I wanted to publish this to coincide with the official start of Senators training camp, but like Josh Ho-Sang, sometimes things run a little bit late.
Unlike last year which was a bit of a cluster because the team had missed the playoffs in 2013-14 and the majority of fans were caught up in things like the internal budget or the uncertain status of impending unrestricted free agents like Marc Methot and Bobby Ryan.
This year, things are different.
There’s a reinvigorating calmness that hasn’t been felt in years.
Like any team there is a bevy of things to look forward to or be concerned about, but as of right now, there are no ridiculous distractions. It’s refreshingly all about the hockey.
This is your guide to talking points for the 2015-16 Ottawa Senators…
Riding the Momentum
Last offseason, it was all about being a competitive team and this year, the buzzword is momentum. The Senators have to carry the momentum from last season’s stretch run into this season in the same way that Eric Gryba once carried all his momentum into Lars Eller.
Yes, it’s all about the momentum of the regular season. Forget about the team’s first round exit against Montreal. Just erase it from your memory. It never happened. Focus on the warm feels created from the historic run that was led by an improbable catalyst named Andrew Hammond.
The thing about momentum carrying over is that it makes for an easy quote.
Fans don’t have to look back too long ago to recognize that it’s ridiculous to believe that circumstances can replicate themselves across seasons or that simply returning the same cast of characters will portend success the following season.
We all endured the rollercoaster of the lockout-shortened 2012-13 season that saw the underdog Senators lose a number of key players to significant injuries. Not only did that team make the playoffs, they also disposed of the Canadiens in the first round. They then proceeded to add enough name value during the offseason to make prognosticators believe that the Senators were on the verge of becoming a Stanley Cup contender in 2013-14.
The Senators never had a chance to contend for the Cup because they fell flat and missed the playoffs altogether – providing a cautionary tale for those people who simply believe that this year’s Senators can only get better.
Obviously there are some real genuine reasons for optimism based on how the Senators had success down the stretch (and I’ll get into some of them a little bit later on), but it’s essential that management and the coaching recognize and understand why and how the organized had success so they can make the appropriate decisions moving forward to fulfill the organization’s goal of reaching the playoffs.
Which brings me to Dave Cameron, one of the individuals whose decision-making will factor in …
Dave Cameron, Let Me Introduce You to the Microscope You’ll Be Under
As reflected by last season’s Jack Adams Award balloting, Dave Cameron received a slew of credit for helping the Senators turn their season around – garnering two first, four second and three third-place votes.
Cameron, who interviewed for the Senators’ head coaching gig that Paul MacLean won the job for, took over from MacLean in mid-December after the Senators sputtered out of the gate to the tune of an 11-11-5 record. The knock on Cameron was that he viewed as someone with deep rooted connections to Senators owner Eugene Melnyk which raised concerns that he was the owner’s personal favourite for the job and not best candidate that was available on the market.
Fortunately for Cameron, the results in the standings helped quiet those criticisms. Under Cameron, the Senators played .665 hockey rattling off a 32-15-8 record from December 12th on.
From MacLean to Cameron, the improvement wasn’t just noticeable in the bottom line, it was evident in the underlying numbers as well.
GP
CF%
SF/60
SA/60
Sh%
Sv%
MacLean
27
47.7 (24th)
26.8
34.0
7.1
93.1
Cameron
55
51.4 (14th)
30.4
30.4
8.5
92.9
Only the inept Buffalo Sabres averaged more shots allowed per 60 minutes of five-on-five hockey than what the Senators allowed during the span of time that Paul MacLean was behind the bench last season. Better personnel usage and the implementation of more aggressive style that was designed to put more pressure on the opposition and create more turnovers within the offensive and neutral zones allowed the Senators to better their five-on-five shot rates to the tune of a +7.2 shot improvement per 60 minutes under Cameron.
This improvement in the shot balance was reflected their Corsi rating which leapt from one of the worst marks in the league to one that was league average. Thanks to their sustained goaltending save percentage while the team enjoyed an improvement in its possession proxies and even strength shooting percentage, it’s pretty easy to see why the team enjoyed more success under Cameron.
Ottawa’s youth definitely came to the forefront during the team’s stretch run, but I’m not comfortable giving Cameron all the credit for it. Players like Mike Hoffman and Mark Stone had already begin to make their mark under MacLean and thanks to some timely injuries to some underperforming veterans like Chris Phillips, Zack Smith and Chris Neil created opportunity for players like Jean-Gabriel Pageau and Patrick Wiercioch.
Although a few of Ottawa’s other superfluous depth players have moved on, two of the three aforementioned veterans are healthy. How Cameron integrates these vets and handles their ice time will be important. Will he exhibit patience and reward last season’s youth for their performance down the stretch? If the veterans struggle, will he pull a MacLean and continue to trot them because of their intangibles, character and leadership? Will the likes of Neil and Phillips be comfortable spending time in the press box when they’re healthy scratches?
Dave Cameron has already come out and said that “the big thing is make the playoffs,” and he is going to be under a lot of pressure to make that come to fruition. Increased pressure makes games and the decisions going into the games more important and as we saw last season, Cameron let this affect his decision-making when it came to Mike Hoffman’s ice time. Rather than value Hoffman’s even strength production and ability to make Mika Zibanejad and Bobby Ryan better, Hoffman was relegated to fourth line duty in an effort to minimize his defensive lapses and the damage they could do.
