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The First Round Pick misses have set us back


Second Line Center

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Also did not realize that Dahlin is 3rd in scoring for all players in his draft class with 80 points...pretty impressive as a defenseman. Only Svechnikov from Carolina with 93 and Brady Tkachuk from the Sens with 83 have more and both are forwards...this kid is going to be a superstar

 

 

Edited by matter2003
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9 minutes ago, woods-racer said:

Liger and GA have done a great job in many previous threads laying out each draft year and comparing how the Sabres have done compared to what was left available to the team. Their take to me has always been the Sabres have done *fairly well* in the early rounds compared to those picking around them.  This is post DR years.

 

The biggest killer to our team has been the double edge sword that GMTM pulled out and slashed away with in 2015. Not only didn't he pick well in late rounds he sold off a lot of early round picks in a very deep draft.

That single draft year and all the activity of GMTM is what we are feeling the effects of right now. It's as if GMTM took all the suffering of the tank accumulating those picks for that deep draft and flushed them away. 

I think Olofsson might be the first good forward  the Sabres have taken outside of the 1st round in 10 years...this is what has hurt them most...not having the role players from later rounds able to fill in adequately in the bottom 6 to help chip in with secondary scoring. Pretty much every team has found 4 or 5 players at least during this time frame in the later rounds, the Sabres just found 1, but he is turning out to be a pretty damn good one...he actually is producing at a higher rate than Reinhart, nearing .9 points per game played to Samson's .8

Edited by matter2003
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9 hours ago, Second Line Center said:

Jack--Slam dunk

Dahlin--Thank you Lotto balls

Other than that, in this decade of awful.  What have we got from the first Round? 

 

Obvious next answer is Samson.  He isnt even an all star.  Sorry...but this was a 2nd overall pick.  And he's just not what you want or need a 2nd overall to be.  And apparently he can only play with Jack.  Not good enough.  Good player.  That Leon guy looks like a Hall of Famer tho.  

Nylander--bust

Casey---um....yea I'm going to bet on "career 3rd liner."

Cozens--We'll see.

 

You finish where we've finished you have to nail these high picks.  Please fire everybody in that front office.  This is why a team Prez is necessary.

In fairness. The hockey draft is unlike football. It's far from sure thing while in football this should nab you a starter. Drafting eighteen year olds whole different thing. 

 

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On 2/10/2020 at 9:37 AM, LGR4GM said:

This looks at Sam Reinhart and Jack Eichel from 2018-2020. This is for 5v5 against all teams. 

Jack and Sam have played 1564 minutes together. Reinhart has played 528 minutes without Eichel. That is about 1/3 of a regular full season. 

J+S = Jack and Sam together

S-J= Sam minus Jack

J+S has a better CF% at 51.95 compared to S-J being at 50.97%. xGF% is also slightly higher with J+S at 51.76 and S-J at 49.73%. Scoring Chance For (SCF%) seems to be the biggest gap. There is a 52.33% for J+S and only a 48.11% for S-J. Continuing HDCF% sees J+S at 52.85% and S-J at 51.35%. The final one for this part is off zone  faceoff percent where J+S are at 61.31% but S-J is at 57.51. 

So what does this part mean? Generally speaking, Jack + Sam have better numbers than Sam - Jack. On average that difference is... 2.1825% better when Sam and Jack are playing together than when Reinhart is playing without Eichel at all. So as we can see, Eichel with Sam is better. 

Let's get to part 2. Jack without Sam(J-S) and Sam without Jack (S-J). 

We already have some good numbers for Reinhart without Eichel. We have his CF% at 50.97%, xGF% at 49. 73%, SCF% at 48.11%, and HDCF% at 51.35%, Off Zone strt% at 57.51

Let's take a look at J-S and see how that lines up. We have CF% at 48.68%, xGF% 51.14%, SCF% at 48.69%, and HDCF% at 54.19%. Finally let's add on Off Zone strt% at 62.95

So what does this tell us? Well is tells us that even though Eichel starts in the offensive zone more than Reinhart, Reinhart has managed a better Corsi. Eichel is clearly the better goal scorer as we see the xGF number in eichels favor. Eichel is +1.41 when away from Sam. That is interesting as we have been told how well they work together and yet Reinhart with Eichel produced a lower expected goal rate. It also coincides with a slightly lower scoring chance rate with Jack - Sam at .58 higher. Now where it gets really interesting is the HDCF%. So basically this looks at shots taken from high danger areas of the ice. As has been shown by countless models and research, there are more dangerous areas of the ice than others. Sam Reinhart by himself is -2.84% compared to Eichel by himself. So generally when Jack is not with Sam his ability to generate these chances goes up. 

