The Cassidy Changes

BaseballJones

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So the Bruins are suddenly just 4 points behind Montreal for 1st place in the division. They've been playing great since Claude got fired (12-3 over their last 15). I thought Claude was a terrific coach. So..... what gives here? Just a "sometimes a coaching change sparks a team" kind of thing? Is there something tangible that they're doing different that Claude was unable or unwilling to do? Is this random statistical variation? What is happening here?
 

Lose Remerswaal

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Cassidy is encouraging the D to take more chances and be more aggressive in the offensive zone and it has paid off in a big way with much higher scoring (G and A) from those guys. He's also gotten more consistent goaltending from the backup than Claude did.

Edit: removed "meme quality" analysis
 
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j44thor

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D aggressiveness on offense has been the biggest change as far as I can tell.
D will also carry it out more and take the ice given to them instead of always looking for the outlet pass.
They are giving up a few more scoring chances as a result but creating many more than they are giving up.
Will be interesting to see if this philosophy is as effective in the playoffs when the checking and defense gets a lot tighter.
So far so good though.
 

FL4WL3SS

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Montreal is 8-4 under Claude and had a 6 game winning streak. It wasn't all the coach.

As j44thor said, we'll see what this team is made of in the playoffs, but I'm just excited to be actually talking about the playoffs.
 

cshea

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They have traded some shot quantity in for higher shot quality while still maintaining good possession. The D is more aggressive and the forwards are making more plays down low in the offensive end. Lineup wise, Cassidy moved Pastrnak to the Krejci line and put Spooner back at C. This has helped stretch out the lineup and give them some scoring depth.

As for Cassidy being "patient" with the kids where Julien wasn't, this is a perception that will never die. Spooner and Vatrano have had their ice time cut under Cassidy, and Cassidy has put Cehlarik and Czarnik in the pressbox in favor of Hayes. I'm not knocking Cassidy, these have been the right roster calls, but I just can't understand this perception of Julien hating young players or not being patient with them.
 

j44thor

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Hopefully the Hayes era ended last night with his 8MIN TOI. By far the lowest of any other Bruin. Celharik is much, much better than Hayes at this point.
 

lexrageorge

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Agree that the "Julien hated the kids" meme needs to die.

Some of the B's success is probably the result of good fortune; they were one of the more snake bitten teams when it came to scoring goals despite a large puck possession advantage, and there is likely some "positive regression" to the mean going on.

Still, Cassidy has made some needed changes, as noted above. And, to be fair, Cassidy does not have the whole "make playoffs or get fired" gun pointed at his head. Granted, if they miss the playoffs, he may not be back, but he'll at least will have had a nice audition for a head coaching position elsewhere if that does happen.

EDIT: Has Spooner had his ice time cut? Last I knew he was recovering from a concussion, but prior to that he seemed to had established himself as the 3rd line center.

EDIT 2: OK, I just looked, and saw that Spooner's 7 highest ice time games were under Julien. What did happen was a steady drop in regular ice time in January. Cassidy started to gradually increase Spooner's time until he had a rough game in Anaheim (-3), and he was down around 11 minutes for 2 straight games. It then gradually increased until he got hurt against Ottawa. He had quality ice time last night against the Flames.
 
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cshea

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Spooner's TOI is only slightly down. It's spiked recently.

Spooner 14:15 TOI under Cassidy; 14:22 under Julien. Vatrano is down more. 13:22 Cassidy; 14:40 Julien.

I checked a couple others while I was there...

C. Miller 14:33* Cassidy; 16:27 Julien
Carlo 20:11 Cassidy; 21:20 Julien

* Miller's average TOI is a bit skewed since he has an outlier where he picked up a 1st period game misconduct.

I have no problems with any of this, I just noting that the kids do indeed play a bit less under Cassidy than they did Julien despite the idea that Julien hated the kids. I'd play C. Miller more but that's my only nit pick.
 

Smiling Joe Hesketh

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Cassidy is encouraging the D to take more chances and be more aggressive in the offensive zone and it has paid off in a big way with much higher scoring (G and A) from those guys. He's also showing more patience with the younger players. He's also gotten more consistent goaltending from the backup than Claude did.
I wonder if this is due to either Cassidy setting a scheduled rotation for the goalkeepers further ahead of time, or it's simply a function of Khudobin getting into better game form since he hurt his hand in practice early in the season and missed a bunch of time, and then sat for a while, and then had two stints in the minors.

