would be proven wrong if he does well in that situation.

I'm not talking about people wanting him to get the chance here though.

I wanna know who'll commit to writing him off, because there's a lot of shit talkers right now haha.
 

Dipsy Doodle

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Enough man. You know they broke in on the 4th line just as Sprong has to. They got expanded roles when they started scoring.

Enough nothing. Tell me how many minutes they were getting. Because from looking at the logs, things were not close to equal.

Kuhn, for instance, averaged 12 minutes per over his first 16 games and only had an assist (though he scored a goal in his 17th).
 

Ogrezilla

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Jul 5, 2009
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My thoughts on Sprong.

1. Sprong hasn't played well enough in his role to force Sully's hand in to promoting him.

2. Sprong likely would do better in a more fitting role. He might not. But I'd like to find out.

3. Sully doesn't like Sprong. I don't know if it's a personal thing or just him as a player. Maybe he hates his face, I don't know. But Sully isn't looking to do him any favors. If Sprong wants to get a better shot, he's going to need to do more with less first.
 

Sidgeni Malkby

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Nov 19, 2008
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I’m just annoyed by how we develop players. If they don’t come in at 18 and wow you, they are pretty much done :/.
 

Empoleon8771

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Aug 25, 2015
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I really only see Emp writing him off.

I'm not even writing him off as a player, I'm writing him off as having a long term spot here. Sprong's biggest death sentence in my eyes was Simon being able to flawlessly play RW with Crosby, that was the final knife in the heart for Sprong's chances with the Penguins. I think Sprong will be a productive player on another team, most likely as a Neal type of pure triggerman for a center. But with Pittsburgh? There's just too much in front of him for me to think he'll do that here. He's now 5th on the Penguins RW depth at this point.

If they were smart, they'd be actively shopping him and trying to raise his value by playing him in a role that suits him better. That's one area I'll definitely criticize Sullivan in, he doesn't want Sprong on this team, but he's not putting Sprong in a position for JR to get good value in a trade for him. He's basically acting like a stubborn child about his usage with Sprong, if he didn't want him on the team, put him with scorers to try and raise his value.
 
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mpp9

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Enough nothing. Tell me how many minutes they were getting. Because from looking at the logs, things were not close to equal.

Kuhn, for instance, averaged 12 minutes per over his first 16 games and only had an assist (though he scored a goal in his 17th).

So all this complaining is over maybe a couple shifts when taking into account Sprong doesn't PK and our top PP takes most if not all of the PP minutes?

Kuhn started PKing pretty early on with us. Wilson was getting around 10 minutes or under most of the games when he started here and actually scored goals while doing so. With Porter.
 
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Shockmaster

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I'm not even writing him off as a player, I'm writing him off as having a long term spot here. Sprong's biggest death sentence in my eyes was Simon being able to flawlessly play RW with Crosby, that was the final knife in the heart for Sprong's chances with the Penguins. I think Sprong will be a productive player on another team, most likely as a Neal type of pure triggerman for a center. But with Pittsburgh? There's just too much in front of him for me to think he'll do that here. He's now 5th on the Penguins RW depth at this point.

If they were smart, they'd be actively shopping him and trying to raise his value by playing him in a role that suits him better. That's one area I'll definitely criticize Sullivan in, he doesn't want Sprong on this team, but he's not putting Sprong in a position for JR to get good value in a trade for him. He's basically acting like a stubborn child about his usage with Sprong, if he didn't want him on the team, put him with scorers to try and raise his value.

I wouldn't say that's been entirely true. He still goes through long stretches of doing a lot of nothing when he plays with Crosby.
 
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Empoleon8771

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The best examples to bring up to refute the minutes arguments are Wilson and Sheary. Sheary had 7 ES goals through 44 games while getting a shade under 9 minutes TOI at ES, and Wilson had 5 ES goals through 24 games while getting a shade over 10 minutes TOI at ES. Those are also the more comparable players to Sprong in terms of player type, at least more so than Rust and Kuhnhackl.

I wouldn't say that's been entirely true. He still goes through long stretches of doing a lot of nothing when he plays with Crosby.

That's just the player he is though, he's just inconsistent. He can flawlessly play RW as in he doesn't get any sort of drop off by playing his off-wing like some players get. He's as effective as a RW as he is a LW, and he fits well with Crosby.
 
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Gurglesons

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The best examples to bring up to refute the minutes arguments are Wilson and Sheary. Sheary had 7 ES goals through 44 games while getting a shade under 9 minutes TOI at ES, and Wilson had 5 ES goals through 24 games while getting a shade over 10 minutes TOI at ES. Those are also the more comparable players to Sprong in terms of player type, at least more so than Rust and Kuhnhackl.

Don’t confuse the Sprong fans by bringing up another Wilson.
 