Okay let us summarize all this. Jack and Sam are not out of this world together but do slightly elevate the others game. They average a 52.223 across the 4 stats that I am looking at. This is compared to Eichel at 50.675 and Sam at 50.04 across the same 4 stats averaged together. Corsi for and HDCF seem to be something Sam excels at. This makes sense to me because he is criminally underrated with making little plays that get the puck to the net or to someone who will get the puck to the net. Eichel being also good at HDCF makes sense because of his skating/stickhandling/shot. That leads us to the next stats of xGF% and SCF% in which Eichel was better without Sam. The expected goals % makes the most sense because Eichel has a really good shot and does get to use it in dangerous places. We see Sam with a deficit without Eichel's shot on the ice. SCF% was also in favor of Jack by himself. As with HDCF this makes sense. Interesting was that Sam rated this as his best category. I think that has to do with the little plays and Sam being in front of the net. He gets and generates a lot of HDCF. 

The final number I saved until the end is Goals For / Goals Against or GF%. Jack and Sam together have a 53.42. Jack minus Sam has a 53.13, so barely a blip on his radar. Sam minus Jack drops to 51.06.  So generally speaking Eichel is getting more goals and seeing less against with Sam and without Sam. Sam is a little less here and again, I think we know that Eichel is the better player so that makes sense. However we have heard it reported on here that Reinhart is lazy and trash in the defensive end in particular and if that were the case the underlying numbers would show us that. They really don't. His corsi, HDCF%, and GF% don't show us a player that without Jack falls off the cliff. I took a look at Skinner in this as well. Jeff and Jack together is good. Jeff and Sam together is bad. Sam without Jack and Jeff is surprisingly good. 

All in all my conclusion is that Reinhart works with just about everyone away from Jack (except Skinner in limited minutes. That looked bad).  Reinhart helps elevate Eichel and Eichel helps elevate Reinhart. The difference is not that much and Sam has good underlying numbers in the 528 minutes he played without Eichel. Is Sam dependent on Jack for scoring? No. Reinhart would produce on his own with any decent linemates. Reinhart runs a 2.727gp/60 alone and a 2.992 with Eichel. That isn't a massive gap at all. Does Eichel need Reinhart on his wing, again no. Eichel would produce still (4.048gp/60). Should we be worried about giving Reinhart a contract based on his play with Eichel "inflating his stats"? I would say no because Reinhart should work well with any center we bring in and produce at a similar level. What this does not account for is strength of competition. If we had a line of Olofsson - Cozens - Reinhart they would play against other teams 2nd lines and pairings compared to the Skinner - Eichel - ????? line. This I think would balance out the scoring "drop" some have suggested. My only conclusion then is that Reinhart can and does produce shots and scoring chances away from Eichel and does not get caved in defensively. Therefore he will be worth the 7million dollars he gets at the end of the year. 

I picked high danger corsi for % (HDCF%), expected goals % (xGF%), scoring chance % (SCF%) and goals for % (GF%) because I wanted a mix of stats that have some prediction values. Goals are a relatively rare event in hockey so shot metrics tend to tell us a little more. I used the percentages because they help normalize numbers. You can see the for and against in the percentages. Also these numbers were readily available on Nat Stat Trick for use and I could easily separate the players. I almost included a couple more like on ice shooting % but we know Eichel is a better shot so again, it would have been redundant. Finally I calculated the goals per 60 minutes number for each player. I think this helps us see that Eichel is very good and Sam is good. We can separate them with no ill effects on the team and in all likelihood, better overall scoring on the team. 

 

15 minutes ago, matter2003 said:

For a 2nd overall pick, I agree he is...especially when Draisatl's comparables are all HOF players pretty much while Reinhart's are Darren Turcotte and Kris Versteeg.

Pastrnak was also out there and didn't get selected until the 25th pick.  Those are the only 2 players with signifcantly more points than Reinhart in their careers.  Draisatl has 407, Pastrnak has 368 and then Larkin and Point have 255 then Reinhart with 253...although Point has over 100 games less played in the NHL than Reinhart.

Reinhart has settled in the past 2 seasons to about a .8 point per game player so that isn't terrible and he should produce 20-25 goals and 65-70 points a season as long as he is playing with Jack, but I am wondering who else could be producing like that with Jack?  

If Reinhart was on his own line away from Jack, what would he be producing?  I fear it would probably be maybe 2/3 of what he is now...

Not according to all underlying data. 

