Tage Thompson's Upside? What Do You Think?

[dudacek]

3 hours ago, LGR4GM said:

Is Tage quietly becoming or already is a #1 center?

He has 32pts in 42 games or... a 62ish point pace over a full season. 

He’s having a season statistically that mirrors ROR’s 3 seasons in Buffalo and to my eyes is playing at similar level.

He has a chance to catch Sam Reinhart for the most points (65) in a decade by a Sabres not named Jack Eichel.

Aside from being productive, he’s seeing the other team’s top defenders and beating them with his size and his skill, he’s opening ice up for his linemates, carrying and protecting the puck very well, working hard on defence and he can finish.

Aside from a dip in December he’s been pretty consistent. He’s also playing with a notable swagger that this team desperately needs more of. I’ve enjoyed watching him play.

Best story of the season.

I don’t think he’s a 1st-line centre or will become one, but I do think he’s become a difference-maker and a legitimate top 6 forward.

 

[Thorny]

On 2/12/2022 at 9:57 AM, dudacek said:

He’s having a season statistically that mirrors ROR’s 3 seasons in Buffalo and to my eyes is playing at similar level.

He has a chance to catch Sam Reinhart for the most points (65) in a decade by a Sabres not named Jack Eichel.

Aside from being productive, he’s seeing the other team’s top defenders and beating them with his size and his skill, he’s opening ice up for his linemates, carrying and protecting the puck very well, working hard on defence and he can finish.

Aside from a dip in December he’s been pretty consistent. He’s also playing with a notable swagger that this team desperately needs more of. I’ve enjoyed watching him play.

Best story of the season.

I don’t think he’s a 1st-line centre or will become one, but I do think he’s become a difference-maker and a legitimate top 6 forward.

 

You mean statistically/visually a similar level offensively, right? 

He doesn’t provide the selke level defence ROR did, or does 

Ryan finished 11th overall in selke voting 2 of his 3 seasons here, that’s my reference point there. On a team as bad as we were that’s a significant accomplishment. 

Edited February 13, 2022 by Thorny

[GASabresIUFAN]

Quick which NHL center has more points this season Thompson or O’Reilly?  Which center has more goals, Thompson or O’Reilly?

[dudacek]

12 minutes ago, Thorny said:

You mean statistical, offensively, right? 

He doesn’t provide the selke level defence ROR did, or does 

Ryan finished 11th overall in selke voting 2 of his 3 seasons here, that’s my reference point there. 

Yes, to the 1st.

That said, Tage this year is better overall than ROR was in year 3.

[Thorny]

1 minute ago, dudacek said:

Yes, to the 1st.

That said, Tage this year is better overall than ROR was in year 3.

I don’t think he was even close. Similar production (ROR from line 2) and like I said, a defensive performance that earned him, even on an awful team, an 11th place league wide finish in the Selke voting 

ROR was an exceptional defensive player. Tage is passable in his own end 

[dudacek]

1 hour ago, Thorny said:

I don’t think he was even close. Similar production (ROR from line 2) and like I said, a defensive performance that earned him, even on an awful team, an 11th place league wide finish in the Selke voting 

ROR was an exceptional defensive player. Tage is passable in his own end 

I don’t know man, I’ve always been a big O’Reily booster, but I don’t remember him being h8 self that year.

Maybe my memory is putting too much emphasis on the way he finished, but he was -23 that year and I remember his effort falling off badly.

Looking at his game log, he finished with 7 points in his last 5 games, but before that he had just 2 goals in 19 games and was -12 over the final 2 months.

He also started the year -17 over his first 25 games and we wondered if he was pouting that Eichel got the C over him.

Maybe he was real good in the middle?

 

[Thorny]

Maybe plus minus isn’t a relevant stat

[Thorny]

12 minutes ago, dudacek said:

I don’t know man, I’ve always been a big O’Reily booster, but I don’t remember him being h8 self that year.

Maybe my memory is putting too much emphasis on the way he finished, but he was -23 that year and I remember his effort falling off badly.

