Granlund - the next Backstrom?

[jcairns]

I don't have the pleasure of watching many non-Montreal/non-Canuck games, so am looking to get a read on Granlund.

Is it safe to assume he will be similar to Backstrom? OK shot totals, and heavy in the assist department? Maybe something like a 15-20 goal scorer, 60-assist guy? This is what his current stat line seems to indicate, so I am just throwing it out there based off that.

[Shiva Blaster]

I don't have the pleasure of watching many non-Montreal/non-Canuck games, so am looking to get a read on Granlund.

Is it safe to assume he will be similar to Backstrom? OK shot totals, and heavy in the assist department? Maybe something like a 15-20 goal scorer, 60-assist guy? This is what his current stat line seems to indicate, so I am just throwing it out there based off that.

I don't like that comparison, personally. Granlund is looking great these days, but let's not get carried away. Backstrom is one of the top-3 playmakers in the NHL today, Granlund isn't going to touch Backstrom's assist, ppp or point production for a long time, if ever. Backstrom has 90+ point potential any given season and feel that's far too generous of a comparison. Granlund is a well-rounded player, but doesn't possess the superior vision or ability to slow the game down like Backstrom does.

I've seen a decent amount of Granlund, but a LOT of Backstrom. I owned him for 2 years in my keeper, along with Carlson, and so I watched a lot of Caps games. Personally, I feel that Backstrom is the most under-rated superstar in hockey.....in both fantasy and reality. The guy is a supreme talent.

[jcairns]

I don't like that comparison, personally. Granlund is looking great these days, but let's not get carried away. Backstrom is one of the top-3 playmakers in the NHL today, Granlund isn't going to touch Backstrom's assist, ppp or point production for a long time, if ever. Backstrom has 90+ point potential any given season and feel that's far too generous of a comparison. Granlund is a well-rounded player, but doesn't possess the superior vision or ability to slow the game down like Backstrom does.

I've seen a decent amount of Granlund, but a LOT of Backstrom. I owned him for 2 years in my keeper, along with Carlson, and so I watched a lot of Caps games. Personally, I feel that Backstrom is the most under-rated superstar in hockey.....in both fantasy and reality. The guy is a supreme talent.

No disagreement there. I meant the comparison as far as ratios and type of player (not necessarily point potential). I mentioned a 15-20 goal scorer, 60 assist guy. So that would bring Granlund in around the 75-80 pt mark, and with OK shot totals. Fair assumption?

[Shiva Blaster]

No disagreement there. I meant the comparison as far as ratios and type of player (not necessarily point potential). I mentioned a 15-20 goal scorer, 60 assist guy. So that would bring Granlund in around the 75-80 pt mark, and with OK shot totals. Fair assumption?

I still see Granlund as being more of a well-rounded player in that he's not primarily a set-up man like a Backstrom or Thornton.....I always wished Backstrom would shoot more, when he does shoot it's usually only because there are zero passing options......I think Granlund has more of a nose for the net. I think his ratio will end up being a little more goal-heavy, with his point upside being about right. I see him being more of a 25-30 goal, 40-45 assist guy in the future.

[Shiva Blaster]

I think you may be extrapolating too much from his numbers this year. If you look at his last year pro overseas, Granlund put up 20 G 31A for 51 pts in 45 games. I think that's a better indication of what kind of G/A ratio to expect than his small sample size in the NHL.

[austeane]

Ya, get a couple more years of sample size before you draw conclusions about goals/assists ratio.

[Maaaasquito]

Good conversation, Angus and I had a bit of a discussion over Granlund in our latest exchange.

http://www.anguscertified.com/talkin...n-ma-volume-3/

I'll bring up some of my points from the discussion.

I'll preface by saying that I'm approaching this from more of a "reality" perspective as opposed to an "upside" perspective.

The reality is that a 60-assist player is extremely rare in this day and age of the NHL. At the moment, there's only about 5 players (Crosby, Thornton, Backstrom, Keith and Malkin) who are realistically on pace to finish the season with 60 assists... So when you throw numbers like Granlund possibly being a 60-assist guy, you're really lumping him in that "superstar" category. Does he have the "potential", why certainly he does, but am I willing to go out and say that he will, I think I'd be grasping at straws to convince someone that he's in Crosby/Thornton/Backstom/Malkin territory at the moment. I mean coming from another perspective, if Tavares, Getzlaf, Seguin, Toews and Benn aren't even hitting the 60-assist mark, it'd be hard to anoint Granlund being a better 60-assist candidate than any of those guys listed...

Also if you break down the numbers even further, most of those "assist heavy" guys tend to play on teams that are much more "offense oriented" than "defensive focused". It's simple math, players that play on teams that average 3.5 goals per game, will have much more "point producing potential" than a player playing on a team who averages 2.5.

3.5 * 82 * 3 (points per goal) = ~861 points to be divided by players (optimal situation)
2.5 * 82 * 3 = ~615 points to be divided by players (optimal situation)

So team situation plays a huge role in terms of point/assist production for a player, simply because the "size of the pie".

Where this really hurts Granlund is that Minny has always been a "defense first" team, "Another huge factor which will prevent him from producing “superstar numbers” is team structure. 25th (2.36), 22nd (2.46), 30th (2.02), 26th (2.48) and 22nd (2.61) in offensive rankings (goals per game) during the last five seasons. Parise is essentially a point-per-game player, but isn’t much more than a 70-point producer in Minnesota. That’s what’s going to hurt Granlund."

