Quote:
Originally Posted by Bingo
And you can be sure on those things if you wish.
I look at a guy that has a career 11.8% shooting percentage shooting 4% through almost a third of a season as a little unlikely to continue. If pucks were going in at his usual rate he's have 8 or 9 now and this wouldn't be a concern.
So over the summer he's lost what was once a consistent year to year ability to shoot the puck? I don't know if I'm ready to just assume that.
I looked at last season for forwards and shooting percentage ... 4% is replacement level or 13th forward shooting ability.
So yeah it hasn't looked good, but to assume this body of work is the season and that's it is a pretty bleak way of looking at averages, especially with a player that has had a pretty good run of consistency.
This happens every year both in the high and low variety.
Chiasson is shooting 27%, that won't last. Hell Troy Brouwer is shooting 20% this year.
Things will normalize and Neal will move back to the 8-9% mark by the end of the season. At his shot/game rate that should settle into about 16 goals. The start is making his 20 goal season run a bit of a stretch, but things won't stay as bleak as they are.
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I don’t think Neal is getting himself into good scoring positions. A lot of shifts it seems to me he is happy being on the periphery which I don’t think is his game. So while the low shooting percentage should improve some, I’m not surprised by it either. He just doesn’t look dangerous out there that often.
Neal has played for a bunch of teams his whole career, and he just signed his long term retirement contract. It’s a long season and he has some miles on him. I really think it’s a case of the guy just not having kicked it into high gear yet.