Holy Bailing Basket Biscuits, Batman!
by David Driscoll-Carignan on Jan 23, 2008 1:07 PM MST
in NHL News
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PrintI don't think I'm going to be surprising anyone when I say that our team is hurting offensively. This summer, we jettisoned Brett McLean, Antti Laaksonen and Mark Rycroft and replaced them with Ryan Smyth, Jaroslav Hlinka and Wyatt Smith. Even with Smith fizzling, overall it should have been a big improvement to the 4th-ranked offense in the NHL.
In the immortal words of Bill Lumbergh..."um, yeah." Through last night's game (a stellar offensive performance resulting in zero goals), the Avalanche are ranked a pedestrian 17th in scoring. Do you want to really blow your mind? We're 14th in the league in goals allowed. That's right, folks, right now our team strengths, statistically, are defense and goaltending.
The above chart shows our cumulative goals per game over the course of the season (the blue line - sorry, forgot to add a legend). The red line is last year. As you can see, we started out on fire for the first six games or so (we had 4 4+ goal games in the first 6 games) and then started to slow down a bit. We had a little offensive surge around the 15-game mark (3 4-goal games in a 4 game span). Then we took that disaster of a road trip - big losses to Dallas, Minnesota and Calgary - we've been in a general decline since then. That one other surge at the 29-game mark is the 9-goal outburst in St Louis. You'll also note that we're now effectively at our lowest goal/game point of the season. Not good. Oh, and those 3 pink dots? That's where Sakic, Smyth and Stastny got hurt. You can see that losing them certainly hasn't helped things...but it also shows that we were struggling to score even before this injury mess started.
This second chart really hammers home just how far we've slipped. This shows our goal totals compared to last year. In the early going, it seemed we were going to shatter last year's goal totals. Sadly, after peaking to a +5 change just 7 games in, it's been all downhill. Once we hit the 18 game mark (the 6-1 loss to Dallas), we've been losing ground ever since, and only pulled ahead of last year on one occasion (again, the 9-5 win against St Louis).
Only 34 shopping days left before the trade deadline. Can we afford to wait?
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Depressing
I normally love line graphs, but not when they're this sad. All that scoring talent and hardly any scoring to show for it.
heh
I was thinking of adding the Dow Jones Index, my 401k balance, and the Britney Spears Hotness Chart as other examples of sliding graphs...but it would have been to painful.
by David Driscoll-Carignan on Jan 23, 2008 1:47 PM MST up reply actions
Dude. Wyatt Smith
Smith just scored his first goal for Lake Erie last night. What are we waiting for?
Probably an unpopular opinion
I know a lot of people like Hensick. However, I'm not sure how he's gotten such a free pass up to this point from fans and coach Q. He's riding his reputation from the CCHA, his draft position and perhaps one break-away goal. I just don't see what he's doing that Richardson can't give you with the addition of PK, faceoffs and a forecheck. This coaching staff is supposed to have all this experience for recognizing talent but they start Smith out of training camp and play Boychuk and Parker at forward while Jones and Richardson are in Lake Erie.
Don't get me wrong, none of that really is the catalyst to the Avs getting back their scoring numbers from last year but with such major injuries to the roster every bit helps.
DD, are you "goals for" numbers purely off final scores? In other words, when the Avs win 2-1 in a shootout they get an extra "goal" for winning a shootout instead of actually scoring goals. I realize that the data would be normalized because it's apples to apples from last year to this. However, it would be a factor if the Avs had significantly fewer OT shootout wins this year from last. Hope that makes sense.
Shootouts
they do include the extra shootout goal. just looking quickly, it looks like it's just a 1-goal difference - 3 SO wins this year vs 4 last year.
I'm with you on Hensick, especially considering that he's stuck on the 4th line. If he can't crack the top 3 lines, he really shouldn't be up. It didn't sound like we're going to see Richardson any time soon, though...
David Jones has been sent down today, btw.
by David Driscoll-Carignan on Jan 23, 2008 2:07 PM MST up reply actions
Jones sent down
I just saw that Jones was sent down. Maybe I'm totally missjudging his abilities but sending Jones down is a bad move. If I get to watch more shifts of Cumiskey, Boychuk and Parker at forward instead of Richardson and Jones I think I'll go Dater on myself and light myself on fire. Then again, maybe I don't know what the hell I'm talking about and those three guys along with Hensick are all heads and shoulders better options than Jones and Richardson.
Re: Jones sent down
I'm still trying to figure out exactly what it was that Richardson did to get sent down. He was playing well. He wasn't scoring a lot, but nobody else on the third or fourth line has all season. Why does Q hate him?
Jones
I'm just guessing, but my thought was thought Jones is being sent down so that he can play this weekend. It wouldn't surprise me to see Hensick go down for the weekend as well (but not until after tomorrow night's game).
by David Driscoll-Carignan on Jan 23, 2008 2:44 PM MST up reply actions
you're not alone
he's supposed to be this super prospect, but he sure hasn't done anything I've seen. He's freakin invisible out there!
Maybe he just needs some time or better wingers. He's not getting the wingers anytime soon, thanks to The Arnason Factor, so send his ass down.
FWIW, I agree, Richie has a game more suited to the position that's open. I really don't get it.
I think....
Jones is actually better suited for the game right now than is Hensick. But Richardson played that 3rd and 4th line spot all last season. He played fairly well there and then occasionally got the chance to show case it a bit more filling in on higher lines. One more reason I have to question Q's mental status. But like some have said, I'm just some guy sitting in front of my TV, what do I know, (other than I have actually been coaching a sport, not hockey, for roughly ten years now).
by Americanario on Jan 23, 2008 6:29 PM MST up reply actions
Re: I think...
Coaching hockey is not some magical profession that only magical people can perform. Anyone who watches hockey games with as much attention to detail as we here at MHH do can make educated, reasonable assessments of talent, skill and on-ice performance.
Criticizing Coach Q for obvious mistakes he's made and poor judgment in general is not overstepping any bounds. It's hard not to.
not that bad?
While these stats are depressing, we have still found a way to aquire 4 more points than at this stage last year (according to ITCS :) )
Which I guess is encouraging.
Though actually now I think about it, it maybe isn't that encouraging. We want to be more than 4 points ahead of where we were last year before the unfortunately unsuccessful streak at the end of last year...
problem with that...
is that I very seriously doubt this team will have a stretch run like last year's did. we HAVE to be putting distance between last year's totals and this year's.
Trade deadline
Only 34 shopping days left before the trade deadline. Can we afford to wait?
No, we can't. But who can we get that has a legit chance of helping us get deep in the playoffs, won't funk up the lines once the Super S's start getting healty, and won't cause us to mortgage the future?
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