Ryan Lambert at Puck Daddy names his five biggest disappoints of the NHL season including every skater on the Rangers not named Marian Gaborik...4. Every skater on the Rangers not named Marian Gaborik
The only reason, and I mean only reason, the Rangers are still even talking about a playoff spot (they're currently a point out of eighth, tied with Tampa) is Marian Gaborik and his 35 goals. That's 35 of the team's 161, or 21.7 percent.
Only two other teams in the league have their leading goalscorers at anything close to that total. One is Sid Crosby for Pittsburgh, who at least has Evgeni Malkin(notes) to take away some of the offensive pressure. The other is Steven Stamkos(notes) in Tampa, who actually leads the league in this category with 21.9 percent of his team's goals, but he has Marty St. Louis and Vinny Lecavalier.
And who does Gaborik have? The team's next-highest point total belongs to Vinny Prospal(notes), who has 22 fewer points than Gaborik. Its second-leading goalscorer is Ryan Callahan(notes), who has 20 fewer goals. The Rangers offense is 24th in the NHL. Imagine what happens if Gaborik's injury holds him out for a significant amount of the season's remainder. Two words: Lottery. Pick.
...while this is a bit of an exaggeration (no love for Del Zotto?), I really can't argue with any of it.
6 comments:
I don't know. I'm pretty tired of everyone hailing Del Zotto as the next coming of Brian Leetch or even someone who should be getting top 4 minutes. He's atrocious at even strength and nowhere near an option on the penalty kill as his team worst -18 attests. He's even dragged down poor Girardi who's been blamed all year. It's Del Zotto's fault Girardi is frequently out of position, scrambling to cover for his partner who has no clue in the defensive zone and frequently takes himself out of the play creating odd man rushes.
The kid is 18 years old and is the best offensive d-man on the team!!! If you weren't expecting double digit +/- you were expecting too much.
I don't contest his age. But is he really the best offensive d-man on the team? You might want to check out the point totals and compare that to power play time on the ice. For getting, the lion's share of the power play minutes, Del Zotto really hasn't differentiated himself from our "offensively challenged" staal and girardi [averaging little and no power play time, respectively].
http://www.nhl.com/ice/playerstats.htm?fetchKey=20102NYRSASAll&sort=avgPowerPlayTOIPerGame&viewName=timeOnIce
Since the slanted power play time is obviously padding his stats, look at his even strength points.
http://www.nhl.com/ice/playerstats.htm?fetchKey=20102NYRSASAll&sort=evenStrengthPoints&viewName=points
At even strength, he's our fifth most productive [points] defenseman. At least he's better at scoring 5-on-5 than Wade Redden.
I don't contest his age. But is he really the best offensive d-man on the team? You might want to check out the point totals and compare that to power play time on the ice. For getting, the lion's share of the power play minutes, Del Zotto really hasn't differentiated himself from our "offensively challenged" staal and girardi [averaging little and no power play time, respectively].
http://bit.ly/cDmKcL
Since the slanted power play time is obviously padding his stats, look at his even strength points.
http://bit.ly/cIEckE
At even strength, he's our fifth most productive [points] defenseman. Congrats. He's better scoring 5-on-5 than Wade Redden.
I think Del Zotto gets a pass because he's a rookie, but if he were a veteran I'd say he's a disappointment too.
I agree... he's impressed us with his offensive ability but he is absolutely lost in his own end. He is way too aggressive at the wrong times. Granted, I blame the forwards as well for not seeing him jump into the play and covering for him.
You say that if we were expecting double digit +/- we were expecting too much, and I agree. But nobody was expecting a -18! Compare him to other rookies on offensively challenged teams (Hedman +2,Franson +11,Kulikov -7,Boychuk +3) and he just doesn't cut it. Being a -18 with all the points he has, is awful.
Having said that, I'm not giving up and counting him out. He's a rookie and maturation is expected. He needs to work really hard over the off-season and fix his game. If the same thing happens again next year it will not be accepted.
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