The Hockey PDOcast - Awards Ballots Through 30 Games, The Jets Top Line, and PDO Surges

Episode Date: December 21, 2023

Dimitri Filipovic is joined by John Matisz to talk through their awards ballots through the 30 game mark. Plus they answer some mailbag questions about what's made the Jets top line so special, and why new coaches always seem to benefit from PDO surges. If you'd like to gain access to the two extra shows we're doing each week this season, you can subscribe to our Patreon page here: www.patreon.com/thehockeypdocast/membership If you'd like to participate in the conversation and join the community we're building over on Discord, you can do so by signing up for the Hockey PDOcast's server here: https://discord.gg/a2QGRpJc84 The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

Progressing to the mean since 2015, it's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri Filippovich. Welcome to the HockeyPedioCast. My name's Dmitri Philipovich, and joining me is my good buddy John Mattis, John. What's going on? Not a whole lot. Christmas is basically here, and what a great time to catch up, Dimitri. What a great time. It's one of our final shows of 2023, and we are in the giving spirit for the holidays. So let's give the people what they want. Let's empty the mailbag out. Let's answer. some of the questions we got from the listeners on the Discord channel. Let's wrap the year up as best we can. And I thought

a good way for us to start would, kind of all-encompassing, right, gives us a good view of the league, gives us a chance to talk about a variety of different things, is our awards ballots through the 30 game mark or so now that each team's play that amount roughly. Instead of doing the full thing, though, because I think we could probably do a full

week's worth of shows on. just that topic, we're going to limit ourselves to just the very top of each awards category for now. So we're going to give our leaders at this point and then our runners up. And then maybe if you want to sprinkle in an honorable mention or someone that that's gaining ground and is jumping into that conversation, I'll give you the optionality for that, but it's not required. So let's start it. Let's let's kind of work our way up. Let's start with a Calder. I did a big show about 20 minutes or So with our pal Dalmatian about it. So I think my thoughts are kind of documented on that.

But I'm curious for your take on sort of how we handicap the rookie of the year right now and whether anyone can challenge Connor Bardard in your eyes. I mean, at this point in the season, I think we're at the let's not overthink this and hand it to Badar just based on goal scoring being the most difficult thing to do in the NHL still. Like, you know, it's not going to matter if goal scoring rates keep going up. Like, it's still the hardest thing to do. And he's got 12 so far. And then he also leads in points with 28.

And he doesn't have much to work with in Chicago. And the definition of the Calder Trophy is we're looking for the most proficient first-year player. So that translates to me more about how outstanding the player is versus, you know, being the most valuable. And I think Badard's been that guy. And that's not to say someone like Brock Faber can't in the second half or whatever the remaining is 60% of the season can't overtake him. I mean, the thing with Faber is that he, to me, he passes the eye test with such blind colors. I really liked him last year in those eight games he had or whatever it was, eight or ten games with Minnesota. And it's really carried over.

I mean, I don't know if you covered this on the show yesterday, but like I think. it's hilarious that Minnesota is 30 and 17 with him on the ice at 5 on 5, 30 goals for, 17 against. And then short-handed, because they have such a tire fire of a penalty kill, they're 0 and 11. And obviously, favor being on that penalty kill, he's part of the problem there. But I think when you focus strictly on 5-on-5, there's no denying his impact. And, you know, just crazy on ice totals, or I should say time on ice totals, the last four games for him 30 minutes, 28 minutes, 31 minutes, 30 minutes. This is almost unheard of for a rookie defenseman. And my philosophy around the calder, generally speaking, is to give defensemen,

if there's a tiebreaker, they usually went out just because it's a more difficult position to handle as a teenager or as, say, a 20-year-old. So Faber's got a lot going for him. I think, you know, he's got a really strong case to be the number two guy, but I'm still waving the flag of team Bedard at this point. Yeah, I think that's fair. I think he summarized that pretty well. He's definitely Faber is surging, and they're both got very compelling cases

from a degree of difficulty perspective, right, Connor Bedard's just the lack of help and the environment around him and the fact that he's been able to do this on a nightly basis since the start of the year with everyone's eyes on him, with all this pressure, and still do all the heavy lifting from an offensive creation perspective with no help, whereas Faber coming on lately here,

his usage is just not only unparalleled for this class, but entering the territory of like unparalleled historically, where he's going to, if this keeps up, he's going to soon pass Toby Endstrom for the most average time on ice for any rookie since the 2005 lockout. Andstrom was older at that point as well. So yeah,

this is just uncharted, uncharted waters. And so these two guys are really, establishing themselves. I think the bad art stuff's obvious. I do think like Faber just deserves a lot of attention here because that type of player profile,

we all sort of, I guess maybe I'm in a bit of an echo chamber, right? Because I think like everyone that I sort of talk to on a regular basis about hockey or whose takes I see thinks similarly to me in a way. So it's like is appreciative of this and pointing it out and talking about and aware of it.

