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    • King Knut
      71
      Sign Jagr
      Philadelphia Flyers
      King Knut - Posted
        Sorry, reading on my phone (my screen is currently cracked), it looked like you said he played on the PK last year.  Which wasn't 100% incorrect.     Sorry, it read like you were laying out the PK options.  I guess you were implying that none were good options?     Yes, the Flyers power play was slightly above average.  But the first unit scored 84% of it's goals.  That's how good they were... and the 2nd unit was so bad that they put in 1/5 as many goals as the top unit.  Imagine how much better that 19.5% power play would be if the 2nd Unit carried just a little more of their weight?  Obviously you don't expect a 2nd Unit to score as much as your first unit, but if they were to be just half as good as the top unit, it would be a vast improvement and result in 14 more PP goals.  For a team that lost so many one goal and OT games last year, that's a huge difference.   My point about the PK is that though they were below average, the difference between the best in the league and the Flyers totals out to about 8 goals over the season.      14 is more than 8 and achieving that 14 (going from terrible to average) is probably more realistic than going from below average to the very best.       Of course IMHO if they can be a good team at even strength, none of this will matter until the later rounds of the playoffs anyway.     Does it stand to reason? I'd argue that it doesn't.  While you're right in that PEB and VDV were their top penalty killers in terms of minutes... Do we really think of them as good players though?  Were they the best options?  Why do we assume that?  Do the numbers bear that out?  Simply put, the numbers tell a completely different story.  They were in fact horrible in comparison.    They played the most minutes, but both their Corsi's on the PK were negative compared to Couturier and Simmonds whose Corsis were both positive.  And not just by a little.  In the case of Couturier, it was a swing of 20% points.  In the case of Simmonds it's a swing of 16% points. That's a MONUMENTAL difference.  That's PEB and VDV giving up a LOT MORE shot attempts against than Couturier and Simmonds.     Their goals against per 60 on the PK are much closer, though Couturier and Simmonds both did better by a lesser margin.   The larger problem on the PK is the defense.  MacDonald and Provorov were god awful on the PK which probably just means that MacDonald was god awful on the PK and had no business being out there and Provo couldn't make up for it.  MacDonald could have been so bad that the entire PK unit was dragged down with him. His goals against per 60 were the worst on the team.     The bright side is that Morin played in one game last year, had 3+mins of PK time, and gave up no goals despite having a terrible Corsi (meaning he was stuck penned in in his own zone and didn't give up anything).   Hagg by comparison also played in only a single game, and had half the PK time that Morin did (probably just didn't have as many penalties) and while he also gave up zero goals in that limited time, his relative Corsi was a whopping 34%.  That's crazy unsustainable good, but really really a positive sign.     Pair a guy like one of them with a Provo (who can move the damn puck) and Gudas (who also has a positive rel. Corsi on the PK) on the PK instead of MacDonald or Shcultz and things might get significantly better in a hurry.       I think based on what I just laid out, it's safe saying that something has definitely been done about the PK.  I guess it's possible that Raffl or whoever else they put on the PK could be worse than VDV and PEB, but seeing as how PEB and VDV were actually pretty terrible on the PK, trying something new might be just fine.     Add to that the fact that they might get to play Morin or Hagg, things could get crazy better on the PK... because the guys who got the lion's share of PK time last year had the worst numbers.       This is a dicey thing to say.  I'll leave the Couturier out of it though.  The entire 2nd unit was bad last year, but the best was Konecny.  Now assuming Weal or Lindblom take Schenn's spot on the first PP unit and Patrick makes the team and the 2nd Unit (those are in and of themselves not givens) That leaves Konecny and let's say Weal and Patrick as three forwards for the 2nd unit.  Now I don't know what Knoblach has in mind.  Will they continue to use 4 fowards or drop to three and another D man?     If they go with 4, who is that 4th forward?   There are no good options.  Based on their overall PP numbers, the best options are Read, Couturier and Weise (in that order).     This all assumes that Konecny gets better and that a PP unit with an average of 58 career NHL games played is going to be an improvement... which I mean considering how bad last year was... one would hope... but really?  Are you betting on that?       This gets back to what Hakstol and Knoblach are going to come up with.  Will they roll 4 fwds like the first line (if so, who's that 4th guy-they have no one who is "good" and by saying who is the 4th, I'm assuming the first three will be better even though they're all unproven and relatively to completely inexperienced on an NHL PP).  If they go with 3fwds and 2D, then you kinda have to hope that it's Provo and Sanheim, otherwise there's not really another D man who would be of benefit on the PP and they might as well switch to 4 fwds even though they don't have a good option.   And before we go down this route, I'll reiterate that over his entire career, Filppula like Couturier is a terrible PP performer.     Best case scenario for the 2nd Unit as it is= 3 ???, 1 bad option and Sanheim (who let's face it... is a pretty big ? at the pro level).        
    • OccamsRazor
      7
      A Take on Giroux in 2017-18
      Philadelphia Flyers
      OccamsRazor - Posted
          And let's be honest he and Coots padded their stats a bit at the end of this season when there was nothing to play for zero pressure they were out the playoffs....