I won't say Claude didn't trust his backup goalies in his later years here, but the Bruins had problems with both Svedberg and Gus and Claude seemed to be loath to play either one. Khudobin was the same here until Cassidy came in, even though obviously Claude knew him from his time here in 2011-2013. Can't blame Claude for playing Rask so often to win as many games as possible, and it is only 4 games for Khudobin after all and he gave up a 70-footer last night, but I do find the turnaround interesting to track.
 

Eddie Jurak

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I think it is a few things.

First, I think Julien is what he is - a very good NHL coach, but not a transcendent one along the lines of a Bill Belichick in football or a (maybe) Brad Stevens in basketball.

"NHL coach" has always seemed to be the professional coaching job with the shortest half-life. What is the median tenure of an NHL coach? I would guess only 3 seasons or so - Julien in Boston was an extreme outlier at almost 10 full seasons. I think that's both an indication of how effective he was and maybe an indication that, at least in Boston, his time had come.

It's possible that Cassidy, for whatever reason, is just better fit with the current team than Julien was.
 

joe dokes

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You cant talk about Spooner's minutes without also noting that Cassidy, from minute 1, had Spooner at center only. That's a real change, regardless of the actual TOI.

On offense, forwards down low are clearly looking less reflexively back to the points. And if Dmen are among the first 3 to break the d-zone, they stay with the play (as opposed to being the 4th offensive player). And the wingers left behind seem to be covering for them well enough. It seems to have affected the Dmen positively. McQuaid, for example, may still be the worst of the top 6, but he seems to be playing at an unquestionably higher level than he was previously, and certainly better than either Liles or Morrow could be expected to. Is it possible that "pay more attention to offense" turns into "being better on defense" rather than "paying less attention to defense"?

Cassidy also seems to juggle defensive pairings mid-game more than I'm used to seeing.
 

TheRealness

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They have traded some shot quantity in for higher shot quality while still maintaining good possession. The D is more aggressive and the forwards are making more plays down low in the offensive end. Lineup wise, Cassidy moved Pastrnak to the Krejci line and put Spooner back at C. This has helped stretch out the lineup and give them some scoring depth.

As for Cassidy being "patient" with the kids where Julien wasn't, this is a perception that will never die. Spooner and Vatrano have had their ice time cut under Cassidy, and Cassidy has put Cehlarik and Czarnik in the pressbox in favor of Hayes. I'm not knocking Cassidy, these have been the right roster calls, but I just can't understand this perception of Julien hating young players or not being patient with them.
This really nails it. They are not settling for cycling around and then shots from the point chances, and are making a concerted effort to get shots in the slot. I know, cshea, you noted that they were in like the top 3 in slot chances since the coaching change, and I think that's a key point. They are getting much better chances because either they are (a) more patient with trying to get more chances, or (2) they do much more creative stuff in the zone to create them (SEE: Pastrnak, David).

Additionally, the other posters discussing how much more offensively active the defense is really a key factor. This has allowed them to play much faster, and as a result they are generating a lot more chances on the backend. I think this has freed up the goalies to just play their game without worrying about how they might lose 1-0.

I've been very impressed. They showed balls earlier in the year, but just couldn't put it all together. After Backes hurt his knee, and then came back and sniped Johnson, I was completely all-in. I was reserved until then, but I am all-in now. They could really do some damage in the playoffs.
 

veritas

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A couple weeks ago on the radio pregame show, Cassidy mentioned (to paraphrase) that he hasn't tried to change a lot of things, but one focus was to get the puck through the neutral zone quicker and attack the other team before they could set up defensively. I think that helps explain some of their success being more creative, getting more dangerous shots, and avoiding some of the perimeter cycling that many have astutely observed. I don't think Claude discouraged getting good scoring chances, but their transition game was not one of their strengths under his regime and it had a ripple effect on their overall offensive game.
 

BaseballJones

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Thanks to everyone for your responses to my question. I don't know enough about hockey X's and O's, and all I can really see is that they're getting much better results than they were, but I couldn't figure out what, exactly, was going on.

