Do the Sabres have enough offence?

[dudacek]

The question about whether this team still has enough offence is an interesting one. I crunched some numbers.

Looking at the current starting 18, the Sabres have 10 guys who have been around long enough to have a reasonable track record. For these guys, I simply averaged their past 2 seasons as a moderate guesstimate for what we could expect this year.

• Thompson 38
• Tuch 29
• Cozens 24
• Zucker 21
• Greenway 8
• Lafferty 12
• Aube-Kubel 5
• Dahlin 17
• Jokiharju 3
• Clifton 5

The other 8 are harder because they don’t really have reliable track records because of youth and/or injury. For these guys, I mostly leaned toward last year’s totals but extrapolated some based on goals per game and previous years totals.

• Quinn 22
• Peterka 24
• Benson 11
• Krebs 8
• Malenstyn 6
• Power 6
• Byram 12
• Samuelsson 2

Finally, teams get contributions throughout the year from players outside their 18 starters. Last year, forwards outside the Sabres top 12 and D outside their top 6 contributed 20 goals, so I’m going to go out on a limb and say that will happen again.

The team, as constituted above, can reasonably be expected to score 273 goals, which is 29 more than last year and would have been good for 10th in the NHL.

There’s no guarantees, obviously - the above doesn’t account for devastating injuries or big breakout seasons. And there’s a new coach, which will mean a different system and different deployments. But there is nothing there that seems out of whack with what these players have produced before, the vast majority of them in similar roles.

What have I missed?

Edited Friday at 02:57 AM by dudacek

[PerreaultForever]

They offend me. 

[7+6=13]

If they become truly harder to play against, it can often result in more offense.  I wouldn't be surprised to see a bump up in some players production.

[French Collection]

31 minutes ago, dudacek said:

The question about whether this team still has enough offence is an interesting one. I crunched some numbers.

Looking at the current starting 18, the Sabres have 10 guys who have been around long enough to have a reasonable track record. For these guys, I simply averaged their past 2 seasons as a moderate guesstimate for what we could expect this year.

• Thompson 38
• Tuch 29
• Cozens 24
• Zucker 21
• Greenway 8
• Lafferty 12
• Aube-Kubel 5
• Dahlin 17
• Jokiharju 3
• Clifton 5

The other 8 are harder because they don’t really have reliable track records because of youth and/or injury. For these guys, I mostly leaned toward last year’s totals but extrapolated some based on goals per game and previous years totals.

• Quinn 22
• Peterka 24
• Benson 11
• Krebs 8
• Malenstyn 6
• Power 6
• Byram 12
• Samuelsson 2

Finally, teams get contributions throughout the year from players outside their 18 starters. Last year, forwards outside the Sabres top 12 and D outside their top 6 contributed 20 goals, so I’m going to go out on a limb and say that will happen again.

The team, as constituted above, can reasonably be expected to score 273 goals, which is 29 more than last year and would have been good for 10th in the NHL.

There’s no guarantees, obviously - the above doesn’t account for devastating injuries or big breakout seasons. And there’s a new coach, which will mean a different system and different deployments. But there is nothing there that seems out of whack with what these players have produced before, the vast majority of them in similar roles.

What have I missed?

It’s a total in between what they’ve done the last two seasons.

Possible.

With improved team defense and goaltending the differential should widen. That is the number I watch more than GF.

[Thorny]

Stickler for me here is the use of “expect”. I think the range of outcomes are wide and the end result far from certain. Averaging out the most recent two seasons and calling that the projection is more so good practice for formulating an educated guess, rather than an expectation. It’s honestly hard to say what will happen. By default I’d think most recent performance would be more predictive overall than older performance, but of course not always. 

10th is a reasonable guess but I can’t expect it when, 

a) we also have to *expect* injuries!
b) it’s questionable whether we brought in more goals than we sent out. In fact it might be the opposite. 

- to elaborate on this, there’s a little bit below the surface shenanigans: Mittelstadt slides out really nicely for us here as his goal totals aren’t that high, but he’s the guy setting up the other guys. With his playmaking gone, I’m not sure we can rule out the goal totals being affected in some way 

.. tldr : I think it’s reasonably possible they finish top 10 but not reasonably expected. To me, expected means a safe bet. I’m not so sure 

Edited Friday at 03:50 AM by Thorny

[GASabresIUFAN]

I think your calculations, especially for TnT and Tuch assume they again shoot at career levels.  I also think you are a little generous to a declining older player in Zucker.  Outside of his fluky season 2 years ago, he's been more in the 15 goals area of late.  

