Friday Five-Hole

How many times have we heard this said about an enforcer in the NHL? Variants of this cliched phrase pop up anytime an announcer or coach need to justify a player who doesn’t score goals (or really do anything to stop them either). 

This version of the quote belongs to bandana-fan Kelly Hrudey, who applied it to long-time Jets enforcer Chris Thorburn after his scrap with Edmonton’s Luke Gazdic this past Tuesday night. Both Hrudey and announcing partner Mark Lee made a point to stress Thorburn as a popular player in Winnipeg, listing his willingness to fight as one of the "little things" – the "intangibles", if you will – that Thorburn brings to the table. 

And Thorburn brings it. A lot. He brought it nine times in the shortened 2012-13 season. In fact, fighting seems to be the main "little thing" the 30 year old brings to the Jets line-up. Here is a visual representation of what Thorburn brought to the table last year:

 

Huh. The Jets actually win slightly less when Thorburn fights. There must be some reason the Jets keep Thorburn employed though, right? Let’s take a look at Thorburn’s "tangible" stats from last season (things, you know, related to scoring):

 

Well, a fourth line player isn’t really expected to score too much, right? It ain’t called an "energy line" for nothing. They’re supposed to "get out there" and "make something happen".

Sorry about all the passive-aggressive quotations marks. Let’s see how those two stat lines compare to each other on a single game basis:

 

 

This gives a more accurate view of Chris Thorburn’s effect on the Winnipeg Jets. Coach Noel can only trust Thorburn with a minimum amount of icetime. He takes too many penalties and is six times more likely to throw a punch than a shot. This is a calibre of player we hate on another team – a guy who spends more time looking for a partner than the puck. Chris Thorburn, Tom Sestito, Colton Orr, Mike Brown, John Scott, Jared Boll…I could go on for like a dozen more 7 point seasons.

For years, players, management, and fans alike have jumped to the defense of this type of player. It’s still commonplace for somebody as experienced and knowledgable as Kelly Hrudey to spout this kind rhetoric on national television. They often have likeable, big personalities on and off the ice. It’s easy to like a guy who is willing to stick up for your star player – especially if you are the star player.

But it’s time to admit that we call these qualities "little" and "intangible" because the Chris Thorburn player archetype’s effect on the game is diminishing. It’s getting harder and harder to define how it’s useful to employ a guy who can’t contribute on the scoresheet. A player can do all the "little things" in the world, but if they generate one shot on net every three games, they don’t belong in the NHL. 

Ed Tait of the Winnipeg Free Press planted his tongue firmly in cheek this week in an article claiming Jacob Trouba’s impressive NHL debut on Tuesday has already earned him Calder consideration.

Nate MacKinnon aside, Trouba indeed looked very impressive in his debut. The rookie saw more ice than anybody else on the Jets Tuesday night – although fellow defender Dustin Byfuglien had 3 points to Trouba’s 2 points, so it’s tough to say which of them will win the Norris and/or Art Ross and Hart trophies this year.

In an unrelated note, be sure to keep checking Jets Nation this week for my next article: "Michael Frolik: Your Next Rocket Richard Winner".

The Jets overcame the Oilers in their season debut this past Tuesday night in Winnipeg. Both teams showed a lot of fire all game long, but the Jets overcame a 4-3 deficit in the third after goals from Trouba and Frolik less than five minutes apart.

In today’s NHL, many games are over after the second period. The prevalence of defense-first philosophy has shown that the bulk of teams taking a lead into the third period are more than willing to hunker down and play some version of the trap. It’s understandable – a boring win is always better than an exciting loss. Most teams would be estatic to comeback and win two games out of ten after trailing through the first two frames. 

Over the past two seasons, nobody comes back to win less than the Jets, managing to do so only once in fifteen tries last season. There are many different ways one could try to explain this – conditioning, team attitude, a difference in systems, etc. – but something I keep coming back to in this ol’ weekly column o’mine is the importance of depth players. In recent years, the Jets have had a dearth of effective bottom six forwards and not-Byfuglien-or-Enstrom defenders. Lo and behold, a rare comeback Winnipeg win was made possible by adding such players this year.

 

The Jets spent the days leading up to their season opener on a team-building retreat in Banff, reports the Winnipeg Sun’s Ken Wiebe. Captain Ladd and the boys allegedly had an open and honest discussion, making a verbal pact amongst each other to be more accountable for the team’s success. This is good news for Jets fans, who remember a much more bleak team message coming out of last year’s preseason.

Ladd summed it up by saying, “we need to be accountable to each other.” This is in stark contrast to what he said this time last year, "we don’t need to be accountable to each other". Young winger Evander Kane added, "we need to play with emotion right off the hop" – the opposite of what he thought last year, "we’ll get emotional when we have to." Even big man Dustin Byfuglien changed his tune this year, saying, "we’re here to win, bottom line". Byfuglien was infamously quoted last year as saying, "we’re here to win, or you know, whatever".