This team suddenly looks kind of dangerous, it appears.
 

j44thor

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Free Cehlarik

My first big issue with Cassidy is sitting Cehlarik who seemed to have a lot of chemistry with Krejci and Pastr. Has there been any mention of why Hayes/Nash et all are playing over him? Cehlarik was a little snake bitten around the net but appeared to make the right plays and showed great vision in his limited playing time thus far.
 

RetractableRoof

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A couple weeks ago on the radio pregame show, Cassidy mentioned (to paraphrase) that he hasn't tried to change a lot of things, but one focus was to get the puck through the neutral zone quicker and attack the other team before they could set up defensively. I think that helps explain some of their success being more creative, getting more dangerous shots, and avoiding some of the perimeter cycling that many have astutely observed. I don't think Claude discouraged getting good scoring chances, but their transition game was not one of their strengths under his regime and it had a ripple effect on their overall offensive game.
I say the following while acknowledging up front that things are rarely black/white but loaded with gray. It seems to me that Cassidy is also enabling the team to play a bit looser or more intuitively and with more confidence while chasing many of the same/similar schematic ideas from Julien's tenure.

We know athletes practice and train to be able to execute their training under pressure, and in a perfect world do so intuitively without their minds overthinking the process. They train that Claude wants me to do X with the puck when Y happens. Swap out coaches, and if the system doesn't materially change - then doing X when Y is still the same. Why better results then? Could be a thousand reasons: from schedule, to luck, to perception, nagging injuries, line pairing adjustments, a new player, alignment of moon/stars, a short term adrenaline bump/kick in the ass because "new coach", etc. But PART of it could be the coach, and how the coach interacts with his players.

There is a psychology to leading/managing people and in this case athletes. There are coaches like Francona who make it known that Pedroia is his second basement no matter how bad it gets (actual truth/realities aside). This takes some amount of pressure off of Pedroia in spite of his growing failure at initially adapting to the majors. Pedroia gets over the hump and would run through a wall for Francona. (I'm NOT saying Pedroia wouldn't have made it for any other coach, just an example.) Other coaches are either unable or unwilling to convey the same message to that player. Perhaps they feel the player is either strong enough to swim on his own or doesn't belong. There may be some truth to that as well. But we know the confidence of the player often is the difference between success/failure - some days flipping day to day, game to game. Some people are subtle at leading, we don't even recognize when they guide us. Some are more sledge hammer-ish when they try to lead (my own personal skill set :/ ). Some players are freed from their nerves when told "you're here for two games, if you go 0-8 you are going back down, if you go 8-8 you are going back down. Go get'em". Some players need more reinforcement, some players need to be challenged when they skid. Each player is different. Sometimes styles just don't mesh, personalities don't click... the locker rooms we are talking about are filled with egos - some fragile and some belonging to divas too. We all know one size doesn't fit all - no matter what the ad execs say.

Professional players seem to come in 3 flavors: 1) Forever blinded by the bright lights and do not belong (or are going to fail based on work ethic, inner demons, etc). They are most often weeded from the system during the journey up the ladder - no matter their physical gifts. 2) Players who are going to succeed because it is in their DNA and it is wired into their minds whether by their parents, their coaches/teachers along the way, or perhaps by God. Players in either of these two groups are not going to be greatly influenced by a Julien or Cassidy in terms of success/fail - it is likely already baked in. 3) The largest group is where a coach makes his leadership bones. When a player isn't playing intuitively he isn't at his best. A player who steps onto the ice knowing that a mistake will get him splinters on the end of the bench isn't playing intuitively, he is playing not to lose. When a player in group 3 believes that his coach doesn't like him (accurately or not) he is unlikely to play at his best. Alternatively, a player who believes his coach will play him through the mistakes as he matures at the highest professional levels (again - accurately or not) is going to have one less mental obstacle keeping him from playing intuitively. When the message is "we demand your success or else" some percentage of players are just not going to get there. When the message is "we demand your success, and here's how we are going to get there together" a larger percentage of athletes might get there. There are lots of messages a coach conveys (it is their job after all), from schematic, to technique, to correct, to praise, and as they tell us in the movies - to inspire. How the message is delivered - and more importantly how it is received can make a large difference - critically so to those in group 3.

