Perhaps the most impressive aspect of the Philadelphia Flyers‘ run of strong play over the past two weeks is that it occurred despite the absence of Jakub Voracek. The team’s best even strength scorer and possession driver over the past three years, Voracek has been out since February 25th with a foot injury, yet the Flyers found a way to go 4-1-0 in their last five games anyway.
Still, it’s impossible to argue that Philadelphia would be better off with Jakub Voracek out of their lineup. He’s second on the team with 48 points in 60 games, and drives play to the tune of a +3.77% Corsi Relative to his teammates. According to the beat writers at practice, Voracek is getting very close to a return.
Hextall says that Voracek is about on pace. The Detroit game remains possible.
— Dave Isaac (@davegisaac) March 9, 2016
In a best case scenario, the Czech winger would return next Tuesday, keeping him out for only two more games. When he does return, however, Philadelphia will have a tough decision to make. Considering the fact that the Flyers have posted a stellar 54.8% score-adjusted Corsi in the five games that Voracek has missed, the forward corps is clearly firing on all cylinders. But one player will have to come out of that humming lineup to accommodate Voracek.
So which player is most likely to find himself relegated to the press box? And as a followup, which player should be taking a seat?
Who it won’t be
The Flyers have 12 forwards currently in the lineup, and it’s easy to strike a third of them off the “potential scratches” list purely through common sense. The first line of Claude Giroux, Wayne Simmonds and Brayden Schenn is obviously safe, and two-way stalwart Sean Couturier won’t be taking a seat either. The organization just made a long-term commitment to Michael Raffl and head coach Dave Hakstol has not scratched him once this season, so consider him safe.
The third line of Nick Cousins, Matt Read and Scott Laughton would seem to be in play as potential scratches at first glance. After all, Laughton and Read both have been healthy scratches at times this season, and Nick Cousins spent most of the season in the AHL before finally earning a call-up.
Still, it’s unlikely Hakstol tampers with this line. The Flyers coach been nothing but complimentary towards their play over the past few weeks, and his eye test is backed up by the stats. They’ve received fairly cushy minutes (22 offensive zone draws versus only six in the defensive zone) but their 5-on-5 performance has been stellar, as they’ve posted a 62.3% Corsi For percentage in 51:01 minutes together. Expect this trio to stay intact.
Pierre-Edouard Bellemare and Chris VandeVelde should be safe as well. While neither has been particularly inspiring at even strength, they lead all Flyers forwards in average shorthanded ice time per game. Hakstol is not about to blow up his penalty kill rotation with only one month left in the season.
That leaves only two viable options for a healthy scratch — Sam Gagner and Ryan White — and three realistic lineup adjustment possibilities.
Option No. 1: Gagner is scratched, Voracek replaces him on second line
This is the most likely scenario. As Kurt noted yesterday, Hakstol even hinted at this solution on a Canadian radio show earlier this week. The Flyers clearly view Sam Gagner as a player incapable of performing any role except that of a top-six forward, and Voracek is obviously higher on the depth chart.
Swapping in Voracek for Gagner would barely disrupt the current line combinations. Giroux would likely stay with Schenn and Simmonds, the Cousins line would be untouched, and the Bellemare line would continue its reign as the team’s longest-standing trio. But it would give an already-strong Couturier line a definite upgrade on the wing. That’s not meant as a slight against Gagner, but he’s no Jakub Voracek.
Still, this move brings an obvious negative — Sam Gagner is actually a productive forward. Since becoming a regular lineup fixture on January 27th, Gagner has averaged 1.8 points per sixty minutes of even strength play and is sporting a positive on-ice shot attempt differential relative to his teammates (+1.8% Corsi Relative). The Flyers would essentially be replacing a solid second line winger with an above-average first line winger.
That’s undeniably an upgrade. But wouldn’t Philadelphia’s forward corps take a larger leap with Ryan White out of the lineup instead?
Option No. 2: Ryan White sits, Voracek replaces him on the Bellemare line
This option may not be as unlikely as it appears at first glance. After all, Voracek did spend the better part of a month alongside Pierre-Edouard Bellemare and Chris VandeVelde, showing that Dave Hakstol is open to the idea. It would be a massive upgrade for the line, replacing the team’s worst neutral zone forward (White has a 46.43% Neutral Zone Score, per my tracking) with one of its best (Voracek checks in at 51.54%).
This would allow Gagner to stay in the lineup, and would not force any changes to Flyers’ top three lines. For a coach averse to the idea of upsetting team chemistry following wins, it’s a tempting decision to make. In theory, this could give Philadelphia four dangerous scoring lines, a terrifying thought for the teams that they are chasing in the playoff hunt.