It’s not something that Cameron ducks doing.
“The biggest advantage I have is that when you change coaches your team is in turmoil and we were a chasing a playoff spot right from when I took over. When you’re chasing or trying to come from behind all the time, a lot of times you’re not as patient with players. You can’t let a guy figure it out on the power play. You can’t let a guy figure it out in the top six forwards because you just think there is too much at stake.”
Another concern is that while Ottawa’s underlying numbers improved under Cameron, they still exhibited a difficulty suppressing shots once the opponent gained entry into the Senators’ zone.
Looking at the shots for and against per 60 minutes of five-on-five hockey, they’re still playing high-event hockey and the rates aren’t that dissimilar from what we’ve grown accustomed to seeing under Paul MacLean.
CF
SF/60
SA/60
2011-12 (MacLean)
52.7
31.2
30.2
2012-13 (MacLean)
53.2
32.1
30.6
2013-14 (MacLean)
52.4
33.0
33.2
2014-15 (MacLean)
47.7
26.8
34.0
2014-15 (Cameron)
51.4
30.4
30.4
Ignoring the wins and the losses that the Senators had under Cameron, at its core, this is a similar team to what we’ve experienced watching in the past. It’s high-event hockey that is propped up by the performance of its goalies.
Which brings me to…
Craig Anderson: Goaltender of the Present and Immediate Future
For the first time since joining the Senators’ organization near the 2011 trade deadline, Craig Anderson no longer has the anointed number one goaltender of the future, Robin Lehner, waiting in the wings.
This is his team. This is his time and Ottawa will only go as far as he can take them.
That may irritate some sect of the fan base who believes that at 34-year of age, Anderson’s performance and inevitable decline with age may not be congruent with the development path of the rest of the team’s young core.
It is a legitimate concern, but no more so than throwing all of the eggs into Lehner’s basket and hoping that he can start fulfilling some of the promise that he showed years ago coming up through the minors.
If there is any reason for reassurance, it’s that Anderson body of work since joining Ottawa is pretty damn good.
According to War-on-Ice.com, only seven NHL goalies who have played more than 8,000 minutes have higher adjusted save percentages than Anderson: Tuukka Rask; Cory Schneider; Henrik Lundqvist; Mike Smith; Jimmy Howard; Carey Price; and Braden Holtby.
There is however a noticeable trend that is impossible to ignore when it comes to Anderson’s career numbers: the more he plays, the worse his numbers get.
If Anderson plays 35 or fewer games in a season, his numbers are sparkling. More than that and his numbers resemble those of a league average goaltender.
Historically, Anderson also has a proclivity for getting hurt and although a few of his injuries aren’t associated with his hips or groins, he’s had some bad luck in recent years.
Without Lehner in the mix, the Sens will be forced to rely on journeyman and feel-good story Andrew Hammond. It would be asinine to expect Hammond to replicate last season’s numbers, but it remains to be seen how much he regresses. If Andy goes down, can Hammond step up and fill in admirably? Or can he be an effective backup NHL goaltender? Will he resemble the goaltender who had mediocre numbers in the AHL? If Hammond struggles, how much time will the organization’s new shiny toy, Matt O’Connor, need to develop as a professional?
The pressure is not only going to be on Andy to perform, but to stay healthy too.
Development of the Youth
With the graduation of so many prospects to the Senators’ parent roster coupled with the Senators drafting in the middle of the first round for a few years and the trade that sent a top ten pick to the Anaheim Ducks in the Bobby Ryan deal, there was inevitably going to come a time when the pipeline for NHL-ready blue chip talent would start to run dry.
It is part of the cyclical nature of the prospect process, but fortunately for the Senators, they have done an excellent job of cultivating and developing prospect depth can step in in the event of an injury or allow the organization to move on from veteran depth players who have priced themselves out of this market, the Senators have young players who can come up and play NHL games without the organization ever taking a significant hit. There’s value in that.
But because Ottawa’s system lacked safely projectable high-end talent that can crack the Senators’ roster in the next year, two or maybe even three years, it creates a situation in which the Senators need continued growth from the young players on the roster.
There’s no question that there’s significant room for growth from players like Cody Ceci, Curtis Lazar and Jared Cowen, but it’s hard to predict how much more players like Mika Zibanejad, Mike Hoffman, Patrick Wiercioch, Jean-Gabriel Pageau and Mark Stone can offer. They were already pretty damn good.
The Senators have stressed how even the littlest of improvements can pay big dividends, but it’s probably a little unreasonable to assume that everyone will take a step forward. That doesn’t mean Sens fans won’t embrace it if it does happen though.
Egress! Egress! Egress!
When your favorite organization’s biggest offseason additions are a new traffic light in an adjoining subdivision and the ballyhooed celebration of resurfaced parking lots at the arena, chances are, you’ve had a pretty shitty offseason.
In Ottawa, where fans incessantly bitch and moan about the arena’s location and the amount of time it takes to get home, you have cause to celebrate.
It’s all about the post-game egress baby!
Whether the improvements are enough to dissuade some fans from grabbing their coats and heading home with 10 minutes left in the third is doubtful, but they are welcomed changes that should allow for fans to move on and find something else to complain about.
