Based on expected goals and possession metrics.
To be fair to Skinner, the offense hasn't converted their xGF to GF well either. But I trust this forward group to start scoring more than I trust Skinner.
That's not really a knock on Skinner - more an inherent and implicit trust in McDrai and recognizing we have 3 top6 quality wings injured and Nuge playing line dog shit.
Yeah these things are usually figured out by the various xGF% models. I also agree that I trust the forwards to revert to their normal shooting% more than I trust our tenders to improve.
Forward name, current shooting %, career %, Shots, expected additional goals
Skinner, 6.5%, 11.1%, 61, 2.8
RNH, 4.5%, 11.9%, 44, 1.9
Hyman, 5.9%, 13.4%, 51, 2.9
Arvidsson, 5.3%, 10.9%, 38, 1.9
Henrique, 5.7%, 15.3%, 35, 1.8
I didn't do the rest of the team, but Drai is higher than normal (+4.9 goals), McDavid is bang on normal, and Bouch is slightly ahead of normal (+2 goals), and they are the 3 highest scoring players right now, so likely cover the portion of the team that is shooting better than normal at a level that is impactful.
For the secondary scoring players we are down just over 11 goals, and they are all shooting at roughly half of what they have traditionally done in their careers. I fully anticipate some positive regression to the mean for most of the above players, and some negative regression to the mean for Drai.
Stu Skinner is another bad story, where his save% is .882 now compared to a .907 career avg. This is -9.9 GA expected swing. I don't think he will improve much truthfully though, as our goalie coach has a history of torpedoing tenders the longer they are with him. I suspect nothing different with Skinner.