White is part of the team’s penalty kill rotation, but he gets less minutes than you might think. He slots in sixth in terms of shorthanded ice time per game for forwards, behind Bellemare, VandeVelde, Couturier, Read and Giroux. Replacing him with Scott Laughton or Michael Raffl on the penalty kill wouldn’t be difficult. White has also taken a role as the net-front presence on the second power play unit, but that unit has remained largely ineffective even with White. It’s tough to imagine that being the driving force that keeps him in the lineup.
So what are the drawbacks? For starters, it seems a gross misuse of Jakub Voracek, just as it was back in November and December of 2015. In nearly 100 minutes of even strength ice time together, the trio of Voracek, Bellemare and VandeVelde posted a 44.5% Corsi For percentage and a Goals For percentage of 25.0%. Now, that’s a pretty small sample, and it’s fair to expect that the line would perform significantly better if reunited. But it does hint that Voracek may not be capable of dragging his linemates to even strength respectability, talented as he is.
In addition, placing Voracek on the “fourth” line would likely result in Hakstol increasing their ice time. After all, Voracek is one of the team’s best players, and the coach will want to use him a lot at even strength. But it’s probably not wise to give two players without much NHL scoring or play-driving ability increased ice time, even when they are playing alongside a forward like Voracek.
Scratching White to replace him with Voracek is enticing in many ways. But the drawbacks are undeniable, and keep this from being the preferred option.
Option No. 3: White sits, Voracek replaces Raffl on second line, Raffl moves to fourth line
And now we come to both the best of the realistic options by the stats, and also the least likely one to actually occur.
It’s clear that Jakub Voracek is best suited to spend his even strength minutes alongside talented forwards. Sean Couturier’s breakout season certainly qualifies him as such, and Sam Gagner’s performance since late January makes him worthy of top-six minutes as well. A Gagner-Couturier-Voracek line would have two big, strong puck carriers and a creative offensive zone weapon. At least on paper, there’s real potential here.
The odd man out would be Michael Raffl, who is currently at wing with Couturier and Gagner. Raffl’s usefulness was endorsed by the Flyers through his new three-year contract extension, which establishes him as a key role player for the years to come. But Raffl is far from an elite scorer, limiting his upside. He drives possession extremely well, making him a strong support player for talented linemates. But Voracek is just as good at puck possession, while adding the scoring touch that Raffl lacks. The second line shouldn’t miss a beat without Raffl.
The logical destination for Michael Raffl would be with Bellemare and VandeVelde. Raffl has spent some shifts recently with the duo, especially when the lines are a bit off-kilter due to penalties. It makes sense, as Raffl is one of the team’s best shot suppression forwards, and Hakstol does give the Bellemare line more defensive zone starts than offensive zone ones.
Raffl wouldn’t turn the fourth line into a scoring machine. But he would be a significant upgrade over White, particularly due to his play-driving ability at even strength. The Flyers don’t depend upon the Bellemare line to score goals, but they do expect the fourth line to not get caved in at 5-on-5. The line has struggled in that regard this season, especially in defensive zone shot suppression, one of Raffl’s best skills. The Austrian forward’s hard-nosed play along the boards would also mesh well with the high-energy forechecking style of Bellemare and VandeVelde.
Unfortunately, this adjustment strategy is fairly unlikely to be Hakstol’s eventual choice. He loves the VandeVelde-Bellemare-White trio, giving them more ice time together this season (353:16 minutes at 5-on-5) than any other Flyers line combination. The chances of Hakstol breaking up this line to keep Sam Gagner in the lineup seem minuscule. But it’s still the option with the most upside and potential reward.
Conclusion
With Jakub Voracek rapidly approaching a return to the Flyers’ lineup, Ron Hextall and Dave Hakstol have a tough decision to make. In the end, it will boil down to whether they prefer to bench scorer Sam Gagner or checker Ryan White to accommodate their star winger.
Benching Gagner would be the easy move. He’s basically an injury-fill in at this stage of his Flyers career, with unrestricted free agency on the horizon. The organization appears to view him as a top-six forward only, and once the forward corps is fully healthy, there just isn’t room for him.
A scratch of Ryan White would have more upside, though. There’s a much larger gap in talent between Voracek and White than there is between Voracek and Gagner, and the team has two ready-made options to slide into White’s role. They could put Voracek back on the line and try to roll four scoring trios, or they could drop Michael Raffl into the 4RW spot, with the goal of turning the Bellemare line into a better defensive unit.
The most likely outcome is that Sam Gagner is the one to leave the lineup, and Hakstol has already hinted at such. But with the playoffs on the line, the higher upside move would be to maximize the amount of scoring talent on the ice, status quo line combinations notwithstanding.
All statistics gathered from War-On-Ice.com, Puckalytics.com, Corsica.Hockey, or manually tracked by Charlie O’Connor.
