Auston Matthews

[Zee]

I expect a big game from Matthews tomorrow night.  It's a known fact that since he's from Arizona he relies on sunlight to heal his powers.  Being down in Florida will give him the boost he needs for the final 15 games.

 

[disco]

I expect a big game from Matthews tomorrow night.  It's a known fact that since he's from Arizona he relies on sunlight to heal his powers.  Being down in Florida will give him the boost he needs for the final 15 games.

There's also another man that relies on solar power to regenerate...

 

[herman]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8AzTFA5-eW4[/youtube]
Some pretty good question handling right at the end there.

I was expecting Mitch Marner to jump in.

 

[Coco-puffs]

If the point spread between Laine and Matthews continues to grow, Babcock playing Matthews with Brown/Hyman is likely going to cost him a fair number of ROY votes.  Maybe that shouldn't be the priority but I think there are still too many voters who are going to look at raw points in their voting decision.

I mean, I'm happy to say it. I don't really care about the ROY and don't think it should be a driving force in any decision but in general I think it'd be better to put Matthews with guys who can occasionally carry the load so maybe he feels less frustrated.

Well, that would mostly be my point.  I mean I don't think we should be just letting Matthews cherry pick to rack up points, but it seems like sitting Leivo when he was killing it in the lineup just so you can dress Matt Martin every night seems counter productive to winning.  As a byproduct of that, you are improving the quality of linemate for Matthews so that he no longer has to carrying around two weights.

I think it's exactly that frustrating feeling that I take issue with.

An interesting article I saw from Twitter today:

https://hockey-graphs.com/2017/03/14/strong-and-weak-links-talent-distribution-within-teams/

The summary of the article is as follows.  The bolded part is relevant to the discussion of who Matthews should play with.

Hockey is a strong link game. Getting the very best players is essential to success. Phrased this way, it sounds obvious. But the above shows that this is the case even at the cost of creating weaknesses elsewhere in the lineup. This has implications for many of the major decisions that general managers make.

When trading, this work suggests that quality is more important than quantity.* Tyler Seguin was traded for multiple pieces and Evgeni Malkin was rumored in plans to do the same, and I think that both Dallas and Pittsburgh are happy to have the best player rather than several lesser players. In free agency, it is better to spend cap space on a single star than on multiple pieces of the bench. For the draft, this piece provides rigorous evidence supporting the belief that tanking works, since tanking is one of the best ways to acquire elite talent (once again, see Moneypuck). Finally, I?d argue that this has implications for coaching as well: hockey is about creating goals, not avoiding mistakes, and there is a compelling case to give top players the freedom to make plays and win games.

These findings also nicely complement DTMAboutHeart?s RITHAC presentation, in which he suggested it is better to spread out top players on different lines rather than putting them together. That suggests that individual matchups are also strong link games, and it is best to have as strong a player as possible on the ice at all times.

Unless we add more elite-level talent to this team, it's probably best to have Matthews-Marner-Nylander on separate lines.  If you want to talk about the distribution of the rest of the wingers, then yes, Leivo or someone like JvR not being on Matthews wing is probably hurting his production (but probably not his ability to keep the puck out of his own net- considering he's getting tough matchups daily now).

Another point this article makes is that the "weakest link" on a team has very little impact on the results of the team.  There is a much higher correlation between the strong links and the overall strength of the team.  There was very little correlation with winning based on the discrepancy between the better weakest players on a team and the worse ones. 

So, if Matt Martin is in the lineup less to help the team "win" and more to do other things like add protection for our stars its not as big a deal as some make it out to be.  ON THE OTHER HAND, since the NHL does work within cap constraints, spending too many millions on the bottom of your roster at the expense of adding elite level players elsewhere will hurt your chances of winning.  So, don't be mad at Babcock for playing Martin- be mad at management for the term and dollars used to sign him.