There are extraordinary athletes in the "not going to make it" of group 1 above. There are some lesser athletes in the "succeed no matter what" of group 2 above. We all know the biggest skill gap between professional athletes and those stuck on the developmental rungs below them is found in their heads. Some coaches are known for imbuing confidence in their players, some are not. Some players need to be tempered like metals over time in order to get to where the team needs them. Cassidy seems in the short term to be able to do those things, getting the best of the most players. He is a bit past the adrenaline bump or short term ass kicking managerial changes typically bring. I think his approach to player confidence, mixed with continued improvement of player skill set by the GM and this team could be heading in a good direction for the longer road. Admittedly I don't know enough about his Xs and O's to know if he's the right answer long term, but I like his direction.

EDIT: TL;DR - Yeah Cassidy for more than Xs and Os!
 
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twothousandone

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There are coaches like Francona who make it known that Pedroia is his second basement no matter how bad it gets (actual truth/realities aside). This takes some amount of pressure off of Pedroia in spite of his growing failure at initially adapting to the majors. Pedroia gets over the hump and would run through a wall for Francona.
That's regular season Tito, right? While I agree with the overall thinking (coaches are managers of men as much as they are Xs and Os) a some point it is win or go home -- for the team AND the coach. Cassidy has presided over this moderate turn around with the season on the line and his own (continued) job on the line. He's got playoff Tito pressure.
 

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That's regular season Tito, right? While I agree with the overall thinking (coaches are managers of men as much as they are Xs and Os) a some point it is win or go home -- for the team AND the coach. Cassidy has presided over this moderate turn around with the season on the line and his own (continued) job on the line. He's got playoff Tito pressure.
To a point, regular season Tito, yes. He had an initial window where nothing was expected of him or the team because of where they were in the standings. At the moment Cassidy was handed the keys, I heard more than a few saying - "Short of a 6-8 game winning streak, they are done". Well, they got there, so it has indeed changed because now we are talking about playoffs. I still think he is playing with house money because if they do slip a bit and miss the playoffs or get outplayed in the playoffs, he won't be blamed. I believe he is going to be judged the same for the position regardless of the results the remainder of the season (short of a prolonged winless streak), so the pressure of retaining the job is likely lessened at this point. Interestingly his stock can still go up (internally and externally) if they play well in the playoffs and steal a round or two. He's really in a no lose situation by my read.
 

charlieoscar

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Watching the team under Julien in recent years made me think there was a lack of team speed and reaction time. There were many times I saw a free puck equally spaced between between a Bruin and a player from the other team but it seemed that far more often the other team would get to the puck first. Watching the team under Cassidy's direction, it seems they have suddenly gained speed and reaction time. I'm guessing that this is because Julien's style was more of the "old style", more defensive oriented hockey while Cassidy has changed with the times. Whatever, they look like a hockey team nowadays.

As for Julien and young players...it might not be him but I got the impression that someone in the organization was not comfortable with young players because they traded off several who turned out to be pretty good players for not a lot in return. But what do I know: I didn't play the game, only watched it for many years.
 

kenneycb

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The only one they got hosed on was Seguin. Wheeler gave them a Cup, the Kessel trade was amazing and the jury is still out in Dougie, so hard to judge that one. The rest was fodder for fodder. Maybe you toss the Reilly Smith deal in there but they traded for a young guy and got Savard off the books.
 

bibajesus

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Was Versteeg a Chiarelli trade? I think he predated Claude. I always liked Sobotka too, but it seemed they had to choose between him and Marchand. They chose wisely.
 

Eddie Jurak

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Was Versteeg a Chiarelli trade? I think he predated Claude. I always liked Sobotka too, but it seemed they had to choose between him and Marchand. They chose wisely.
Versteeg was a Chiarelli trade, during the Dave Lewis year.