But then maybe the, the wider public or I guess the voting body itself generally doesn't reflect those same feelings, right? Like this isn't a player profile that generally gets a lot of appreciation. Now we mentioned he's on the top unit power play. So he could work his way towards getting some more of those offensive counting stats that generally get the attention of voters. But for the most part, not someone who's that flashy, right? Just very smooth and poised and already play such like a sophisticated game for a 21-year-old defenseman playing all situations for Minnesota.

So awesome player, but generally someone who doesn't get a lot of love in the awards market. We should say, do you know which awards you're going to be voting on this year? Is that determined for or do you find out after? No, I mean, the professional hockey writers association votes on only specific awards.

Like every year, it's the same awards. Gotcha. But you're not guaranteed a vote every year. I have, luckily, every year I've been, in the organization been able to vote. I think partly because I'm the only one from the score that's part of the organization. Partly because you're a cool guy with good takes who appears in the video cast. Yeah.

Exactly. But Calder is always one. Selky. Bezna is not. Hart is. Norris is Calder. I already mentioned Calder. Jack Adams isn't.

So it's most of the awards. I'd say all the fun ones to discuss. And it's honestly like the biggest honor. Like it's amazing to do that. Well, it's good to know so that we know which awards we can push you into. So I'm excited about that. Okay. So I think the Calder, I think we did that.

The Selkie. I mean, I mean, it's, it's Barkoff, right? Like, I need to have a big conversation. And I think we do in the sense that it's not a reputation thing, right? I think that's something that this award has in the past for for deserve reasons, kind of become. link too, right? It's like, all right, it's just the same names over and over again. You don't actually look at it. Now, the past couple years, Bergeron certainly

earned that with his play. And I think Barkov is following in those footsteps this season. Yeah, I started laughing there just because I had a problem just, and, you know, keep in mind people who are listening that like, it's not like me and Dimitri did these massive deep dives and we're really in the thick of figuring

out the awards. It's, we put some thought into it, but not until the end of the season. Speak for yourself, John. But anyways, I was getting to something and my point was that I was having trouble finding a second player to bring up. Like, sure, you could bring up, you know, 10 guys who are, you know, might make your ballot at the end of the year. But there was no one even contending with Barkov in my eyes at this point in the season. And it's crazy that his goals against per 60 minutes at 5 on 5 right now is 0.9. and that's fourth in the in the league among players or forwards I should say with 200 minutes or more at 5-1-5.

So obviously phenomenal and the other guys, you know, are third and fourth-liners. So that's huge. And then you also dig into like, okay, so who are his most common forward opponents? Like, you know, is he getting the other team's second lines? Is he kind of beating the system here where he's riding that name recognition? And it's like, no, we've got Mitch Marner up there. Austin Matthews, Mark Schifley, Johnny Gutro, Elias Pedersen. These guys are right up there as far as his most common opponents.

And that's a huge part of the discussion for me in the Selki is level of difficulty. And he checks those boxes. And you broke it down with Daryl Belfrey in such a wonderful way with your deep dive on Barkoff. Like this guy, the little details, whether it's his stick work or, you know, where he appears on the ice is positioning. He does so many little things that I think with tracking data, we're starting to see the evidence of quantitatively. But when you watch him, it's very obvious how much he impacts the defensive side of the puck,

along with being an effective offensive player. And that's something that we can't discount either, is that say if you just throw out a Jordan Stahl, I mean, he's a defensive player through and through. Barkoff contributes offensively all the time and is a driver in so many ways for Florida. So, no, 100%. If I was doing the ballot today, I would write Barkov and Penn for a number on the Selki vote. And then I'd have to really dig deep on who to put from two to five.

Yeah, the degree of difficulty, like on the one hand, it is a defensive award, right, for the best defensive forward. But also, I think you need to apply the content. of like the responsibilities of the player and what they're tasked with, right? It's so much easier if you're playing those secondary minutes to just go out there for 30 to 40 seconds at a time and make sure nothing happens. Whereas if you actually are going against either team's best players and then required to contribute offensively and turn those defensive sequences into scoring chances and goals, that's just like an entirely different stratosphere for me, right?