Looking at his game log, he finished with 7 points in his last 5 games, but before that he had just 2 goals in 19 games and was -12 over the final 2 months.

He also started the year -17 over his first 25 games and we wondered if he was pouting that Eichel got the C over him.

Maybe he was real good in the middle?

 

This trend of selecting a specific portion of games and cherry picking a single stat within needs to die a quick death. From November 27 to January 20th, a stretch of 17 games, Tage only had 2 goals.

It doesn’t mean anything 

[Thorny]

Reinhart’s plus minus went from -28 to +18 last year to this.

ROR’s from -23 to +22, from Sabres to Saint Louis.

These guys didn’t change, the teams around them did. Plus minus isn’t indicative 

Edited February 14, 2022 by Thorny

[Radar]

1 hour ago, Thorny said:

I don’t think he was even close. Similar production (ROR from line 2) and like I said, a defensive performance that earned him, even on an awful team, an 11th place league wide finish in the Selke voting 

ROR was an exceptional defensive player. Tage is passable in his own end 

I like what I'm seeing with Tage but comparing to ROR? I'm not there.

[dudacek]

21 minutes ago, Thorny said:

This trend of selecting a specific portion of games and cherry picking a single stat within needs to die a quick death. From November 27 to January 20th, a stretch of 17 games, Tage only had 2 goals.

It doesn’t mean anything 

 

I was approaching this from the opposite direction, checking to see if the numbers supported my memory.

Your cherry-picked Tage stat also seems to reflect my memory of him slumping in December.

I don’t remember O’Reilly being as good in year 3 and enjoying Tage’s game more this year, Maybe I’m wrong. 🤷

[Thorny]

14 minutes ago, dudacek said:

 

I was approaching this from the opposite direction, checking to see if the numbers supported my memory.

Your cherry-picked Tage stat also seems to reflect my memory of him slumping in December.

I don’t remember O’Reilly being as good in year 3 and enjoying Tage’s game more this year, Maybe I’m wrong. 🤷

Well you obviously can’t be “wrong” when it comes to enjoyment.

Anecdotally, there’s a heck of a lot more enjoyment among the fan base for this 65-odd point season than the last 65-odd point season. The affect of re-setting the expectations was a PR master-stroke from the organization, I’ll give it that 

Within any ROR v Thompson comparison, I’d be shocked if “expectation” isn’t playing a, well, very significant role in perception 

- - - 

Everything the organization has amounted to this year is, to borrow from the Joker, “all part of the plan”. Things going according to plan is what keeps people satisfied. As long as that’s the case, the future the plan promises is going to go unquestioned. There is a lot of reputational value in achieving expectations, regardless of WHERE the expectations are set 

The year has taught me this

The rebuild doesn’t need to be proven successful, it’s successful in perception until proven otherwise. 

Edited February 14, 2022 by Thorny

[dudacek]

30 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Reinhart’s plus minus went from -28 to +18 last year to this.

ROR’s from -23 to +22, from Sabres to Saint Louis.

These guys didn’t change, the teams around them did. Plus minus isn’t indicative 

If Ryan O’Reilly goes -10 for the Blues in December and +10 for the same team in January, I’m going to conclude he was likely a more effective player in January.

Feel free to laugh and point and call me unsophisticated.

[dudacek]

28 minutes ago, Radar said:

I like what I'm seeing with Tage but comparing to ROR? I'm not there.

To be clear I’m not either. I said he’s having a season offensively that mirrors what O’Reilly did over his 3 years here.

And I think Tage’s performance so far this year might be better than what I perceive to be the weakest season of O’Reilly’s past 10. 

But he’s got a long way to go to reach the stature O’Reilly has and I would be very surprised if he gets there.

[Thorny]

13 minutes ago, dudacek said:

If Ryan O’Reilly goes -10 for the Blues in December and +10 for the same team in January, I’m going to conclude he was likely a more effective player in January.

Feel free to laugh and point and call me unsophisticated.