They never had to choose between Sobotka and Marchand.
 

veritas

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Watching the team under Julien in recent years made me think there was a lack of team speed and reaction time. There were many times I saw a free puck equally spaced between between a Bruin and a player from the other team but it seemed that far more often the other team would get to the puck first.
There are plenty of valid criticisms of Claude, but this is just crazy talk. Getting and keeping the puck was the one thing they were always consistently great at
 

RetractableRoof

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To a point, regular season Tito, yes. He had an initial window where nothing was expected of him or the team because of where they were in the standings. At the moment Cassidy was handed the keys, I heard more than a few saying - "Short of a 6-8 game winning streak, they are done". Well, they got there, so it has indeed changed because now we are talking about playoffs. I still think he is playing with house money because if they do slip a bit and miss the playoffs or get outplayed in the playoffs, he won't be blamed. I believe he is going to be judged the same for the position regardless of the results the remainder of the season (short of a prolonged winless streak), so the pressure of retaining the job is likely lessened at this point. Interestingly his stock can still go up (internally and externally) if they play well in the playoffs and steal a round or two. He's really in a no lose situation by my read.
Maybe I spoke too soon...
 

lexrageorge

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Rask is shaky, and the well documented limitations of the rest of the roster are coming home to roost. Too many plodding skaters on the 2nd and 3rd lines, and a defense that still relies heavily on Chara.
 

MiracleOfO2704

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Rask has already played in 59 games. There's a decent chance he starts 6 of the last 8. It was so obvious that Rask isn't a Price/Brodeur kind of goalie that Julien emphasized spelling Rask more often.

Then he didn't do it. Because it was playoffs or bust.

Cassidy has been a little better about getting Khudobin more starts, but there's no way he's getting more than 2 starts down the stretch, even if it's obvious to everyone that Rask is cooked - again.
 

lexrageorge

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The Bruins have a host of issues they are working through that go beyond the change from Clode to Bruce Cassidy as coach.
In no particular order:

- While at the time I was a fan of the David Backes free-agent acquisition, he looks completely cooked to me this year. Now if he came into the year tired after starting off in the World Cup, that's one thing, but he should have been able to get over the fatigue factor quickly. It's not like the US Team had a long run in that tournament. The problem for me with Backes is that he looks extremely slow for the pace at which the game is now played. And that wouldn't change even if he was playing center regularly, and not currently affixed at wing with 63 and 37. And at his age (32), it's not like he's going to get quicker moving forward over the next four years.

- Does anyone know, really, what happened to the type of game Matt Beleskey used to play with regularity when he was with the Ducks? I know three years ago he scored 19 goals and was an absolute wrecking ball in those playoffs (The series he had that year against Calgary was outstanding), but then he comes to Boston and he's a shell of his former self. And I understand he was hurt this year, so if that has dramatically impacted his ability to move quickly and pursue pucks, he gets a pass. But it's not as if he was a consistent force last year when he was healthy. (And I'm not one wishing he would "drop the gloves." As we all know that goes nowhere in today's NHL and has little value in today's game.)

- Jimmy Hayes still has another year left on his contract at $2.3M. In my lurking days on this board, I read with interest the comments of others so I won't say much about this. But it would be great if we could truly find out who made the evaluation of him as a player that said he was worth that extension, and then who had the final say in the front office with giving him that money. From where I sit there is no justification for that decision. And if it was based off of his one productive season in Florida, what does that say about the B's decision makers in the talent acquisition realm? Gawd.

- Is it just me, or is Ryan Spooner exceptionally soft, even in the kinder, gentler version of today's NHL where contact is minimized. He's fast, skilled, and an above-average playmaker for sure, but there are too many stretches in which he disappears from games. He also has a penchant from shying away from contact along the boards when it comes to digging out pucks. As far as we all know from what was reported in the past, Clode tried to address that last issue with him, but it really doesn't seem to have improved to any degree under Cassidy.
Does anyone have any thoughts on what can be done to get more out of him?

Thanks for letting me join your group.
Thought I would respond to your post in this thread.

Your post did make me look back to the general reaction here when Hayes and Beleskey were acquired. Generally, the reaction was pretty favorable when Hayes was acquired, mainly because the Bruins were able to dump the contracts of both Savard and Reilly Smith. Even the extension did not raise very many eyebrows; $2.3M isn't horrible for a guy that was expected to be a solid 3rd line contributor. The justification is that the team bought out one RFA year and one UFA year in the process, which makes the $2.3M seem even better. The one concern raised at the time was that there was a very small sample of basically one solid season to work with, and it appears that he really was just a one year wonder and nothing more. There's a chance he could get claimed by Las Vegas, so all is not lost with Hayes.

General view on Beleskey was a "meh" player on a "meh" contract. One issue is that his shot percentage (the old BABIP of hockey) was unsustainably high in his contract year, so some folks thought he was ripe for regression. The 2015-16 version of Beleskey would be OK; that's the player we would have been ecstatic with this season. It's probably "wait 'till next year" with him.