And those are the players where we're trying to capture with this award as opposed to the most hipster third line pick that you can think of. And so Barkov is clearly that not only with him on the ice, at 515, you mentioned six goals against, they're up 24 to 6 without him down 42 to 32. So we'll talk more about Paul Maurice here in a second. But, you know, if I was the coach of the panthers,

I would just clone Barkov and just have him on the ice for all 60 minutes because that seems like the winning formula there. I have a second name for you, though. I think someone has emerged from the field. still quite a gap to bridge between him and Barkov, but I think he's faltered himself above the rest of the competition, and that's Sean Kachari, who, first off, I mean, remarkable story, right, as a 31-year-old coming off the two back surgeries,

didn't play for nearly two calendar years, and you look at the impact he's had on this Flyers team, with him on the ISFI-15, they're controlling 63% of the high-dangered chances, 56.6% of the shots outscoring opponents 2719 and they've been a phenomenal defensive team to go along with all the other stuff right and he's been a big reason for that and it's interesting because he's almost working his way back into form it feels like right like one of the things that that's really caught my eye is his face off efficiency is way down this season and I think it makes sense that like the rhythm and timing and the hands that that would require to be

elite at would sort of fade a little bit with two years worth of inactivity and rust. And I think that's going to come along. I don't think he suddenly got bad at faceoffs, right? I think that's a sign of what he's trying to accomplish here in his return. Yet it hasn't mattered in terms of the rest of his profile and his impact on the game. And so I think that's going to come along with more reps here. And hopefully he can stay healthy because he's not only been phenomenal, but a huge driving reason for why this Flyers team has been one of the biggest surprises in the league.

Well, and I wonder, what would the Flyers have done if he came back and was a shell of himself, right? You've got this guy who's on a big contract. It's not old enough where you can kind of shoe him away on LTIR or something. Like, he clearly wanted to come back. And it's rare for a guy to bounce back in this way. I mean, it's the Masterton, you know, not to talk about an award that we didn't have on the sked here, but like, off the top of my head, he's probably the guy that would win that award, uh, given what he's been through and what type of player he looks like now. Yeah, uh, really cool story. Okay, the Norris. I think this is going to be a quick one for us just because you look at it and I don't really recall there being this big of a gap between

the top two and the field ever. And thankfully for this, uh, the purposes of today's show, we're limiting ourselves to the favor and the runner-up, because currently the betting market has Evan Bouchard and Rasmus Dahlin as third and four on the list. And I think the gap between them and Quinn Hughes and Kail McCarr is just so, it's even bigger than what we just talked about at the sell key. And so I guess it's, it is between Hughes and McCar. I'm kind of curious what your take was on that and how you sized up those two for the

purposes of this, this exercise. Yeah, and first of all, shout out to Noah Dobson. I think he's really taking a big step and he would certainly be in contentioned for Yeah, but John. Hughes is plus 130 right now. McCar is plus 160. Noah Dobson is plus 2,800. Wow.

Like, it's, it's just the gap between those guys. It's almost like, it's already been solidified as there's just no one else. It's really a battle for third between all the other names. you can think of. Yeah. And in one way, it's cool, right? Because this is, you know, they came into the league at the same time. There was a big discussion about their Calder cases when they were in their first year.

I remember voting for Quinn Hughes, but thinking after like, oh, did I kind of underrate what McCar did? And it's cool for them to, you know, whatever it is, five, six years later, be at the top of the heap for the real trophy for defenseman Lenoris. And, you know, part of me goes, and then the other side of me goes, and then the other side of me goes, oh, it's unfortunate that Amir O'Haskin and hasn't really had the season that we would have hoped. Or Adam Fox not having a bad season, but not to, you know, his Norris caliber self in the past. So it's interesting from that perspective. But yeah, it's Hughes. It's McCar.

And, I mean, I put Hughes ahead of McCar at this point. Just based on, I guess, the start to finish nature of his dominance. as far as, you know, the game one and whatever game, Vancouver that now 30 or whatever, I haven't seen much of a dip. And he just controls play at such a high level. And whether that's the pace, the flow, chances for and against, when he's on the ice, he is kind of the guy stirring the drink, you know, for both teams. And that sounds weird to say, but it's true.

And, you know, he's playing a ton. 24, 35 a night. He's putting up points, which I realize is not everything in the Norris conversation, but it's something. And Vancouver has 67% of the goals at 5 on 5 when he's out there. Like it's just a super high percent. And I know you've talked about in the past that him and Heronic have not been playing with Pedersen a ton. I assume that hasn't changed over the last couple of weeks. Last time I heard you bring that up on the pod. Because that's notable. Like he's carrying a forward line in a lot of ways. So Hughes has been massive, massive, and so was McCar, but I give it to Hughes at this point.

Yeah, Hughes, 41 points in 33 games. They are up 39, 19 with him on the ice 5-15. And I think you mentioned the ice time. Part of this is a function of McCar missing the five games or so he's already missed, but Hughes has logged like 160 more minutes so far than him. and if that gap remains the same at the 82 game market, it's not as big of a deal. But if we're talking about it through 30 games right now, that is pretty sizable difference of relatively similar production and impact on the game, but then just doing so so much more

often because he's played the extra games. And so I think that's an important factor here. And yeah, I mean, with the success the Canucks have had and with his impact and fingerprints all over these games, I'm comfortable going here. He was McCar one, two. But both guys are obviously just absolutely phenomenal players. Okay. Avesna.

