The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!
The Washington Capitals conclude their three-game road trip on Thursday night when they visit the St. Louis Blues at Enterprise Center in St. Louis. The Caps will be looking to end their two-game losing streak and a 2-5-2 skid over their last nine games over which they find themselves increasingly unable to stop other teams from scoring, but we will get to that.
The Blues are a happier bunch these days, going into a contest with the Chicago Blackhawks on Wednesday night on a three-game winning streak after suffering an eight-game losing streak, all of the losses in regulation. It is not hard to see what changed. Over their eight-game losing streak they averaged only 1.50 goals per game, were held to two or fewer seven times (and they lost the only game they scored more than two goals), and were shut out once. Over their last three games, though, they scored 11 goals while holding opponents to seven.
Jordan Kyrou has two goals in those three wins for the Blues, perhaps a sign that the slow start he had to this season (3-1-4, minus-17, and no, that is not a misprint… minus-17) is behind him. It would be fair to say that much was – is – expected of Kyrou based on his NHL progress to date. A second round pick for the Blues (35th overall) in the 2016 Entry Draft, he made the jump to the NHL in 2018-2019, appearing in 16 games with a 1-2-3, minus-1, scoring line. In his sophomore season he played in 28 games, going 4-5-9, plus-1. Kyrou made a big leap in 2020-2021 with 14 goals (including his first two career game-winners) and 35 points in 55 games. Last year was another big leap in production for Kyrou, a 27-48-75, plus-10, season in 74 games. The odd part of his season overall is that the Blues are 2-8-0 when Kyrou skated 17:50 or more in ice time, but they won all for games in which he skated less than 17:50. Kyrou is 0-2-2, plus-2, in three career games against Washington.
Robert Thomas and Pavel Buchnevich are tied for the team lead in points over the Blues’ three game winning streak with four apiece. Thomas (1-3-4, plus-1 in the last three games) has had an eventful career to date for one so young, and not all in a good way. Thomas was taken in the first round of the 2017 Entry Draft (20th overall) after going 16-50-66, plus-41, in 66 games for the London Knights in the Ontario Hockey League. He split the 2017-2018 season between London (20-26-46, plus-13, in 27 games) and the Hamilton Bulldogs of the OHL 94-25-29, plus-4, in 22 games). He made the jump to the NHL in the 2018-2019 season, going 9-24-33, minus-2, in 70 games for the Blues.
But it was then that the injury bug would bite. He missed seven games with a shoulder injury, then missed four playoff games with a wrist injury. He barely got out of the gate for the 2019-2020 season when he missed five games with an upper body injury. In the 2020-2021 season he missed 18 games to a broken thumb,and then he missed four more with a shoulder injury late in the regular season. Last season, Thomas lost seven games to a lower body injury, two games to illness, and another game to an upper body injury. None of this string of injuries that limited Thomas to 241 games over four seasons kept the Blues from offering, or Thomas from signing, an eight-year/$65.0 million contract last July that will go into effect for the 2023-2024 season. It is a risk, but a calculated one for the Blues, seeing his 42 goals and 164 points in those 241 games as indicators of promise as a reliable scorer, provided he is healthy. This season, his performance and that of the team closely parallel one another. In the Blues’ 3-0-0 start, Thomas was 0-4-4, plus-5. In the eight-game losing streak, he was 2-1-3, minus-12. But in the Blues’ current three-game winning streak going into Wednesday night’s action, he is 1-3-4, plus-4. In three career games against the Caps, Thomas is 1-2-3, plus-2.