Spooner was supposedly one of Cassidy's reclamation projects; it appears he's just a limited player. Frustrating for a 2nd round pick, but that's why they're second rounders and not first rounder. He'll be an RFA, and he may not be back.

And then there's Backes. Those are the signings that can get GM's fired. The one "consolation" is that he took Loui Eriksson's place, and Loui has been worse this year. Best case is that this season is just a "David Price/Josh Beckett" adjustment year.
 

Reggie Hammond

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Thanks for the perspective Lexra. It's appreciated. I've always been interested in the talent acquisition process with NHL teams when it comes to how they select players in the Amateur Draft.

Here's a comparison I found to be a little interesting: In the 2010 Second Round in which Spooner was selected by the Bs at #45, another center was tabbed at #47.
That player, in 284 career games, has scored 82G 90A for 172 points. Spooner, through 206 career games, has 32G 84A for 116 points.

That other player?

Tyler Toffoli of LA.

So my question to the Bs talent evaluators at that time would be - "What did you see in Spooner made you think he was a better long-term projection than Toffoli?" I wonder did they use analytics? Was it the "eye" test?

Because certainly if they could do it over now, Toffoli would have been the pick by the Bs.
 

NYCSox

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Yeah but stuff like that happens all the time. For those of us a little older, here is more salt on the wound from the first round of the 1987 draft.

1 14 Boston Stephane Quintal D Granby Bisons [QMJHL] 1037 63 180 243 1320 2003-04
1 15 Quebec Joe Sakic C Swift Current Broncos [WHL] 1378 625 1016 1641 614 2008-09
 

Eddie Jurak

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Yeah but stuff like that happens all the time. For those of us a little older, here is more salt on the wound from the first round of the 1987 draft.

1 14 Boston Stephane Quintal D Granby Bisons [QMJHL] 1037 63 180 243 1320 2003-04
1 15 Quebec Joe Sakic C Swift Current Broncos [WHL] 1378 625 1016 1641 614 2008-09
Every team passed on Patrice Bergeron in 2003 - even the Bruins who took Mark Stuart in the first round.
 

lexrageorge

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Thanks for the perspective Lexra. It's appreciated. I've always been interested in the talent acquisition process with NHL teams when it comes to how they select players in the Amateur Draft.

Here's a comparison I found to be a little interesting: In the 2010 Second Round in which Spooner was selected by the Bs at #45, another center was tabbed at #47.
That player, in 284 career games, has scored 82G 90A for 172 points. Spooner, through 206 career games, has 32G 84A for 116 points.

That other player?

Tyler Toffoli of LA.

So my question to the Bs talent evaluators at that time would be - "What did you see in Spooner made you think he was a better long-term projection than Toffoli?" I wonder did they use analytics? Was it the "eye" test?

Because certainly if they could do it over now, Toffoli would have been the pick by the Bs.
In 2003, the Dallas Stars had the 3rd pick in the 2nd round of the entry draft, which they used to select a Swedish junior player who scored 16 goals in 30 games. 3 seasons later Loui Eriksson would make the big club to stay, and go on to score 223 career goals in 790 games and counting. The next 11 players selected in the second round would combine for 60 goals and 1037 games, most of which were tallied by Kevin Klein (38 goals in 621 games).

The following player selected after those 11 has since scored 255 goals in 891 games: Patrice Bergeron.

In 2006, the Montreal Canadiens selected center Ben Maxwell with the 49th pick of the draft; Maxwell scored 28 goals and 60 points in 69 games in the WHL. As a result, the Bruins were forced to settle for a player who scored only 9 goals in 62 games for the WHL's Vancouver Giants: Milan Lucic, the only player selected in that round to score more than 120 career NHL goals (177).

Welcome to the 2nd round of the NHL draft.
 

veritas

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Draft picks are like lottery tickets, even for the best scouting departments. Higher picks are less likely to fail, but outside of the top of the first round, most draft picks are likely to be complete misses. You need multiple year sample sizes to really evaluate a team's drafting ability
 

TSC

SoSH's Doug Neidermeyer
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Oct 25, 2007
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Between here and everywhere.
Does this message board really need a reminder of the crapshoot nature of drafting?

Tom. Goddamned. Brady.