I also think your "fudge factor" (other non-roster current players such as deadline pickups or injury callups) is a little generous.  Certainly 20 goals is possible, but we would have injuries in the top 18 skaters for that to happen.  We'd probably then see a corresponding decrease in the projected numbers of the injured player(s).

I came up with 253 goals including a fudge factor of 12.  I can see, with an improved PP the team rebounding to 260-265.  Krebs would also have to find a new level to his game and some returning players would have to step up their playmaking.

For us to hit 273, we'd have to have much better lucky in the injury department and the PP would have to become lethal again.  

Edited Friday at 04:06 AM by GASabresIUFAN

[dudacek]

10 hours ago, Thorny said:

Stickler for me here is the use of “expect”. I think the range of outcomes are wide and the end result far from certain. Averaging out the most recent two seasons and calling that the projection is more so good practice for formulating an educated guess, rather than an expectation. It’s honestly hard to say what will happen. By default I’d think most recent performance would be more predictive overall than older performance, but of course not always. 

10th is a reasonable guess but I can’t expect it when, 

a) we also have to *expect* injuries!
b) it’s questionable whether we brought in more goals than we sent out. In fact it might be the opposite. 

- to elaborate on this, there’s a little bit below the surface shenanigans: Mittelstadt slides out really nicely for us here as his goal totals aren’t that high, but he’s the guy setting up the other guys. With his playmaking gone, I’m not sure we can rule out the goal totals being affected in some way 

.. tldr : I think it’s reasonably possible they finish top 10 but not reasonably expected. To me, expected means a safe bet. I’m not so sure 

I was using "expected" here more as a median. Not sure what would be a better word. Over/under?

What is a reasonable figure for this group that's neither optimistic, nor pessimistic based on their track records, and how should we determine it?

Obviously, there are way too many variables to expect anything.

Edited Friday at 01:52 PM by dudacek

[Thorny]

29 minutes ago, dudacek said:

I was using "expected" here more as a median. Not sure what would be a better word. Over/under?

What is a reasonable figure for this group that's neither optimistic, nor pessimistic based on their track records, and how should we determine it?

Obviously, there are where to many variables to expect anything.

I’m not close to being able to figure that out. For comparison, I do know that when you see those predictions online for new seasons, how often does our point projection for example look eerily similar to the one that came right before and we all say, “ah well that’s too low…you forgot to account fo…well, Boston is old!” and we end up within 2 points of the projection at years end. They know more about those prediction models than me 

I don’t know what I’d EXPECT but I bet you it’s closer to what we just did than you’d think, particularly when, looking in the macro and being honest, we’ve had a fairly uneventful offseason 

Ruff is an admitted wildcard 

it’s also hard to separate bias. I want to say i wouldn’t be surprised if we go boom and Quinn and Benson explode and we are second in the Atlantic and the goal total reflects 

Edited Friday at 04:35 AM by Thorny

[dudacek]

10 hours ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

I think your calculations, especially for TnT and Tuch assume they again shoot at career levels.  I also think you are a little generous to a declining older player in Zucker.  Outside of his fluky season 2 years ago, he's been more in the 15 goals area of late.  

I also think your "fudge factor" (other non-roster current players such as deadline pickups or injury callups) is a little generous.  Certainly 20 goals is possible, but we would have injuries in the top 18 skaters for that to happen.  We'd probably then see a corresponding decrease in the projected numbers of the injured player(s).

I came up with 253 goals including a fudge factor of 12.  I can see, with an improved PP the team rebounding to 260-265.  Krebs would also have to find a new level to his game.  

For us to hit 273, we'd have to have much better lucky in the injury department and the PP would have to become lethal again.  

I figured people might point to Tage and say "too much weight to one flukey season". That was kinda my perception before I ran the numbers.

But if you pull it back another year, he scored exactly 38 goals that year — that's his average three seasons running. That's a pretty significant sample size for NHL hockey.

