Toffoli Vs. Kucherov

[rataylor22]

Interesting. I haven't seen many opinions stating that Toffoli has reached his peak. I still think there's decent room for growth there. I've seen plenty of people saying Toffoli can hit 70 (which is something Kucherov is certainly capable of, but has yet to do).

Has Toffoli peaked? Tough to say, but he's a lot closer to his peak than Kucherov.

In terms of my league set up, Kuckerov did not beat Toffoli in "every category" last season. Far from it actually. Toffoli led in several. The only category with a significant separation was PPP.

I literally said per game stats, you just aren't paying attention.

Kucherov: 0.39 G/g, 0.47 A/g, 0.39 PIM/g, 0.32 PPP/g, 2.71 S/g

Toffoli: 0.38 G/g, 0.33 A/g, 0.24 PIM/g, 0.13 PPP/g, 2.6 S/g

If you'll notice, Kucherov has the high number in each category, indicating he wins each category.

Overall Tampa has better point-generating players, I agree. But the argument can be made that since Tampa has so many options, then their scoring will be more spread out, where as LA's top line will be looked at to carry the load. Also, in my opinion Kopitar is much better than TJ, and is on-par with Stamkos. And Doughty is better than Hedman. So while Tampa has a better group of point generators, the quality of players that will surround Toffoli when he's on the ice is just as strong as the players that will surround Kucherov.

Real life players? Sure they are. Point producers? They are not. Plus LA plays a much more defensive system. Plus we have more than enough data (2+ years) to show that LA is much more likely to spread the and score by committee than Tampa is.

Does it matter if Toffoli gets more PP time? Well, lets just say if Toffoli had the same PP time as Kucherov last year, theres a good chance he would of out scored him by the end of the year. So yeah, I think it does matter.

Based on? You're not accounting for Toffoli going from the central point on PP2 to a secondary piece on PP1. Plus, LA just spreads the wealth on their PP. Who knows what Toffoli could do with Kucherov's 251 minutes of PPTOI, but Kopitar lead all LA forwards with 208 minutes of PPTOI, and Toffoli had 171, so he doesn't have much room to grow there anyways.

[sharpp87]

Kucherov here for sure.

[tomastop]

I don't think they are in the same tier. I definitely prefer Kucherov.

[an0maly]

@ rataylor22
lol, damn, condescending much?

1. I got that you were using per game stats, but you kind of missed my point. Yes, Kucherov played 5 fewer games, I'm well aware, but at the end of the week I don't get bonus points based on per-game statistics that would of theoretically occurred. The books on last season are closed, the numbers are locked in, and again, with the final tallies, Kucherov did not beat Toffoli in every category. Does this mean anything going into next season? No, not particularly, but I never said it did... I simply stated the indisputable fact that based on last years complete statistics, Kucherov did not beat Toffoli in all of my league's categories.

2. TJ and Hedman are better point producers than Kopitar and Doughty? God damn, that's news to me.

3. LA is more likely to score by committee than Tampa? Wow... care to explain why LA's top 5 scorers last year (Kopitar, Carter, Toffoli, Lucic, & Doughty) scored 50% (300/600) of their team's points, where as Tampa's top 5 scorers (Kucherov, Stamkos, Hedman, Palat, & Killorn) only scored 43% (257/585) of their team's points? Notice how Tampa's top 5 scored a smaller percentage of their team's total points? That means Tampa was the more "score by committee" team. (let me guess, you're going to quickly blame this on TJ's shit season and Stamkos' injury? Well during the 2014-15 season LA's Top 5 scored 45% where as TBay's score 46%, so over the 2 seasons combined Tbay is still the higher score by committee sqaud, sorry.)