Should we just pull up the sport logic stats here and sort by goal save a lot of expected? Well, I find the Vezna is getting like super interesting from a big picture perspective. As we have the workloads conversation really take up a lot of oxygen. I mean, you've got, should we, you know, to counter you, you know, Your point, should we give it to Allmark and Swayman? Can they split it? Are we able to do it at this point? And obviously, I'm joking there. But we've got so many goalies having huge seasons, but they're playing 50% of their team's games or 55 or 60. So, you know, there's different ways to look at that. The lens that I choose to look at that is I give extra marks to the guys that are going to get a ton of starts and still maintaining. a high level of play. And not to turn this into a whole Canucks podcast, but Thatcher Demko is 23 starts. That's tied for third in the league.

Yet he has a 921, say percentage. And out of those 23 starts, 16 qualify as quality starts by sport logic. So he's basically coming out and giving his team a chance to win, you know, whatever that is, more than two-thirds of the of the starts that he's had. And he's fifth in the league in goals saved above expected per 60 minutes. And guess what? All the guys in front of them, they've played 15 games or less. So he's not only playing a ton, but he's keeping pace with these guys who are playing 50% of their team's games.

Yeah, nearly 17, like raw goals save above expected in 23 games. I mean, he has been otherworldly had a bit of a dip there for a hand, of games when the Canucks sputtered a little bit a couple weeks ago, but has bounced back here. And yeah, season long numbers are just outrageous. And I do think the volume or workload here is an important factor, right? Because I think on a per game basis, I would say Jeremy Swayman has been the best goalie in the league. You look, and he's got a 938 percentage with plus 13 goals. I've expected in his 15 games. And I think last time we spoke, he hadn't at that point even given up a shot, a goal against outside of the slot.

Like he's just not giving up bad goals. Every time he plays, he's giving the Bruins of quality performance. They haven't been as good defensively as I think we've become accustomed to in the past, but we haven't recognized that because the goaltending has been so good, but him and Allmark are quite literally splitting the games right down the middle 50-50. And so at the end of the season, when you look up in a guy like Demko or Hellebuck, who I have second on my list, has played 15 to 20 more games than these guys. that's a big differentiator, right, when the numbers are this close because that provides so much additional value to these teams where, with all due respect to the seasons that Casey de Smith and Laurent Brassoire are having and they've been really good whenever they've been called upon, that's not the same caliber of goalie as going from Allmark to Swayman and vice versa, right?

And so these teams are relying on their starting goalies quite a bit and they're delivering pretty much every time they play. And I do give them full marks for that. Yeah, and Ilius Srokin on the Islanders, Connor Ingram in Arizona, both of them have started 20 games. So they're in that upper echelon as far as workload and they both have really good underlying numbers as well. So there's a fair amount of guys in the hunt here. But Demko is a cut above the rest of my opinion. Yeah, Ilyosarokin having a goals against above three and a goal save above I expected of a plus 12 so far right now is. is outrageous. And I think his season has been viewed as kind of like disappointing.

And then you look and it's like, wow, he has been so good once again. You mentioned Ingram there, give him an honorable mention as well and similar to sorrows. I know he got pulled most recently, but he had rattled off a great stretch there. So I've got Demko Hellebock 1, 2 on my list. It sounds like you're the same. Yeah, yeah, roughly. I mean, I was focused mostly on Demco and then had, you know, three or four guys. contending for that two spot.

But yeah, hell of buck, sure. Okay, well, let's stick with the Jack Adams and the Canucks theme. Do you have Rick Talkett first on your list? Because I imagine if the season ended today, I think he would probably get unanimous first place votes from the voters. I think so. I feel like, though, from a podcasting or conversation perspective, there are a few more interesting cases though as far as you mentioned paul maris earlier

you know the amount of injuries that his team dealt with to start the year and just the quality of players that were out mixed with when i watched the panthers i'm like this team is a well-oiled machine like they have absolutely picked up from from last year and just kept running with it i think todd mcclellan in in elli LA deserves a ton of credit. They have laughably elite defensive numbers. Like, you know, if a, you know, a listener wants to throw out while they're listening, you know, a couple of defensive metrics. Like, I can tell you for sure that they're in the top five. Like, they're across the board. And, you know, even just strictly goals against. They're at the top of the league in terms of suppressing goals. So, and they also have good offensive numbers. And I don't know. I just find that LA is kind of this undercover juggernaut. Like, Obviously, they're high in the standings, but they've never been leading the West. They've been kind of, you know, flirting with the top of their division. But I feel like underneath the surface, they're actually a juggernaut.

And we just haven't quite seen it yet. And I think McClellan deserves some credit there. And then the last guy I'll bring up and shoot it back to you, Dimitri's Andre Turney. I just wrote about the coyotes. And I don't know. a lot of my thought process when I was writing about it was like this guy has has brought some real stability, some real purpose to the team. He's playing to the roster's strengths, which sounds stupid to say it's underrated, but there's a lot of coaches that don't do that. You know, they're playing with speed down in Arizona.

