Posts by Patrick Holden

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Michael Latta is the Last Guy Barry Trotz Should Consider Scratching Saturday
michael-latta-tongue-out

Michael Latta fights current teammate Kris Newbury in a game last year.

According to Alex Prewitt of The Washington Post, Eric Fehr will return to the lineup this weekend and the healthy scratch will be one of four players currently practicing on the fourth line. They are: Jay Beagle, Michael Latta, Liam O’Brien, and Tom Wilson

Scratching Michael Latta would be a mistake and here’s why.

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By Patrick Holden 6 years ago

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Liam McHugh Gets Sassy With Caps Fans on Twitter After Citing Plus-Minus on NBCSN
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In case you missed NBCSN’s pregame coverage of the Caps game, NBCSN anchor Liam McHugh used plus-minus as a way to discredit Alex Ovechkin‘s 51 goals last year. Clearly Mr. McHugh can’t be bothered with knowing that plus-minus is a silly way to measure a player’s effectiveness. He’s probably also a really big Jeff Schultz fan.

Mr. McHugh’s use of plus-minus didn’t go unnoticed by Caps fans on Twitter.

But know this, Mr. McHugh sees you Caps fans. He sees you and he’s bringing the sass.

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By Patrick Holden 6 years ago

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Breaking Down Jeff Schultz’s Plus-50 Season

Editor’s note: Pat Holden has written about Caps hockey over at Brooks Laichyear since 2012. We’ve asked him to pitch in here at RMNB to smarten us up a bit. Please give Pat a warm welcome. Follow him on Twitter.

This isn’t a post about plus-minus or debating its merits. I don’t like it and neither should you, but that’s not my purpose here. You can love plus-minus and still read this post without becoming enraged. Probably.

Jeff Schultz‘s plus-50 in 2009-10 was the highest rating we’ve seen since Peter Forsberg in 2003. When Caps fans or hockey fans in general make fun of plus-minus, Schultz’s name is almost always invoked. Even Ovechkin did it.

But we don’t often look too closely at Schultz’s 2009-10 season. It was uncommon and– most importantly– really, really lucky. Below is a player usage chart for the Caps defense from that season that will serve as the foundation for examining Schultz’s season.

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By Patrick Holden 6 years ago

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Barry Trotz’s Forward Deployment is Working …Except for Evgeny Kuznetsov

Photo: Amanda Bowen

Editor’s note: Pat Holden has written about Caps hockey over at Brooks Laichyear since 2012. We’ve asked him to pitch in here at RMNB to smarten us up a bit. Please give Pat a warm welcome. Follow him on Twitter.

During the preseason, Barry Trotz said that he prefers to keep forwards in pairs when shuffling lines. So far, that has proven to be the case. The Caps’ four persistent pairs through the first five games have been Ovechkin-Backstrom, Burakovsky-Johansson, Ward-Chimera, and Kuznetsov-O’Brien.

There’s a lot of noise in the numbers this early in the season, but with that disclaimer, a look at Trotz’s deployment so far shows many things we’d expect and some things we wouldn’t. But the biggest story is that the Caps fourth line is struggling, and Barry Trotz clearly doesn’t trust them.

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By Patrick Holden 6 years ago

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Did Alex Ovechkin Deserve the Calder Trophy in 05-06?
ovechkin-crosby-calder-race

Editor’s note: Pat Holden has written about Caps hockey over at Brooks Laichyear since 2012. We’ve asked him to pitch in here at RMNB to smarten us up a bit. Please give Pat a warm welcome. Follow him on Twitter.

Alex Ovechkin won the Calder Trophy for NHL rookie of the year in 2006. That season, Ovechkin totaled 52 goals and 54 assist in 81 games. His 106 points is the 3rd highest total ever for a rookie.

But 2005-06 was also Sidney Crosby‘s rookie season. Crosby scored 39 goals and recorded 63 assists. According to Wikipedia, the only other time two rookies scored over 100 points in the same season was in 1992-93, when Teemu Selanne and Joe Juneau did it.

Voting for the Calder was not especially close. Ovechkin got 125 out of 129 first-place votes. He also received 4 second-place votes. Crosby got 4 first-place votes, 95 second-place votes, and a number of third- and fourth-place votes. Scoring 52 goals as a rookie is going to grab the attention of voters. Ovechkin’s highlight-reel goals and physical play were credited for helping him win the award nearly unanimously.

Advanced stats are more prevalent than ever before in the NHL, and are certainly more of a going concern than they were in the 2005-06 season. While many voters still pay them no mind, I want to take a look at how the Ovechkin’s and Crosby’s rookie seasons match-up from an advanced stats perspective.

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By Patrick Holden 6 years ago

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