No idea on the fudge factor. I strictly pulled last year's Sabres team, no idea what is typical, but it didn't seem out of whack. And to be clear, the flip side is also true for injuries. Had Quinn been healthy last year the fudge number would likely be lower, but the Quinn number would probably be correspondingly higher.

How do you come up with 253?

 

Edited Friday at 01:53 PM by dudacek

[Thorny]

36 minutes ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

I think your calculations, especially for TnT and Tuch assume they again shoot at career levels.  I also think you are a little generous to a declining older player in Zucker.  Outside of his fluky season 2 years ago, he's been more in the 15 goals area of late.  

I also think your "fudge factor" (other non-roster current players such as deadline pickups or injury callups) is a little generous.  Certainly 20 goals is possible, but we would have injuries in the top 18 skaters for that to happen.  We'd probably then see a corresponding decrease in the projected numbers of the injured player(s).

I came up with 253 goals including a fudge factor of 12.  I can see, with an improved PP the team rebounding to 260-265.  Krebs would also have to find a new level to his game and some returning players would have to step up their playmaking.

For us to hit 273, we'd have to have much better lucky in the injury department and the PP would have to become lethal again.  

This seems well reasoned 

I’ll go with your number lol

260 to be precise. That seems a good over under. That would have been good for 15th

Edited Friday at 04:26 AM by Thorny

[dudacek]

9 hours ago, Thorny said:

I’m not close to being able to figure that out. I do know that when you see those predictions online for new seasons, how often does our point projection look eerily similar to the one that came right before and we all say, “ah well that’s too low…you forgot to account fo…well, Boston is old!” and we end up within 2 points of the projection at years end. They know more about those prediction models than me 

I don’t know what I’d EXPECT but I bet you it’s closer to what we just did than you’d think, particularly when, looking in the macro and being honest, we’ve had a fairly uneventful offseason 

Ruff is an admitted wildcard 

it’s also hard to separate bias. I want to say i wouldn’t be surprised if we go boom and Quinn and Benson explode and we are second in the Atlantic - but I don’t know how much of that is bias. History would suggest not disregarding that as a big factor 

Was also if you recall never anti Granato so I don’t put as much emphasis on the affect of a coach as some others. So I’m not sure I see that as a huge avenue for improvement at least not relative to roster construction. I could be totally wrong and he has a huge affect on goal output

This is all reasonable, but it's not really what I'm going for here.

There is no projected explosion from Benson or Thompson, or huge regression from Peterka and Dahlin in my post: there's none of the bold going on with this one: it's strictly a numbers thing based on what the players have done in the recent past.

Edited Friday at 01:53 PM by dudacek

[GoPuckYourself]

1 hour ago, dudacek said:

The question about whether this team still has enough offence is an interesting one. I crunched some numbers.

Looking at the current starting 18, the Sabres have 10 guys who have been around long enough to have a reasonable track record. For these guys, I simply averaged their past 2 seasons as a moderate guesstimate for what we could expect this year.

• Thompson 38
• Tuch 29
• Cozens 24
• Zucker 21
• Greenway 8
• Lafferty 12
• Aube-Kubel 5
• Dahlin 17
• Jokiharju 3
• Clifton 5

The other 8 are harder because they don’t really have reliable track records because of youth and/or injury. For these guys, I mostly leaned toward last year’s totals but extrapolated some based on goals per game and previous years totals.

• Quinn 22
• Peterka 24
• Benson 11
• Krebs 8
• Malenstyn 6
• Power 6
• Byram 12
• Samuelsson 2

Finally, teams get contributions throughout the year from players outside their 18 starters. Last year, forwards outside the Sabres top 12 and D outside their top 6 contributed 20 goals, so I’m going to go out on a limb and say that will happen again.

The team, as constituted above, can reasonably be expected to score 273 goals, which is 29 more than last year and would have been good for 10th in the NHL.

There’s no guarantees, obviously - the above doesn’t account for devastating injuries or big breakout seasons. And there’s a new coach, which will mean a different system and different deployments. But there is nothing there that seems out of whack with what these players have produced before, the vast majority of them in similar roles.

What have I missed?

