F Nicholas Robertson - Peterborough Petes, OHL (2019, 53rd, TOR)

[TheKrebsCycle]

Let's pump the brakes on too good for junior. He's 6th in PPG amongst '01 born players in the OHL. Great season, but he's a 5'9 160 lbs 18 year old and arguably not the best player on the Petes. Let him develop, no need to rush him.

He's additionally only days away from being eligible for this seasons draft. Super young drafty

 

[LeafChief]

Is this good?

 

[TopC0rner]

Here's the list of all 18 years old and younger since 2001-2002 in the OHL with over 1 GPG:

Nick Robertson 1.118
John Tavares 1.075
Patrick Kane 1.069
John Tavares 1.036
Connor McMichael 1.000

Here are the other prospects further down the list (18 years old or younger) all the way down to 0.830:

Corey Locke 0.955
Steven Stamkos 0.951
Connor McDavid 0.936
Andrei Svechnikov 0.909
Jack Quinn 0.867
Alex DeBrincat .850
Tyler Toffoli 0.838
Rob Fabbri 0.833

Scoring is up in the OHL this year but it's still pretty good company.

 

[slimbob8]

Let's pump the brakes on too good for junior. He's 6th in PPG amongst '01 born players in the OHL. Great season, but he's a 5'9 160 lbs 18 year old and arguably not the best player on the Petes. Let him develop, no need to rush him.

Say what? To use the phrase arguably, that would mean there are people arguing two sides of something. I doubt you could find a single person that would argue otherwise in this case. He's 4 points off the team lead in scoring despite playing 11 fewer games than SDA. Of course he's easily the best player on that team right now.

 

[Mickey Marner]

Say what? To use the phrase arguably, that would mean there are people arguing two sides of something. I doubt you could find a single person that would argue otherwise in this case. He's 4 points off the team lead in scoring despite playing 11 fewer games than SDA. Of course he's easily the best player on that team right now.

I was talking about Akil Thomas...

 

[slimbob8]

I was talking about Akil Thomas...

Oh, ok. My bad then.

 

[Gargyn]

I was talking about Akil Thomas...

He’s better than Thomas. And I’m definitely not a Leafs fan.

 

[Future]

Another goal last night increasing his totals to 39 in 35. Absolutely insane.

 

[Randy Randerson]

Another goal last night increasing his totals to 39 in 35. Absolutely insane.

the Leafs two future Richard winners hitting 39 goals on the same night...

 

[Favster]

Watching the Leafs game last night, Robertson is the exact kind of player that team needs. He has enough skill to keep up with their big guns but even more importantly, he's an extremely hard worker which is something that team desperately needs IMO. I'm quite confident he will make the team out of camp next year.

 

[Leafs at Knight]

2+2 so far tonight, with a period still to play.

 

[BigHitter67]

Born 96 hrs later and he goes 2OA in upcoming draft ? What’ifs..lol

 

[ViewsFromThe6ix]

2+3

 

[7even]

Born 96 hrs later and he goes 2OA in upcoming draft ? What’ifs..lol

Tad dramatic.

 

[ViewsFromThe6ix]

Here's the list of all 18 years old and younger since 2001-2002 in the OHL with over 1 GPG:

Nick Robertson 1.118
John Tavares 1.075
Patrick Kane 1.069
John Tavares 1.036
Connor McMichael 1.000

Here are the other prospects further down the list (18 years old or younger) all the way down to 0.830:

Corey Locke 0.955
Steven Stamkos 0.951
Connor McDavid 0.936
Andrei Svechnikov 0.909
Jack Quinn 0.867
Alex DeBrincat .850
Tyler Toffoli 0.838
Rob Fabbri 0.833

Scoring is up in the OHL this year but it's still pretty good company.

 

[93LEAFS]

A bit misleading, because people like DeBrincat has paced for 70 in his D+1. A bit unfair to use pace for one, and then apply it to a full season when Robertson can't play a full season due to injury and WJC. Either way, he's putting up crazy totals this year.

 

[nbwingsfan]

I’ve only seen the Petes play twice this season, one in which Robertson didn’t play.

Is he driving play or is he acting more as triggerman to others? Honest curious question since obviouly his goal totals are exceptional but his overall point totals aren’t anything out of the ordinary for good D+1 players. Typically when there is a massive goal to assist gap the player isn’t driving his line but instead finding open spots for others to get him the puck. Not that that’s a bad thing either, just curious how he’s played this season, especially since a couple guys on his team have crazy discrepancies in assists vs goals but going the other way.

 

[Knies iT]

By all reports, he's driving his line. His "low" assist totals are probably in large part due to playing primarily beside SDA, who has 8 goals in 46 games and hates shooting the puck.

Some of his handiwork on the night:

 

[7even]

I’ve only seen the Petes play twice this season, one in which Robertson didn’t play.

Is he driving play or is he acting more as triggerman to others? Honest curious question since obviouly his goal totals are exceptional but his overall point totals aren’t anything out of the ordinary for good D+1 players. Typically when there is a massive goal to assist gap the player isn’t driving his line but instead finding open spots for others to get him the puck. Not that that’s a bad thing either, just curious how he’s played this season, especially since a couple guys on his team have crazy discrepancies in assists vs goals but going the other way.

