Prospect Info: 2024/25 Oilers Prospect Thread

[McDNicks17]

Right? If he is often playing on a line with good offensive players, and often playing with one of the best offensive d in the league, he should be collecting points. Like what, is his role to never touch the puck and only let the other guys?
He is also seeming to settle into more of a third line role for the team which, I don’t know much but that’s not a great sign for a first round draft pick in his d+1.
Like it’s not bust status or anything but it definitely points to a guy who will most likely be a limited player. Like a 3rd/4th liner in the NHL. Not completely useless but still.

Like if he continues his pace over 68 games he will actually drop 10 points from last season. Which….i mean.

Instead of guessing, you could watch them play.

The Knights are a heavy rush team and it's usually Dickinson either rushing the puck or joining the rush. Tonight is a good example of how much the offense is focused around him. The Knights scored six goals. He had six points. O'Reilly is the guy deep in the Knights zone playing D and he was almost always the guy that sits back in Dickinson's spot because it would be stupid to not let a defenseman scoring at 2 points per game roam. You aren't going to collect many points when some of the best players in the CHL are scoring at will off the rush or as the net-front PP guy when everything is just going in from the outside.

O'Reilly showed his value tonight. Just an absolute stud defensively and showed that 1st round skill when he had a chance.

 

[Shizuka]

Dickinson is something else, nearly 2pts a game as a D. Guy is just too good for junior at this point. SJ has an incredible prospect there.

 

[Senor Catface]

Instead of guessing, you could watch them play.

The Knights are a heavy rush team and it's usually Dickinson either rushing the puck or joining the rush. Tonight is a good example of how much the offense is focused around him. The Knights scored six goals. He had six points. O'Reilly is the guy deep in the Knights zone playing D and he was almost always the guy that sits back in Dickinson's spot because it would be stupid to not let a defenseman scoring at 2 points per game roam. You aren't going to collect many points when some of the best players in the CHL are scoring at will off the rush or as the net-front PP guy when everything is just going in from the outside.

O'Reilly showed his value tonight. Just an absolute stud defensively and showed that 1st round skill when he had a chance.

 

[Fourier]

Instead of guessing, you could watch them play.

The Knights are a heavy rush team and it's usually Dickinson either rushing the puck or joining the rush. Tonight is a good example of how much the offense is focused around him. The Knights scored six goals. He had six points. O'Reilly is the guy deep in the Knights zone playing D and he was almost always the guy that sits back in Dickinson's spot because it would be stupid to not let a defenseman scoring at 2 points per game roam. You aren't going to collect many points when some of the best players in the CHL are scoring at will off the rush or as the net-front PP guy when everything is just going in from the outside.

O'Reilly showed his value tonight. Just an absolute stud defensively and showed that 1st round skill when he had a chance.

A stat that can tell the story in these situations is IPP. It tells you the percentage of points a player receives when a goal is scored when they are on the ice. Great players dominate puck possession. When you are on the ice with a guy like McDavid for example he has the puck so much that if a goal is scored he is going to almost always get a point. His all situation IPP is about 80%. Moreover, because of his ability to generate his own opportunities a larger percentage of the points he is in on are goals with only one assist. That means that when you play with McDavid more goals are scored but you may be in on a far fewer percentage of those than you would driving your own line. This is what is happening with O'Reilly when he plays with Dickinson and the Knights big boys.

 

[Spawn]

A stat that can tell the story in these situations is IPP. It tells you the percentage of points a player receives when a goal is scored when they are on the ice. Great players dominate puck possession. When you are on the ice with a guy like McDavid for example he has the puck so much that if a goal is scored he is going to almost always get a point. His all situation IPP is about 80%. Moreover, because of his ability to generate his own opportunities a larger percentage of the points he is in on are goals with only one assist. That means that when you play with McDavid more goals are scored but you may be in on a far fewer percentage of those than you would driving your own line. This is what is happening with O'Reilly when he plays with Dickinson and the Knights big boys.

This all sounds a bit dubious to me. Just regarding the bold for example, of McDavids 132 points last year, 111 of them three players got a point on the goal (84%). Compare that to the entire league where 78% of goals scored had two assists. So plays with McDavid were more likely to end up with two assists than the average goal.

And while an elite player might have an unusually high IPP, that would presumably be balanced out by the sheer number of goals that are being scored while they’re on the ice.

 

[Fourier]

This all sounds a bit dubious to me. Just regarding the bold for example, of McDavids 132 points last year, 111 of them three players got a point on the goal (84%). Compare that to the entire league where 78% of goals scored had two assists. So plays with McDavid were more likely to end up with two assists than the average goal.

