Quote:
Originally Posted by GioforPM
You are missing the point. It’s not that they started losing when he left. It’s that you can’t point to him in or out as causing winning or losing. The Flames have won when was in. They’ve won when he was out. They were on both a seven game winning streak and a 4 game losing streak in his absence. Again, correlation is not causation. It’s a logical fallacy.
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No, you can't point to Neal as "causing" winning or losing, but you can point to Neal reducing the quality of our play relative to his replacement.
Through to the point of Neal's injury, the Flames were a 52.51% possession team and a 52.27% GF team 5v5. Since his injury, the Flames have been a 57.28% possession team and 59.57% GF team 5v5. Taking Neal's on-ice numbers - 50.20% CF and 40.98% GF and contrasting them with Czarnik's on-ice numbers since Neal's injury (since Czarnik has taken Neal's role) - 58.97% CF and 57.95% GF we see that it's not an insignificant difference. I think there's some merit to the idea that the Flames have experienced an improvement in their quality of play without Neal. That difference would probably be even more profound if the 1st line didn't slump after the all-star break.
The eye test shows why, too. Our third line forecheck is absolutely suffocating and they regularily finish their shift with a whistle in the offensive zone, and this is, on paper, beneficial to other lines too as they they can then start their shift with offensive zone faceoffs. Neal is not so effective as a forechecker in my opinion.
I don't dislike Neal, and I think a Czarnik - Bennett - Neal third line would have the best combination of abilities possible, but I do think the third line is better off playing fast rather than... well.. whatever they do when Neal is out there with Jankowski, which I wouldn't call playing fast.