A third scenario that really hurts Granlund is competition from within the team. If you look at a lot of the high point/assist producers, many of them basically play on teams that lack scoring depth.

If you look at Crosby/Malkin/Kane/Giroux/Okposo/MSL/Seguin, and compare them to what the "rest of the team" produces, you can see a distinct trend. If you look at "offense-by-committee" teams with a good spread of offense, Blues, Kings, Bruins, Jets, Wild the players on those teams, tend to have a leveling factor with their production. With the competition being so stiff in Minny, Koivu, Parise, Pominville, Granlund isn't in an ideal spot to really produce high end numbers.

Another point to make to Shiva's point, is that overseas numbers tend to be a bit skewed, and doesn't necessarily transfer over 100%, in the SM-liiga he might have been a bit more goal heavy because he was more of the "go to" guy on his team. Maybe the more open ice surface was more conducive for Granlund to showcase his scoring ability. In the NHL and the difference in talent and ice surface, could limit his goal scoring ability.

Nigel Dawes is a perfect example, 39 goals in 212 career NHL games. He has 62 in 157 KHL games during the last 3 seasons. So I would be a little bit wary of looking at overseas stats to pigeonhole players...

Once again, the NHL is a dynamic league, where things chop and change all the time. But given the information that we have, and assuming things remain relatively close to status quo. I see a little bit more Kopitar (20-25 goals, 35-40 assist, minus the SOG) in Granlund than Backstrom when taking into account team offensive structure, scoring depth on team, and role on the team.

[plug]

Whoa....highlight Granlund on your draft list... I love that he is being knocked down to Kopitar Pickup a solid producer for the future..

[ross10019]

Once again, the NHL is a dynamic league, where things chop and change all the time. But given the information that we have, and assuming things remain relatively close to status quo. I see a little bit more Kopitar (20-25 goals, 35-40 assist, minus the SOG) in Granlund than Backstrom when taking into account team offensive structure, scoring depth on team, and role on the team.

So I was following along agreeing with your reasoning. I too believe Granlund won't ever be Backstrom.

Then I read this last paragraph, that Kopitar is a 55 to 65 pt player. Say what? Kopitar had 61 pts his rookie season, then put up 6 seasons of 77, 66, 81, 73, 76 and pro-rated 73 last year. As a Granlund owner, I'd be pretty happy with those numbers, and feel he can reach them. Not sure how you came up with those numbers for Kopitar, but they're way off. Maybe you were mistaking him for Dustin Brown

[MXHockey]

He's been great this year, but I don't see it. Backstrom is waaaaaaaaay ahead of him. Granlund hasn't even surpassed Mikko yet.

Cheers.

[Maaaasquito]

So I was following along agreeing with your reasoning. I too believe Granlund won't ever be Backstrom.

Then I read this last paragraph, that Kopitar is a 55 to 65 pt player. Say what? Kopitar had 61 pts his rookie season, then put up 6 seasons of 77, 66, 81, 73, 76 and pro-rated 73 last year. As a Granlund owner, I'd be pretty happy with those numbers, and feel he can reach them. Not sure how you came up with those numbers for Kopitar, but they're way off. Maybe you were mistaking him for Dustin Brown

You have me confused... those numbers were for Granlund (20-25 G with 35-40 assists) not Kopitar, so sorry for the confusion. But I was also referring to the 2013-14 Kopitar, not the 2008-2012 Kopitar.

At the moment and how DS has structured the team, Kopitar isn't much more than a 65-75 pointer IMO and even then I'd probably lean towards closer to 65 than 75.

If you just look at how they're structured, 2.34 goals per game (tied for 3rd last in the entire league), their offense is actually worst than Calgary, Edmonton, Florida and Nashville... Then add in the fact that he has to compete with Carter, Richards, Williams and Gabby plus chuck in guys like Brown, Stoll, Vey, Toffoli and King for points, you've got to think how that already diminished pie is going to get split even more...

Gone are the days of point-per-game Kopitar IMO...

Of course there's nothing to say that the offense won't suddenly wake up back to 2.73 (2012-13) levels once again, but until that happens you're really reaching to think that Kops is a bonafide point-per-gamer in this day and age.

[agentzero]

20-25G, 40+A.

Saku Koivu 2.0 in my opinion. Smart, quick player. 70 pt upside with a slight chance of cracking it to like 73..

[Spec7ral]

Granlund is playing with some top notch NHLers right now, if you take them away his numbers would suffer. Backstrom plays stretches without Ovie at times (albeit not long ones) but his vision allows him to create offense without Ovie. I think Granlund may have 80 points in him, but he'd have to stay healthy (which he is yet to prove for a full season) and keep the type of company he is currently playing with ( and Koivu could always usurp his top line spot if the coach sees fit). I also think Yeo is a bit of a flake, but he has finally put Granlund on the top line, so maybe he's figuring it out a bit.

[SeaDawg]

20-25G, 40+A.

Saku Koivu 2.0 in my opinion. Smart, quick player. 70 pt upside with a slight chance of cracking it to like 73..

^^^^this