You're projecting kids who are 16-18 years old, it's an imperfect science. You're projecting things that are often completely intangible.
 

Smiling Joe Hesketh

Throw Momma From the Train
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I think it's fair to say that in the 2nd round results are wildly inconsistent and it's not a fair approach to criticize teams for having talents emerge after they've drafted in the 2nd round.

For the high 1st round, I do think that criticism of certain picks is fair to extent. Exhibit A: Zach Fucking Hamill.

But IMO the Quintal/Sakic comparison above is also a bit unfair, because Quintal did go on to have a good career, (1000 games is no joke, that's an excellent career) and comparing points totals between the two is silly given that Quintal was a defenseman. For a 15th pick Quintal was a good choice. Hell, in the same draft the Bruins picked 3rd overall and took Wesley (Turgeon and Shannahan had gone 1-2) and looking at the rest of the round that was a great pick (1457 games for Wesley).

Harry always did love picking defensemen instead of forwards anyway. Kluzak over Bellows being another example (anecdote goes that Harry's wife was on the phone with him asking what he'd do with the pick, and when he said Kluzak she hung up on him).
 

Red Right Ankle

Formerly the Story of Your Red Right Ankle
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If anything, I would guess hockey has the highest hit rate of higher picks any of the four major sports.
Yeah, that's probably true. Here's an article on the NHL draft from 2014:

http://www.sbnation.com/nhl/2014/6/27/5845256/nhl-draft-2014-analysis-luck

Something like 70% of NHL 1st rounders play 100 games+ in the NHL (31% of second rounders; 17% of all rounds after the 1st).

In the NFL, here's an article with Dimitroff quoted as the Falcons' statistics showing only 55-60% of 1st rounders start:

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2016/04/22/the-first-round-of-the-draft-remains-a-total-crapshoot/

It's different evaluation metrics, but I think roughly parallel - someone who is good enough to start in the NFL is likely to play at least 1 full season of games and 100 games is a little bit more than one season in the NHL.

Basically, if you "hit", i.e., get more than 100 NHL games out of, 1/3rd or more of your second rounders, you are doing pretty well (or your team epically sucks to the extent that crappy picks are getting lots of playing time for you). And of course, success can be weighted. If you only hit on 1 player in the 2nd over 5 or 6 drafts, but that player is someone like Patrice Bergeron, you should probably be judged as a success.
 

charlieoscar

Member
Sep 28, 2014
1,339
You're projecting kids who are 16-18 years old
Or younger. The Bruins first started following Bobby Orr in the spring of '61 (he was born Mar 20, 1948) and they signed him at age 14 to a junior league contract with a commitment to the Bruins when he turned 18.

The current rules are a bit different but:

"The Bantam division is for players aged 13 to 14. It is the division where many top players begin to take things more seriously. For starters, second-year Bantam players are eligible for the Canadian Hockey League’s Major Junior draft, and junior-hockey scouts can often be found at many rep team’s games."

In other words, good players from Canada and the U.S. are being scouted from an early age. I don't know about across the Atlantic.
 

TSC

SoSH's Doug Neidermeyer
SoSH Member
Oct 25, 2007
12,280
Between here and everywhere.
I think it's fair to say that in the 2nd round results are wildly inconsistent and it's not a fair approach to criticize teams for having talents emerge after they've drafted in the 2nd round.

For the high 1st round, I do think that criticism of certain picks is fair to extent. Exhibit A: Zach Fucking Hamill.

But IMO the Quintal/Sakic comparison above is also a bit unfair, because Quintal did go on to have a good career, (1000 games is no joke, that's an excellent career) and comparing points totals between the two is silly given that Quintal was a defenseman. For a 15th pick Quintal was a good choice. Hell, in the same draft the Bruins picked 3rd overall and took Wesley (Turgeon and Shannahan had gone 1-2) and looking at the rest of the round that was a great pick (1457 games for Wesley).

Harry always did love picking defensemen instead of forwards anyway. Kluzak over Bellows being another example (anecdote goes that Harry's wife was on the phone with him asking what he'd do with the pick, and when he said Kluzak she hung up on him).
Agreed for the most part - but the 2007 draft was a weird one.

You have your obvious hits in the 1st (Kane, Couture, Voracek, McDonagh). The 2nd was a dumpster fire outside of Wayne Simmonds.