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Dipsy Doodle

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So all this complaining is over maybe a couple shifts when taking into account Sprong doesn't PK and our top PP takes most if not all of the PP minutes?

Kuhn started PKing pretty early on with us. Wilson was getting around 10 minutes or under most of the games when he started here and actually scored goals while doing so. With Porter.

In '15-'16...

Kuhn averaged about 3.5 more minutes a night than Sprong and had 0 goals and 1 assist through 16 games. Rust averaged about 2 more minutes a night than Sprong and had 2 goals and 0 assists through 16 games. Sheary averaged about 2.5 more minutes a night than Sprong and had 2 goals and 1 assist through 16 games (and 2 of those points were with Sid). Wilson averaged about 1 more minute a night than Sprong and had 3 goals and 1 assist through 16 games.

All 4 played more, 3 of them significantly more. 3 produced more goals, and nobody produced more points.
 
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mpp9

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In '15-'16...

Kuhn averaged about 3.5 more minutes a night than Sprong and had 0 goals and 1 assist through 16 games. Rust averaged about 2 more minutes a night than Sprong and had 2 goals and 0 assists through 16 games. Sheary averaged about 2.5 more minutes a night than Sprong and had 2 goals and 1 assist through 16 games (and 2 of those points were with Sid). Wilson averaged about 1 more minute a night than Sprong and had 3 goals and 1 assist through 16 games.

All 4 played more, 3 of them significantly more. 3 produced more goals, and nobody produced more points.

So one of them played marginally more when factoring in PK minutes. Another played marginally more while scoring goals. And the other two played more while scoring goals.

I can see why you feel the need to ruin your entertainment of Pens hockey to fight this good fight.

I'll gladly make an avatar bet with you on this. Name your terms.
 

Pancakes

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Sprong situation is weird. You can say maybe JR screwed his development a tad by making him waiver eligible earlier than hoped for, but on the other hand he dominated the AHL last year and was a PPG. He's got nothing left to prove down there, so I'm not sure what sending him back down would be good for even if we could do it.
 
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Dipsy Doodle

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So one of them played marginally more when factoring in PK minutes. Another played marginally more while scoring goals. And the other two played more while scoring goals.

I can see why you feel the need to ruin your entertainment of Pens hockey to fight this good fight.

I'll gladly make an avatar bet with you on this. Name your terms.

Yep. Sprong, as a 21 year old, despite playing fewer minutes has scored as many or more points through 16 games this year as a number of older Pens prospects in '15-'16 who went on to contribute to a Cup run. It's the surprise twist of the year! :sarcasm:

I'm down for an avy bet.

Terms? Hmm. Just sport an avatar that says "I Was Wrong" for a month if Sprong averages reasonable TOI (let's say 13 minutes or more a game for 10+ games, to be in line with Sheary last year and ZAR this year) primarily with a Brassard-or-better quality center and produces well (let's say a 35 + point pace, just so we can confirm he could outproduce Sheary's last year here).

If Sprong gets those minutes somewhere and doesn't do it, I'll use an "I Was Wrong" avatar for a month instead.

I don't have a timeframe on this, but neither of us are going anywhere and we can trust each other to be honest. I'll concede if it looks hopeless.
 
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Dipsy Doodle

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Sprong situation is weird. You can say maybe JR screwed his development a tad by making him waiver eligible earlier than hoped for, but on the other hand he dominated the AHL last year and was a PPG. He's got nothing left to prove down there, so I'm not sure what sending him back down would be good for even if we could do it.

Really though. There's no amount of AHL seasoning that makes a player able to produce in 2018 with 8:30 a game flanking Sheahan, Grant, and Cullen. It's doesn't confer magical powers.
 
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ronduguayshair

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People were so sure he was going to be this dynamic superstar and now that it’s not working out they don’t know how to handle it. It’s a bad look plaguing this messageboard.
 
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Pens x

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Oct 8, 2016
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Try Sprong somewhere in the top 9; playing him with offensively inept players like Grant and Sheahan, and past his prime that shouldn’t have been brought back Cullen, is setting Sprong up to fail.
 

Sidney the Kidney

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If they were smart, they'd be actively shopping him and trying to raise his value by playing him in a role that suits him better. That's one area I'll definitely criticize Sullivan in, he doesn't want Sprong on this team, but he's not putting Sprong in a position for JR to get good value in a trade for him. He's basically acting like a stubborn child about his usage with Sprong, if he didn't want him on the team, put him with scorers to try and raise his value.

This is my biggest issue with the situation. If you don't see a future for him on your team because the coach hates him, then at least raise his trade value by playing him in a position where he might actually bring you back something good.

Sullivan's stubborn usage of him basically means we'll be lucky to get a Pouliot-like return (ie. 5th round pick or whatever it was). That's not exactly selling high.
 
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