And yes, you better believe I’m using that last sentence as the perfect segue way for a section on Jared Cowen.
What the hell is Jared Cowen?
Thanks to a knee injury, Jared Cowen slid to the Senators who selected him with the ninth overall selection in the 2009 NHL draft. Standing at 6’5” and over 200 lbs, Cowen was pegged as a defenceman who could blend mild offensive upside with the physically imposing size and skillset that NHL general managers and scouts salivate over. Cowen was just another in the long line of prototypically big defencemen who, if everything broke right, had a chance become the next Zdeno Chara.
Six years later and the only things that have broken for Cowen are the pieces of his body.
Knee problems, a hip issue and a sports hernia injury have hampered Cowen’s development time and questions abound as to where he now fits in on the Senators’ blue line.
Envisioned as the ideal future complement to Erik Karlsson, Cowen’s never been able to take a grasp and seize any of the numerous top four opportunities that he has received. With Karlsson now entrenched with Marc Methot and Patrick Wiercioch finally getting the respect and playing time from the organization that he deserves, Cowen’s essentially relegated to fighting for a spot on the team’s third pairing.
Slated to earn $3.7 million this season and $4.5 million next year, Cowen’s an expensive commodity and one of the few Senators that management has not received a good return on the investment for.
Cowen’s never been a positive relative possession guy in his NHL career and if it weren’t for the injuries and pedigree, there is little statistical evidence to suggest that Cowen’s about to turn things around. From a qualitative perspective, his undisciplined play and over-aggressive chasing the play portray the picture of player who lacks hockey IQ or someone who is simply trying to do too much on the ice.
Hopefully it’s the lack of development time that is contributing to that, because it’s a hell of a lot better for the Senators organization if a healthy Cowen eventually does figure it out.
With the money committed to him and guys like Mark Borowiecki and Chris Phillips (once healthy) fighting for the third left defenceman spot in camp, Cowen shouldn’t have that hard of a time beating either of these guys out for a spot, but I just don’t have a lot of confidence in him panning out.
Swan Songs for Neil, Phillips
Two of this organization’s longest tenured players are entering what could ultimately wind up being the last year of their respective careers with the Senators.
Both Chris Phillips and Chris Neil spent considerable time on LTIR last season and coincidentally, the Senators enjoyed a lot of success in their absence.
Phillips has not played a game since he surpassed Daniel Alfredsson’s franchise record by playing in his 1,179th career game on February 5th, but it’s fair to say that before he was hurt, he was overmatched playing significant minutes alongside Erik Karlsson on the team’s top pairing.
Unlike any defenceman who has had the opportunity to play alongside Erik Karlsson, Phillips managed to do the impossible: his play contributed to Karlsson being a replacement-level NHL player. Paired together at five-on-five, the Senators scored 36.0 percent of the goals, 46.2 percent of the shots and of the players who spent 300 or more even strength minutes alongside Karlsson, no player managed to be a bigger drag on Karlsson’s offensive contributions than Phillips.
Not even Filip Kuba could manage to make Karlsson perform at a replacement level pace and he was out of hockey just one year after riding shotgun to Karlsson during the young Swede’s first Norris Trophy campaign.
A week and a half after Phillips was shutdown with a back injury, Chris Neil suffered an injury to his thumb in a fight with the Edmonton Oilers’ Luke Gazdic that necessitated surgery. Although he returned for two games in Ottawa’s first round series versus the Canadiens, he played in a limited role and never really had any kind of impact on the series.
As I mentioned within the Cameron section, now that Neil’s healthy, it will be interesting to see whether his role will diminish and by how much. Neil is prideful person and it remains to be seen how well he’ll respond to being benched in favour of prospects or players like Alex Chiasson who deservedly has surpassed Neil on the depth chart.
Phillips’ situation is similar in the sense that he was expected to arrive in camp healthy and compete for a spot in a depth role. Unfortunately for him, he suffered a setback in his recovery from back surgery and was recently diagnosed with a cracked vertebra that will keep him on the shelf for the next few months.
For someone who was contending with guys like Mark Borowiecki and Jared Cowen for ice time, it was already going to be hard for him to compete at 37 years of age with these young players, but now I can’t even imagine how much more difficult it’s going to be for him considering he’ll be trying to start playing when everyone else is in midseason form. It’s already been a long period of time since he last did hockey-related activities. Missing camp isn’t going to help him either. Like Neil, how will he respond to a situation in which he may have trouble getting into the lineup?
For his benefit and the Senators, perhaps the ideal solution is for him to spend the season on LTIR before calling it a career.
Swan Song for GM Bryan Murray?
Veteran players aren’t the only members of the organization who could be headed into their last season.
Even though he only has a year left on a deal that calls for him to step down and assume an advisory role with the organization at the end of this season, Bryan Murray recently made remarks acknowledging that he’s not closing the door on returning as the team’s general manager next season.
Murray’s undoubtedly the most likable person that has ever worn the general manager’s hat and with last year’s revelation that he’s battling stage-four colon cancer, everyone in this city is pulling for him in his fight.
The 2015-16 season marks his ninth season as general manager since taking over the role in a coup d’etat which led to John Muckler being fired at the conclusion of the team’s 2007 Stanley Cup Final appearance.