For me it’s just the idea that - I think the Reinhart/ROR examples illustrate rather effectively that even in large sample sizes attempting to tie individual performance to the resulting plus minus to ANYWHERE NEAR THE DEGREE it’s influenced by “the team” is dicey at best: thinking it would be any more indicative within a SMALLER sample size isn’t where I would want to go

[dudacek]

22 minutes ago, Thorny said:

For me it’s just the idea that - I think the Reinhart/ROR examples illustrate rather effectively that even in large sample sizes attempting to tie individual performance to the resulting plus minus to ANYWHERE NEAR THE DEGREE it’s influenced by “the team” is dicey at best: thinking it would be any more indicative within a SMALLER sample size isn’t where I would want to go

 

I’m not going to get into a situation where it seems like I’m defending +/-; it’s a weak stat for measuring personal success. It’s a good stat for measuring how effective your line was in the role in which it was used.

ALL stats are a measure of team success mixing with personal success, tied to usage.

[Thorny]

15 minutes ago, dudacek said:

 

I’m not going to get into a situation where it seems like I’m defending +/-; it’s a weak stat for measuring personal success. It’s a good stat for measuring how effective your line was in the role in which it was used.

ALL stats are a measure of team success mixing with personal success, tied to usage.

I agree but some lean much more heavily one way or another 

[dudacek]

15 minutes ago, Thorny said:

I agree but some lean much more heavily one way or another 

I don’t think the fact Alex Tuch is +8 this year is particularly relevant in answering the question “Is he a good player?”

I do think the fact that he is +8 in 15 games on a team that has been outscored by 11 goals over that span, and has done it while generally playing against the other team’s best players is highly relevant in answering the question “How has he been playing?”

[dudacek]

I like how Granato talks about Tage and Tuch.

He recognizes their successes but it’s always tempered. He makes sure to always mention that they are at the start of what they can be, and that they have a lot of room to grow and that he expects them to grow.

[pi2000]

11 hours ago, dudacek said:

I don’t think the fact Alex Tuch is +8 this year is particularly relevant in answering the question “Is he a good player?”

I do think the fact that he is +8 in 15 games on a team that has been outscored by 11 goals over that span, and has done it while generally playing against the other team’s best players is highly relevant in answering the question “How has he been playing?”

TRpm

[Digger]

On 2/13/2022 at 7:07 PM, Radar said:

I like what I'm seeing with Tage but comparing to ROR? I'm not there.

I find the comparisons with ROR strange and seems to be some kind of a justification for the trade today. 

Yes Tage has finally developed into a player nearing his potential (great).  But with the O'Reilly trade we went years without a decent 2nd line center in 2018 until really this season.  The Blues won the cup the season of the trade and I would guess have zero regrets with making this trade with the Sabres.  It was a bad trade for the Sabres.  The ROR trade did nothing except kick the rebuild out a few more years.

I'm on board with Adam's current rebuild plan but my point about trading top players for futures and potential is that it continually keeps us with a draft lottery pick waiting year after year for prospects and draft picks to develop.  Hopefully this time we can keep a GM that will stay employed long enough for us to make the playoffs again.   

Edited February 15, 2022 by Digger

[Thorny]

On 2/13/2022 at 6:25 PM, Thorny said:

Everything the organization has amounted to this year is, to borrow from the Joker, “all part of the plan”. Things going according to plan is what keeps people satisfied. As long as that’s the case, the future the plan promises is going to go unquestioned. There is a lot of reputational value in achieving expectations, regardless of WHERE the expectations are set 

The year has taught me this

The rebuild doesn’t need to be proven successful, it’s successful in perception until proven otherwise. 

Just wanted to revisit the bolded quick with my weekly Smart Sabres Twitter update (if you are a part of Sabres Twitter you’ll be good with seeing it here, if you don’t like Sabres Twitter, well, another reminder why, I suppose..).

 

Personally I have a significantly stronger concern that stacking up losing seasons would work to torpedo the “players who want to be here” mantra. Acting like wins don’t matter could foster the type of losing environment that got us in trouble the last time.