They love their puck possession in the offensive zone, which makes sense when you have a lot of coaches. Clayton Keller and a Matias Machelli, those types of players. They love to pass the puck around until they get that, that prime look. And if you look at their profile as far as what's under the hood, whether it's sport logic or some of these other outlets, their numbers have improved pretty drastically as far as the type of style they want to play versus last year. So a little, I guess, recency bias for me because I just wrote about them and dug into them. but, you know, I think he's really put his stamp on the coyotes and he's just,

he's becoming one of the better coaches in the league. And sometimes it takes a few years and he's kind of at that point where he's starting to to really get a firm handle on, on, on NHL rosters. Yeah, that's a good shout. You know, just quickly on Talk It, because I know that this award has generally been considered the PDO award, right? And it's like, all right, well, the, uh, the coach with either the hottest goaltending or riding the best percentages is going to get the most love for this because that generally

coincides with being the most surprising team compared to our pieces and expectations. And certainly the Canucks PDO right now is through the roof and that's been a big topic of discussion all season. Beyond just that though and the fact that they are 22, 9 and 2 right now in the standings, the thing that I like about what the job talk it has done is because I can clearly trace like I know exactly what type of coach he is and what he wants his team to play like. And you can see the fundamental change he's made from when he took over and what that team was to what they are now, right? Where you look, they're a top five team in terms of offensive zone possession time.

They control the puck there. They cycle it. And then defensively, their metrics are so much significantly improved to what they were previously. And they're making life easier for their goalies. And they were such a train wreck at the start of last season under Bruce Boudreau. and I know that they made some personnel changes certainly, right, along the way and added specific players that fit what Talk It wants, but the fact that he's actually gotten them to play this way and then gotten these results,

I do think matters, right? Like, it's so difficult for us to quantify the role of a coach and what they do and how you see that on the ice. And in this case, I think you can kind of trace exactly what he's done and what he's wanted to accomplish and then how he's gone about doing it. One other name that you didn't mention there. John Tortorella.

Now, longtime PEOCast listeners are going to be like listening to this and being like, wow, I remember the days where Paul Maurice and John Tortorella were the whipping boys of the show.

And now you've got them in your top three for the best coach of the season. But I did the show with Charlie O'Connor last week, so I don't want to rehash all of it. But, man, this Flyers team with the personnel they have playing the way they are where it's not just the fact that they're winning, but the fact that they're passing

all these checkpoints from like an underlying perspective as well, the power play is obviously catastrophically bad. And I think that's a sign of just not having high-end talent to score goals on that. But otherwise, phenomenal rush team, really good defensively. And they're legit. Like they're 13, 3 and 2 during this stretch. And it's not because of a high PDO. It's not because they're riding percentages. Like they're getting good goaltending, but it's because it's a good defensive environment. and they're getting all these young to sort of mid-20s players to play in a fun, fast-paced downhill style, which is unlike anything we've seen from the flyers in recent years

and not what we think of John Turrell at hockey at all, but that's exactly what they're done. So whether that continues for the next 50 games, TBD, but through the first 30, I mean, he's just made a fundamental change here, and it's provided great results, and that's what this award is all about. yeah that's fair torts

torts is really changing minds out there because i mean up until the season i was thinking maybe not the right guy to go through a rebuild with but i mean i don't know if it's something that danny prier kind of got through to torts with or what happened there but it seems like he's

he's certainly a changed man as far as how he's having these guys play and sort of his demeanor in general and just embracing like we're on the ups and it's not going to be perfect. Okay, let's take our quick break here, and then when we come back, this is going to be a little tease, John. We're going to do the heart when we come back from break

and we'll finish up this award talk and then we'll answer a couple mailbag questions so we have that to look forward to. You are listening to the HockeyPedio guest streaming on the Sportsnet Radio Network. We're back here on the HockeyPedio cast with John Mattis, John. We did the tease before we went to break. We're doing our 30 game mark.

awards ballot. The only award we haven't done yet is the most prestigious one, the heart. Give me your favorite and then runner up. Okay. So Nikita Kutrov favorite, runner up, Quinn Hughes. And we already touched on Hughes in the previous segment. I'm sure we can circle back a little bit, but to zero in on Kutrov here. So I'm getting serious shades of 2018-19 as far as how this is all going to shake out. He's currently the leader in points across the league by six. So he's got a nice sizeable lead. Points per game.

He's got a nice sizeable lead. Primary points. He's up, you know, again, there's no sort of gaming the system there as far as his production so far. And Tampa is close enough to the playoffs. They're out by one point as we speak here with only 11 Vasselowski starts. So that's pretty difficult to do with the amount of depth. they've lost over the last couple of years. And I think they've been outscoring their problems for the most part.

