Regardless, I'm still not sold on the guy. He did have a good game, last night- maybe I need to relax and give the guy 10-20 more games to settle in.... my biggest beef is he rarely puts the puck on net when he does shoot, and he rarely if ever seems to be involved in the physical play. If his conditioning is the reason he only gets 9-10 minutes a night, that's one thing; if the reason is the coaches' dissatisfaction with his effort, that's entirely another.
I decided to move my post here, rather than keep the Tampa Bay game thread at the top of the charts.
And I will try to lay off Sykora, and give him the next several games to change my mind. But having had the opportunity now to see him a few times, both live and on television, here is what I see (and I fully expect others, like fjc or apa, to correct me if they discern the opposite or other traits in Sykora's game than I):
He floats between the blueline and the slot, like many of the Czechs do, looking for chances, but without the eye for teammates' moves and the nose for the net that a Lang or a Jagr have; his attempted SOGs are often high and wide, which is not a problem when you're rushed, but often he has no one around him, and no screens in front of the net, but just fires away immediately- I don't think I've seen a rebound from any of his attempted SOGs yet; he does not get involved in the physical play, an absolute requirement of that line if they ever want to take the heat off Ovechkin and his linemates.
Yeah, he's great at the cycle, but doesn't seem to know when or how to break out of it to create scoring chances. I did point out that in a between-periods interview, Friesen creditted his own goal as a "line goal", and went into detail as to Cassels' skills in the passing area- to my memory, he did not mention Sykora at all. The coaches don't seem to be giving Sykora any appreciable increases in ice time (still at under 8:00 a game after 10 games), while Friesen and Cassels are approaching or exceeding the 14-15 minutes a game needed from that line.
I'll try to make this my last comments on him, until the 30 game mark, but I'm going to need a lot more convincing- and I do mean a lot more.
I will give myself a pat on the proverbial back for noticing Bradley's departure in the game early on- this, from Tarik Al-Bashir's column, in this morning's Washington Post:
Dainius Zubrus, Matt Bradley, Jeff Friesen, and Jamie Heward did not skate yesterday, all of them apparently suffering from varying degrees of lower body ailments. Bradley left Friday's game in the second period and did not return; Zubrus took only two shifts in the third period. Team officials have refused to comment on the extent of the injuries, but none appear to be serious. The four players were spotted undergoing treatment at Piney Orchard yesterday.
The Caps did not have enough forwards on the ice yesterday at practice to play a game. Two regulars, center Dainius Zubrus and right wing Matt Bradley, are listed as day-to-day with groin problems, while a third, right wing Petr Sykora, missed practice with a sore back.
Now, I'm not posting this to pick on Sykora- this is from fjc's "First 10 Games" recap, and is to be used for informational purposes only. Kids, don't try this at home:
The other forwards are a disappointing lot, as a whole. Dainius Zubrus was an exception to that with his 3-4-7, -1 overall. But, both Jeff Friesen and Petr Sykora, both of whom must score for the Caps to have any chance of being competitive, had rocky starts. Friesen was 1-2-3, -2, but perhaps of most concern, had only 21 shots – second on the club, but this is a club that does not get many shots on goal. It wasn’t a lack of taking shots, but one of getting them on net. Worse in this regard was Sykora, who actually had more missed shots (10) than shots on goal (9). Sykora had the oddest statistic among Caps in this stretch. He was the only Cap among all who dressed not to register a single hit. He was also the only Cap who played in at least half the games not to register a blocked shot. There is a certain “Robert Lang” quality to his style, but he lacks Lang’s sense of where the voids are in a defense and how to take advantage of them. One hopes that will come as he becomes more familiar with the North American game.
This message has been edited by reallycrowesnest on Nov 3, 2005 5:48 PM
It’s a long season, and by the time April comes around, it’ll be hard to remember many of the things that happened in October. How can we gauge progress with the Caps over the course of the 82-game schedule. Well, one way is to break the season down in to ten-game pieces. With a team like the Caps, it’ll be interesting to see if the last 10 games are better than the first ten. For a team that is unlikely to make the playoffs this year, that seems to me as the fairest measure of success. So, in this first ten-game slice, the baseline is being established . . . how did they do?
Record: 4-6. Frankly, that’s better than I would have expected, even with six home games among the ten. If there was one thing to watch out for, it was whether the Caps could keep games close. They lack the depth on offense to get into shootouts with anyone. Early on, the keys were to keep things close, and let Alexander Ovechkin get on the score sheet.
