Jets Address Right Wing Depth, Make Questionable Add in Devin Setoguchi

 

Photo by Dinur

Here at Jets Nation, I spend a lot of time trying to fix the second line. I mean, like, way more time than Kevin Cheveldayoff does (can we call him the Other Kevin yet?). Recently I suggested Michael Ryder for the job, and also Ales Hemsky as a discount trade option. Yesterday the Jets finally made a move to address the gaping hole in their lineup most recently filled by Antti Miettinen and Kyle Wellwood by bringing in one-time 30 goal scorer Devin Setoguchi for a 2014 2nd round pick. 

The catch is that he truly is a one-time 30 goal scorer, averaging just 22 goals and 42 points per 82 games when his top season is excluded. Those totals have context, of course, and this past year Setoguchi was the 17th highest scoring right winger by points per 60 minutes of even strength ice time. The year prior, he was the 71st highest scoring right winger by the same metric. Who is the Gucher, really?

Today, our own Travis Hrubeniuk wrote a very interesting article looking at how Setoguchi’s centres have affected his play. Seriously, read it. I’ll wait.

Michael Russo of the StarTribune notes Setoguchi’s hot streak with Matt Cullen as his centre last year. The devil is in the details, of course. Setoguchi scored 17 of his 27 points last season between February 26th and March 30 – a span of 17 of the 47 games he played on the year. For the math impaired, that’s 10 points spread out over his other 30 games. It wasn’t just a streak – it was the difference between calling Setoguchi a bust and calling him a scorer. 

Let’s look at some contextual stats.

Photo by Dinur

His first season with Minnesota stands out as an unusual year. He faced tougher competition and he seemed to do reasonably well by it. Maybe that’s all that happened to make him drop to 71st best scoring RW in the league that year. Still, I show his raw Corsi-on for a reason. That team was so bad that his negative corsi number alongside top centre Mikko Koivu translated into a massive positive relative corsi.  He also saw more than an extra minute per 60 of 5×5 time compared to his next highest season. Before we jump to conclusions, he also had the most powerplay time of his career that year. He was legitimately moved up the lineup for that season, falling back down after scoring 36 points and going -17 on the 24th place WIld.

Apart from that single season, Setoguchi has faced a fairly easy assignment with good zone starts. He’s struggled slightly with injury, and I will be watching his skating in particular. Why? Well, early in his career, Setoguchi drew a lot of penalties – more than twice as many as he took himself – but that has dried up in Minnesota. That may be a style of game, or it may be that injuries have slowed him somewhat. 

He’s originally an 8th overall pick, and when put with a quality playmaking centre (Thorton, Cullen), can score. But he is also very streaky, and adds little else to the club. Is his average of 42 points a season better than Kyle Wellwood, who scored 47 for the Jets two years ago? Moreover, his value contract of $3M is somewhat less impressive next to Ryder’s new deal with New Jersey of $3.5M given that Ryder has six 50-pt seasons and Setoguchi has one. Still, he’s a better powerplay player than Miettinen (obviously) and has the upside of the quality second-line scorer the Jets so badly need.

Setoguchi seems like a compromise addition to me – a player who barely qualifies as a top-six player and who needs help to score coming on to a team that really needed a player who could make others score, whether it be the struggling Olli Jokinen or the rookie Mark Scheifele. Setoguchi is young, has talent, cost only a draft pick, and doesn’t come with a long commitment. Those are all reasons to be excited. Yet, chemistry is a major factor for this player, and so we wait with unease for what October will bring.