LW Evander Kane: The Money Team, Embrace the Hate

[garret9]

I'm going to start off with this. None of this thread is to do with his attitude, rumours (unfounded or founded), showing up one day early instead of two or three, or whatever people are being sensitive about; please, respect my hard work and do the same. Now let's breakdown this young goalscorer.


Even Strength and PP Production

YEAR | GP | ESTOI/60 | ESP/60 | ESG | ESA | PPTOI/60 | PPP/60 | PPG | PPA | SHTOI/60 | SHG | SHA | SOG | SH%
2009| 66|12.27| 1.85| 13|12 | 0.34| 0.00| 0|0 | 1.15|1|0 | 127| 11.0
2010| 73|14.07| 1.81| 15|20 | 2.26| 2.54| 4|4 | 0.84|0|0 | 234| 08.1
2011| 74|14.74| 2.42| 24|24 | 2.16| 3.39| 6|3 | 0.05|0|0 | 287| 10.5

Kane has had interesting development. He's consistently increased his scoring chances by shooting the puck more each season. Heck, last season Kane had 15 games with >5 shots (3 games with 9!) and Wellwood's goal totals would like to thank Kane for that. You can see how in the second season Kane gained more ice-time and his shooting % went down, but his ES scoring rate stayed consistent thanks to him shooting more often. Side note: drop in sh% is really rare for someone who increases their PP time dramatically, usually it's the opposite. The next season we see a dramatic increase in scoring rates, as Kane continues to shoot more and his sh% goes up (possibly also influenced by Wheeler, Wellwood and Burmistrov being better line-mates than Stewart and Thorburn).

Even Strength Advance Stats

YEAR | RelQoC | OZS | RelCorsi | Corsi | G/60 | A1/60 | P/60
2009| 0.611| 47.1| -2.4|-3.33| 0.96| 0.59| 1.85
2010| 0.499| 54.5| 0.7|-0.64| 0.76| 0.82| 1.81
2011| -0.028| 57.6| 8.7| 6.21| 1.26| 0.55| 2.42

2009: Kane enters the league playing tough minutes, along same competition levels as LLW but less OZS. He actually scores at a decent rate but isn't out-chancing the competition.
2010: Kane is pushed into the offensive zone more, which helps his Corsi. His scoring drops and so does his sh% (chicken or the egg). You can decide what combination of him, team-mates, luck, etc causes it. He actually sports a team best SA/60 for the PK, similar #s to Burmistrov in 2011.
2011: Kane loses a bit of PP time but gains more offensive minded line-mates and Noel begins to slightly shelter him from tough line-matches. Kane puts up goals at almost the same rate as Little puts up points. Kane puts heavy load of shots onto the net. In fact, Kane had more goalies make saves on him than any player in the league. Also, Kane is 5th in SOG/GP with Malkin, Neal, Kovalchuk, and Ovechkin in the lead.

Summary
Kane nows his role and he does it right. He is a top 10 goal scorer for even strength. When you look at guys who play top6 the top 10 goal scoring rates are (in order):
Stamkos, Malkin, Pacioretty, Ryder, Toews, Gaborik, Benn, Eberle (unsustainable 18.9 sh%), Sharp and Kane.
Not bad when you consider most of these guys are on top teams and have much better line-mates than Burmistrov and Wellwood (no offence to them).
Remove the filters so you get also people who played 5 mins a game but had high sh% and he's 13th in goal scoring rate... out of 407 NHL forwards... that's top 3% #s... That's literately within elite levels.

People may complain about the amount of shots Kane seems to pepper on the goalie, but these are the reason why he's so successful. You may think of it as dumb hockey at times, but in the end it works.
There are two types of goal scorers: mass shooters (Stamkos, Kane, Ovechkin, Neal) or pick your moment shooters (Stamkos, Little, Toews, Hudler) or the grand master who seems to do both effectively and consistently (probably guessed it... Stamkos). The streaky goal scorers are usually the pick your moment guys because they rely on their sh% (as we showed on Little breakdown), the mass shooters tend to be more consistent.
Watch out for him with Jokinen this season. I'm quite excited to see what Kane can do with someone who will drive to the net with him.
Game on haters... Embrace the hate!


