Line Combos: TLC Line to suffer same fate as MLA line?

Jun 15, 2013
5,556
5,257
Winnipeg
Going back to last summer many had Matthias-Lowry-Armia pencilled in as the shutdown line for 2017-2018. When healthy not a game went by in 2016-2017 without them affixed to each other.

What a change last season. I don't remember this trio playing a shift together.

The new shutdown line is Copp-Lowry-Tanev, affectionately referred to by some as TLC. Will they suffer the same fate next season?

It doesn't matter if you read the Sun or the Press, subscribe to the Athletic or read Arctic Ice Hockey, listen to 1290 or CJOB, if you're an a Vancouver based analytics guru or a forced capped poster from Finland, for once everyone is in perfect agreement with one another, Copp-Lowry-Tanev "TLC" will return in 2018-2019.

So will they? What other options would Maurice consider & how would such changes affect the rest of the roster?
 
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bumblebeeman

Registered User
Mar 16, 2016
1,955
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It definitely seems like it. Mathias was really bad last year, I don't see T or C dropping off like that. I could see Lemieux doing well on that line too.
 

mcpw

WPG
Jan 13, 2015
10,024
2,072
So, first, some stats (from corsica):

In 2016-17, there were 35 forward lines leaguewide who spent more than 300 minutes of 5v5 time on the ice together.
Matthias-Lowry-Armia 368 minutes, compared to those 35 lines:
48.55 CF% (30th; best: Pearson-Carter-Toffoli, worst: Grabner-Miller-Hayes)
-1.97 RelCF% (29th; best/worst same as CF%)
44.83 GF% (34th; best: Johansson-Kuznetsov-Williams, worst: Raffl-Giroux-Voracek)
-4.19 RelGF% (34th; best: Hall-Zajac-Palmieri, worst: Lucic-RNH-Eberle)
2.12 GF/60 (27th; best: Hyman-Matthews-Brown, worst: Nordstrom-McClement-Stalberg)
In other words, that line sucked badly. You have MLA as a third line and Thorburn on the fourth and your depth scoring is a huge problem. It was quite infuriating to see PauMau trying to make it work even in garbage time when he could have experimented with other players (Connor, Roslovic, Dano, Petan). At the (rough) beginning of this season, when Connor was sent down, some of us were complaining about "two fourth lines". I was very disappointed when MLA was sent out for the first game, and I was very happy it only lasted one game.

Same exercise for Copp-Lowry-Tanev (313 minutes), compared to the 44 >300 minute lines of 2017-18:
60.39 CF% (1st; worst: Nieto-Soderberg-Comeau)
+7.96 RelCF% (6th; best: Panarin-Dubois-Anderson, worst: Marleau-Kadri-Komarov)
66.67 GF% (8th; best: Ritchie-Henrique-Kase, worst: Cousins-Richardson-Martinook)
+14.91 RelGF% (13th; best: Nyquist-Zetterberg-Manta, worst: Cousins-Richardson-Martinook)
2.68 GF/60 (29th; best: Bjugstad-Barkov-Dadonov, worst: Kuraly-Schaller-Acciari)
That line was actually pretty good and it produced results that most teams would be happy to get from their top line. It's obviously unlikely that they can sustain those elite numbers, but it's not farfetched to think they can be decent.

tl;dr: CLT is nothing like MLA because CLT was great and MLA was garbage.

Evidence that PauMau isn't completely married to the CLT line: they only played one game against Vegas together (game 4). Note though that in the other games, it was always Armia who replaced either Copp or Tanev on that line, and Armia is gone now.

