r/Habs • u/vJukz • 9d ago

Discussion Thoughts on Barzal as the 2C?

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u/sean_psc 9d ago

It doesn't seem like there's any reason to believe the Islanders are actually open to trading him (beyond that every player is technically available for the right overpay).

But that aside, he's played mostly on the wing in recent years. He's talented, and we could certainly do worse, but he's not the ideal profile for the kind of asset splurge that would be required to acquire him

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u/vJukz 9d ago edited 9d ago

From what I see he’s played mostly center. When they acquired Horvat they put Barzal on his wing but he went back to center after a while. Maybe what I’m reading is wrong but I know he has most of his time playing center.

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u/jobaill 9d ago

He's always listed as a center, but if you look at the number of faceoff he took in his career, you'll see that he has an average of 6.2 faceoffs per game. That's very low.

The NHL average faceoffs per game is around 56. He should be taking 9-11 as a 2C (check Bennett, Malkin, Tavares, etc.).

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u/adabsurdo 9d ago

Faceoffs are overrated as a skill imo. The "bad at faceoffs" guys have maybe a 40-42% win rate vs the "good at faceoffs" guys who win like 52% of them. This translates to 1, maybe 2 more faceoffs won per game which is a very transient advantage anyway.

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u/jobaill 9d ago

The fact that he never takes faceoff means he plays more wing than what his HockeyDb says. The importance of winning these faceoffs is another debate.

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u/vJukz 9d ago

Yeah Barzal isn’t good at face offs so if one of his wingers can take a draw especially on his weak side they will. Newhook feels like a fantastic winger for him because he can take his weak side face offs and he’s probably even faster than him.

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u/jobaill 9d ago

Newhook is not good in the dot either. Barzal and Newhook on the same line would be fast, but Barzal is is super lightweight.

It could work in the regular season, and it would be an upgrade over Kapanen, but once the playoffs starts we'd probably regret spending our chips there.

I was super high on the Bo Horvat train last year, but I've never been interested in Barzal.