Finally, the author does point out where his analysis could use further improvement:

Assuming the general conclusions are right, more work on the effect size of roster imbalances would help define exactly how much the tradeoff for elite talent is worth. Second, Jack Han suggested splitting this work into offense and defense to see if the weak link / strong link distinction is clearer in one side of the game, and this sounds like a worthwhile investigation. In addition, it would be nice to find a compelling method for including goalies in this analysis. Finally, more work should be done to better understand the marginal cost of improving each part of the roster.

I think that improving your weakest defenseman is CERTAINLY going to have a bigger impact on winning compared to improving your fourth line.  But as we all know here in leaf land and as the article suggests- the biggest improvement we'd like to see is actually a top-flight right handed-defenseman to play with either Morgan or Jake, pushing Zaitsev and Carrick down to 4-6 spots. 

 

[rdowdall]

I think the bottom line is:

- There are only 60 minutes in a game (most of the time)
- The best players on each team play the most
- More playing time means a higher percentage of overall time off the game
- Higher percentage of the overall game time means that the actions of that individual contribute more to the winning/losing of the game.

 

[LuncheonMeat]

I think the bottom line is:

- There are only 60 minutes in a game (most of the time)
- The best players on each team play the most
- More playing time means a higher percentage of overall time off the game
- Higher percentage of the overall game time means that the actions of that individual contribute more to the winning/losing of the game.

Interestingly, JVR sits at 15:43 TOI/game on average this season. That ranks him at 20th on the team in ice time/game. Every forward on the list after him, arguably, is a 4th line player (except maybe Leivo?). Given that he has 21 goals/51 points, I find that somewhat surprising.

 

[Kin]

[quote author=Significantly Insignificant
Interestingly, JVR sits at 15:43 TOI/game on average this season. That ranks him at 20th on the team in ice time/game. Every forward on the list after him, arguably, is a 4th line player (except maybe Leivo?). Given that he has 21 goals/51 points, I find that somewhat surprising.

It's really just a result of him not being part of the penalty kill. In terms of 5v5 and PP Ice time he's 6th and the only really questionable person above him is Hyman.

 

[ZBBM]

Matthews seems like he's struggling a bit during this last stretch of no points -- more than during that earlier drought this season.  Not looking nearly as dangerous. 

 

[Highlander]

Matthews seems like he's struggling a bit during this last stretch of no points -- more than during that earlier drought this season.  Not looking nearly as dangerous.

It would be interesting to compare his rookie season with Crosby, Toews and several other of the top prospects in their first year and see where the dry spells are, if any.  Hopefully he will get moving and soon, we need him and the others to pick it up.

 

[mr grieves]

Patrick O'Sullivan came for Hyman's head.

And freaked out Andi Petrillo and Dave Poulin.

http://www.tsn.ca/video/when-is-enough-enough-to-find-better-linemates-for-matthews~1078558

 

[disco]

Respectfully, Auston is still moving his feet and working. They all are. He said it, no one's really 100% this time of year. It is what it is. That O'Sullivan rant is great! A lot of good points. Yeah, Hyman doesn't finish. Two even-strength goals in 45 games. I love Hyman, clearly an NHL-player, like Patrick says, forechecks, penalty-kills, he's dug it out and fed it several times for goals...

But he's cost Auston 10 assists this year at least. His finishing and passing is not top-six. Your best player deserves guys on both sides that have it. Actually more productive with Brown on the right than Willie. Poulin made a good point, you can get away with it better if you have that offensive defenseman that slides into the play that you can pass to.

I'm sold, new left-winger for Auston. I think it probably will be next year when Auston goes over 20 minutes a game, more players come up and Willie moves to center. Right now the other left-wingers are JVR or Komorov, and I don't think Babs wants to take from the other lines. Kadri with Komorov as a more responsible vet line, and JVR/Bozak/Marner. To be fair I don't think Babs is obtuse to this whole issue, he's working with what he has. Matthews will eventually have guys on both sides he deserves, that I'm sure of.

