Nothing Nice To Say

I try to find something positive to say about the NHL's worst team

There comes a point in the regular season where I know what teams I need to focus on. Not that I put games on the backburner with A3Z, but there are teams where I kind of just do my job with collecting the data & don’t really dig into the nuances of the games or players. It’s kind of what you have to do when you’re trying to track every team & get everyone up to a reasonable sample.

Since I’m tracking some of these games anyway, I thought a fun exercise would be to come up with some positive takeaways from the worst teams in the league. I can usually find 2-3 good takeaways from most games & even the worst teams have a few nights where everything clicks.

This year, it might be a challenge because the Connor Bedard race led to some truly awful teams competing for the top lottery pick. None of them were worse than the Anaheim Ducks. You have to back to the 70’s to find a team with a worse goal differential than them (although the 2019-20 Red Wings had a chance before COVID cut their season short). The Ducks will likely be the biggest challenge in this project because this team was truly awful in every facet.

I’m not sure if I’ve ever seen anything like this in the A3Z project before, but like I said, I can usually find something good to focus on when you dig into the details of a game. Granted, it took a couple of tries when reviewing Anaheim’s footage.

Turning the Page

Deciding when to enter the “we need to win some damn games” phase is the toughest part of the rebuild. Ottawa is figuring that out & Los Angeles decided to flip the switch a couple years ago. This probably wasn’t what Anaheim had in mind last year even though they spent long-term money on middle-of-the-roster players like Ryan Strome and Frank Vatrano. Their AHL club is kind of old & even though they made some strides in 2021-22, this was looking like a roster that had a few more Years of Pain ahead regardless of who they brought in.

They reached a crossroads with their old defense corps, Cam Fowler being the lone remaining member from the old guard, and filling most of the spots with one-year deals. Most of those players have moved on and while I wouldn’t say it fixes their problems, they couldn’t exit the zone, stop a cycle and had nobody who could handle top-four minutes except Fowler.

Getting 20% better play from their group next year shouldn’t be that difficult. I’m not sure if Radko Gudas & Robert Hagg will be much better, but I assume some prospects are going to be in the mix as they’re in the process of overhauling their defense. Speaking as a fan, sometimes it’s easier to stomach losing hockey when you have more prospects in the lineup, because you’re just evaluating who is going to stick around when the Pain Years are over instead of playing out the string.

They also looked like they wanted to play a more skilled game than what the roster was suited for. There’s dumping the puck in by choice & “dumping” the puck in because you made an errant pass or made a poor play in the neutral zone. Anaheim was in the latter category more often than not. Watching some of their games, it always looked like they had some skilled plays in mind that they couldn’t execute.

Seeing a forward trying to skate through traffic & make a play to a guy standing still was a common theme. It looked like they were trying to play like the Blues did in 2021-22 where they regroup in the defensive zone & try to attack, but it didn’t work in practice. There are more players in the league who can carry the puck in against a set forecheck now, but Anaheim only has two (Zegras & Terry, McTavish might get there) & they didn’t get much help from linemates or their defensemen for support options. So, you ended up with a lot of turnovers and stretches where they were stuck in their own zone.

Their defense isn’t terrible at carrying the puck, as Klingberg, Fowler and (strangely) Kulikov are all players that like to get up in the play but it’s more of an ancillary skillset for a defenseman unless you’re of the Dahlin/Karlsson/Josi mold and getting 5-6 opportunities to carry the puck in per game. I would assume they’re planing to simplify their approach here with Radko Gudas taking a top-four spot. Jamie Drysdale getting big minutes could balance that out, though. He’s still finding his way in the NHL, but he is the type of d-man that loves to rush the puck & join the attack so I’m interested to see how the rest of his game fits in.

Again, this doesn’t really “fix” anything about the Ducks but getting them just a little better probably sets them up more for when they’re ready to compete. The roster isn’t good, but basically every forward on the roster except Adam Henrique put up dismal numbers, especially in terms of defensive impact. Strome in particular had some of the worst in recent NHL history. Do they suck that much at hockey, or does it stem from a broken playing style where the roster is caught in between?

Getting just a little more connectivity between the forwards & D could go a long way, especially with some rookies coming in. They had a lot of these “reload” types of plays that they tried last year that didn’t work even though passing is the strength of guys like Klingberg & Shattenkirk. Most teams just dump the puck in & play a simple game when they get drawn off-side, but Anaheim was looking for the extra play, they just couldn’t do it. I’m interested in how Greg Cronin has their next wave of defensemen handle these types of plays. It’s less about winning games & more about installing good habits for the next few years.

