Yesterday I had a copy of Rob Vollman's Stat Shot delivered to me and I'm thrilled to find that the first chapter is entitled What's the Best Way to Build a Team? and is particularly about roster management in the salary cap era. I'm only a handful of pages in so far and already have learned a great deal that will be helpful.
That might seem a bit tangential but it is exactly what this exercise (this thread) is about and it fits in with my learning process and tough decisions that I will have coming up at the end of this season, if not before. With several key players having contracts that expire after this season, including both of our Goalies and the two young talented defencemen who I inherited,
Thomas Dingle and
Michal Lezak, as well as Center/re
Aiden Keene, it will be helpful to have some guiding principles to build on in making decisions about which players to try to extend and who to trade or allow to move on in free agency.
Speaking of managing the budget, with the second month of the season now over the balance sheet is looking a bit better but I have tried to be even more cautious in my approach to spending on things like player morale, scouting support, and promotions and arena operations.
On the ice, the team leveled off a bit in November but remains one of the top teams in the NHL.
Here is a look at current standings:
As you can see from the image above, in the continuing game of Goalie leapfrog on the Avs it has been
David Mencl's turn to once again gain dominance and he has been tremendous thus far. In
Terry Ross' 14 games he has a record of 7-5 with a GAA of 2.76, a save percentage of .909, and a GSAA of 0.61, all by far the worst numbers in his Avs career up to now, though there is a good deal of season still ahead of us.
Here are some team numbers for the Avs:
Clearly our strength has been in limiting the number of shots on goal and consequently goals against us this season. We aren't great with the advantage nor in killing penalties but this second part is mitigated by our ability to avoid taking penalties better than any other team in the league. If we are to maintain our good season though it is likely imperative that we get better on special teams and just in goal scoring as a whole.