1-2 Years in the Future
All that at 20? OKAY!
Guys at or under 20 that have scored 30+ goals since the lockout (in G/GP order):
Ovechkin, Stamkos, Crosby, Malkin, Kane, Toews, Kopitar, Bergeron, Skinner
Of course you know what line Kane goes on. Find a natural centre that can play with Kane and (Scheifele? Jokinen? Getzlaf?).

1: Kane-x-Wheeler
2: Ladd-x-Little
3: x-x-x

Click to read more...

 

[allan5oh]

He should have a phone conversation with his glove after scoring his first goal at MTSC. Then the media will ask him about it, and he should say it was the NHL head office informing him that he's in the lead for the Rocket Richard trophy.

Troll the haters.

 

[CorgisPer60]

He should have a phone conversation with his glove after scoring his first goal at MTSC. Then the media will ask him about it, and he should say it was the NHL head office informing him that he's in the lead for the Rocket Richard trophy.

Troll the haters.

I would ****ing love it if he did that.

 

[YWGinYYZ]

He should have a phone conversation with his glove after scoring his first goal at MTSC. Then the media will ask him about it, and he should say it was the NHL head office informing him that he's in the lead for the Rocket Richard trophy.

Troll the haters.

As usual, very interesting and informative analysis, garret9.

 

[ps241]

Great stuff Garret

I always learn something from these thorough breakdowns

 

[meedle]

Kane really needs to be on the #1 line this year. Looking at those stats its interesting to see that he scored 30 with <17 min of icetime a night. I'm sure most 30 goal scorers are closer to 20min a night.

What I didn't like about last year is you have your best scorer on the bench when we had 5 vs 3. And our 5vs3 stunk last year.

 

[Romang67]

Kane really needs to be on the #1 line this year. Looking at those stats its interesting to see that he scored 30 with <17 min of icetime a night. I'm sure most 30 goal scorers are closer to 20min a night.

What I didn't like about last year is you have your best scorer on the bench when we had 5 vs 3. And our 5vs3 stunk last year.

Now, I said in the Wheeler thread that I wanted to see him and Kane on the top line together, but there is a good thing about Kane on the second line. It spreads out our scoring. Since the LLW line works so well, the other team have to choose between sending their best shutdown men out against either them or Kane, meaning we have a legitimate chance of scoring with both our #1 and our #2 line.

 

[garret9]

Now, I said in the Wheeler thread that I wanted to see him and Kane on the top line together, but there is a good thing about Kane on the second line. It spreads out our scoring. Since the LLW line works so well, the other team have to choose between sending their best shutdown men out against either them or Kane, meaning we have a legitimate chance of scoring with both our #1 and our #2 line.

If Jokinen is also on the 2nd it miight even score more than the first line. TBH I wouldn't even be surprised if Noel splits the icetime evenly, like having 2 2nd or 2 1st lines depending on how you look at it.

Plus the problem also arises does Kane do as well in beating tough minutes? LLW tends to line up against Malkin, Stamkos, Giroux, etc. This let's Kane face nobodies. The 2nd line couldn't take toughs either as I'm not a fan of Wellwood there (or Jokinen).

Besides, Bob McKenzie agrees with my line-up for this year

I'm hoping that Kane will be placed on the first line next season when we hopefully have one more legitimate top 6 piece.

 

[garret9]

Kane really needs to be on the #1 line this year. Looking at those stats its interesting to see that he scored 30 with <17 min of icetime a night. I'm sure most 30 goal scorers are closer to 20min a night.

What I didn't like about last year is you have your best scorer on the bench when we had 5 vs 3. And our 5vs3 stunk last year.

