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getting better at faceoffs

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04-07-2012, 10:04 PM
  #1
Illinest
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getting better at faceoffs

The weak link Evgeni Malkin - 47.5% on faceoffs.

Staal - 50.7%
Crosby - 50.6% (but I think we'd all agree that he can do better. The two prior seasons were 55.7% and 55.9%)

Park - 55.1%
Grand Champion - Vitale - 55.5%



If you go back 5 years you see a team that had Sid at about 50%, Talbot took a lot at about 44%, This was also Malkin and Staal's rookie year at 43% and 37% respectively. Our aces - if you can even call them that - were Dominic Moore at 53% and Erik Christensen at 56%.

So we don't have one of those monster faceoff guys who wins more than 60% of the time but there has been vast improvement up and down the lineup.

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04-07-2012, 10:13 PM
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Somebody said Scott Hartnell is the most improve player in the league right now, I disagree. Hartnell is having a solid season, but he hit 30 goals before and 60 points before. He hasn't really improved from what I can see, he's just playing with better linemates.

Malkin is the most improved. He improved his faceoffs, he improved his discipline, he definitely looks stronger than before. Malkin is in his best form ever, the guy just came off major surgery on his ACL/MCL and put up 109 points in 75 games. Mind boggling.

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04-07-2012, 10:48 PM
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I can remember most the time in the late 90's early 00's talking about how horrible our faceoffs were. I'm too lazy to look at all the stats from those years, but it seems like we've come quite a ways in that department the last couple years. It's great knowing we have a chance of winning a faceoff in the defensive zone without putting Kent Manderville out there (i can remember people mad that we didn't resign him just because of his faceoff ability).

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04-08-2012, 02:26 AM
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The Pens are good now at them, took long enough lol.

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04-08-2012, 10:45 AM
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Whatever happened to ziggamanis? He was amazing at it.

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04-08-2012, 11:29 AM
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ColePens
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Blitzburgh87 View Post
Whatever happened to ziggamanis? He was amazing at it.
Are you trolling me? I was a huge Ziggy fan. I'll still reference the Detroit game early in the season when he was dominant on the faceoffs and the only reason we got back in the game.

The stats on NHL.com say this (slightly different from OP):

Joe Vitale & Richard Park: 55.7% ()
Jordan Staal: 51%
Sidney Crosby: 50.1% (down from last year.. and one of those things that is actually taking him longer to work back in his game)
Evgeni Malkin: 47.5% (A huge increase from his past years)

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04-08-2012, 11:32 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ColePens View Post
Are you trolling me? I was a huge Ziggy fan. I'll still reference the Detroit game early in the season when he was dominant on the faceoffs and the only reason we got back in the game.

The stats on NHL.com say this (slightly different from OP):

Joe Vitale & Richard Park: 55.7% ()
Jordan Staal: 51%
Sidney Crosby: 50.1% (down from last year.. and one of those things that is actually taking him longer to work back in his game)
Evgeni Malkin: 47.5% (A huge increase from his past years)
I'd be curious to see Malkin's numbers after the first two months of the season. IIRC, he was pretty bad for the first couple months; high 30's low 40's. I wouldn't be surprised to find out he's better than 50% over the last 4 months.

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04-08-2012, 12:59 PM
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Sidney the Kidney
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I actually think Staal's improvement, getting his faceoff percentage over 50%, is huge. Coming into this year, that's been one of my bigger complaints about him. Great defensively, but not especially good on draws.

One area it helps is the PK. Instead of losing the draw and the Pens having to run around their own zone, trying to stop the other team from setting up, now he wins his fair share and the Pens can ice the puck right off the bat.

I also think Vitale at center on the 4th line over Adams (who was there last year) is huge, for similar reasons as Staal's improvement is huge. Instead of an automatic loss (Adams sucks on draws) and the Pens scrambling to regain the puck, Vitale allows the Pens to control the puck more often than not.

Sid's not at where he was prior to his layoff, but he'll get there. Hopefully in the playoffs he'll get back to his ~55% winning rate. In which case, the Pens will have 3 centers (I don't count Park since he'll likely be a scratch) who win over 50% of their draws -- which is huge.

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04-08-2012, 02:12 PM
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Illinest
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My numbers were for 81 games. Colepens numbers were for 82. Same general idea anyways. Improvement on faceoffs. Both personal improvement (especially malkin and staal) and teamwide improvement.

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04-08-2012, 05:03 PM
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Crosby's decrease isn't too worrisome for me, since faceoffs are so timing-dependent and Sid just hasn't had the amount of time he needs to get back to 100% there.

It's still worth noting that even a little off, he's way better than a good chunk of the league on them.

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04-09-2012, 11:45 PM
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I judge Geno's season from Jan. 15th on when we were in the midst of our losing streak and he started carrying the team. Really don't think his knee was anywhere near 100% until around that timeframe.

Not counting the last two games of the season since he played wing, he's right around 50%. He's all over the place quite often, but that's impressive nonetheless.

That whole 32 goals and 130+pt pace in that timeframe doesn't hurt either. It's nuts to think what kind of numbers he could have put up if his knee was ready to go game 1 of the season.

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04-10-2012, 12:26 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ColePens View Post
Are you trolling me? I was a huge Ziggy fan. I'll still reference the Detroit game early in the season when he was dominant on the faceoffs and the only reason we got back in the game.

The stats on NHL.com say this (slightly different from OP):

Joe Vitale & Richard Park: 55.7% ()
Jordan Staal: 51%
Sidney Crosby: 50.1% (down from last year.. and one of those things that is actually taking him longer to work back in his game)
Evgeni Malkin: 47.5% (A huge increase from his past years)
Haha. The Guy was easily the best in the league at it. Plus he had a little scoring touch for a 3rd or 4th liner. And Malkin has definitely gotten better. Crosby kind of dropped off but egh he's damn near perfect anyway.

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