Thursday, January 22, 2009

What a Difference a Year Makes

In the above picture Rob Schremp celebrates his 1st goal as a Springfield Falcon on October 7th 2007, an OT winner in his 3rd game as a Falcon in the '07-08 season. This season it took him until his 14th game to score his first of the season. So far his season to date has been inferior to his '07-08 campaign statistically.

I decided to look at select Oilers prospects as well as 2 new key Falcons to compare how they did last season Vs. this season in the same amount of games they've played to date. Let's see how they've done in relation to what they did last year.....

Rob Schremp

'07-08 34gp. 9-27-36 -4 83sog. 30pim.
'08-09 34gp. 5-21-26 -5 74sog. 14pim.
-10 points, -9 in shots on goal
Worse in all areas except he's taking less non physical penalties (-16PIM).

Ryan Potulny
'07-08 36gp. 13-18-31 -11 117sog. 35pim.
'08-09 36gp. 17-14-31 -3 130sog. 26pim.
+8 in +/- , +13 in sog., -9 PIM.
Better across the board except in total points

Ryan Stone
'07-08 40gp. 7-15-22 -3 71sog. 81pim.
'08-09 40gp. 10-20-30 +3 72sog. 57pim.
Better in all areas except less PIM. for a physical player (-24PIM)

Slava Trukhno
'07-08 27gp. 5-8-13 -3 18sog. 17pim.
'08-09 27gp. 3-12-15 -1 46sog. 14pim.
Showed a large improvement in shots on goal (+28) and small improvements elsewhere.

Ryan O'Marra

'07-08 31gp. total 2-7-9 +1 43sog. 31pim.
'08-09 32gp. 1-4-5 -6 43sog. 25pim.
-4 points -8 in +/-
Absolutely no improvement shown.

Colin McDonald

'07-08 40gp. 9-10-19 -10 101sog. 28pim.
'08-09 40gp. 3-5-8 -7 65sog. 26pim.
-11 points -36sog.
A little better in +/- but not enough to offset his lack of production.

Theo Peckham

'07-08 39gp. 6-2-8 -9 37sog. 111pim.
'08-09 39gp. 5-11-16 -1 53sog. 73pim.
Double the points(+8), +16 in sog., +8 in +/- but almost 40 less PIM for what should be one of the Falcons most physical players.

Outside of Peckham, the other returning Falcons players have shown little progress statistically or are headed in the wrong direction altogether. Their team has been MUCH worse to this point in the season this year, but it is definitely not an encouraging trend. And Peckham hasn't been nearly as physical and intimidating as he was last season despite the fact that he's been better offensively and defensively this season.

If the purpose of an AHL affiliate is to improve their players on paper the Oilers have failed on that department for whatever reason. I feel that the Falcons will go on a tear soon, but the problem is that guys like McDonald and O'Marra will most likely be HS casualties of a stronger lineup. However their play dictates less ice time anyway.

3 comments:

oilerdago said...

Nice work BB. Peckham is a keeper and should be challenging for a full time roster spot next fall.

What are your thoughts on Dubnyk?

Jordan said...

My only concern with the numbers you're showing are based on the role changes and TOI that the different players have on the team. All of the players have seen their roles change a fair bit, except for Schremp, and I'm pretty sure that all of the players this year are suffering from the same slump. If you look at their numbers as a group and compare where they were at 20 games in, and then compare those to the numbers now, I beleive that the "lack of progress" you are talking about is really just the team's slump.

WHat would be really interesting would be traking the player's progress this year and last year, as you are doing, and then compare the falcons' record as a team over the same time period.

I think that would help you address the concern I have brought up.

Bryanbryoil said...

Unleaded-No doubt their 20 game slump killed their production as a whole, but in terms of players like O'Marra and McDonald, their individual play has been horrible.

Outside of Schremp's play during the skid, it could easily be argued that the first 20 games this year was the best that he's played in the AHL in terms of what he was able to accomplish at ES.

The team shouldn't be slumping anymore so we'll see how the numbers react to that. I personally feel that Schremp is on the verge of a tear in particular if they keep him down the middle.

As for the teams record, that would be difficult considering that guys like Trukhno and O'Marra were scratches last year and that O'Marra only played 31 games total.

At this time last year IIRC the Falcons were in the playoff hunt in the 3rd or 4th spot. This year they are comfortably in the boat anchor position in the division.