From the first few seasons of Cup Final in 2007 to the team winning just one playoff round in its past eight seasons, I don’t know if there’s another organization in the league that would have kept their general manager around for that long based on those results alone.
Yet, here we are.
The problem with looking explicitly at the bottom line is that it is stripped of the context under which Bryan Murray has had to operate under for these past eight years.
With new owner Eugene Melnyk promising to spend to the cap every season and Ottawa finally making it past the Eastern Conference final, many fans believed that 2007 was the beginning of long window of Stanley Cup contention, but thanks in large part to the Muckler regime’s heinous draft record and a farm system that was headline by Josh Hennessy, Murray inherited a team whose real window for Cup contention closed the moment Dominik Hasek stepped foot on a plane to fly to Turin.
Over the next few years, the Senators went from an organization that desperately tried to prevent its window of Cup contention from closing to one that wished it bit the bullet earlier and resigned itself to needing a wholesale rebuild.
Since then, the ballyhooed rebuild has been sidetracked thanks to the team’s goaltending, the emergence of Erik Karlsson and some strong player development system that unearthed some talented and inexpensive players, the Senators have been a playoff bubble team since 2012.
Like any general manager, Murray has done done some good. Bobby Ryan aside, the roster is comprised of cost-effective players who have been drafted or acquired by the organization via trade. Relative to the Muckler years, it was reassuring to see the organization transition from the depleted farm system era to one in which there is quality depth at each position.
Working under a restrictive financial budget while enduring Eugene Melnyk’s whims and impulses cannot be easy and because of it and how relatively inept his predecessor was, a lot of people absolve the Murray regime of blame because of the circumstances he has had to work with.
It doesn’t mean he shouldn’t shoulder responsibility for some of this organization’s shortcomings however.
Post hoc analysis for Murray’s tenure comes naturally but unfortunately, many of the organization’s biggest mistakes could have been avoided with straightforward “fancy stat” analysis. Instead, ignorance and a fear of bad PR has fuelled a number of transactions that have tried to fast-track the process and contributed to this organization’s failure to develop into something resembling a Cup contender.
We’ve already heard the frequently bandied about reports concerning the team’s intention to add a top six forward, but management’s renewed faith in this defensive core is also disconcerting. I can understand the rationale behind giving the young blue line time and opportunity to grow, but you simply cannot players to get better because of their age and pedigree alone.
Optimism eventually has to be fueled some supporting evidence and in the case for a few of Ottawa’s blue liners, it just isn’t there. What’s even more frightening is that Patrick Wiercioch, one of the only players who took a backseat to shittier defencemen and someone who’s numbers supported the position that he deserved a bigger role, was reportedly five-minutes away from being traded at this year’s trade deadline. It’s the kind of report that makes you question the organization’s professional valuations and thought process.
In fairness to the organization, there is still plenty time of time for the Senators to develop into a contender, but I’m skeptical that it can happen in what might be Bryan Murray’s last season. And since it may be his last year to architect a winner, how aggressive and uninhibited will he be trying to create a winner in his last year at the helm?
Erik Karlsson: Healthy and Insulated
Erik Karlsson’s 2014-15 was a lot like the first season of the Wire.
What began with a slow burn, kept building and building as characters were knocked off (I’m looking at you Chris Phillips). By the end of his season, Karlsson had the 2015 Norris Trophy tucked away in his back pocket.
Now with two Norris Trophies under his belt before his 26th birthday, it’s hard to wrap your head around the idea that Karlsson can be better, but it’s true and it’s one of the best reasons to be excited for this upcoming season.
Provided both players can remain healthy — *knock on wood* — a full season of playing alongside Marc Methot will pay dividends and may even allow Karlsson to surpass last season’s totals of 21 goals and 66 points.
More importantly, Karlsson’s underlying numbers at five-on-five should see a massive spike (numbers via HockeyAnalysis.com):
Defensive Partner
TOI
GF60
GA60
GF%
CF60
CA60
CF%
With Phillips
323:18
1.67
2.97
36.0
50.85
59.20
46.2
With Methot
737:43
2.93
1.63
64.3
61.73
50.34
55.1
Expecting similar numbers alongside Methot this year is a bit of a stretch, but if Karlsson can replace the 300-plus minutes alongside Phillips and the other 300-plus minutes that he spent alongside Mark Borowiecki and Jared Cowen with numbers that approach what he did with Methot, Sens fans will be ecstatic and Karlsson will probably be laughing all the way to a third Norris Trophy win.
Depth
From the strength of the farm system to the number of players who could step right into the Senators’ lineup, depth is an often thrown around term in the nation’s capital.
There’s no question that the Senators have the depth in numbers, but will there be enough quality depth?
Although it should have been ineffectual play creating the opportunity for Ottawa’s young roster players like Patrick Wiercioch and Jean-Gabriel Pageau, injuries to a number of the team’s vets allowed these aforementioned players to step into the lineup and prove that they could be valuable and reliable contributors.
The return of players from injury like Chris Neil, Jared Cowen and Zack Smith coupled with the return of a Colin Greening — who returns only because his contract fell $10,000 short of making him eligible to be bought out — creates a situation in which they’ll be competing for ice time with cheaper players who could use the development time to become more important contributors.
I have written about Alex Chiasson’s development into a viable puck possession driver in the second half of the season and because of it, I would love to see him get the first opportunity to be the team’s fourth line right winger ahead of Chris Neil to see if this was simply the by-product of small sample size.