Speaking of Ovechkin . . . he was 6-5-11, +1 in the first ten, which was the stuff of headlines (well, it would have been, but for the fact that most attention is focused on the rookie in Pittsburgh). But, he showed an enthusiasm for the more physical aspects of the game. He tied for the club lead in hits (22), but did so without falling victim to an undisciplined style – he had only four minor penalties over the ten games. As might be expected, Ovechkin led the team in shots (45) – more than twice as many as the next Cap (Jeff Friesen, 21). Of note about his shot statistics is that he doesn’t show an inclination to give up looking for a shot. He actually had more third period shots (18) than first period shots (13). But, taking that many shots means missing quite a bit, and he did – leading the club in missed shots with 15. What he hasn’t yet done is kill penalties. He earned less than five minutes of PK time, total, over the ten games, which accounts for his total ice time of a shade over 18 minutes. But that still was among the rookie leaders among forwards. If one looked at Ovechkin’s play in the first ten games, what is evident is that he plays at a consistent high energy level and that while the offensive part of his game is unsurprisingly good, the physical dimension of his play is probably a bit more than people expected.
The other forwards are a disappointing lot, as a whole. Dainius Zubrus was an exception to that with his 3-4-7, -1 overall. But, both Jeff Friesen and Petr Sykora, both of whom must score for the Caps to have any chance of being competitive, had rocky starts. Friesen was 1-2-3, -2, but perhaps of most concern, had only 21 shots – second on the club, but this is a club that does not get many shots on goal. It wasn’t a lack of taking shots, but one of getting them on net. Worse in this regard was Sykora, who actually had more missed shots (10) than shots on goal (9). Sykora had the oddest statistic among Caps in this stretch. He was the only Cap among all who dressed not to register a single hit. He was also the only Cap who played in at least half the games not to register a blocked shot. There is a certain “Robert Lang” quality to his style, but he lacks Lang’s sense of where the voids are in a defense and how to take advantage of them. One hopes that will come as he becomes more familiar with the North American game.
In what might be called, the “first wave” of prospects – Brian Sutherby, Boyd Gordon, Shaone Morrisonn, and Steve Eminger – the defensemen were far ahead of the forwards. Sutherby and Gordon were a combined 0-0-0, -7, and 44.8 percent on faceoffs. Although Boyd Gordon has since been farmed to Hershey, it will be particularly interesting to see how these two develop over each of the ten-game stretches. On the other hand, Eminger has emerged as a solid defenseman whose game looks to be especially suited to the new NHL (although there were some glaring problems, which will be noted later). At 2-7-9, +7, he led the team in +/- and was second in scoring. He was second on the team in playing time and was second in blocked shots. If there was a disturbing statistic, it was the 16 giveaways, which led all defensemen – twice as many as the second most among defensemen (Heward). Morrisonn’s play was a good deal quieter, but in its own way effective. While not able to dent the score sheet, he logged a lot of minutes (fourth among defensemen), and showed a knack for blocking shots (14). His offense bears watching – he took few shots in the first ten games (six in all). If he can add that dimension, the Caps will be a much harder team to defend.
The unexpected in the first ten games was Mike Green. I would have expected he would remain at Hershey or perhaps get a ‘cup o’ coffee” with the big club before being sent down. But, it appears he is with the big club to stay for the foreseeable future. Although he did not score in the ten game stretch, he did manage 7 hits and 7 blocked shots. He also displayed an ability to avoid turnovers – he averaged one giveaway for every 22-plus minutes . . . compare that with Eminger’s one every 14-plus minutes.
As a whole, the fact that the Caps struggled on defense was not a surprise. It is an entirely retooled defense from the one that played the last game of 2003-2004, except for Brendan Witt. Witt played a generally solid defense over the ten games, especially given that he gets virtually no power play time (a shade more than four minutes, total). He was only -1, and he registered 19 hits and 27 blocked shots. He is, for good or ill, the best defensive defenseman on this squad. Given the circumstances – the club’s rebuild, a generally young or otherwise inexperienced blue line, his desire to go to a contender – he’s been a good soldier and played rather effectively.
More broadly, the club hasn’t done a particularly good job of protecting the puck. 116 giveaways to 81 takeaways accumulate and ensure that the opponent can keep pressure in the Caps end of the ice. What this leads to is the opposition maintaining puck control, and this is where the club ends up taking hooking, holding, and interference penalties. If you have the puck, fewer of those penalties are committed. Another factor in possession is faceoff success. Here, the Caps have deceptive statistics. While the club was 49.3 percent successful overall over the ten games, they were much worse in the offensive end (45.8) and defensive end (46.5) . . . they were 54 percent in neutral zone faceoffs.
Of course, no discussion of the ten games could go by without mention of penalties. In ten games, the Caps committed 96 penalties. Steve Eminger and Brendan Witt combined to commit 23 of those. That was a lethal combination in that these two defensemen are the most capable on the squad. That they spent so much time in the box condemned the Caps to a poor penalty killing record. But that is a discussion for another time when we’ll look at the goaltending, special teams, and other items.
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On Sykora, he looks so far to play primarily a perimeter game, although one of his goals was a nifty little backhand from in close. I think he's still feeling his way , but I think too that he would be more effective not trying so much to pick top corners with his shot and just punish goalies. I think he'd end up creating some rebound situations teammates might take advantage of.
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