In my opinion, it comes down to who's the fourth guy to play center after Scheifele, Little, and Lowry.
- Wheeler: I have a hard time seeing PauMau splitting Scheifele and Wheeler so I'm confident he won't play center. I also really hope he'll never play center again.
- Perreault: the days of Center Perreault are gone for good.
- Petan: Lots of different scenarios what could happen with him, but the one in which he plays #4C is pretty unlikely in my opinion.
- there could be a Hendricks-type August veteran signing (Letestu? Moore?), but it hasn't happened yet.
So I think it's safe to say that it probably comes down to Copp vs Roslovic. The reasons why everybody has CLT as a line in their projected lineup are 1) they were really good together and 2) most people who write projected lineups are fans of the team and as such they want to see Roslovic succeed as a center and become the eventual #2C.

Of course, PauMau might not want play Roslovic at center, we'll see what he does. I think it's safe to say Roslovic will play some games at center next season, but maybe he won't start there, or maybe he will be moved back to wing if he doesn't get good results. And in that case, Copp is probably the backup option, which would spell the end of CLT.

In both cases it will be interesting if PauMau runs a 8-10 minutes fourth line that's clearly behind Lowry and Little (like when we had Scheifele-Little-Lowry-Hendricks), or if he runs four lines and assigns icetime depending on the score (like when we had Scheifele-Stastny/Little/Lowry, and Lowry was used as a second liner when we were up early and as a fourth liner when we were down early).
 

Mortimer Snerd

You kids get off my lawn!
Sponsor
Jun 10, 2014
57,187
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So, first, some stats (from corsica):

In 2016-17, there were 35 forward lines leaguewide who spent more than 300 minutes of 5v5 time on the ice together.
Matthias-Lowry-Armia 368 minutes, compared to those 35 lines:
48.55 CF% (30th; best: Pearson-Carter-Toffoli, worst: Grabner-Miller-Hayes)
-1.97 RelCF% (29th; best/worst same as CF%)
44.83 GF% (34th; best: Johansson-Kuznetsov-Williams, worst: Raffl-Giroux-Voracek)
-4.19 RelGF% (34th; best: Hall-Zajac-Palmieri, worst: Lucic-RNH-Eberle)
2.12 GF/60 (27th; best: Hyman-Matthews-Brown, worst: Nordstrom-McClement-Stalberg)
In other words, that line sucked badly. You have MLA as a third line and Thorburn on the fourth and your depth scoring is a huge problem. It was quite infuriating to see PauMau trying to make it work even in garbage time when he could have experimented with other players (Connor, Roslovic, Dano, Petan). At the (rough) beginning of this season, when Connor was sent down, some of us were complaining about "two fourth lines". I was very disappointed when MLA was sent out for the first game, and I was very happy it only lasted one game.

Same exercise for Copp-Lowry-Tanev (313 minutes), compared to the 44 >300 minute lines of 2017-18:
60.39 CF% (1st; worst: Nieto-Soderberg-Comeau)
+7.96 RelCF% (6th; best: Panarin-Dubois-Anderson, worst: Marleau-Kadri-Komarov)
66.67 GF% (8th; best: Ritchie-Henrique-Kase, worst: Cousins-Richardson-Martinook)
+14.91 RelGF% (13th; best: Nyquist-Zetterberg-Manta, worst: Cousins-Richardson-Martinook)
2.68 GF/60 (29th; best: Bjugstad-Barkov-Dadonov, worst: Kuraly-Schaller-Acciari)
That line was actually pretty good and it produced results that most teams would be happy to get from their top line. It's obviously unlikely that they can sustain those elite numbers, but it's not farfetched to think they can be decent.

tl;dr: CLT is nothing like MLA because CLT was great and MLA was garbage.

Evidence that PauMau isn't completely married to the CLT line: they only played one game against Vegas together (game 4). Note though that in the other games, it was always Armia who replaced either Copp or Tanev on that line, and Armia is gone now.

