Player Discussion Neal Pionk

[Fitzy]

The endless debate between the analytics supporters and the eye-test supporters reminds me of the similarly endless debate between technical traders and fundamental investors. Very hard for a person one side of the fence to convince his opponent (for lack of a better word) to leave the other side.

It's very much like Quantitative-Qualitative in the social sciences.

 

[Filthy Dangles]

Retrieving the puck and starting the breakout and transition consistently is definitely an issue. Definitely noticeable in my early review of him in the LAK game.

Two times where he goes to retrieve the puck down low but can't really make a play or do anything with it.

What did you guys see? I though the first entry was a decent one by LA and a smart same side dump by Iafallo. Pionk sure takes a long time to pivot and turn his back for the puck (will keep an eye on this). Gets Kopitar to pursue inside but just sort of Muffs it when he turns outside. The misses Zucc wide open on the breakout and tries to chip window. I thought him trying to attack Forbort was pretty funny too.

Spoiler

I thought the second one should have been an easy corall and box out of Pearson but he muffed it again and LA got more zone time.

Hope to get more time and add to this and add commentary to the videos instead of having to type all this out and what not.

 

[ManUtdTobbe]

I also think Tobbe notes good stuff in his post above.

I am not sure about the zone entries though. To even try to stand someone up at the blueline you need to have very good support. Its very much a team thing. The forward heading up ice must be pressured and the defender must have support from a backchecker that can cover behind him if he only manage to take the body but not the puck.

I saw someone at the trade board tear Skjei apart because he supposedly had bad zone entery data last year under AV. From my POV that is laugh worthy, neither AV nor Torts -- or any coach other, up until recently at least -- had their Ds ever try to stand up players at the blueline. That is what the whole gap control thing is about, nobody talked about gap control before the redline offside rule was removed. Before that people stepped people up and had structures in place to support it. The biggest difference after 05' was that when you couldn't whack forwards across the arms or hook them Nylander and co. skated eights around Ds trying the stand them up at the blueline.

Bob Hartley in Atlanta was one of the last coaches who tried to have a blueline that regularly tried to prevent zone entries.

Have this changed now? Honest question.

Yes and no on the zone entry defending… Yes you need support, but he puts no pressure at all on the puck carrier, his gap Control is just off. To defend the blueline well you don't actually have to stand up at the blueline and win pucks, you need to put enough pressure on the puck carrier to force his hand, make him play a tough pass or dump it, not just let him skate it in with possession.

 

[effen]

snip

this is all mitigated by him having his head up more and positioning his body so he can see things. As played, if he passes it to Zucc it's a blind pass into the slot that in the best case scenario he's doing because system wise Zucc should be there. WE can see it, but how he's facing there's no way he can, and even if he could, he doesn't have time to judge which way someones leaning or how fast they're gliding. Can't do that.

He's gonna be fine when he learnes little things like positioning his hips a certain way to allow his shoulders to be a certain way to give him a better field of vision. That fundamental, at least in that clip, is bad. That can be worked on.

Him chasing that dude to the other side is actively stupid for a variety of reasons and I can't imagine he's allowed to do that.

 

[lilphildub]

Hope to get more time and add to this and add commentary to the videos instead of having to type all this out and what not.

On the first one I think he makes a horrible decision and takes it the wrong way. He had Zucc on the opposite boards. Just pass it down to him and its an easy break out. Instead he loses it, retrieves the puck, tries to hit off the boards. Horrible turnover

The second one isn't bad in my eyes. If he tries to retrieve the puck and tries to box out, I think Pearson easily hits him off the puck or freezes it against the boards. He doesn't corral the puck but Pearson is out of the play and Spooner has an easy play to pick the puck up with some space. If Spooner doesn't mess up the pass, its an easy breakout

I think Pionk focuses too much on getting it out of the zone instead of starting the breakout. Pretty much handing the puck back to the opposing team. Also Staal isn't the best player to help him pass it off and find open space. Staal stands around too much, taking himself out of the play. As if he's scared to receive the puck in his own zone

 

[DanielBrassard]

That's good stuff FD, thanks for taking the time to watch it and posting it. I would definitely have to agree with effen that the pass to Zucc would have been much too risky of a pass in that situation, although if he saw it and connected it would have led to an attack.

 

[offdacrossbar]

the wiff at the end of the sharks game was brutal.

 

[aufheben]

1k posts

Part II: https://hfboards.mandatory.com/threads/neal-pionk-part-ii.2563235/