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines “flash in the pan” as “one that appears promising but turns out to be disappointing or worthless.” It would be harsh to consider goaltender Jordan Binnington as worthless, but disappointing? It might be a fair characterization. Binnington was the sixth goalie taken in the 2011 Entry Draft, a draft that does not seem to have a very impressive goalie class. He worked his way up the development ladder and finally broke through with a single NHL appearance in the 2015-2016 season (13 minutes, three saves on four shots faced, a no decision). But then came the 2018-2019 season. Binnington exploded on the scene – 32 appearances, 24-5-1, 1.89 (best GAA in the league), .927, five shutouts. He was the first team goalie on the All-Rookie Team, finished second in Calder Trophy voting as top rookie, finished tenth in Hart Trophy voting for MVP, and finished fifth in Vezina Trophy voting for top goaltender. But he saved the best for the postseason; he was 16-10, 2.46, .914, with one shutout, backstopping the Blues to the Stanley Cup.
But then he had a bizarre sophomore season. The regular season was impressive – 30-13-7, 2.56, .912, with three shutouts. It was good enough to finish seventh in Vezina Trophy voting. And when he finished the regular season on a 6-2-0, 1.75, .931, two shutout record in his last eight games, he looked to be in position to lead the Blues deep into another postseason. But after a 36-save effort in a 2-1 loss to Colorado in the round robin prelude to the 2020 postseason, the bottom dropped out of his game. He made four more appearances, losing all of them, and stopping just 84 of 103 shots, a ghastly .816 save percentage. He really has not been the same since. In two seasons following that 2020 postseason debacle, he is 36-28-12, 2.87, .906, with two shutouts. He has not shaken out of that fog this season – 6-5-0, 3.07, .904, with one shutout – 35th in goals against average (of 57 goalies with at least 250 minutes), 33rd in save percentage. However, he has won his last three decisions, stopping 106 of 113 shots along the way (.938). Binnington is 0-0-1, 2.86, .912 in his only appearance against the Caps to date, a 3-2 overtime loss to the Caps on October 2, 2019.
2. Beware the St. Louis power play on home ice, it is the sixth-ranked power play in the league at home (29.4 percent).
3. On the other side of special teams, the 66.7 percent penalty kill is the third-worst in the league on home ice, but no team has deployed it less frequently at home than the 2.00 shorthanded situations faced by the Blues per home game.
4. First periods in St. Louis have not had much in terms of goal scoring action – four goals for the Blues and four by opponents in six home games.
5. Over his first 11 games this season, Jordan Kyrou did not have a “plus” rating in any of them. He was as high as “even” only twice, going minus-17 in the other nine games. However, he is even in his last three games overall.
1. Over their 2-5-2 slide, the Caps have seen there scoring defense deteriorate. Over the first four games of the slump, the Caps held opponents to three goals three times and two goals once, but they lost all four games (0-2-2). They beat Edmonton to end that skid, but they allowed four goals in doing so in a 5-4 win. Starting with that game, the Caps have allowed 20 goals in four games, four or more four times (they beat Tampa Bay, 5-1, in that 2-3-0 run).
2. We mentioned the 2017 Entry Draft in the context of the development of Blues forward Robert Thomas. But the 2017 draft was noteworthy for the Caps as well. It was a disaster. It is the oldest draft class for which no player has dressed for an NHL game. Granted, the Caps had only four picks and none until the fourth round (120th overall). The Caps’ first round pick was traded with Zach Sanford, Brad Malone, a conditional seventh-round pick in 2017 or 2018, a conditional second-round pick in 2019 to St. Louis for Kevin Shattenkirk and Pheonix Copley. The second round pick went to Montreal as part of the trade in June 2016 that brought Lars Eller to Washington in exchange for a second-round pick in 2018 and this second rounder. The third rounder was sent to Buffalo in February 2016 for defenseman Mike Weber.
3. The Caps have been creamed in third periods in road games, getting outscored, 14-6, in nine away contests.
4. Washington has taken a lead in a road game to the first intermission only twice in nine road games. Only Chicago and Detroit have led fewer times after 20 minutes (once apiece). The Caps lost both games and are one of five teams without a win when leading after one period.
5. From the symmetry file, the Caps took a lead into the third period of their nine road games only twice as well. They won both of those contests.