And guess what? Kutrov is the driver of that. You know, there's a greater discussion to be made about or to have about, you know, the hard trophy in the playoffs. But generally, my whole thing is if you're close enough to the playoff line, you're certainly in the running. You're certainly included in the discussion. because it's just, it's so difficult to determine the outcome of these games as one skater.

And yeah, so the kicker here is that he's, Kutrov is 19 points clear of the next highest Tampa scorer, who of course is Braden Point, who's actually played one more game than him. And I put a pretty big emphasis on that kind of relative to teammate production. and Kutrov has hit that one out of the park. So all in all, just an offensive wizard. And he's really, in a bit of an underrated way, destroyed the league so far. Yeah. I think McDavid is still the betting favorite for the heart.

And I think that's just like a sign of respect for the stranglehold he's had on this award for years now. And the fact that he's such a threat to just rack up ungone the amount of points now that he looks healthy again, right? And so I get that. Kuturov's been the best player I've watched this season. And by a pretty sizable gap, his impact on these games and how he's controlling them offensively is just unmatched. We talked about this on the deep dive that I did with Belprey about him. But Tampa's the one power play that's able to be effective without much movement from their players because Kuturov's just the puppet master who moves everyone else on the ice on the other team around for them. And so they're able to just be stationary and just get their shot.

shots anyways because he does everything. On pace for 57 goals, 82 assists, has a point on 48.6% of Tampa's goals this season. Here's my favorite stat for you, though. He's on pace for 382 shots on goal, which is second behind is David Pasternak. But he also leads the league with being on pace for 333 slot passes.

So the volume in terms of chances he's creating both for himself as for his teammates is just in a different stratosphere from everyone else. And to put that into perspective, he has 130 slot passes so far. Clayton Keller, who's having a phenomenal season offensively, is fifth in the league,

and he's got 92. So 40 fewer in 30 games. I mean, what Kutrov is doing right now is just offensive brilliance in the highest form. And regard, like, the teams, I don't think is very good around him, and we'll see on the playoffs.

But I just think he's going to be, putting together this offensive resume this season that is just going to be really, really tough to overlook. And I hope it's not because it's been one hell of a season so far by him. Okay, that's enough on the awards. Let's answer a couple mailback questions before we get out of here. Let's start with this one from Mateo. It's really nice to see Nikolai Ehler's buzzing with the opportunity he's gone lately.

What makes him with Volardi and Shifley such good teammates for that play style? Also, is Pierre-Luc Dubois just not a dog? I had to include that second part, but let's take the first part here on the Jets because I honestly have not spoken enough about them on this show this season, especially with how they've been playing lately. And this line in particular has really captured my attention and in my imagination.

And I tweeted about Valardi's performance in particular last night, but I think let's lump all three of them together because they're playing as good as any line in hockey right now. Yeah, I mean, what jumps off the page with Bolivoli, is that he lives around the net. And he's also really quick at getting pucks off his stick around the net. Like he's not dipsy doodling. He's not, you know, as a passer and a shooter, the puck touches are really short.

And that's a unique part of what he does. And another thing is that he actually is useful on defense, whereas I feel like, you know, Shifley doesn't care a ton about the other side of the puck. I know he's gotten better over the last couple of the first. a couple years, but still, I'm not exactly a Selke candidate. And Eelers is kind of the transition guy, right? So I see a nice kind of puzzle piece fit here. And it's just, it's just been been flowing nicely. And Filardi, I actually, when I was, when I was thinking about this question, I'm like, oh, it's so nice that he's finally healthy. And then I'm like, wait a second. You know, he hasn't been

healthy even this year. So there's always that in the back of your mind. as far as like, you know, how long does this last? You know, does he run into another injury later this season or early next season, whatever? But whenever he's been on the ice for the, for the Jets, it's been nothing but the arrow pointing up. Yeah, they've been so good together. And it's interesting because Valardi started the year

playing with Shifley and Connor, right? And they dominated, like, their underlying numbers were all through the roof. And then Valerty gets hurt. and so they move stuff around. Then Nick Eler's plays in that role and him, Shifley and Connor played really well. And then Connor gets hurt and Valardi comes back. And then now they bring Valardi in there.

And so I guess the only constant has been Mark Shifley, who historically you're right has been quite poor defensively. And yet they're getting these phenomenal numbers. And I wanted to shout all of them out, but let's focus on Eilers and Valardi here. So Eelers, I mean, finally getting the opportunity, right, to be featured in a top line role and him making the most of it is such a cool storyline for me.