4. Of course I'm taking into account Toffoli's the bump from PP2 to PP1. That shift leads to increased ice time. Increased ice time over an 82 game span will theoretically lead to an increase in point production. The point I was trying to get across was that if the 2 players in question had equal PPTOI then it would be interesting to see how far apart they'd be in terms of overall production. Toffoli has never gotten the amount of ice time Kucherov has been given, but there is reason to believe that is about to change. Toffoli is without question LA's best winger now. He is 24 and entering his prime. There is plenty of reason to think that his totals will go up as his ice time does, and the numbers reflect that. What numbers am I basing this on? These:

From 2014-15 to 2015-16 Kucherov had an ATOI increase of 3:16, which resulted in a 0.06 PPG increase
From 2014-15 to 2015-16 Toffoli had an ATOI increase of 2:44, which also resulted in a 0.06 PPG increase

As you can see, Toffoli had the same PPG increase, but a sizeably smaller ATOI increase. If Toffoli gets a larger ATOI increase in 2016-17 than Kucherov, and that ATOI increase includes significant PP time, then their total ice time may start to look similar... which may lead to their point totals being alot closer than many people would predict.

But hey, I guess I'm just "not paying attention".

P.s: I can be condescending for no reason too.

[rataylor22]

@ rataylor22
lol, damn, condescending much?

1. I got that you were using per game stats, but you kind of missed my point. Yes, Kucherov played 5 fewer games, I'm well aware, but at the end of the week I don't get bonus points based on per-game statistics that would of theoretically occurred. The books on last season are closed, the numbers are locked in, and again, with the final tallies, Kucherov did not beat Toffoli in every category. Does this mean anything going into next season? No, not particularly, but I never said it did... I simply stated the indisputable fact that based on last years complete statistics, Kucherov did not beat Toffoli in all of my league's categories.

2. TJ and Hedman are better point producers than Kopitar and Doughty? God damn, that's news to me.

3. LA is more likely to score by committee than Tampa? Wow... care to explain why LA's top 5 scorers last year (Kopitar, Carter, Toffoli, Lucic, & Doughty) scored 50% (300/600) of their team's points, where as Tampa's top 5 scorers (Kucherov, Stamkos, Hedman, Palat, & Killorn) only scored 43% (257/585) of their team's points? Notice how Tampa's top 5 scored a smaller percentage of their team's total points? That means Tampa was the more "score by committee" team. (let me guess, you're going to quickly blame this on TJ's shit season and Stamkos' injury? Well during the 2014-15 season LA's Top 5 scored 45% where as TBay's score 46%, so over the 2 seasons combined Tbay is still the higher score by committee sqaud, sorry.)

4. Of course I'm taking into account Toffoli's the bump from PP2 to PP1. That shift leads to increased ice time. Increased ice time over an 82 game span will theoretically lead to an increase in point production. The point I was trying to get across was that if the 2 players in question had equal PPTOI then it would be interesting to see how far apart they'd be in terms of overall production. Toffoli has never gotten the amount of ice time Kucherov has been given, but there is reason to believe that is about to change. Toffoli is without question LA's best winger now. He is 24 and entering his prime. There is plenty of reason to think that his totals will go up as his ice time does, and the numbers reflect that. What numbers am I basing this on? These:

From 2014-15 to 2015-16 Kucherov had an ATOI increase of 3:16, which resulted in a 0.06 PPG increase
From 2014-15 to 2015-16 Toffoli had an ATOI increase of 2:44, which also resulted in a 0.06 PPG increase

As you can see, Toffoli had the same PPG increase, but a sizeably smaller ATOI increase. If Toffoli gets a larger ATOI increase in 2016-17 than Kucherov, and that ATOI increase includes significant PP time, then their total ice time may start to look similar... which may lead to their point totals being alot closer than many people would predict.

But hey, I guess I'm just "not paying attention".

P.s: I can be condescending for no reason too.

You were trying to be condescending? That's some real good data, but just a piss poor attempt at being condescending. Maybe you should not be so sensitive.