 

[Bullfrog]

I think Kadri might make a good left-winger for Matthews.

 

[rdowdall]

I think Kadri might make a good left-winger for Matthews.

The problem there is that you are then weakening your center depth.  There are decisions to be made up front with this team.  I think rolling with Matthews, Nylander and Kadri at center is a start.  That means you need to figure out what to do with Bozak.  You can resign Boyle, or let him walk.  Either way you can put Gauthier on the 4th line next year as Boyle can play the wing. 

Once the positions are set, it becomes a question of which wingers play where. 

 

[McGarnagle]

There's no disputing Matthews would be better with better linemates, but I think it's fair to acknowledge that he hasn't played all that well compared to the standard he set since the all-star break. I assume the season he played in Sweden was much shorter?

 

[Arn]

Switzerland, rather than Sweden. It's a 12 team 50 game regular season. Playoffs would be shorter too. (I think Zurich only played one round last season too). There's also a minimum of 4 European Champions Hockey League games (a continental competition with top clubs from Switzerland, Finland, Germany, Sweden etc but not Russia).

So I'd say about 65ish games for top European clubs.

Edit to add: while there is still a level of hitting in most of the European leagues the larger ice means the game is probably also less physical and attritional.

 

[Guilt Trip]

Patrick O'Sullivan came for Hyman's head.

And freaked out Andi Petrillo and Dave Poulin.

http://www.tsn.ca/video/when-is-enough-enough-to-find-better-linemates-for-matthews~1078558

And he should..Hyman is terrible on Matthews line and let's be honest, he's bringing him down along with his numbers. Bad move and the experiment by Babs needs to end. Matthews deserves a better left winger...

 

[ZBBM]

Patrick O'Sullivan came for Hyman's head.

And freaked out Andi Petrillo and Dave Poulin.

http://www.tsn.ca/video/when-is-enough-enough-to-find-better-linemates-for-matthews~1078558

And he should..Hyman is terrible on Matthews line and let's be honest, he's bringing him down along with his numbers. Bad move and the experiment by Babs needs to end. Matthews deserves a better left winger...

Hyman may not be the fit long-term, but he's not the reason Matthews is slumping at the moment.

 

[Bender]

Patrick O'Sullivan came for Hyman's head.

And freaked out Andi Petrillo and Dave Poulin.

http://www.tsn.ca/video/when-is-enough-enough-to-find-better-linemates-for-matthews~1078558

And he should..Hyman is terrible on Matthews line and let's be honest, he's bringing him down along with his numbers. Bad move and the experiment by Babs needs to end. Matthews deserves a better left winger...

Hyman may not be the fit long-term, but he's not the reason Matthews is slumping at the moment.

POS mentioned a stat that Matthews would probably have 10 more assists with a decent winger. He definitely isn't helping the matter.

Sent from my SM-G935W8 using Tapatalk

 

[mr grieves]

Patrick O'Sullivan came for Hyman's head.

And freaked out Andi Petrillo and Dave Poulin.

http://www.tsn.ca/video/when-is-enough-enough-to-find-better-linemates-for-matthews~1078558

And he should..Hyman is terrible on Matthews line and let's be honest, he's bringing him down along with his numbers. Bad move and the experiment by Babs needs to end. Matthews deserves a better left winger...

Hyman may not be the fit long-term, but he's not the reason Matthews is slumping at the moment.

Yeah, Hyman can't get the puck to anyone in scoring position and can't score when he's in a position to do so... but, other than that, I don't see how he has anything to do with Matthews's slump.

 

[Kin]

Yeah, Hyman can't get the puck to anyone in scoring position and can't score when he's in a position to do so... but, other than that, I don't see how he has anything to do with Matthews's slump.

Hyman was on Matthews' wing when Matthews was scoring bunches so seems pretty straight-forward that the cause of Matthews slump can't be that Hyman is on his wing.