The Hamil pick was terrible, but he wasn't the only miss in the top ten with both Hickey and Gagner not really meeting their draft status. And Hamil was defensible as a pick considering his WHL stats, just never panned out at the NHL level.
 

Red Right Ankle

Formerly the Story of Your Red Right Ankle
SoSH Member
Jul 2, 2006
11,937
Multivac
I think it's fair to say that in the 2nd round results are wildly inconsistent and it's not a fair approach to criticize teams for having talents emerge after they've drafted in the 2nd round.

For the high 1st round, I do think that criticism of certain picks is fair to extent. Exhibit A: Zach Fucking Hamill.
Yeah, it's definitely fair when 87% of top ten picks play 100+ games in the NHL. Especially since Chiarelli basically missed every other pick except Tyler Seguin, Hamilton and Pastrnak with a few prospects from his last draft still to be evaluated. It's actually sort of mind-blowing how bad Chiarelli's drafts were after 2006. In 7 years of drafts, the dude got 3 players. Admittedly, 3 very good players, but still, 3 players and all in the 1st round. He, of course, got a lot of value elsewhere via trades and young and old FA signings (e.g. Krug) to make up for it, but it pretty much tells the story of his tenure, doesn't it? Had he hit on a few of those other 1st round or later picks, he might not have ended up making some of the meh to bad signings that he did that put them in dire cap straits and ultimately cost him his job.

edit: the epic 2006 entry draft kept him afloat for years - Kessel, Lucic and Marchand was quite a haul.
 
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TFP

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Yeah, it's definitely fair when 87% of top ten picks play 100+ games in the NHL. Especially since Chiarelli basically missed every other pick except Tyler Seguin, Hamilton and Pastrnak with a few prospects from his last draft still to be evaluated. It's actually sort of mind-blowing how bad Chiarelli's drafts were. In 7 years of drafts, the dude got 3 players. Admittedly, 3 very good players, but still, 3 players and all in the 1st round. He, of course, got a lot of value elsewhere via trades and young and old FA signings (e.g. Krug) to make up for it, but it pretty much tells the story of his tenure, doesn't it? Had he hit on a few of those other 1st round or later picks, he might not have ended up making some of the meh to bad signings that he did that put them in dire cap straits and ultimately cost him his job.
Chiarelli gets credit for Kessel, Marchand, and Lucic too in 2006. Spooner should count as well. Donato, Heinen, and Bjork will look good when all is said and done.

But yes overall you are right, from 2007-2013 - the Bruins drafts were an absolute wasteland. It's depressing to look back on.
 
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Smiling Joe Hesketh

Throw Momma From the Train
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Er, Chia drafted Kessel as well. He was hired in 2006, wasn't he? Are we talking just 1st rounders or his drafts in general?

Because for NHL players I see:

2006:
Kessel
Lucic
Marchand

2007:
None (the Hamill draft)

2008:
Colborne
Hutchinson

2009:
Caron (meh player)

2010:
Seguin
Spooner

2011:
Hamilton


After that there's still tons of guys playing all over the place.

EDIT: beaten by T4P
 

Red Right Ankle

Formerly the Story of Your Red Right Ankle
SoSH Member
Jul 2, 2006
11,937
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Chiarelli gets credit for Kessel, Marchand, and Lucic too in 2006. Spooner should count as well. Donato, Heinen, and Bjork will look good when all is said and done.

But yes overall you are right, from 2007-2103 - the Bruins drafts were an absolute wasteland. It's depressing to look back on.
Yeah, thanks, I edited later when I realized that I'd muffed when his tenure started.

Had he drafted a few quality guys in the 2007-2013 timeframe besides the big 2, he'd probably still be here. Of course, considering where he ended up, he might be in a better long-term position with McDavid than anything he could have had here.
 

Smiling Joe Hesketh

Throw Momma From the Train
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I think leaving out 2006 when looking at Chairelli's tenure is awfully unfair to him in general. While the drafts afterwards weren't great, he did get 3 franchise cornerstones in 2006.

No, the real problem besides the drafting afterwards was turning the Kessel/Seguin pick into a bunch of dross and chaff when all was said and done. That series of events and trades was an absolute killer. We'll also have to see how the returns from the Dougie trade pan out.