19.5.15 points this season, which is top 20 in the league and he's 15th on a permanent basis. With him on the ice at 515, the jets are up 24 to 12, controlling 58% of the shots and 56% of the expected goals. So yeah, those 75 minutes with Connor as the third guy, the numbers were through the roof. Now Valardi comes back on that line. In the five games, those three have played together, 48 to 22 goals 9 to 2 and the reason why this is important for me is even when the jets have been good in the past and when their top line has been producing offensively it's been so long since they've had a group like this that is just dominating territorially and just punishing the opposition right it's generally been sort of efficiency and making the most of their opportunities

and being opportunistic as opposed to just pure outright dominance where you're hovering around the 60% mark in terms of these categories and really just putting your foot down and keeping the opposition pin that has not been the Jets M.O. And if they actually are going to have a top line now that does that, I think our outlook for them for this season needs to change drastically because that is like a key hallmark for a true contender. And if you're going to pair that with good defensive metrics, which they have, depth, and then obviously goaltending and Hellebuck, if they can figure out the power play, which has been a sore spot for them this season, and Connor comes back, and they can figure out a role for him that doesn't disrupt this trio, all of a sudden now,

the Jets have my, you know, they have my curiosity, now they have my attention. For sure. And on the note about the, how efficient they've been in the past and how, you know, that's, that's great in a way, but also it, you know, it doesn't necessarily lead to results. I mean, they also had Blake Wheeler, and correct me if I'm wrong, Demetri, but he was a pretty high percentage guy as far as shooting. And then Shifley, Eelers, Connor, like, these are all guys that can really shoot the puck and score and are kind of looking for those high-end opportunities. So, you know, what we see with a lot of these elite teams in the modern NHL, Vegas, Florida, whoever, is they have the other team in their own zone. And it's like shift after shift. You're just grinding them down and grinding them down for check cycle.

and in order to do that you have to have a certain team a certain makeup and a certain style and i feel like winnipeg didn't quite have that previously and i don't know if they still have if they have it now but they're certainly leaning into that a little bit more um you know that lowry needer rider appleton line is nice and uh and yeah i just i just think it's one of those things where it's it's it's uh it needs to be talked about more for lack of a better way to put it, that when you can get multiple shifts going in the offensive zone and really just wear down the opposition as far as that one two-minute shift where they've got their number one pair and their number one line out and it just kind of screws their conditioning for the rest of the game,

that's just so huge. And I feel like if you don't have that that weapon, that tool in your toolbox as a team, you can be exploited. And it seems like, Winnipeg's maybe finding that a little bit. Yeah. And I think the reason why these guys make sense together to answer the listeners question beyond just the fact that it's like good players playing well, which just kind of goes without saying, is you're checking a lot of,

you're checking a lot of boxes here in terms of like specific player types, right? Like you got a power forward in Valardi. And you mentioned like his work from the dots down around the net. It just seems like he's always open and then making quick decisions before the defense can react. Right. So even if they do eventually cover him by the time they get there, the puck's already gone, as you saw with Eelers' goal against Detroit last night,

where he's behind the goal line, they rotate over to him, damn, it's out in front of the net, Eelers taps it in, right? And so you have that from him, the elite finisher in Shifley, who's historically always been such a lethal finisher, and then a playmaker and sort of puck transporter in Eelers. And the thing about Lardy and Shifley is they're both very willing to defer in that capacity. just give the pocket out of the way and then make their way down into the offensive zone and allow Eelers to just cook and carry the pocket. He's one of the best, most prolific guys at doing so in the league going from defensive zone

to offensive zone. And so, yeah, it's been really fun to watch passing all the underlying numbers and the eye test. And so I can't wait to watch them. The jets have been on fire. I think they're second in the central now, just like point percentages behind Dallas. And so they've been on a heck of a run. So wanted to shout them out. Okay, let's end with this.

Question from Curtis, which I think is an interesting thought exercise. We always hear about how coaches are hurting or benefiting from their team's PDO. It seems like their success and failure is attributed to luck. How much consideration should go to adjustments made by the new coach shifting these figures for their team? Or the firing of a coach motivating the players the same way a goalie getting pulled in a game is often employed. I'm thinking of how the wild and oilers turn their seasons around after making coaching changes. So this is an interesting one because certainly you see this, right? Coaches generally get fired because their team's percentages are in the tank.

You generally don't see a coach unless there's some sort of nefarious reason getting let go in season. Because if the percentages are good, chances are their teams winning. The GM and owner are going to be happy. I have no reason to fire them. And the show goes on. So if there is a coaching change in season, it's generally because the PDO is low for a variety of reasons. and then we see time and time again that when a new coach comes in, they generally turn around. How much of that do you attribute to just natural regression?

