GDT: Devils @ Hurricanes - 7:00 PM - MSG

[NjdevilfanJim]

But if Casey has been really good, while Nemec, (who is actually younger then Casey and only a 2nd year player himself) has been a boat anchor, wouldn't Keefe see this and change deployment accordingly?

Casey is clearly impressive with the puck, but I think it's a stretch to say he has been very impressive defensively.

There is nothing easy in the NHL and for a rookie he has been impressive....He earned the spot because even Fitz said plan was for him to be in Utica....

 

[WhiskeyYerTheDevils]

Its just not true.

Nemec was great against Arizona-Utah. He was a good piece against Hurricanes.

I agree, he was great against Utah and was pretty good against Carolina. His first 4 games were very poor by his standards

He was defenseman who won puck battles, took the puck away, or didn't give opportunity to create more dangerous chances. Nemec was responsible for escaping. Canes always using Casey side to enter the zone or create traffic from his side. Casey was responsible for continuing of canes action mostly. Because of his lack of experience, little mistakes, positional and just losing the space battles.

That is not what I saw. He won the majority of his board battles and was excellent boxing out around the net. The biggest issue for that pairing the other night was our wingers not securing the walls - multiple times Casey and Nemec moved the puck up the wall after evading heavy pressure only for the winger to be out of position and get beaten to the puck by the Canes active D.

Casey is fun and interesting in O zone, but now he is not close to Nemec in overall actions and especially in D zone. Its okay to be fanboy, but unfair hate and lie is pure nonsense. He is god enough but he isn't better to play more than he is playing, he is not good enough to play meaningful situations in D zone. Nemec is.

Casey has been better offensively & defensively through our first 6 games (and most notably through the first 4).

In those first 4 games, Nemec forced Casey to defend at least 6-7 odd man rushes because of poorly timed pinches. The last 2 games have been much better for Nemec, as he's stopped overcommitting up ice as much, but he's still been guilty of that a few times.

On the other hand, I can't recall a single instance of Nemec being forced to defend an odd man rush because of a bad pinch by Casey - the closest I can think of was that scoring chance Casey had coming off the bench in the 2nd vs the Canes, but even in that instance, with Casey deep, Nemec was still too aggressively positioned.

Casey's biggest gaffes have been a couple neutral zone turnovers, but in terms of defending he's been really solid.

You are acting like a mtl fan and it doesn't make any favor and create bad vibe and this kind of conversation in fan base. Its ok to admit that Nemec is much better now in d zone, and that Casey is better in O zone.

I do agree that Nemec is a better defender in the defensive zone, mostly because of his size advantage - both guys are really smart positionally and great at controlled breakouts, but Casey can't lean on guys like Simon, nor can he shrug off body checks as well.

But there is a lot more to defensive play than just the D zone. Casey's shown to be extremely responsible positionally in the neutral zone and offensive zone - which you'd expect from a rookie. Nemec played like that in his first 40 or so games, then he seemed to get a bit too comfortable, and starting making too many high risk pinches up ice, leading to tons of odd man rushes and high danger chances against.

This is supported in the 5v5 data as well:

And here are the relative 5v5 numbers:

He was awesome for his first 40 games, hovering around 2.5 xGA/60, but by the end, he his last 10 games he finished at 3.53, and that trend has continued to start this season. He fell from around +1.5 xG differential/60 in the middle of the season to around -1.5 by the end.

If Nemec can get back to the type of steady positional play we saw from him during those first 40 games, I'd agree he's the better defensive player due to his edge in the d-zone (I like Casey's NZ gap control and 1-1 defending more, but that weighs a bit less than defensive zone play). But the Nemec we've seen over the last 25-30 games of his career has not been very reliable, unfortunately.

In his last 10 games, at 5v5:
-2.06 xG differential/60
1.66 xGF/60
3.72 xGA/60
30.8% xG%

In his last 10 games of last year:
-1.36 xG differential/60
2.17 xGF/60
3.53 xGA/60
38.1% xG%

And their ice time and their using by our coach is translating it very clearly.

I don't put a lot of stock into that - coaches trust veterans. Brendan Dillon is getting more ice time than Nemec, but I doubt you'll find many that think Dillon is the better defenseman. And Marino got more ice time than Nemec last season despite Nemec being the clearly better player last year.

We have glenwo who is fan of Bratt but he doesn't make an effort to sh1t on every other player for not helping to cover "The Prima".

How am I ****ing on Nemec? I'm a big fan, but you have to call a spade a spade. He was not very good to finish last season, he was really bad in the preseason, and he's been poor for the most part to start the season. I have full confidence he'll figure it out - it's just growing pains for a young defenseman. But some additional seasoning in the AHL might be necessary if he doesn't turn it around soon (the last 2 games have been promising, for sure).