How great it would be if hockey was like basketball, and the top 5 scorers on a team were all that really mattered. Considering Toffoli was third on LA in ATOI behind Kopitar, I'd love to see where you're pulling this magical extra ice time for Toffoli from. Considering his most common linemates on the PP last season where Kopitar, Carter, and Lucic, I'd love to see where this notion comes from that he didn't play first PP last season. I guess if you want to pretend like coach tendencies don't exist, that's great for you, but I'll live in the reality that Sutter tends to more equally spread his ice time across all 4 lines, and as such Toffoli's ice time is limited. I'm not really particularly concerned that those 3rd and 4th liners on LA don't produce as well as the 3rd and 4th liners in Tampa, the point is Cooper is going to give his top players more offensive run than his bottom players, and more importantly, he's going to load up his PP and let his best players produce, which Sutter does not.

Ultimately, yea, I guess you're not.

[an0maly]

You were trying to be condescending? That's some real good data, but just a piss poor attempt at being condescending. Maybe you should not be so sensitive.

How great it would be if hockey was like basketball, and the top 5 scorers on a team were all that really mattered. Considering Toffoli was third on LA in ATOI behind Kopitar, I'd love to see where you're pulling this magical extra ice time for Toffoli from. Considering his most common linemates on the PP last season where Kopitar, Carter, and Lucic, I'd love to see where this notion comes from that he didn't play first PP last season. I guess if you want to pretend like coach tendencies don't exist, that's great for you, but I'll live in the reality that Sutter tends to more equally spread his ice time across all 4 lines, and as such Toffoli's ice time is limited. I'm not really particularly concerned that those 3rd and 4th liners on LA don't produce as well as the 3rd and 4th liners in Tampa, the point is Cooper is going to give his top players more offensive run than his bottom players, and more importantly, he's going to load up his PP and let his best players produce, which Sutter does not.

Ultimately, yea, I guess you're not.

I LOVE how you're all of a sudden "not really particularly concerned" how TBay is the score by committee team. One second your willing to argue that LA is the committee team and use that against my point, but I use facts to disprove it, and suddenly it doesn't matter to you, LOL. And then what do you do? You don't admit your ignorance, but instead you just blurt out more stuff that doesn't add up.

LA's Top PP unit was Lucic/Kopitar/Carter/Muzzin/Doughty. Why were they the "top" PP unit? They got more ice time than any other power play unit. Notice how Toffoli isn't on that unit?
LA's 2nd most run PP unit was Carter/Kopitar/Toffoli/Muzzin/Doughty. Notice how Toffoli IS on this unit? Throughout the year this particular unit saw much less PP time than the previously mentioned group.
Notice how their 1st unit is no longer possible since Lucic is gone, meaning the 2nd formation will now be their default unit.
I NEVER said Toffoli will get better PP linemates... i said he'd get more PP ICE TIME. With more ice time comes more production. Please pay attention.

I don't know how you think an increase in Toffoli's ice time would somehow be "magical". Do you think its rare for improving young players to get increased TOI as they enter their prime? You seem to be a box score fan. Try to do a little more research in the future.

Anyways, it seems like I've gotten all I;m going to get out of this topic, so THANKS to everyone who actually provided input!

[hockeymanG23]

Well, I sure hope they improve by massive amounts since I have both and am not close to trading either.

That said, if I have to choose between the two I'd be saying goodbye to Toffoli even though I've considered a while back that he might have a noticeable uptick in PPPs .

[havanablast21]

Not even close imo.

Kucherov is 2 full tiers ahead of Toffoli in my eyes. I would think Kucherovs upside is comparable to Tarasenko (45G, 40A) whereas I have Toffoli at around 65 points (35G, 30A).

This right here. I don't need to read on nor add to The a finishflash's rationale!

Kuch all day long!

[RizzeeDizzee]

This comparison is what the expression AINEC was made for. Folks realize that Kucherov was essentially a point per game player for all but the first month of last season, right? And that was despite down years for Stamkos, Johnson and Hedman.

I've said it here before and I'll say it once again - if I had to bet on current NHL players to be the next to hit 90+ points without having hit that threshold in the past, my first pick would be McDavid but after that it would be Kucherov.