The Peerless’ Players to Ponder
St. Louis: Ryan O’Reilly
A walk-year for a player – that last season of a contract with the possibility of a big free agency payoff looming – can bring out the best or the worst in a player. The jury is deliberating the case of the Blues’ Ryan O’Reilly. The 31-year old is in his 14th NHL season, O’Reilly is off to a slow start with three goals and five points with a minus-12 rating in 14 games. His production on home ice has been especially disappointing – 1-0-1, minus-6, in six home games through Tuesday. And now, trade rumors are swirling.
What is confounding, and perhaps merely a slump, is his assist total. In 13 seasons leading into this one, O’Reilly finished with fewer than 30 assists only three times (all with Colorado) – 18 in 81 games in his rookie 2009-2010 season, 13 in 74 games in his sophomore 2010-2011 season, and 14 in 29 games in 2012-2013. So far this season he has only two assists in 14 games, none in six games on home ice. He has yet to post a power play assist, even though he does average 2:01 in power play ice time per game. O’Reilly might be emerging from his early season slump. He is 2-2-4, even, in his last four games going into Wednesday’s action, although his ice time is down about a minute per game (17:31 in those four games) from that of his first ten games (18:28 per game). O’Reilly is 1-13-14, plus-3, in 21 career games against Washington.
Washington: Connor McMichael
If Rod Serling was alive today, he would be hunched over his typewriter clicking away on his typewriter keyboard (hey kids, remember typewriters?) penning a screenplay for “The Twilight Zone.” The episode might have the working title, “The Connor Conundrum.” It is the story of a hockey player who was a high draft pick, but who rarely plays; a player who has consistency issues (especially on defense), but whose numbers are not as bad as his perceived shortcomings would suggest; a player thought of as a core element of the future Capitals, but a player who might not be a Capital when the inevitable rebuild takes place a few seasons from now.
Caps fans might be forgiven for thinking that McMichael has been a part of this organization for years and years, but the fact is that he was drafted by the Caps 25th overall in the 2019 Entry Draft, just three years and change ago. Although he has had difficulty breaking into the lineup on a regular basis, he will turn just 22 years old on January 15th. By that time, he could pass former Caps Brooks Laich, Richard Zednik, and Jason Allison in games played by their 22nd birthdays (McMichael has 74; Laich and Zednik had 77, Allison had 86). He has already passed Laich and Allison in goals scored before age 22, having scored nine career goals thus far to Laich’s and Allison’s seven apiece. The Caps are 39-24-11 in games in which McMichael has played to date, a respectable 99-stnadings point rate over 82 games. If he has been a liability, it has not been an influencing element in team results to a serious degree.
Which is not to say there haven’t been of are not problems that need attention. Despite not getting scoring line minutes to a large degree, McMichael’s strength would appear to be less as a high-end scorer and more as an all-around player who plays with skill and consistency in all three zones. However, he is a minus-3 in career goal differential at even strength. For a successful Caps team, a McMichael who gets consistent middle-six forward playing time is going to have to turn that minus into a plus. McMichael has also held his own in the turnover area, although takeaways and giveaways are recorded with some level of ambiguity and arbitrariness. He has 16 career takeaways (13th among Caps forwards over his three seasons) and 10 giveaways. His positive takeaway-to-giveaway ration holds its own over that period with veteran Caps forwards such as Conor Sheary (75/29), Nic Dowd (74/35), Nicklas Backstrom (58/37), T.J. Oshie (54/48), and Garnet Hathaway (39/33).
The point is that Connor McMichael occupies his own corner of hockey’s Twilight Zone, and his search for an exit is one of the continuing subplots of Capitals hockey. He is without a point and has a minus-1 rating in one appearance against the Blues.
In the end…
The Caps will be catching the Blues in a vulnerable position on Thursday night. Even though they seem to have righted themselves, St. Louis will go into the game fresh off a three-game road trip, playing the second of a back-to-back set of games, and skating in their third game in four nights. Those are usually the hallmarks of a team that an opponent can wear down, even in their own rink. But the Caps have had their own issues since Halllowe’en and are looking for a win by any means possible.
Capitals 4 – Blues 3
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