On the left side, I want to see a Matt Puempel or a Shane Prince get an opportunity before Colin Greening or a Nick Paul over a Zack Smith. And on the blue line, I hope that Chris Phillips doesn’t play over any of the younger alternatives.
I want to watch the younger players play because I already know what the older guys offer and at this stage of the franchise’s development, I’d rather roll with younger upside in hopes that the team can continue to grow organically than cling to intangibles and the past.
Importance of the Second Pairing
When spitballing the names of players who are under a significant amount of pressure to have good seasons, with the exception of Erik Karlsson and Craig Anderson, I don’t know if there are other players on the roster who will have bigger impacts on this team’s success than second pairing defencemen Cody Ceci and Patrick Wiercioch.
In the case of Ceci, he’s one of three right-shooting defencemen on the roster and because Chris Wideman has never played in an NHL game, the Senators don’t have the internal depth to absorb an injury to Ceci or handle any prolonged ineffective play. They will either be forced to look outside the organization for help or rely on the inexperienced Chris Wideman or one of their left defencemen to play on their off-side.
I know Marc Methot gets a lot of love for helping Erik Karlsson turn around his season, but it’s also worth sharing how much Wiercioch positively impacted Ceci’s game.
Courtesy of HockeyAnalytics.com, here are Ceci’s ‘With or Without You’ (WOWY) numbers playing with and without Wiercioch:
TOI
GF60
GA60
GF%
CF60
CA60
CF%
With Wiercioch
402:04
1.94
1.49
56.5
59.84
52.38
53.3
Without Wiercioch
798:53
2.18
2.78
43.9
52.05
59.18
46.8
Like Methot, the proof is irrefutable and the hope is that the defenceman finally caught the attention of the organization considering hockey analytic-types have been pumping his tires for the past two or three years.
Despite Wiercioch’s emergence as a viable alternative to the shit that was being trotted out regularly besides Erik Karlsson and Cody Ceci, it didn’t stop the organization from shopping him near the 2015 trade deadline.
Wiercioch was 5 minutes from being dealt at deadline. Other team involved never called back becuz they had another deal fall apart. #Sens
— Bruce Garrioch (@SunGarrioch) April 28, 2015
Fortunately, a deal was never struck and Wiercioch’s play was eventually rewarded by Hockey Canada inviting him to represent the nation at the World Championships where it won gold. I’m hopeful that this success and recognition will go a long way towards the organization doing a lot of introspective reflection on how they’re evaluating players. While at the same, I’m hoping that they actually give Wiercioch a ton of rope to work with instead of returning to the familiar and giving Jared Cowen every opportunity to crack the top four simply because of his size and tools. At the very least, if they really want to stagger the top four, perhaps as reasonable compromise is to move off a top heavy first pairing and put Methot with Ceci and Wiercioch with Karlsson.
Melnyk’s Health
In the end of the year eulogy for the 2014-15 season, I wrote:
“It’s hard to ignore how conspicuously silent Senators owner Eugene Melnyk has been over the past number of months. Essentially since the time that the Senators were announced as one of the accepted bids for LeBreton Flats’ development, the owner went dark. There were no interviews and only a handful of tweets. Events like Alfredsson being awarded the key to the city, Phillips setting the franchise record with his 1,179th career game, the Hamburglar tying Frank Brimsek’s 77-year old record, passed without any mention. It was completely uncharacteristic of him and it made me wonder what was going on, if anything, with him. At the same time, it was actually kind of refreshing to see Melnyk stay out of the limelight during this successful run of games. Instead of grabbing headlines for what he said to reporters, he got attention for making fantastic gestures like hosting the two girls who were harassed by Habs fans at the Bell Centre in his owner’s box for game three. For the first time in a long time, everything was about the hockey and the on ice product. This sense of normalcy felt really, really good.”
While those feelings were genuine, having seen the photos of Mr. Melnyk from the team’s photo, it was obvious that something was afflicting his health and contributing to a jaundiced appearance. I should have known better to celebrate normalcy when the owner was probably making regular visits to a hospital for treatment. Admittedly, I feel like a bit of an asshole here, so I’d like to apologize to Mr. Melnyk and the Senators organization for it. I’m sorry. For all of the cynicism and ridiculous criticism of the ethics involved in how the Senators owner went about using his public figure status and celebrity to solicit the public and help him find an organ donor match for a new liver, 20 prospective donors for Melnyk elected to remain on the donor list to help others in need. Those are 20 people who wouldn’t have been on the donor list had Melnyk not come forward with his appeal for help and because of his battle, the organization will make a concerted effort to raise awareness, publish stories of people in need, and encourage the public to donate throughout the course of the season.
LeBreton Flats Development
Even with the worthwhile renovations to the Canadian Tire Centre, a lot of energy is going to being spent following the progress of the LeBreton Flats Development RFP process. Back in February, the RendezVous LeBreton Group – an umbrella group that the Senators are involved in — were one of four groups that were shortlisted for submissions to redevelop LeBreton Flats. This group proposed “a major event centre for sports and entertainment performances, complemented by green spaces, and residential and commercial developments.” Although the RFP submissions were originally slated to be due this fall, the date for submissions has now been extended.
