Backs is worth every penny of his contract. His scoring is off this year relative to his career average, but defensively he and his line are still the men to get the job done.
Backlund and Coleman are known as the 'fixers'. Coach Huska can put any struggling player on their line for a more or less instant improvement. The Backlund bump.
Watch him away from the puck. He does all the little things right and instinctively knows where to go on the ice.
If you watched the game last night he and his wingers Farabee and Coleman were not only an offensive threat, but held Caufield, Suziki, and Slafkovsky off the score sheet even if they had a lot of shots. Of course Dustin Wolfe had a pick part of that too.
And rumour has it he had been playing injured a good chunk of games after Christmas and is only now playing like he can.
Thank you for providing some input from the fans side. I wasn't able to respond yesterday. For clarity I didn't mean it as an attack, just as an outsiders observation. I enjoy watching those types of players -- when I was growing up, my favorite player was Sami Kapanen for example. The meat and potatoes type players.
My thought surrounding Backlund originated from after going thru the team's scoring rates....I'm a big stats guy, and I like to answer questions with that type of lens. I noticed that Backlund's scoring rate at 5v5 is lower than basically any other 'top-6 forward'. So I looked at his scoring rates (at 5v5) against all of the other forwards who are given around the same amount of 5v5 ice time (13.5 to 14.5 mins per game). There's 47 forwards that fall within that amount of time.
He ranks 47/47 (last) in points per 60. And it's not close. He's also dead last in points share, which is basically means....Of all of the points scored when a skater is on the ice, what is the percentage of goals is that skater getting a point for...For example, if a player is on the ice for 10 goals and records 5 points , his point share would be 50% (5/10 =50%). He's also in last place for that as well.
One of the reasons that Calgary is not scoring as much is because Backlund isn't performing to his previous performances, or his peers. I'm not picking on him, but that is true... Now, I've only watched 5-6 games here and there since the Flyers trade (I watch a lot of hockey and try to keep up with the players I like -- Frost in this case). I've just noticed that Backlund appears less effective, particularly with the puck on his stick. Hearing that he was injured earlier this year checks out because these numbers are very low relative to the rest of his career. Also, his NHL edge data (which has skating information) suggests there might be an injury as well, as his speed burst numbers and overall speed are low.
If it is an injury, you'd expect some form of rebound once he recovers...But the other side of that coin is he's 35 years old, in his 15th year of NHL level hockey. At some point, the body breaks down -- it happens to everyone. I hope it's injury and not aging.
Again, I'm not trying to attack Backlund -- he's been a wonderful player through this entire career. One of the 'good soldiers' of the NHL.