I'm not sure it's something you're missing but you're adding in a year in which every single player had career years then came down to earth. Are we getting the players from 2 seasons ago or last year? Adding Ruff should in theory help this but what if it doesn't, Benson should take the next step but what if he doesn't? Can Quinn stay healthy for an entire season? Will Peterka improve upon last year? Nothing changed along the defense, will they get better defensively? Again there are so many what ifs here which is why I want a guy like Ehlers in a trade since he is the model of consistency imo and at least you know what you'll be getting in him. Adams did this last year as well, instead of improving upon the lineup he kept staus quo. He went out and changed the bottom 6 which is awesome an love the look of that 4th line now and even the 3rd should be pretty solid but has done nothing once again to replace Skinner. Just hoping that either Peterka takes the next step or Benson does is terrible mismanagement again (but I know the offseason isn't over but thats my take unless he fixes the problem). Also of course the 3rd line center postion is being given to Krebs who imo has not earned it whatsoever.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[GASabresIUFAN]

35 minutes ago, dudacek said:

How to you come up with 253?

I looked at both the guys average 3 years running and also look at their career and recent shooting % with average shoots on goals the last 3 seasons and did a comparison.  

You bring up TNT who averaged 38 goals the last 3 seasons, but in two of those seasons he had shooting % of over 15%.  He fell to 11.8% last season.  Prior to the last 3 seasons he had never reached even 10%.  Using his Buffalo shooting % of 12.9% and his 264 shots on goal (his 3 year average) I came up with 34 goals.  I also had Zucker at 16, and Cozens at 21. Tuch was also less than your projection.  His career shooting % is 11.4%.  During his career year he posted an out of character 16.5%.  Using his career shooting % and the average shots over the last 2 years, I had him at 24 goals.  I had Kubel (8) and Benson (14) a little higher than you did.  Benson's increase is a projection from having an increased role next season.

All told, I looked at all top 18 skaters and came up with 241 goals, plus a fudge factor of 12 for 253.   

Fudge Factor: I looked at the Sabres goals by players who played less than 40 games for the team the last 3 seasons and they scored 14, 11, 15 goals.  The average is 13, but I discounted it one to 12 hoping for better health.

Edited Friday at 04:58 AM by GASabresIUFAN

[PerreaultForever]

1 hour ago, French Collection said:

It’s a total in between what they’ve done the last two seasons.

Possible.

With improved team defense and goaltending the differential should widen. That is the number I watch more than GF.

There's an assumption that we will have improved goaltending but that's certainly far from a certainty. We have a guy who had one good season and an undersized rookie with potential. Either one of these guys gets off to a rocky start and it's game over. 

[PerreaultForever]

59 minutes ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

I think your calculations, especially for TnT and Tuch assume they again shoot at career levels.  I also think you are a little generous to a declining older player in Zucker.  Outside of his fluky season 2 years ago, he's been more in the 15 goals area of late.  

I also think your "fudge factor" (other non-roster current players such as deadline pickups or injury callups) is a little generous.  Certainly 20 goals is possible, but we would have injuries in the top 18 skaters for that to happen.  We'd probably then see a corresponding decrease in the projected numbers of the injured player(s).

I came up with 253 goals including a fudge factor of 12.  I can see, with an improved PP the team rebounding to 260-265.  Krebs would also have to find a new level to his game and some returning players would have to step up their playmaking.

For us to hit 273, we'd have to have much better lucky in the injury department and the PP would have to become lethal again.  

Just want to say that players rarely match "career years", that's why they are called career years. 

[dudacek]

9 hours ago, GoPuckYourself said:

I'm not sure it's something you're missing but you're adding in a year in which every single player had career years then came down to earth.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes and no.

Yes, I am giving 50 per cent of the weight to last year and 50 per cent of the weight to this year. What would you do instead and why?

And no, every single player did not have a career year last year. Tuch, Thompson and Cozens did. As GA points out, Zucker had a bit of an outlier as well. Peterka had a career year this year, and Dahlin and Greenway less-dramatic ones. Quinn got hurt and the others are rookies or basically the same year-to-year.

Again, I am not saying "this is what I think these players will get" I'm simply presenting numbers, mostly based on the past two seasons.

Edited Friday at 01:55 PM by dudacek

[B-U-F-F-A-L-O]

1 hour ago, dudacek said:

The question about whether this team still has enough offence is an interesting one. I crunched some numbers.