#LeBreton Flats: At the request of proponents, they now have until December 15 to submit their proposals. Open house in Jan. #ncclive — NCC-CCN (@NCC_CCN) September 8, 2015
As one of three locations that has been spitballed as a prospective destination for a 2017 Heritage Classic that has not even been awarded to the Senators yet, interest in transforming this parcel of land into a viable downtown destination for hockey is only going to ramp up over the course of the season.
Speaking of which…
Heritage Classic Game in 2017
It’s no secret that Senators and the City of Ottawa have been gunning for an outdoor game as part of their plans to not only commemorate Canada’s 150th year as a nation, but to also honour the 100th anniversary of the league’s first game which was played with franchises from Ottawa and Montreal.
Although the league hasn’t officially even acknowledged that the Senators would host such a game, the fact that the mayor and Senators president Cyril Leeder are talking about a prospective outdoor game and have investigated site locations to host such a game make it seem like a 2017 Heritage Classic in Ottawa is a foregone conclusion.
At this stage of the process, it only feels like it’s a matter of time before an outdoor game in 2017 between the Senators and Canadiens is announced.
Deterioration of the Bottom Six and How Mike Hoffman Isn’t the Right Solution
Having already touched on Ottawa’s depth, one of my biggest concerns is the possible deterioration of Ottawa’s bottom six forwards.
Admittedly, that feels a bit weird to write considering I’m optimistic about seeing some growth from players like Jean-Gabriel Pageau and Curtis Lazar, but I’m mindful of three things: first, I’m concerned about the loss of Erik Condra; secondly, the dump and chase brothers, Zack Smith and Chris Neil are back and healthy; and finally, I don’t know if Alex Chiasson’s second half puck possession numbers were for real or a by-product of a small sample size.
Starting with Erik Condra, he was a unique player who struggled with his production but was invaluable as an inexpensive forward who consistently drove possession and made the players around him better.
As a defensively responsible forward who could also log significant minutes on the PK, Condra helped make the bottom six better by doing an excellent job of transitioning the play and funneling it towards the opposition’s end.
A lot of the hubbub has been about how the loss of Condra is acceptable because it creates a spot on the roster for a Shane Prince or a Matt Puempel, but it ignores just how important he was to the success of the Condra-Pageau-Lazar line.
Courtesy of Puckalytics.com, here is a comparison of how Pageau and Lazar fared together at even strength when joined by Condra
TOI
GF%
CF%
22-44-27 Line
280:09
52.4
54.1
Lazar Without Condra
370:27
42.4
48.9
Pageau Without Condra
209:28
46.7
48.5
It’s worth noting that I also looked at how Pageau and Lazar fared together while playing with a linemate other than Condra, but it only accounted for approximately 22 minutes of TOI – far too small to really conclude anything from it.
Looking at their ‘With or Without You’ numbers and the success that Condra-Pageau-Lazar had as a line, I think it’s reasonable to assume that Condra was an instrumental part in that line’s success.
From a lineup construction standpoint, I think one way you could mitigate Condra’s loss would be to put another puck possession driving forward like Mike Hoffman in his spot. As a more talented offensive player, not only would responsible players like Pageau and Lazar mitigate his defensive lapses, he would probably help improve the offensive production rates of his linemates. Unfortunately, the cost of doing this would necessitate putting Milan Michalek on the second line. Historically, the production and possession rates of Zibanejad and Ryan sputtered when this change in linemates was made.
Zibanejad & Ryan…
TOI
GF%
CF%
Sh%
With Hoffman
484:09
56.8
52.2
9.84
Without Hoffman
267:12
50.0
46.8
6.67
This kind of statistical evidence creates a conundrum for the coaching staff. Down the stretch as the games became more important, Dave Cameron and the coaching staff dreaded Hoffman’s defensive miscues within the defensive zone costing them a goal at an inopportune time. In their efforts to mitigate against these micro-level instances, they elected to play the more responsible and predictable Milan Michalek in this second line role to limit the defensive zone brainfarts.
From the macro-perspective, they may have helped limit the brainfarts, but this move essentially neutered the offensive and territorial effectiveness of that line. At least with Hoffman, the line scored more than they gave up and was significantly better from a territorial standpoint.
For me, having a significantly better second line is more important than propping up the third line.
Should Hoffman stick in a second line capacity, it would relegate Michalek to the third line and as someone who’s never been much of a possession driver, it would be interesting to see whether Pageau and Lazar could carry him. I suppose a Shane Prince or a Matt Puempel could fit in in the event of an injury, but with their lack of experience and games played, I’m not sure whether either player is a good fit at this juncture either.
Although I’m really intrigued to see whether Alex Chiasson not only gets first dibs at the fourth line right wing spot, if he’s playing with the historically bad possession tandem of Chris Neil and Zack Smith (AKA the ‘Dump and Chase’ boys), his numbers (or whomever gets the other spot on the wing) will inevitably get submarined.
If Smith and Neil get stapled to the bench in favour of guys like Chiasson or a Nick Paul, things could get interesting. Unfortunately, I have trouble believing that Smith and Neil won’t be regulars in this lineup and because of it, and the loss of Erik Condra, I can’t help but be worried about seeing the degradation of the bottom six – when it was one of the team’s best strengths down the stretch last season.