How much of it do you attribute to the human element of like fresh voice, motivation, all that good stuff? And how much of it is an actual sort of discernible difference in terms of tactics or deployment or something that a coach is doing structurally that is different from their predecessor? I mean, it's very difficult to define a percentage, but let's just say 50-50, because I think we can't underestimate how the human psychology part of it is impacting the results where if you put yourself in the shoes of a player who's struggling under this coach and he gets fired, I mean, your stress level goes down, your motivation goes up and you go to the rink and you meet this new boss of yours

and you just try to make that good first impression and maybe he rewards you with a little bit more ice time or a different. different role or maybe the style that he's implementing the tactics. The X's and O's is a little more complimentary to you. And I feel like that's something where it takes a fresh voice, a fresh mind to see what's going on in a room within a team as far as the different dynamics, whether it's personality or on ice play. Like I think it's almost impossible when you're in the middle of it to really get a grasp on things if you're too far down the rabbit hole of a losing streak or something, right? You'll lose focus of like the big picture. And then this new person comes in and is able to just with fresh eyes go, oh yeah, why don't we just do this? And it's like the simple thing that the other

coach was either afraid to do or just was able to, wasn't able to wrap their head around because they were just so worried about getting that next win to save their job. So I think it's, you know, it's really like you said, Demetri, it's really hard to. to, like it would be case by case you'd have to do if you're going to really evaluate this, but because the percentages are never in the fired coach's favor, like otherwise they wouldn't be getting fired. And especially on the goaltending front, we know how, how up and down it is. And if you go through, let's just say a 20 game stretch when you're getting no saves,

sometimes the coach just takes the fall for that. And then by no, like nothing really happening. with this new coach and the goalie, the goalie just bounces back. Like it's just kind of the nature of things. So it's really, it's really difficult. But I think the human psychology part is, is quite interesting. If you put yourself in the shoes of a struggling player and, and just sort of, if you've ever had a new boss, what that does to your psyche and, you know, makes you a little more alert.

Maybe you're practicing a little harder, et cetera. Yeah. On the one hand, like when the percentages are that low for teams like the Oilers and the wild, which we're referenced in this question and we generally see within season coaching changes. Like in a vacuum, it's easy for us to look from the outside and say, well, this is a candidate for aggression, right? Like the puck's going to start,

the luck's going to turn around and they're going to get better results. But when you're part of that team, if things are going so south for you in that way and you just feel like you can't buy a bounce, sometimes it's almost a self-fulfilling prophecy, right? Where unless something fundamentally changes, it's really tough for that luck to turn around. because all of a sudden now you start making uncharacteristic mistakes, you start doing little things that are out of the norm that are reinforcing that bad luck in a way, right? Or you start chasing the game

or just things are off. And then all of a sudden, you make some sort of a change. And as much of it sounds as a cop out, you bring in like a new voice, there's that human element, right, where all of a sudden now everyone, whatever lack of complacency you might have had with like being assured of your spot in the lineup or on the top power player or whatever, you kind of have to prove yourself again now for most guys on the team. I'm sure there's a motivation factor there. And you probably feel like, all right,

I've got this fresh lease on life, fresh lease on the season. We're starting from scratch. Let's go from here. And then all of a sudden, you start getting some of those better balances. And it might have happened anyways to a degree, but maybe not unless something had changed like that.

Right. So I think that's an interesting thing to consider. I think we could do a full show on this. So maybe let's revisit it when we have more time. But we got to get out of here, John. I'm going to let you quickly plug some stuff on the way out. Since this is the last time I'm going to have you on in the year, 2023, it's going to be weird doing shows in 2024. But that is coming in a couple weeks here.

So plug some stuff. Let the listeners know either what you've got in the works or what they can check out that you've done recently. Sure. Yeah. Let me go off the board a little bit here because it's going to be the holidays and maybe people have some extra time on their hands as far as, you know, they're not being that daily flow of podcasts and whatnot. I did a podcast on 1990s goalies a couple of years ago that's still very relevant. It's called When Goleys were Weird. So try that in your whatever app you used to find your podcast and you'll find it.

And it's a lot of great, great stories of Patrick Waugh, of Ed Bell for Curtis Joseph and the like. And we really dive deep on their personalities and the quirks. And also just the heyday that was the 90s for goaltending. So when goalies were weird, check it out. Awesome. Well, I highly recommend that, man. Keep up the great work. Also the Coyote's piece you referenced.

I think people should go read that because I enjoyed that one. as well, my quick plugs on the way out here. Go join the Discord community, which John is in. We take the mailbag questions from there so you can have your voice heard, jump into the conversation and be part of future shows. And we've got a great community growing in there. So the invite link is in the show notes. And also pop on the YouTube channel, the Hockey-Pediocast,

check out the archive of the shows I do with Daryl Belfrey there as a little tease to get people excited for the new year. I'm going to try to take a couple weeks off here. But we've already started prepping and getting the wheels moving for shows that we're going to do we're going to do map arsale we're going to do gave valardi which we mentioned here i think i think brock faber as well and then david pastronach so plenty of fun stuff there to look forward to john happy holidays uh happy new year to you we're going to have you on again soon in the new year and thank you to the listeners for listening to us we'll be back with plenty more of the hockey

podcast streaming on the sports net radio network