That wasn’t pretty hockey but it was another win, and a win is a win!
The Flyers game had just 32 total shots, yet it revealed a lot about Winnipeg and the impact of missing Lowry & Samberg (and Perfetti).
Full analysis + microstats breakdown in the article. Let me know any thoughts and such.
Also, feel free to give me some mailbag questions for this Monday!
2 comments
My current ~~cope~~ take is that the Jets were better, relative to their opponent, this game than they were last game. And they were better than they were the game before that. It’s early in the season, it takes time for the rust to come off, for the new faces and linemates to gel. That the Jets seem to be trending in the right direction is encouraging.
My take on the season thus far:
The Jets have played against one good team (Dallas), and they lost that game. I think LA, NYI and PHI will all miss the playoffs this year, with NYI and PHI being in the McKenna sweepstakes by the deadline.
A one game sample isn’t particularly revelatory given some of the weird stuff that went down in the home opener, but I think it’s also worth noting that Dallas is *probably* the very best team in the National Hockey League this year. If the Jets split their games with the Stars, I would call that a win.
Outside of that game, the Jets beat the teams they were “supposed” to beat – as long as they keep doing that, they’ll get a massive boost when the injured players return, then hopefully we make some additions at the deadline to bolster areas of need.
All of this is a lot of results-based analysis, and I get there’s cause for some concern amongst their advanced metrics but I do think it’s worth noting that pretty much every player/line will see better matchups/linemates when the injured players return, so their metrics should improve as a result.
Misc thoughts:
I don’t think Toews has been as bad as his metrics would suggest. As you mentioned, he’s seeing some tougher competition right now. When Lowry comes back, if Toews sees the exact same deployment as Vlad last year, where he gets sheltered behind Lowry at times, I think his 5v5 numbers will get significantly better. I also think his linemates are not doing him any favours at all. I’ve seen a couple of 19’s passes die on someone else’s stick in and around the goal in the first four games. I think it would be far better for the Jets to acquire a player like Kempe or Tuch rather than spending (even more) premium assets on a mid-level 2C, unless someone crazy becomes available.
I also think some of the posession woes are tied back to the fact that even if healthy, our third pair has been a disaster. Stanley has actually been not terrible outside of game 1, but again, that was against a good team. We need someone who can play against good teams in the playoffs lol. I’ve been banging the Jamie Oleksiak drum since the last trade deadline – bring in a player like that who puts up solid 2nd pair results and who checks the ‘sIzE/gRiT’ box then get him out on the 3rd pair with Miller and move Schenn either to another team or to the press box.