Terry & Zegras

Another crossroad the Ducks are at is paying their top two offensive players long-term. It’s a little more complicated with Terry than Zegras because he’s older & might not be on this team when they’re ready to compete. As for last year, the Ducks positives starts & ends with these two. I mean, just look at this.

This undersells Adam Henrique a lot, but these two were still the Ducks catalysts for any offense. Terry in particular has been one of the top players in the league at turning zone entries into scoring chances (and still potted 23 goals in a bad shooting year). He was someone I had pegged for a breakout a few years ago because he had an uncanny knack for creating his own offense without needing to be setup. From then, it was just a matter of finishing & getting ice-time. His goals will fluctuate, but you have a high-ceiling with him. He’s a slam-dunk keeper, it’s just a matter of how many more Years of Pain the Ducks plan to have & if they want Terry around for the long haul. Scorers are the toughest & most expensive players to find/keep, so this is a tricky situation.

Zegras is a little more interesting. He’s kind of at the point where he’s considered a star while also still figuring out what he is at the NHL level. Being a high draft pick with a flashy skillset goes a long way, but it helps that he has the points to back it up. What also helps is that the Ducks usually score more goals when he is on the ice. In all three (technically) seasons he’s been in the league, Anaheim has outscored their xG whenever Zegras is on ice, whether it’s through his own shot or setting plays up. This can happen to anybody in one season, but when you’re on Year 3 through multiple models (see HockeyViz & Evolving Wild), it’s looking like a positive trend.

My own stats weren’t as high on Zegras, as he’s far from a complete player and he seemed to get caught in the muck the rest of the team was stuck in last year. He didn’t create as much offense in volume & couldn’t dangle through the neutral zone at will like he did in his rookie year. The one thing that stayed consistent was that he was still setting up chances & making plays that are very hard to do at the NHL level.

Note the high danger plays, one-timers & passes from the middle. Those are high percentage plays & if you can execute them consistently, you’re more likely to finish chances at a higher rate. Zegras has that going for him, despite some of the issues in the other two zones. The Ducks yo-yoed him between center & wing and positions were kind of thrown out the window when I was watching their games. He would be down low helping out sometimes & other times he would fly the zone looking for a stretch pass before the puck was even gone. One of those instances actually led to a controlled entry, surprisingly.

Stuff like this is probably going out the window if he gets moved to center, but you’re starting to see more players like this now. Their skill level is so high that they can outscore their problems to a point. Zegras kind of stretched the limits with his play in the defensive zone last year. Part of what makes players like Jack Hughes so dangerous is they can retrieve the puck & go end-to-end. With Zegras, it was more like far-blueline-to-end unless it was off a turnover high in the zone. I really want to see how he looks when the Ducks aren’t a defensive catastrophe before making any final judgements, though.

The vision on broken plays in the offensive zone is also starting to come around for him.

Mason McTavish

Unlike Zegras, the Ducks had McTavish play mostly at center in his rookie season and neither sank nor swam. His numbers were typical of most young rookies that I’ve tracked before where they don’t get a lot of puck touches but try to make the 3-4 they get per game count. He likes to carry the puck but didn’t do it often & was average in terms of things like chance/shot creation.

The games I watched were a little more impressive, but he had real linemates (Adam Henrique & Troy Terry) whereas most of the year it looks like he was stuck with some conglomeration of bottom-sixers with no consistent group. I was confused why they gave Alex Killorn so much money, but it’s starting to make more sense now.

Still, there were things that I liked about him. He made a lot of small, sneaky plays to protect the puck and keep possession going for the Ducks. Probably the type of skillset that will translate better when he puts on some more weight & can do it in all three zones. Killorn’s been one of the better support players in the league, especially with helping zone exits, so I can see these two working together.

The Ducks really wanted to establish him as a threat on the power play. They tried setting up this play five times before it eventually connected.

His wrister is pretty good too.

Definitely interested to see where the next level is with him because treading water on last year’s Ducks team is worth something.

Overall, there’s a lot about this Ducks team that I still don’t know. How good is Leo Carlsson going to be? What are they getting back for John Gibson? Will their string of developing NHL defensemen continue with this next wave of prospects? Things can’t get much worse than they were last year.