In my opinion, it comes down to who's the fourth guy to play center after Scheifele, Little, and Lowry.
- Wheeler: I have a hard time seeing PauMau splitting Scheifele and Wheeler so I'm confident he won't play center. I also really hope he'll never play center again.
- Perreault: the days of Center Perreault are gone for good.
- Petan: Lots of different scenarios what could happen with him, but the one in which he plays #4C is pretty unlikely in my opinion.
- there could be a Hendricks-type August veteran signing (Letestu? Moore?), but it hasn't happened yet.
So I think it's safe to say that it probably comes down to Copp vs Roslovic. The reasons why everybody has CLT as a line in their projected lineup are 1) they were really good together and 2) most people who write projected lineups are fans of the team and as such they want to see Roslovic succeed as a center and become the eventual #2C.

Of course, PauMau might not want play Roslovic at center, we'll see what he does. I think it's safe to say Roslovic will play some games at center next season, but maybe he won't start there, or maybe he will be moved back to wing if he doesn't get good results. And in that case, Copp is probably the backup option, which would spell the end of CLT.

In both cases it will be interesting if PauMau runs a 8-10 minutes fourth line that's clearly behind Lowry and Little (like when we had Scheifele-Little-Lowry-Hendricks), or if he runs four lines and assigns icetime depending on the score (like when we had Scheifele-Stastny/Little/Lowry, and Lowry was used as a second liner when we were up early and as a fourth liner when we were down early).

Pretty much covers it. If Roslovic plays C, we get CLT. If he doesn't then Copp is 4C.

Copp at 4C opens up a few questions. Does that open a door for Lemieux at LW or is it still between Petan and Dano? And then there is the usage question.
 

Gm0ney

Unicorns salient
Oct 12, 2011
14,420
12,650
Winnipeg
So, first, some stats (from corsica):

In 2016-17, there were 35 forward lines leaguewide who spent more than 300 minutes of 5v5 time on the ice together.
Matthias-Lowry-Armia 368 minutes, compared to those 35 lines:
48.55 CF% (30th; best: Pearson-Carter-Toffoli, worst: Grabner-Miller-Hayes)
-1.97 RelCF% (29th; best/worst same as CF%)
44.83 GF% (34th; best: Johansson-Kuznetsov-Williams, worst: Raffl-Giroux-Voracek)
-4.19 RelGF% (34th; best: Hall-Zajac-Palmieri, worst: Lucic-RNH-Eberle)
2.12 GF/60 (27th; best: Hyman-Matthews-Brown, worst: Nordstrom-McClement-Stalberg)
In other words, that line sucked badly. You have MLA as a third line and Thorburn on the fourth and your depth scoring is a huge problem. It was quite infuriating to see PauMau trying to make it work even in garbage time when he could have experimented with other players (Connor, Roslovic, Dano, Petan). At the (rough) beginning of this season, when Connor was sent down, some of us were complaining about "two fourth lines". I was very disappointed when MLA was sent out for the first game, and I was very happy it only lasted one game.

Same exercise for Copp-Lowry-Tanev (313 minutes), compared to the 44 >300 minute lines of 2017-18:
60.39 CF% (1st; worst: Nieto-Soderberg-Comeau)
+7.96 RelCF% (6th; best: Panarin-Dubois-Anderson, worst: Marleau-Kadri-Komarov)
66.67 GF% (8th; best: Ritchie-Henrique-Kase, worst: Cousins-Richardson-Martinook)
+14.91 RelGF% (13th; best: Nyquist-Zetterberg-Manta, worst: Cousins-Richardson-Martinook)
2.68 GF/60 (29th; best: Bjugstad-Barkov-Dadonov, worst: Kuraly-Schaller-Acciari)
That line was actually pretty good and it produced results that most teams would be happy to get from their top line. It's obviously unlikely that they can sustain those elite numbers, but it's not farfetched to think they can be decent.

tl;dr: CLT is nothing like MLA because CLT was great and MLA was garbage.

Evidence that PauMau isn't completely married to the CLT line: they only played one game against Vegas together (game 4). Note though that in the other games, it was always Armia who replaced either Copp or Tanev on that line, and Armia is gone now.

