What about his post was wrong?
Looking at his graphs, xGF/60 with him on the ice 1.67, xGF/60 without him 2.54 so he's an absolute offensive black hole.
I guess I should preface my post by highlighting the fact that I am not a big Slafkovsky fan, far from it. In fact, I do not mind the pick (although I would have picked Wright, Cooley and Nemec before him), but I still am not sold on Slafkovsky's hockey sense and similarly continue to wonder if we have not drafted a slightly faster/more talented Joel Armia.
All of this to say that after Slakovsky had a pretty mediocre camp, I was not thrilled when the team chose to let him start the year with the big club. I was also NOT impressed with Slafkovsky's showing in his first three/four games with the big club.
Put simply, on the ice he looked like Bambi after his deer mother's death in that first stretch of games; he looked shaky, nervous, and heart-breakingly out of his element.
Although he has great physical gifts that should allow him to do well at any level, Slafkovsky played like a youngster WAY over his head, with the game moving much too quick for him to respond. Basically, any halfway-decent player straight out of the ECHL would have had a better showing than Slafkovsky in those first couple games, to say nothing of a fresh first-overall pick.
In fact, if it had continued that way I would have become very vocal about sending him back to Laval or maybe even Europe before we, again, destroyed a promising young player's development. And I try to keep a cool, level-headed mind as a person/poster, trying to stop from overreacting/being hasty. So that should give a hint as to how badly I thought about Slafkovsky's performance to start the year, and the mounting urgency I felt.
But then Slafkovsky got his first goal in a majorly flukey way, it did wonders for his confidence, and I don't know why/how, but the game seems to have stopped going 600% too fast for him.
Since then he's responded very, very well (not perfect mind, still LOTS to improve in his case) and has more than acquitted himself of his responsibilities for our team. Much more importantly though, Slafkovsky, who looked lost during that first stretch, is now on a pretty clear upwards trajectory curve development-wise and seems to improve a little bit every game, going by the eye test.
He's also shown a lot more intelligence on the ice than he did previously, even though he hasn't been especially effective offensively yet.
So yeah, as long as that progression is there every game we should keep him in the NHL. And if he really needs more playing time to further polish his game we can always send him back to the AHL, and maybe for the WJC.
Now, as far as pure stats go, even though the advanced statistics that have been pointed out do indeed reflect a part of Slafkovsky's output on the ice, and his inability to have a sizeable impact offensively, they also largely ignore context.
Fact of the matter is that Slafkovsky's NHL career is only 10-games old. Then there's also the fact that his coach has told him to focus on learning how to play well in all three zones 5-on-5 (emphasis on taking care of the puck/defense) while he's been playing mostly on the fourth line, which hasn't produced much as a whole, and with little offensive deployment. So maybe give him a break for a while in the offensive department?
Do forgive me for the overly long post, but I had to substantiate my point and get it across as clearly as I could, and I did, although it did clutter up this thread a bit.
Anyways, that's it from me. Cheers and have a good night.
