''playoff performers''

[Overated Veteran]

Maybe that thread isn't so fantasy related but hey it's covid time and there's no hockey for a while so let's talk about the playoff performance phenomenon.

Players like Giroux, Brière, O'reilly, Toews are known to be so much better during the post season. It can't be luck, or maybe it can...
Do they play at 75% capacity during the regular season and then they go on a cocaine binge when the playoffs starts?

And then there's the total opposite. I was having a talk about Thomas Tatar today with a friend. I believe he's the best habs F atm.
We were arguing MB having to get rid of one of Danault or Gally and he told me Tatar was total shit in the playoff therefore he had to leave.
I'm not sure about it.

Tatar was total shit during the playoffs, yes. He had 10GP, 2 goals and nothing else. But do you really think it means he won't have some monster series next year?
Does he play at 100% capacity during the regular season and then smokes a bowl before every playoff games?

What's the deal here? how do you explain it?

[senryu]

People's desire for meaning leads them to find reasons for things happening when in fact the "causes" are nothing more than random distributions of events.

[Overated Veteran]

People's desire for meaning leads them to find reasons for things happening when in fact the "causes" are nothing more than random distributions of events.

I agree with you, but you can even hear GMs talk about this phenomenon. I'm talking about real gms here, not about us haha

[Dr.Brad]

It’s everywhere. 7-10 years ago, and AFTER Marc-Andre Fleury won a Cup, the Penguins had 3 early playoff exits, and it was “Fleury can’t do it.” Then he single-handedly beat Washington in an Eastern semifinal as the rest of the team was outplayed, and Wow with Vegas’ first year’s playoff run. So Tatar?? He’ll get more chances. Judging just makes people look silly.

[senryu]

I think that NHL general managers are especially susceptible to creating narrative and meaning based on random events because they want to have reasons for the actions they take which can placate ownership, fans, and the press. And saying "I re-signed player X because his playoffs performance proves he's a winner" is better than saying "Every action I take is akin to shouting into the void."

[newfcollins]

I don't think there is a set of criteria about playoff performers. It's simply media hype used to put forward an easy story. Using Giroux as an example, he was great from 2008-09 to 2013-14, when he was 21-26 years old. He has two goals and 12 points in his last 28 postseason games, when he was 28-32 years old. People still consider him a great playoff performer because of what he did six-plus years ago.

I think another big part of playoff performers that rarely gets mentioned is the quality of opponents. Mark Stone is a great example. He had 13 points in 27 career postseason games with Ottawa. Goes to Vegas last year, and has 12 points in seven games. Pretty impressive, until you realize that Vegas played the Sharks with Martin Jones in net.

This year, Stone had 17 points in 20 games. However, he had 14 in his first 12 games (round robin, overmatched series against the Hawks, then against Markstrom). Once Demko went into the next, and then into the next round against Dallas, Stone had three points in eight games.

Stone has had 29 points in 27 games for Vegas. Is Stone a great postseason performer able to turn up the dial in the playoffs? Or has he benefitted from playing some weaker opponents?

[stevegamer]

Random variance will explain most of the playoff performers/chokers. There are players who do excel more in the clutch, but we can't really measure it well.

If I had to pick one of those 3 guys to leave it'd probably be Tatar, but not due to playoff performance.