I replied to Romang above why I don't think you'll see much of Kane-Jokinen on the first line... but I'm hoping we get one more piece to have that.

I'm also hoping that Noel splits the ice time between the top 2 lines more evenly this year... TBH I think he wanted to. Last season Wellwood admitted that Noel had asked more ice-time of him but Wellwood felt that his conditioning disallowed him to (not to get off topic but he said that's why he trained in the off-season towards getting the best conditioning of his life).
When the stakes rose in the end of the year, Noel made up for this by sometimes double shifting Wheeler on both 1st line and 2nd line when Wellwood was out. Now we'll have the same situation but with Jokinen on the 2nd line instead of Burmistrov with Kane and a better conditioned Wellwood.



Top Scorers

Name | GP | ESTOI/60 | ESG/60 | ESG | PPTOI/60 | PPG/60 | PPG
Stamkos | 82|17.02 | 1.89 | 48| 3.56| 2.05| 12
Malkin | 75|15.73 | 1.88 | 38| 4.12| 2.14| 12
Gaborik | 82|15.06 | 1.41 | 31| 3.30| 1.33| 10
Neal | 80|14.56 | 1.13 | 22| 3.66| 2.87| 18
Ovechkin | 78|15.62 | 1.03 | 25| 3.47| 2.88| 13
Kovalchuk | 77|17.55 | 0.98 | 27| 4.72| 1.49| 10
Kessel | 82|16.09 | 1.14 | 27| 3.17| 1.38| 10
Hartnell | 82|14.10 | 1.04 | 21| 3.06|3.58 | 16
Perry | 80|16.10 | 0.98 | 23| 3.38| 2.66| 14
EKane | 74|14.74 | 1.26 | 24| 2.16| 1.50| 06

 

[garret9]

I replied to Romang above why I don't think you'll see much of Kane-Jokinen on the first line... but I'm hoping we get one more piece to have that.

I'm also hoping that Noel splits the ice time between the top 2 lines more evenly this year... TBH I think he wanted to. Last season Wellwood admitted that Noel had asked more ice-time of him but Wellwood felt that his conditioning disallowed him to (not to get off topic but he said that's why he trained in the off-season towards getting the best conditioning of his life).
When the stakes rose in the end of the year, Noel made up for this by sometimes double shifting Wheeler on both 1st line and 2nd line when Wellwood was out. Now we'll have the same situation but with Jokinen on the 2nd line instead of Burmistrov with Kane and a better conditioned Wellwood.



Top Scorers

Name | GP | ESTOI/60 | ESG/60 | ESG | PPTOI/60 | PPG/60 | PPG
Stamkos | 82|17.02 | 1.89 | 48| 3.56| 2.05| 12
Malkin | 75|15.73 | 1.88 | 38| 4.12| 2.14| 12
Gaborik | 82|15.06 | 1.41 | 31| 3.30| 1.33| 10
Neal | 80|14.56 | 1.13 | 22| 3.66| 2.87| 18
Ovechkin | 78|15.62 | 1.03 | 25| 3.47| 2.88| 13
Kovalchuk | 77|17.55 | 0.98 | 27| 4.72| 1.49| 10
Kessel | 82|16.09 | 1.14 | 27| 3.17| 1.38| 10
Hartnell | 82|14.10 | 1.04 | 21| 3.06| 3.58| 16
Perry | 80|16.10 | 0.98 | 23| 3.38| 2.66| 14
EKane | 74|14.74 | 1.26 | 24| 2.16| 1.50| 06

Will fill this table in a bit

So as you can see here Kane's issue is he's not getting much PP time... and he's not exactly pushing for the PP time very well either since Ladd, Little and Antropov have better PPG/60...
The one thing to remember though is PPG/60 tends to fluctuate from year to year pretty starkly

<EDIT>
I'd also like to add that wow... Stamkos and Malkin really are at another level

 

[jetkarma*]

Great posts to read before the puck drops , much appreciated .