    • OccamsRazor
      29
      Flyers and Oct, the first 11 games
      Philadelphia Flyers
      OccamsRazor - Posted
          No two prospects develop at the same time and rate some take time and coming over from Europe learning the difference in size rinks along with a different system takes time.   He has been on some not so talented teams in the AHL.   Has been through coaching changes.   And last year was his 1st year with an actual coach to coach up the Dmen. And he has had many many different partners on the blueline for the Phantoms.   He has all the tools tough and physical and skates well and brig some size 6-2 and i heard up to 212 pounds now.   All he needs is a chance and someone to coach him up and let him go through his growing pains like Ivan did.   Then we'll see.
    • King Knut
      71
      Sign Jagr
      Philadelphia Flyers
      King Knut - Posted
        Absolutely.  Raffl does everything right but score.  He can't find the net or thread a pass to save his life, but he's really really good at almost the rest of everything in hockey.  I agree that he should probably be on the PK and he's one of the reasons I'm excited by the 4th line.  Dude was our 1LW last year.  Shouldn't have been, but he'll be great on the 4th.    Read can still skate well and his defense should never be in question.  But he can't seem to find the puck anymore either.  He's got a year left, so it's not likely another team will trade for him until maybe the deadline.  He's been a penalty killer for years and if he's on the team should remain there (since we already have to replace two penalty killers).   That's what I mean about all these guys.  They were all playing top 6 minutes last year, but shouldn't have been.  Lehtera included.  St. Louis went as far as to put him on the 4th line and take him off the PK in the playoffs (oddly he put up an assist the night they did it).  I don't feel great about having him around either.  Having Frost around is interesting to me, but right now Lehtera is a roster spot that should probably go to Laughton or Vecchione.  God willing one of them can outplay the heck out of the guy and he can go on waivers.  Worst case scenario, he's definitely going to be an upgrade over PEB or VDV at least in on ice play.   That said, based on his recent years, I can easily imagine him being waived.     Weise is a quandry to me.  The problem is that he was abnormally bad for most of the year.  You're pointing out that the end was the aberration as far as the year goes, but the whole year was the aberration as far as his career goes.  Judging by the fact that the entire team was so horrible at even strength and given the fact that Weise played almost exclusively at even strength,    What I will say about Weise and Read is that they were two of the four forwards with a positive +/-.  Likely because they spent chunks of time with Couturier.  But I don't think it benefits the team to have both of them... AND Lehtera... AND Raffl.     Of the four, Raffl is definitely the best to have around,  and his year was cut short with injury.  But having all 4 is going to be a drag on the team.  at least 2 need to not be playing the same night as the other two.  
    • vis
      71
      Sign Jagr
      Philadelphia Flyers
      vis - Posted
      This is a bit of a non-sequitur.  I wasn't touting Konecny as a potential PKer.  I was pointing out that he was a PP player.  He averaged 1:41 of PP time per game.  It's clear he was a second unit PP player.   Not really an accurate characterization of what I said.  I pointed out that there are not viable candidates for the PK.  So, no, I don't think there are realistic options for the PK.   NHL PP% average was approximately 19.1%.  The Flyers were slightly above average at 19.5%.  The PP ranked 14 out of 30 teams.   NHL PK% was approximately 80.9%.  The Flyers were at 79.8%.  The PK ranked 21 out of 30 teams.  And they lost their top two PKers in the offseason.  Stands to reason they will have a difficult time maintaining even that level of "efficiency."     Further erosion of PK "efficiency" is more problematic to me than improving a PP that, overall, performed slightly above league average and, by most accounts, should see some improvement by virtue of hiring a new coach and influx of younger players on the second unit.  Nothing has been done to realistically address the PK.   Well, there would be addition by subtraction by not having Couturier on the second PP unit.  I realize that statement probably just triggered a visceral reaction, but, please, let's not go down that road...   Agree with this.  Biggest issue for me is who QBs the other point on the PP.  It's not the forwards I worry about.  I have no problem with Provorov back there.  But the other spot is a bit of a mystery to me.  
    • Howie58
      7
      A Take on Giroux in 2017-18
      Philadelphia Flyers
      Howie58 - Posted
      Good Morning!   Agreed with all that a trade is tough here--partly because the guy is associated with being "Mr. O and B," a little like Shane Doan, for example.  I hope G is on the mend and gets support to bring his numbers back to where the salary is justifiable.  But if they aren't, we face a lot of head scratching.  It will also put a lot of pressure on Hakstol--he is hired to win, not maintain to egos or justify salary. Let's keep our fingers crossed!  
    • mojo1917
      7
      A Take on Giroux in 2017-18
      Philadelphia Flyers
      mojo1917 - Posted
      This would be truly the "kick the can down the road move"...  dealing Schenn, he's a peripheral piece, he drives nothing in terms of scoring, he got points, but those points were not a result of his dominant play, they were scraps from the hard work of others. Dealing Giroux would signal "total rebuild", his back should be pretty sore from carrying the team around for the last 3 years. 

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