And while an elite player might have an unusually high IPP, that would presumably be balanced out by the sheer number of goals that are being scored while they’re on the ice.

I should have been more careful in what I stated. My refence was based on stats I put together about two years ago and was for to ES points. Here are the numbers for McDavid ES over the last 5 years in terms of percentage of points with two assists.

2023-24 79.3%
2022-23 75%
2021-22 75,6%
2020-21 71.8%
2019-20 76.5%

It would be interesting to see how that 78% was calculated. On thing to note is that SH goals tend to have fewer assists awarded by a significant amount. For example in these five years McDavid had 9 SH points and 7 of them had one or fewer assist. And over this period there were was 1 4 vs 5 GF for ever 5 vs 5 GF. So it is very likely that the ES points with two or more assists typically exceeds 80%.

Just for comparison lets look at Kucherov over the last few years ES.

Kucherov

2023-24 82.4%
2022-23 84.1%
2021-22 76.9%
2020-21 Did not play
2019-20 78.3%

 

[North]

Beau Akey with an assist today.

Sam O’Reilly with the shootout winner today.

 

[McDNicks17]

 

[Scrapin Ice]

Watching some of the london knights game. Sam O'Really played an excellent defensive game in the parts i saw. That shootout goal just the cream on the top of his game today.

 

[Fourier]

Watching some of the london knights game. Sam O'Really played an excellent defensive game in the parts i saw. That shootout goal just the cream on the top of his game today.

I am pretty sure that they drafted him because of his ability to play a mature 200 ft game. It's not like the team is lacking in offensive centers. The top two are pretty solid options for the next 8 years I'd say.

My guess is that they see a lot of Ryan O'Reilly in him. ROR did not exactly light it up either and was able to step in and play in his D+1 year because of his mature game. Now ROR did find his offensive side and I suspect that the Oilers hope that SOR will as well. But right now in London that is not his focus even though he does have skill.

 

[CupofOil]

I am pretty sure that they drafted him because of his ability to play a mature 200 ft game. It's not like the team is lacking in offensive centers. The top two are pretty solid options for the next 8 years I'd say.

My guess is that they see a lot of Ryan O'Reilly in him. ROR did not exactly light it up either and was able to step in and play in his D+1 year because of his mature game. Now ROR did find his offensive side and I suspect that the Oilers hope that SOR will as well. But right now in London that is not his focus even though he does have skill.

I've been hard on Sam O'Reilly but his offensive numbers aren't that dissimilar to Ryan in their respective 2nd years in junior so it's not that alarming I suppose BUT Ryan O'Reilly is an exception to the rule. Guys that are at or less than a PPG in junior in their draft and draft+1 years generally don't pan out as anything more than 4th liners so we'll see, there's a lot of season left to play but I'd like to see those numbers bumped up in the second half.

 

[Fourier]

I've been hard on Sam O'Reilly but his offensive numbers aren't that dissimilar to Ryan in their respective 2nd years in junior so it's not that alarming I suppose BUT Ryan O'Reilly is an exception to the rule. Guys that are at or less than a PPG in junior in their draft and draft+1 years generally don't pan out as anything more than 4th liners so we'll see, there's a lot of season left to play but I'd like to see those numbers bumped up in the second half.

The circumstances are pretty exceptional. Probably 99% of first round forwards drafted out of the OHL would be already primarily in offense first roles. As @McDNicks17 has stated the London situation is rather unique especially when you look at what Dickinson is doing.

Drafting for defense in a Round one forward is pretty rare. In part because most teams really want their 1st rounders to become top sixers. In the Oilers case, they are probably hoping to get an elite defensive 3rd line center with the added bonus of some skill. That is basically what ROR was seen as. (ROR went #33 by the way which is pretty much where SOR went.) He's obviously not a monster like Lowery but if you can get an elite defensive 3rd line center it can really help your team win. Lowrey of course was not a first round pick. But O'Reilly also has shown a lot better offensive chops than a guy like Lowery did at the same age.

 

[McDNicks17]

I've been hard on Sam O'Reilly but his offensive numbers aren't that dissimilar to Ryan in their respective 2nd years in junior so it's not that alarming I suppose BUT Ryan O'Reilly is an exception to the rule. Guys that are at or less than a PPG in junior in their draft and draft+1 years generally don't pan out as anything more than 4th liners so we'll see, there's a lot of season left to play but I'd like to see those numbers bumped up in the second half.

Keep in mind Ryan put up those numbers in a far different role. He projected as a third liner, but he was getting 1st line minutes and prime PP minutes.

Sam putting up the points he has is pretty impressive considering the role.