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    Home / Opinion / Should We Be Concerned About Brooks Laich?

    Should We Be Concerned About Brooks Laich?

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    January 23, 2011 10:10 pm

    Brooks Laich

    Photo credit: Joel Auerbach

    Before the season began, a lot of people were looking for Brooks Laich to “turn it on” in his contract year. After three straight years of scoring 20 goals or more, many felt we would see his game taken to the next level. His season up to this point:

    Instance G A PTS S TOI
    Laich through 49 games 9 18 27 116 889
    proj 82 games 15 30 45 194 1488

    So far, underwhelming. Or is it?

    What could we have reasonably expected from Laich? Players who have had similar seasons since the lockout at around the same age give us some clues.

    Player Pos Year Age GP G A P Sh TOI
    Brooks Laich 2010 26 78 25 34 59 222 1426
    Similar players
    Jason Pominville RW 2007 24 82 34 34 68 212 1428
    Nik Antropov C 2009 28 81 28 31 59 224 1392
    Mark Bell C 2006 25 82 25 23 48 227 1444
    Marco Sturm LW 2007 28 76 27 17 44 224 1413
    Milan Michalek RW 2009 24 77 23 34 57 179 1421
    Scott Hartnell LW 2009 26 82 30 30 60 210 1460
    Patrick Marleau C 2008 28 78 19 29 48 185 1422
    Antoine Vermette C 2008 25 81 24 29 53 175 1424
    Dustin Penner LW 2008 25 82 23 24 47 201 1411
    Averages 26 80 26 28 54 204 1424
    Similar players following year 27 77 22 28 50 176 1348

    In 2011 Laich scoring 22 goals would have been a reasonable expectation. Take into account the regression to the mean for Capital’s shooting overall, constant line juggling, and his occasional use as a 4th line checker and his 82-game projection of 15 goals doesn’t look like he is too far off the mark.

    Some might even point to his scoring droughts this year as another cause of alarm, going as many as a dozen games without registering a goal, but they would be mistaken. Given that coming into this year Brooks Laich has scored in roughly a quarter of every game he has played the last three years, we can be 99% sure that he would have to go 16 games in order to see a statistically significant scoring drought.

    Sure, we would like to have the bittersweet moment where Laich is lighting that lamp at a pace for a 30-goal season as we rack our brains on Capgeek trying to figure out how to keep him. For now, just enjoy the fact he is the team’s best forward when it comes to keeping even strength scoring chances in the Caps’ favor, considered a Selke candidate by others and performing completely within reasonable expectations.

    Brooks Laich
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