Looking at the current starting 18, the Sabres have 10 guys who have been around long enough to have a reasonable track record. For these guys, I simply averaged their past 2 seasons as a moderate guesstimate for what we could expect this year.

• Thompson 38
• Tuch 29
• Cozens 24
• Zucker 21
• Greenway 8
• Lafferty 12
• Aube-Kubel 5
• Dahlin 17
• Jokiharju 3
• Clifton 5

The other 8 are harder because they don’t really have reliable track records because of youth and/or injury. For these guys, I mostly leaned toward last year’s totals but extrapolated some based on goals per game and previous years totals.

• Quinn 22
• Peterka 24
• Benson 11
• Krebs 8
• Malenstyn 6
• Power 6
• Byram 12
• Samuelsson 2

Finally, teams get contributions throughout the year from players outside their 18 starters. Last year, forwards outside the Sabres top 12 and D outside their top 6 contributed 20 goals, so I’m going to go out on a limb and say that will happen again.

The team, as constituted above, can reasonably be expected to score 273 goals, which is 29 more than last year and would have been good for 10th in the NHL.

There’s no guarantees, obviously - the above doesn’t account for devastating injuries or big breakout seasons. And there’s a new coach, which will mean a different system and different deployments. But there is nothing there that seems out of whack with what these players have produced before, the vast majority of them in similar roles.

What have I missed?

What do your lines look like? Players on the third line probably go down to a lack of minutes and talent. Injuries WILL be devastating as we cannot really cover the top nine. Bad chain reactions will occur to top six players getting injured.

Your numbers seem reasonable though…. I could see Power and Greenie’s goals go up and Quinn’s going way up. I think if the Sabres can give him a great line, 40+ Gs is possible if the line stays healthy. The trouble is I am already giving Benson too big of a jump. He has the potential but is still too weak to compete with men and still has a lot to learn and adjust to…

but….in the future…. Benson - Cozens - Quinn could be a very talented and balanced line and a 2nd line that can win. I’d also like Quinn to add a lot of muscle yet too….But Jack’s got mean skills already…. Great draft for Sabres - Quinn -JJ…. Let’s hope the even younger kids: Rosen, Savoie, Östlund, Kulich and Helenius look like those two very soon….

 

[Thorny]

17 minutes ago, GoPuckYourself said:

I'm not sure it's something you're missing but you're adding in a year in which every single player had career years then came down to earth. Are we getting the players from 2 seasons ago or last year? Adding Ruff should in theory help this but what if it doesn't, Benson should take the next step but what if he doesn't? Can Quinn stay healthy for an entire season? Will Peterka improve upon last year? Nothing changed along the defense, will they get better defensively? Again there are so many what ifs here which is why I want a guy like Ehlers in a trade since he is the model of consistency imo and at least you know what you'll be getting in him. Adams did this last year as well, instead of improving upon the lineup he kept staus quo. He went out and changed the bottom 6 which is awesome an love the look of that 4th line now and even the 3rd should be pretty solid but has done nothing once again to replace Skinner. Just hoping that either Peterka takes the next step or Benson does is terrible mismanagement again (but I know the offseason isn't over but thats my take unless he fixes the problem). Also of course the 3rd line center postion is being given to Krebs who imo has not earned it whatsoever.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I agree. It’s “can you see a path with what we have?”, again. 

Yes. There’s a path. But this isn’t being proactive to seize the goal. We MIGHT score enough goals with this lineup and it’s not a poor argument to think we will, but no we certainly don’t KNOW we have enough and we should be adding more. Adams job is to do it, not configure a lineup where it’s reasonably possible. It’s ok to take steps to ensure it happens. It’s ok to aim for more than just enough  

or prevent more goals. 2 way 3C would help both things

Edited Friday at 04:55 AM by Thorny

[GASabresIUFAN]

4 minutes ago, PerreaultForever said:

Just want to say that players rarely match "career years", that's why they are called career years. 

Exactly and those career years will skew projections.

[GoPuckYourself]

10 minutes ago, dudacek said:

Yes and no.

Yes, I am giving 50 per cent of the weight to last year and 50 per cent of the weight to this year. What would you do instead and why?