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7 minutes ago, matter2003 said:

I think Oloffsson might be the first good forward  the Sabres have taken outside of the 1st round in 10 years...this is what has hurt them most...not having the role players from later rounds able to fill in adequately in the bottom 6 to help chip in with secondary scoring. Pretty much every team has found 4 or 5 players at least during this time frame in the later rounds, the Sabres just found 1, but he is turning out to be a pretty damn good one...

A team has a much better chance of finding those guys the more picks a team has. It's a crap shoot with 18 year old players. The other thing we haven't had is a good AHL team to bring them up on. Teams that have that also seem to find their late round picks more often.

Edited by woods-racer
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10 minutes ago, matter2003 said:

For a 2nd overall pick, I agree he is...especially when Draisatl's comparables are all HOF players pretty much while Reinhart's are Darren Turcotte and Kris Versteeg.

Pastrnak was also out there and didn't get selected until the 25th pick.  Those are the only 2 players with signifcantly more points than Reinhart in their careers.  Draisatl has 407, Pastrnak has 368 and then Larkin and Point have 255 then Reinhart with 253...although Point has over 100 games less played in the NHL than Reinhart.

Reinhart has settled in the past 2 seasons to about a .8 point per game player so that isn't terrible and he should produce 20-25 goals and 65-70 points a season as long as he is playing with Jack, but I am wondering who else could be producing like that with Jack?  

If Reinhart was on his own line away from Jack, what would he be producing?  I fear it would probably be maybe 2/3 of what he is now...

1st bolded.....not anyone on this team currently. Outside of VO/ Skinner on the other side, no one else has come close to producing there either. This makes me believe that these guys are even better than we think or the rest are even crappier than even we want to believe.

2nd bolded.....SIGN ME UP? 2/3 of Sam on the 2nd line with someone else producing on the top line with Jack? Not one winger on this team will be anywhere close to that at seasons end. This also is a testimonial towards Sam and his skill.

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10 hours ago, Second Line Center said:

Jack--Slam dunk

Dahlin--Thank you Lotto balls

Other than that, in this decade of awful.  What have we got from the first Round? 

 

Obvious next answer is Samson.  He isnt even an all star.  Sorry...but this was a 2nd overall pick.  And he's just not what you want or need a 2nd overall to be.  And apparently he can only play with Jack.  Not good enough.  Good player.  That Leon guy looks like a Hall of Famer tho.  

Nylander--bust

Casey---um....yea I'm going to bet on "career 3rd liner."

Cozens--We'll see.

 

You finish where we've finished you have to nail these high picks.  Please fire everybody in that front office.  This is why a team Prez is necessary.

We tanked our way through one of the worst seasons in Sabres history to get Reinhart, and he in no way is worth that.

He was also a mistake as it turns out, as he obviously should have been Leon Draisaitl.

We would definitely be in better shape if Reinhart was more of a superstar than he is (given that he was the first forward taken overall in the world in his draft class).

Having said that, what has really set us back is our failure to acquire and retain quality and depth in the lower rounds, 2 and below.

Every team has a few first round stars on it.  The good ones are packed with depth coming from deeper in the draft.

We hardly have anything in that regard.

And what we do have (Larsson, Girgs) are probably leaving at the trade deadline, or at least arguably should be leaving.

 

 

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4 hours ago, Kruppstahl said:

We tanked our way through one of the worst seasons in Sabres history to get Reinhart, and he in no way is worth that.

He was also a mistake as it turns out, as he obviously should have been Leon Draisaitl.

We would definitely be in better shape if Reinhart was more of a superstar than he is

(given that he was the first forward taken overall in the world in his draft class).

Having said that, what has really set us back is our failure to acquire and retain quality and depth in the lower rounds, 2 and below.

Every team has a few first round stars on it.  The good ones are packed with depth coming from deeper in the draft.

We hardly have anything in that regard.

And what we do have (Larsson, Girgs) are probably leaving at the trade deadline, or at least arguably should be leaving.

 

 

And Brett Connolly should've been Jeff Skinner....Jonathan Drouin should've been Seth Jones. 

Sabres aren't the only ones that F'up in the draft, there's risk involved for sure.

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15 hours ago, Radar said:

In fairness. The hockey draft is unlike football. It's far from sure thing while in football this should nab you a starter. Drafting eighteen year olds whole different thing. 

 

Yeah, NHL drafting is similar to baseball, mostly projections.

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On ‎2‎/‎20‎/‎2020 at 12:16 AM, Gatorman0519 said:

Sam was the safe pick.  Leon had the upside... which turned out to be twice that of Sam.  

