Before digging into our new topic for the week I wanted to update a couple of takes from last week where we were taking a look at some cold players.

Some good news and some bad news on Edmonton's top power play. Leon Draisaitl has four points in his last three games and nine in his last seven. Evan Bouchard also has four points in his last three games. Unfortunately, Connor McDavid is going to be out for a couple of weeks. Add that to Ryan Nugent-Hopkins only having one point in his last three and Zach Hyman with one point in his last three (and on the season).

The next couple of weeks will certainly be interesting. All are still on the top power-play but the latest lines (noted on October 30) have RNH, Hyman, and Jeff Skinner together at even strength and Draisaitl with Viktor Arvidsson and Vasily Podkolzin. Arvidsson joined the top power play during the game McDavid was hurt, but Mattias Ekholm got a look instead during the next day's practice. Moral of the story: Not great news for Hyman and RNH looking to break out of their funk losing McDavid for two weeks, but maybe an opportunity for Arvidsson and/or Ekholm if they can secure that role.

I vouch for him and then Steven Stamkos goes and has a couple of really blah games with no points and only one shot. Then on October 28, he goes off for six shots and two assists. I am still reasonably optimistic here.

David Pastrnak has three points in his last three games. Still not quite the level we were hoping for, but all of the indicators are still good.

Switching gears now I wanted to check in on the players we identified over the summer as hitting their breakout threshold. As a quick reminder the article was focused on this quote.

"It’s always a great indicator if you see that a player finishes the previous season with 230 or 240 career games and he just enjoyed a very strong second half. When you see that, then feel confident in a potential breakout for the year ahead."

It comes from a previous Dobber article that attempts to define a little more specifically a game count by when a player might be more likely to break out.

The players who came from that review are below.

Name	Team	Pos	Age	Total GP	23-24 Season Pace	Breakout 24-25 Pace
MATT BOLDY	MIN	R	23.4	203	75	94
COLE CAUFIELD	MTL	L	23.7	205	65	81
TREVOR ZEGRAS	ANA	C	23.4	211	40	50
MORGAN FROST	PHI	C	25.3	229	47	59
LUCAS RAYMOND	DET	R	22.4	238	72	90
SETH JARVIS	CAR	R	22.6	231	68	85
ALEX NEWHOOK	MTL	C	23.6	214	51	64

As we turn the calendar to a new month, let’s check in on how our breakout candidates are stacking up to start the season.

Our data will all be prior to games on October 31.

Matt Boldy is definitely hitting his stride with 11 points in nine games for a 100-point pace thus far. He has career high total time on ice, power-play time, shot rates, and strong expected goal numbers. There are a couple of small flags that a 100-point pace might not be sustainable, but a lot of what he is doing is very definitely for real, and 90 points doesn't look completely out of the possible realm at this point.

Cole Caufield has ten points in ten games for an 82 full season pace. Another one who appears to be right on the money for his preseason breakout. Unfortunately, the picture isn't quite as rosy under the hood. He has lost about a minute and a half of overall ice time and is shooting right at three shots per game, which is usually quite good, but is actually down a little from his past two seasons. He has feasted with goals putting up nine, but has an overall shooting percentage of 30% and he and his teammates are scoring on 16.9% of their shots while he is on the ice at even strength.

If Caufield was shooting at 14% instead of 30%, he would only have five points in ten games. I called point per game during the summer and I still think he could get there, but not like this. He needs to bump up his shot rates again, and have the rest of the team start pulling a little weight so he can add some assists to his point totals.

Anaheim's attempt at a top nine and a split power play is a bit baffling, and Trevor Zegras is certainly not benefitting from the distribution. Sure, his shooting percentage is low, but his deployment isn't looking much better than it was in his shortened season in 2023-24, plus his shots are down from even that pace, barely above two per game. Will he end up with more than an 18-point pace on the season? I would bet yes, but any sort of breakout is really not looking great already in this young season.

Morgan Frost has five points in ten games, so he's not off to the best start. He has seen an uptick in his power-play role and in his overall minutes. He has often been playing with one of either Travis Konecny or Matvei Michkov (or both), which is exactly where you would want him to be. Unfortunately, the lines are almost constantly in a blender so it is essentially impossible to count on solid deployment, and there is a huge difference between a top line game of 19 or 20 minutes with elite wingers or a 12-minute game in the bottom six. Given that fluctuation it is hard to really envision a real breakout is imminent.

Lucas Raymond is the mirror opposite of Cole Caufield. His ten points in ten games are made up of nine assists and one goal. I wasn't super optimistic during the summer about Raymond hitting his breakout number, and while he is still short of a 92-point pace, he has improved on his 72-point 2023-24-point pace thus far.

It's a real mixed bag under the hood though. Raymond has a low personal shooting percentage so he could have another goal or two. But he is also shooting below two shots per game on average, which is down from 2023-24. It isn't a crazy drop (only 0.3 shots per game), but he has actually added almost a minute of overall ice time. That in and of itself is good, but more time usually equates more opportunities for shots, not fewer.

Raymond is also seeing a higher share of the power-play time, which again is good, but five of his ten points are on the power-play which would amount to a 41 power-play point season if extended across the whole season, which is very unlikely. He has never surpassed 20 before. If we knock off a few power-play points but give him a goal to account for the shooting percentage, his play seems to be worth about a 70-point pace going forward. About what we expected, but not yet to his breakout potential. The increased deployment certainly gives some reason for optimism, but he really needs to start shooting more if he wants to get there.

Seth Jarvis is seeing career high overall minutes, and power-play deployment, career high shot rates, and very strong expected goals. That is all great news, but unfortunately, he is not hitting his breakout point pace with only has six points in eight games which essentially matches his pace from 2023-24. There is definitely room for more optimism, though, as part of the problem is that even strength goals are not being scored while he is on the ice. The team's five on five shooting percentage is down at 4.8%. That should improve which should mean more goals for Jarvis to get in on going forward. Hope is definitely still alive here.

Alex Newhook is enjoying a Zegras-level letdown thus far. Over the summer we observed that he had been on the top power-play over the second half of 2023-24 and put up a 55-point pace over that portion. Adding Patrik Laine was a question mark, but should have helped at even strength. Kirby Dach returning to the lineup has really sunk his deployment though. He briefly spent some time on the power play when Juraj Slafkovsky was injured, but by and large has been seeing middle six, second power-play time without the benefit of a potentially strong winger in Laine who is out for a little while yet. It has amounted to less than 15 minutes a night on average, a drop in shot rates (down to one a game) and only two points over ten games.

By the way, those two points include a goal, which means Newhook is shooting 20% when he averages closer to 12 or 13% for his career. The moral of this story is that Newhook is looking like a bust thus far in 2024-25.

That is all for this week.

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