In my opinion, it comes down to who's the fourth guy to play center after Scheifele, Little, and Lowry.
- Wheeler: I have a hard time seeing PauMau splitting Scheifele and Wheeler so I'm confident he won't play center. I also really hope he'll never play center again.
- Perreault: the days of Center Perreault are gone for good.
- Petan: Lots of different scenarios what could happen with him, but the one in which he plays #4C is pretty unlikely in my opinion.
- there could be a Hendricks-type August veteran signing (Letestu? Moore?), but it hasn't happened yet.
So I think it's safe to say that it probably comes down to Copp vs Roslovic. The reasons why everybody has CLT as a line in their projected lineup are 1) they were really good together and 2) most people who write projected lineups are fans of the team and as such they want to see Roslovic succeed as a center and become the eventual #2C.

Of course, PauMau might not want play Roslovic at center, we'll see what he does. I think it's safe to say Roslovic will play some games at center next season, but maybe he won't start there, or maybe he will be moved back to wing if he doesn't get good results. And in that case, Copp is probably the backup option, which would spell the end of CLT.

In both cases it will be interesting if PauMau runs a 8-10 minutes fourth line that's clearly behind Lowry and Little (like when we had Scheifele-Little-Lowry-Hendricks), or if he runs four lines and assigns icetime depending on the score (like when we had Scheifele-Stastny/Little/Lowry, and Lowry was used as a second liner when we were up early and as a fourth liner when we were down early).
IIRC from playing with NaturalStatTrick's line tool, the Lowry-Copp combo was very good (2017-18). It didn't really matter who the third guy was on the line - when Copp and Lowry were out there together, they dominated the opposition. Whoever was the 3rd wheel on that line was less effective away from them (especially away from Lowry - he seemed to be the big factor, but Copp was pretty solid too).
 
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Jun 15, 2013
5,556
5,257
Winnipeg
So, first, some stats (from corsica):

In 2016-17, there were 35 forward lines leaguewide who spent more than 300 minutes of 5v5 time on the ice together.
Matthias-Lowry-Armia 368 minutes, compared to those 35 lines:
48.55 CF% (30th; best: Pearson-Carter-Toffoli, worst: Grabner-Miller-Hayes)
-1.97 RelCF% (29th; best/worst same as CF%)
44.83 GF% (34th; best: Johansson-Kuznetsov-Williams, worst: Raffl-Giroux-Voracek)
-4.19 RelGF% (34th; best: Hall-Zajac-Palmieri, worst: Lucic-RNH-Eberle)
2.12 GF/60 (27th; best: Hyman-Matthews-Brown, worst: Nordstrom-McClement-Stalberg)
In other words, that line sucked badly. You have MLA as a third line and Thorburn on the fourth and your depth scoring is a huge problem. It was quite infuriating to see PauMau trying to make it work even in garbage time when he could have experimented with other players (Connor, Roslovic, Dano, Petan). At the (rough) beginning of this season, when Connor was sent down, some of us were complaining about "two fourth lines". I was very disappointed when MLA was sent out for the first game, and I was very happy it only lasted one game.

Same exercise for Copp-Lowry-Tanev (313 minutes), compared to the 44 >300 minute lines of 2017-18:
60.39 CF% (1st; worst: Nieto-Soderberg-Comeau)
+7.96 RelCF% (6th; best: Panarin-Dubois-Anderson, worst: Marleau-Kadri-Komarov)
66.67 GF% (8th; best: Ritchie-Henrique-Kase, worst: Cousins-Richardson-Martinook)
+14.91 RelGF% (13th; best: Nyquist-Zetterberg-Manta, worst: Cousins-Richardson-Martinook)
2.68 GF/60 (29th; best: Bjugstad-Barkov-Dadonov, worst: Kuraly-Schaller-Acciari)
That line was actually pretty good and it produced results that most teams would be happy to get from their top line. It's obviously unlikely that they can sustain those elite numbers, but it's not farfetched to think they can be decent.

tl;dr: CLT is nothing like MLA because CLT was great and MLA was garbage.