I don’t know that it’s all that common a concern, though - if you read the comments you can hear about how there’s no sense in Adams trying to achieve anything while Patrice Bergeron is skating in this league. It’s quite an off putting sense of “We can’t do anything now anyways”. Have to say, if that’s how my GM is thinking, there’s an issue.

Edited February 15, 2022 by Thorny

[dudacek]

30 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Just wanted to revisit the bolded quick with my weekly Smart Sabres Twitter update (if you are a part of Sabres Twitter you’ll be good with seeing it here, if you don’t like Sabres Twitter, well, another reminder why, I suppose..).

 

Personally I have a significantly stronger concern that stacking up losing seasons would work to torpedo the “players who want to be here” mantra. Acting like wins don’t matter could foster the type of losing environment that got us in trouble the last time.

I don’t know that it’s all that common a concern, though - if you read the comments you can hear about how there’s no sense in Adams trying to achieve anything while Patrice Bergeron is skating in this league. It’s quite an off putting sense of “We can’t do anything now anyways”. Have to say, if that’s how my GM is thinking, there’s a issue.

I’m curious what kind of moves the Sabres could be making that they won’t be making that you think they should be making?

Would you be interested in a move like the Tyler Toffoli trade? Dvorak? Nate Schmidt?

Should Adams be in the Jeff Chychrun market?

Why do you think the Sabres don’t care if they are better or not next year?

Please don’t take this as a “there’s no goalies worth playing the price for” post. I’m genuinely interested.

 

[Thorny]

7 minutes ago, dudacek said:

I’m curious what kind of moves the Sabres could be making that they won’t be making that you think they should be making?

Would you be interested in a move like the Tyler Toffoli trade? Dvorak? Nate Schmidt?

Should Adams be in the Jeff Chychrun market?

Why do you think the Sabres don’t care if they are better or not next year?

Please don’t take this as a “there’s no goalies worth playing the price for” post. I’m genuinely interested.

 

I don’t know if they do, or not. I know that winning wasn’t the priority regarding the season we are currently in, though, and that’s where the idea gets its start. 

Like I’ve mentioned before, it’ll be the moves, or lack thereof, that Adams makes this coming offseason that inform my viewpoint on whether or not winning is being given the appropriate level of priority.

My post didn’t say anything about what the true course of action would be for Adams. Like the bit I bolded in the post you responded to, that I used as a reference point, I was making a point about fan perception. What satisfies is often the achievement of expectations, *regardless* of what the expectations are. 

Like the twitter bit I included - the overwhelming sense is NOT that the rebuild might, or even will, work: it’s that it’s *already* successful. They aren’t looking for markers of success, a little thing like “being very bad” (being very bad. Think about this.) doesn’t even represent a point of CONCERN regarding whether the rebuild is moving along successfully. I can’t wrap my mind around it.

The twitter post is consciously setting the expectations low. “We will be bad but rebuild still great”. As long as we achieve expectations, right? “That’s the plan, the plan is to not win.”

You have to remember, I said from the *beginning* I was against a full scale reset. It’s a admitted bias that informs many an opinion, from me. I’ve posted numerous times about the danger I perceive in a GM being given too long a runway: that carving out a long, long plan, that doesn’t require actual results for a long time, is to the benefit of the job security of the GM in question.

I’ve said it - the conscious, actually clearly marketed (in many forms of media) re-set of expectations this offseason by the organization was a master stroke.

I posted the twitter post because the buy-in scares me. I worry about the rope they are being given and what may come of it. The post isn’t about what I think will happen so much as it is about me being worried about it. 

[dudacek]

So a post about the mindset of fanbase more than the mindset of the team.

Speaking only for myself, I think this year is a convergence of a hockey rebuild philosophy with the financial needs of the larger Pegula empire.

But I certainly don’t buy into the idea that progress (measured, amongst other factors, by wins) is irrelevant.

A hockey rebuild would benefit from more wins next year, but a business rebuild is desperate for it.

So I expect a better team next year and action taken toward that goal.

Which leads me to the other part of my post: what are some real world examples of the kinds of moves do you think the Sabres can and should be making?