Similar to Matthews, who also consistently has more goals than assists, he's a huge volume shooter who scores on an above average percentage of them. When you put those two things together, a shoot-first playstyle is more reasonable than it would be for players who don't have that specific skillset, which is most.

 

[TheKrebsCycle]

I’ve only seen the Petes play twice this season, one in which Robertson didn’t play.

Is he driving play or is he acting more as triggerman to others? Honest curious question since obviouly his goal totals are exceptional but his overall point totals aren’t anything out of the ordinary for good D+1 players. Typically when there is a massive goal to assist gap the player isn’t driving his line but instead finding open spots for others to get him the puck. Not that that’s a bad thing either, just curious how he’s played this season, especially since a couple guys on his team have crazy discrepancies in assists vs goals but going the other way.

SDA has a poor shot /is extremely reluctant to use it.

 

[Blueboy]

By all reports, he's driving his line. His "low" assist totals are probably in large part due to playing primarily beside SDA, who has 8 goals in 46 games and hates shooting the puck.

Some of his handiwork on the night:

He is absolutely relentless. He’s going to look fantastic with Matthews & Marner or Tavares & Nylander in 2-3 years.

 

[GTA]

Here's the list of all 18 years old and younger since 2001-2002 in the OHL with over 1 GPG:

Nick Robertson 1.118
John Tavares 1.075
Patrick Kane 1.069
John Tavares 1.036
Connor McMichael 1.000

Here are the other prospects further down the list (18 years old or younger) all the way down to 0.830:

Corey Locke 0.955
Steven Stamkos 0.951
Connor McDavid 0.936
Andrei Svechnikov 0.909
Jack Quinn 0.867
Alex DeBrincat .850
Tyler Toffoli 0.838
Rob Fabbri 0.833

Scoring is up in the OHL this year but it's still pretty good company.

Now do PPG.

 

[Namikaze Minato]

Now do PPG.

Why not do it yourself?

 

[Randy Randerson]

I’ve only seen the Petes play twice this season, one in which Robertson didn’t play.

Is he driving play or is he acting more as triggerman to others? Honest curious question since obviouly his goal totals are exceptional but his overall point totals aren’t anything out of the ordinary for good D+1 players. Typically when there is a massive goal to assist gap the player isn’t driving his line but instead finding open spots for others to get him the puck. Not that that’s a bad thing either, just curious how he’s played this season, especially since a couple guys on his team have crazy discrepancies in assists vs goals but going the other way.

1.75ppg is pretty impressive as well, if you look at the forwards on the 1st page of the NHL top scorers list, 1.75ppg is better than a lot more of them than it's worse than in their D+1's. I think if his point pace was as much of an outlier as his goal pace, he would be being looked at as an absolutely elite prospect at this point, but the point pace that he's on in isolation puts him in pretty good company. There are certainly some guys who put up impressive D+1 point paces as well (Leipsic, Petan, etc) who it didn't convert to pro for as well so it could go either way but I don't know if point pace is a good way to categorize until you get to the truly elite level at above 2ppg, scouting of the tools is big for context. Usually it seems to be skating that separates those big junior scorers from the ones that succeed at the next level, maybe outlier size as well but we've seen that mold broken with DeBrincat.

I do think that his tendency is to shoot and his situation lends itself to that - linemates who like to pass, he likes to be in dangerous areas where putting the puck on net is the only real viable option when he gets it, etc

 

[nbwingsfan]

1.75ppg is pretty impressive as well, if you look at the forwards on the 1st page of the NHL top scorers list, 1.75ppg is better than a lot more of them than it's worse than in their D+1's. I think if his point pace was as much of an outlier as his goal pace, he would be being looked at as an absolutely elite prospect at this point, but the point pace that he's on in isolation puts him in pretty good company. There are certainly some guys who put up impressive D+1 point paces as well (Leipsic, Petan, etc) who it didn't convert to pro for as well so it could go either way but I don't know if point pace is a good way to categorize until you get to the truly elite level at above 2ppg, scouting of the tools is big for context. Usually it seems to be skating that separates those big junior scorers from the ones that succeed at the next level, maybe outlier size as well but we've seen that mold broken with DeBrincat.

I do think that his tendency is to shoot and his situation lends itself to that - linemates who like to pass, he likes to be in dangerous areas where putting the puck on net is the only real viable option when he gets it, etc

For sure, his point totals are still great but not anything out of the ordinary. This season there are other D+1 players putting up similar or better points per game (Poulin, Pelletier, Tomasino, McMichael, Kaliyev, etc) but Robertson is dominating in goals which is making him stand out.

More just curious why there’s a big gap in his goal vs assist ratio when his stats previous to this season have been a pretty equal 50/50 split? Has he just decided to do more on his own or has he accepted being the triggerman (due to his incredible shot) to some very good playmakers? A mix of both?