And no, every single player did not have a career year last year. Tuch, Thompson and Cozens did. As GA points out, Zucker had a bit of an outlier as well. Peterka had a career year this year, and Dahlin and Greenway less-dramatic ones. Quinn got hurt nd the others are rookies or basically the same year-to-year.

Again, I am not saying "this is what I think these players will get" I'm simply presenting numbers, mostly based on the past two seasons.

Sorry I meant the career years 2 seasons ago not last year my bad. I know it's hard to configure that's why it's flawed and too many what ifs for me which is why I think we need more.

[B-U-F-F-A-L-O]

6 minutes ago, B-U-F-F-A-L-O said:

What do your lines look like? Players on the third line probably go down to a lack of minutes and talent. Injuries WILL be devastating as we cannot really cover the top nine. Bad chain reactions will occur to top six players getting injured.

Your numbers seem reasonable though…. I could see Power and Greenie’s goals go up and Quinn’s going way up. I think if the Sabres can give him a great line, 40+ Gs is possible if the line stays healthy. The trouble is I am already giving Benson too big of a jump. He has the potential but is still too weak to compete with men and still has a lot to learn and adjust to…

but….in the future…. Benson - Cozens - Quinn could be a very talented and balanced line and a 2nd line that can win. I’d also like Quinn to add a lot of muscle yet too….But Jack’s got mean skills already…. Great draft for Sabres - Quinn -JJ…. Let’s hope the even younger kids: Rosen, Savoie, Östlund, Kulich and Helenius look like those two very soon….

 

The third line continued. I definitely think we absolutely should have gotten someone better for 3C. We needed a tough and talented player there. Not only for the C job and his points but to help the 3rd line wingers more. That line really lacks talent right now. But not only that none of them can really play up either. Third line is just a huge weakness for this team, imho… If we end playing the first two more more because of this you risk injury and burnout…. I think we only have top six forwards at this time. A good team, I think has at least seven, more like eight top six players or at least a very good third line that they can at least fill in without dragging the line down right away…

[GoPuckYourself]

I would get a veteran defensive RHD to replace Jokijarju who may never has as much value as he does now after a decent season. Trade for a veteran top 6 and get a legit 3rd line center like Ross Colton who may want to play with his buddy Bowen. These 3 upgrades would get me to a point where I feel comfortable that we've upgraded instead of staying status quo and again just my 2 pennies.

[Thorny]

2 minutes ago, GoPuckYourself said:

Sorry I meant the career years 2 seasons ago not last year my bad. I know it's hard to configure that's why it's flawed and too many what ifs for me which is why I think we need more.

Yup. I think the fact it’s hard to nail down a solid projection is sort of the emerging key - like you said, there are a lot of ifs. Therefore we can’t imo say we have enough  with anything close to the amount or certainty a team on the verge of missing the playoffs 5 straight times under this regime deserves to have 

[B-U-F-F-A-L-O]

Even hating the 3rd line like I do, I do like the five new Sabres we added though two of them should have more skill…. What I’m trying to say is, I had my doubts about the Sabres actually getting harder to play against this year. I was worried they would only get one guy, the D-man from Buffalo, and that’s it. We needed at least four imho, and beat it by one
 

One thing Lindy definitely has to do is hammer home that these vets aren’t here to protect them really,they are hear to show us how you have to play in the NHL… Everyone, the whole team! I’d say everyday and twice on Sundays…. Gain muscle! Go get the puck and win it! Then go to the net and smash it in that goal!

etc….

[dudacek]

2 minutes ago, PerreaultForever said:

Just want to say that players rarely match "career years", that's why they are called career years. 

And I just want to say that what players do in their 3rd or 4th season is more typically called "breakout year" because it might be an outlier, and it might be a sign of what's to come.

Perreault improved 3 straight years, then got hurt then came back with a "career" year in his fifth season.

And then he smashed that career season with another one the very next year.

Danny Briere had a "career" year, making a huge jump to 60 points in his 4th season.

He stayed around that mark for 3 more years, and then erupted with his real career year with 95

Pominville broke out with 80 in his 3rd season and it was his real "career" year. The highest he ever got after that was 73.

Many of the Sabres are too young to know for certain whether they've had their career year.