Evidence that PauMau isn't completely married to the CLT line: they only played one game against Vegas together (game 4). Note though that in the other games, it was always Armia who replaced either Copp or Tanev on that line, and Armia is gone now.

In my opinion, it comes down to who's the fourth guy to play center after Scheifele, Little, and Lowry.
- Wheeler: I have a hard time seeing PauMau splitting Scheifele and Wheeler so I'm confident he won't play center. I also really hope he'll never play center again.
- Perreault: the days of Center Perreault are gone for good.
- Petan: Lots of different scenarios what could happen with him, but the one in which he plays #4C is pretty unlikely in my opinion.
- there could be a Hendricks-type August veteran signing (Letestu? Moore?), but it hasn't happened yet.
So I think it's safe to say that it probably comes down to Copp vs Roslovic. The reasons why everybody has CLT as a line in their projected lineup are 1) they were really good together and 2) most people who write projected lineups are fans of the team and as such they want to see Roslovic succeed as a center and become the eventual #2C.

Of course, PauMau might not want play Roslovic at center, we'll see what he does. I think it's safe to say Roslovic will play some games at center next season, but maybe he won't start there, or maybe he will be moved back to wing if he doesn't get good results. And in that case, Copp is probably the backup option, which would spell the end of CLT.

In both cases it will be interesting if PauMau runs a 8-10 minutes fourth line that's clearly behind Lowry and Little (like when we had Scheifele-Little-Lowry-Hendricks), or if he runs four lines and assigns icetime depending on the score (like when we had Scheifele-Stastny/Little/Lowry, and Lowry was used as a second liner when we were up early and as a fourth liner when we were down early).

Great analysis. Your thoughts basically echo my own, although I had no idea TLC's 5x5 stats were THAT good & that their Corsi had them as league leaders. I'm familiar with web sites listing individual player stats for analytics, but have yet to find a site that lists & sorts by actual lines. Where did that data come from?

Anyways, as you bring up, whomever occupies that last centre position after Scheifele-Little-Lowry is what seals the fate of TLC. The current roster, as is, dictates it's either Copp or Roslovic. One spells the end of TLC. Mo's usage of Copp at centre suggests that being the option, but as you mention that occurred prior to Armias trade to Montreal.

Should the top 6 remain as is with some combination of Connor-Scheifele-Wheeler, Ehlers-Little-Laine, then perhaps it's Perreault who joins "LT". He's been the ultimate plug & play guy, succeeding wherever he's been placed. That would leave Petan/Dano-Copp-Roslovic as the final line. Interesting that that line would consist of 4 centres, although it's been years since Dano played that position.

Lemieux would be the other existing option, the speed of both Tanev & Lemieux has the potential to do a lot of damage, but doing so would cause waiver issues with either Petan or Dano. More importantly I'm not convinced that Lemieux can remain out of the penalty box. TLC as a whole took 20 minors the whole season. Lowry & Copp 10 seconds of PIM/GP, Tanev 16 seconds of PIM/GP. Lemieux appeared in 9 games and had 2 minutes & 19 seconds of PIM/GP. Despite their success last year, the Jets were once again near the top of the league in time shorthanded. The addition of Lemieux certainly wouldn't help that cause.

Much of last seasons success was clearly TLC. I'm hoping the line remains intact. With another year under their belts they could be even better this year.

EDIT: As brought up immediately above me by @Gm0ney it appears the combo of Copp/Lowry drove possession much better than Lowry/Tanev. Just a further reason to keep this line together!
 
Last edited:

mcpw

WPG
Jan 13, 2015
10,024
2,072
Great analysis. Your thoughts basically echo my own, although I had no idea TLC's 5x5 stats were THAT good & that their Corsi had them as league leaders. I'm familiar with web sites listing individual player stats for analytics, but have yet to find a site that lists & sorts by actual lines. Where did that data come from?

Corsica | Line Stats
 

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