Bobby Ryan Signed, Sealed, Needs to Deliver
Ottawa…. Im coming in hot
— Bobby Ryan (@b_ryan9) July 5, 2013
With four words, Bobby Ryan had Ottawa in the palm of his hand.
Having lost Daniel Alfredsson hours earlier to unrestricted free agency, Ryan’s acquisition restored a sect of this fan base’s confidence in management and ownership for allowing their longstanding captain, prospective Hall of Famer and most tenured player in franchise history to leave.
With Ryan in tow, the Senators finally had a media-savvy and marketable four-time 30-goal player that they could use to strengthen their brand and re-establish whatever credibility they had lost that day with their fans.
For the most part, fans bought in. They ignored the fact that the deal carried a substantial amount of risk and that the organization had given up a large part of its future — a first round pick, a prospect and a young NHLer in Jakob Silfverberg – to do it.
Rosterbating fans loved the move because on paper, they believed the team was more talented. They eagerly pencilled Ryan in alongside Jason Spezza believing him to be the second-coming of Dany Heatley – a scorer who Spezza could push past the 30-goal threshold and put him in the conversation for the Rocket Richard Trophy.
In these past two seasons however, he has averaged a disappointing 20.5 goals. Well short of the expectations cast upon him. As an organization, the Senators have also struggled to take a step forward and prove that they are more than a playoff bubble team that needs a favourable opponent to sneak out of the first round.
To Ryan’s credit, his performance has been marred by injuries. Hernia surgery and an injury to his thumb certainly didn’t contribute positively to his comfort level and ability to shoot the puck. Despite these physical ailments however, Ryan led all Senators who played more than 1,500 five-on-five (5v5) minutes these past two seasons in points per sixty minutes of 5v5 ice time.
Relative to the rest of the league, Ryan was tied for 46th in 5v5 points per 60 and was in the same company as players like Jakob Voracek, Phil Kessel and James Neal. (Note: for what it’s worth, Ryan was tied for 79th in the NHL in goals per sixty minutes of 5v5 ice time with 0.76)
Heading into the first year of a seven-year extension that carries an average annual value of $7.25 million, it’s safe to say that the Senators need more out of Ryan. That probably sounds odd in consideration of his even strength point production, but unlike some of the aforementioned players who produced at a similar even strength rate, Ryan has struggled to be a productive player on the power play which has helped submarine his offensive numbers.
Whether that is a systemic power play issue or not probably deserves its own piece, but relative to his peers (players who have logged a combined 200+ power play minutes in the past two seasons), Ryan ranks 181st in points per sixty and tied for 101st in goals per sixty. It’s worth mentioning new assistant coach Andre Tourigny, who was hired this offseason and brought in from Colorado, will reportedly be helping out with the power play. Although the Avalanche had the league’s second-worst power play last season, they had the league’s fifth-best power play percentage during the 2013-14 season.
Looking at Ryan’s season-by-season numbers however, it’s hard to ignore the fact that last season’s even strength goal and production rates, while still good, were some of the worst of his career.
As Jack Han mentioned in an excellent read over at Habs Eyes On the Prize, Ryan has never been much of a puck possession driver. If his goal and production rates continue to tail off like other non-possession driving goal scorers like Han’s examples of Dany Heatley, Thomas Vanek, Vincent Lecavalier, Michael Ryder, Rene Bourque and Daniel Briere, it will be bad business for the Senators.
The opportunity cost to acquire Ryan was sizable and considering he only had one-year left on his contract, the Senators essentially painted themselves into a corner when they traded for him. They simply could not afford to let him test the unrestricted free agent market because the organization desperately wanted to quell fears that players, in the wake of offseasons in which Jason Spezza and Daniel Alfredsson left, did not want to play in Ottawa.
Hypothetically, they always could have tested the market for his services, but after giving up what amounted to the tenth overall selection in the 2014 draft, Jakob Silfverberg and Stefan Noesen, the Senators were never going to recoup that kind of value back in a deal. Like letting Ryan hit UFA, any deal would have inevitably made the Senators look bad, so they essentially gave Ryan a blank cheque to remain in the nation’s capital and thanked him profusely for making a long-term commitment to the organization.
“Bobby, on behalf of the Ottawa Senators, I want to thank you for making a long-term commitment to our organization and to our fans. We’re delighted to have you an Ottawa Senator for the next eight years.” ~ Eugene Melnyk at the press conference to announce Bobby Ryan’s new extension. October 2, 2014.
Now 28-years old with rates trending in the wrong direction, the thought of Bobby Ryan continuing to decline as he exits his prime but enters the first year of a long-term contract extension is troublesome. For a team with limited financial resources in the salary cap era, the Senators cannot afford to paper around their mistakes.
While I have always leaned on the side of wishing the Senators allowed their young roster to grow organically rather than worry about PR and trade for the kind of quick fix move to satiate a pissed off fan base that just lost its captain, it’s all in the past now. While I disliked the rationale behind the decision to acquire Ryan, I really like him as a player and person. He’s truly a great ambassador for the organization, but most importantly, he’s healthy again and has chemistry with Mike Hoffman and Mika Zibanejad. We could also stand to take a lesson from him and tweet less to become more productive people.
If ever there is a season for him to prove that he can return to the days in which he was an elite goal scoring forward, this is it.