Yes, and I want the GM that evaluates that scenario better than everyone else.

I recall Leon's stock rose swiftly right up to the draft.  He was the big physical presence versus a guy with hockey sense and pedigree.   Look at them both today, it's not close.   Superstar (Leon) versus solid contributor (Sam). 

Oh well, its best to move on from past misses, all teams have misses.  What we seem to lack is ability to finding value in other parts of the draft. 

Edited by Pimlach
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2 hours ago, Pimlach said:

Yes, and I want the GM that evaluates that scenario better than everyone else.

I recall Leon's stock rose swiftly right up to the draft.  He was the big physical presence versus a guy with hockey sense and pedigree.   Look at them both today, it's not close.   Superstar (Leon) versus solid contributor (Sam). 

Oh well, its best to move on from past misses, all teams have misses.  What we seem to lack is ability to finding value in other parts of the draft. 

Would you rather have Darnelle Nurse or Rasmus Ristolainen? You are right all teams have misses and we should be happy we didn't get Bennett instead. 

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On 2/20/2020 at 6:40 AM, Skibum said:

The last 5-7 years have actually been far better than the 15 prior. Remember such luminaries as Jiri Novotny, Mika Noronen, Marek Zagrapan, Dennis Persson, Artem Kryukov, and Erik Rasmussen? 

The difference I believe, in those picks compared to the recent ones, they were picks in the bottom half of the drafts 1st round, the recent ones are in the top 10 of the 1st round.....

Missing on players in the bottom half isn't that bad because that's were things get tough trying to get really good talent. If you are picking in the top 10, you need to get talent and hit on those picks which should be easier to get talent from 

I also think another factor is their dislike of the Canadian Hockey League players because they can immediately put them in Rochester. Your limiting your chances again by trying to stay out of that talent pool just because they have to play there if not in the NHL

Edited by apuszczalowski
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I would also add the inability to draft and develop good goaltending.  I know the popular opinion the last decade has been "you can just get a goalie" like anytime......I guess at the goalie store....that hasn't worked out well for us.

My whole 35 plus years of fandom this franchise has never had an issue with goaltending.  Its been a disaster going on 5 seasons now.  

We've had 7 goalies since 2014 that have played in at least 10 games.  Lehner has probably been the best one.  

From 2001 to 2014 we had 5 goalies total do that.  Yes I know we had the stability of Miller (drafted and developed).  

Frustrating.  It's just so frustrating.  

 

 

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8 minutes ago, Second Line Center said:

I would also add the inability to draft and develop good goaltending.  I know the popular opinion the last decade has been "you can just get a goalie" like anytime......I guess at the goalie store....that hasn't worked out well for us.

My whole 35 plus years of fandom this franchise has never had an issue with goaltending.  Its been a disaster going on 5 seasons now.  

We've had 7 goalies since 2014 that have played in at least 10 games.  Lehner has probably been the best one.  

From 2001 to 2014 we had 5 goalies total do that.  Yes I know we had the stability of Miller (drafted and developed).  

Frustrating.  It's just so frustrating.  

 

 

We did for a couple brief periods of time, Tom Draper anyone?  But yeah, overall GT has been a strength of this organization generally.

Granted, we are in a period where we can't really call any position a strength right now.  Thanks, tank.

Edited by Weave
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1 hour ago, Second Line Center said:

I would also add the inability to draft and develop good goaltending.  I know the popular opinion the last decade has been "you can just get a goalie" like anytime......I guess at the goalie store....that hasn't worked out well for us.

My whole 35 plus years of fandom this franchise has never had an issue with goaltending.  Its been a disaster going on 5 seasons now.  

We've had 7 goalies since 2014 that have played in at least 10 games.  Lehner has probably been the best one.  

From 2001 to 2014 we had 5 goalies total do that.  Yes I know we had the stability of Miller (drafted and developed).  

Frustrating.  It's just so frustrating.  

 

 

Goalie purgatory was predicted here when Miller was traded.

We drafted just 6 goalies between Enroth in 2006 and UPL in 2017 and Jonas Johansson was the only one picked higher than the 5th round.

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11 hours ago, dudacek said:

Goalie purgatory was predicted here when Miller was traded.

We drafted just 6 goalies between Enroth in 2006 and UPL in 2017 and Jonas Johansson was the only one picked higher than the 5th round.

Funny how that works. Kinda like drafting defenders and forwards in the top 3 rounds at a 1:1 ratio and then bemoaning not having good forward talent in the pipeline. 

You need to take a goalie in the 2nd or 3rd round every other year. 

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