Sophomore Success
Alright Mark Stone, not only did you finish the 2014-15 season having one of the ten-best points per 60 minutes of ice time rates amongst NHL forwards, you also tied for the league lead in takeaways and from January 1st onward, only Jamie Benn (55), John Tavares (54) and Alex Ovechkin (51) had more points than you.
What do you do for an encore?
Together with Mike Hoffman, the Senators will be relying heavily upon their sophomore forwards to not only bolster the offence but be possession-driving forwards who can tilt the ice in the Senators’ favour whenever their top two lines are on the ice.
It’s probably a little unfair to the player to assume that Stone can replicate his numbers that he put up since the calendar turned to the year 2015, but if he can, you’re looking at the best organizational development story since Daniel Alfredsson arrived on the scene in 1995.
Welcome to Management Alfie
After months of foreshadowing, fans can stop waiting. Daniel Alfredsson has officially returned to the Senators organization by signing an agreement that gives the title of senior advisor of hockey operations.
Since leaving the Senators to sign as an unrestricted free agent with the Detroit Red Wings, today’s news is simply the final step in a series of moves that have helped mend fences between two parties.
Alfredsson will work within the front office where he will serve primarily as an advisor to general manager Bryan Murray and will “support hockey operations duties at the National Hockey League level, from scouting to player development.”
As acknowledged in an interview on TSN 1200 this afternoon, the Senators have one of the smallest front offices in the league, so adding another set of eyes and voice to the mix certainly should help – especially since he isn’t too far removed from the game and should be able to act as a liaison between the players, the coaching staff and management.
It’s going to be a steep learning curve and it’s going to take a significant amount of time for Alfie to learn the ropes, but hopefully he brings a fresh voice and some new ideas to the fold, because as other front offices around the league keep expanding and trying to identify and find new ways to exploit the game’s inefficiencies, I worry that the Senators will get lapped by the field.
Beyond his input, the fact that he will be around the organization a lot more bodes well simply because it means he’ll be around Erik Karlsson more. His presence and mentoring skills can only help make things easier for the Senators’ captain.
Watching Robin Lehner From Afar
The most controversial thing the Senators did this offseason was package former goaltender of the future Robin Lehner with David Legwand in a trade that netted the Senators the 21st overall selection that they used to select Colin White out of the USDP.
From the moment that Lehner led the Binghamton Senators to the 2011 Calder Cup and earned the Jack A. Butterfield Trophy as the Most Valuable Player of the Calder Cup Playoffs as a 19-year old teenager – joining the esteemed company of Carey Price (2007), Patrick Roy (1986) and Gordie Bell (1943) – Senators fans truly believed that the organization was primed to develop its first superstar netminder.
A few years later and we were still waiting for Lehner to prove himself at the NHL level.
Even though the organization invested a significant amount of dollars and time into Lehner’s development, it’s easy to forget just how young Lehner is relative to his peers around the league because of how many seasons he’s played as a professional. To put things in perspective, there were only five goaltenders in the entire NHL last year who were 23 or younger who also happened to play in more than 10 games. Lehner was one of them. Petr Mrazek, John Gibson, Calvin Pickard and Andrey Vasilevskiy were the others.
At 24 years of age, he’s just a few months older and more professionally accomplished than the ballyhooed collegiate free agent Matt O’Connor. Yet, thanks to his inconsistency and unfortunate injury history, he no longer has the shiny, new object feel that a prospect like O’Connor has. It’s like Lehner’s been around just long enough for us to evaluate his flaws, so we’re done with him. It’s on to the next big thing because we have a hard time realizing just how volatile and difficult the goaltending position can be for any player – let alone one who’s trying to thrive in his early 20’s.
For as much as we talk about the age and his accomplishments however, it’s not like there aren’t red flags either. An overbearing father who just happens to be a goaltending coach, strained relationships with coaches, a recent concussion or even off-ice habits may all play a part in Lehner struggling to live up to expectations. Or maybe he’s just young and needs more time to develop
Unfortunately for Lehner, he simply has not been able to get consistent reps at the NHL-level which has probably contributed to his inconsistency. Since the time he joined Ottawa, it always felt like it was impossible for Lehner to get into a rhythm. When Craig Anderson was felled by his unfortunate hand injury, the organization traded for Ben Bishop and last season when Anderson went down again, Lehner was involved in a collision with Clarke MacArthur that literally knocked him out for the remainder of the season and opened the door for Andrew Hammond to steal his job like it was a hamburger.
There’s simply no way Hammond can sustain his peripherals or success from last season, but on a three-year deal that pays him an average of $1.35 million, the Senators aren’t paying him like he should either. Provided he is a likable player who can provide competent relief, it’s hard not to like Hammond or get behind him as a player.
Although everyone is certainly going to pay attention to it, it’s not going to be fair to simply judge Lehner against the performance of Ottawa’s goaltenders moving forward. Sure, it would be an extremely bitter pill to swallow to watch Lehner flourish over the next few years on a young divisional rival whose team can only get better – especially when I have my own concerns about Anderson’s age and whether it’s congruent with the timing of success that I hope Ottawa has as its own young core develops. The Senators did however acquire the right to draft to Colin White and although it will take years to evaluate how this deal panned out, if White develops as expected and/or the Senators continue to receive good goaltending moving forward, it will make the decision to trade Lehner easier to stomach. Even if Lehner pans out.