I find fans bellowing “SHOOT” during the PP, while the player with the puck clearly has no shot, to be tiresome.

Tobias Enstrom could probably stand to shoot the puck a few more times on the powerplay on a nightly basis. However, I do not want him to trade his current style on the extra-man unit for one that is over aggressive or removes his role as a handler of the puck/playmaker.

Ron Hainsey is dangerously irresponsible on the powerplay. I saw three rushes on Tuesday in which Hainsey tried to take on three penalty killers solo… results? Not good. Hainsey lost possession and the Nashville got an easy clear.

The duo at the top needs to have some defined roles, but the two point guys should not be confined to those roles. Enstrom has a good shot and Bogosian/Kubina can deliver the puck. How about a wrinkle that appears as if the play is for a left point one-timer (by either Zach or Pavel), but then gets quickly reversed for an Enstrom blast?

The main problems I see with the powerplay currently are three fold:

1. Atlanta’s forwards are stagnant. The obvious starting point for John Anderson’s extra-man unit comes from the point; usually in the form of a one-timer. Atlanta rarely uses the ice down below the goal to set up a PP and the as a result the forwards are left waiting for the shot to come hoping for deflections or rebounds. Without some movement or rotation, Atlanta doesn’t work the PKL unit and when a shot is deflected, stopped, or put out on a rebound, the PKers for the opposing team are essentially as fresh as our forwards to get to a loose puck and clear it. The forwards have to start working the ice.

2. Entry into the zone. The Thrashers as a team are terrible at recognizing what the PK units of other teams are doing and then adjusting. It’s just stubborn hockey and I’m surprised that attitude hasn’t changed from when Kovalchuk left. Hainsey, Kubina, Antropov, Bergfors, and Enstrom were all guilty of at least one ill-advised carry-in to the offensive zone which directly resulted into a clear. Sometimes the flow of play allows for a carry-in, but other times the highest chance of attaining the zone is to chip and charge or rattle it to the far side boards and out number the puck. Being up 5-on-4 does not issue a free pass to NOT out work the other team.

3. Adjusting to adjustments. Word is out and the Thrashers are a team that consistently looks for shots from the point to power the man-advantage. This problem lies both on the coaching staff and the players. If the PK unit is rotating two men with heavy pressure on BOTH points, especially early in the powerplay, then the puck has to move down low… where the space is… forcing the PK unit to adjust. Too many times the Thrashers play right into the teeth of the PK. I’m not sure whether it’s a coaching or a personnel issue, but this is where Slava Kozlov’s struggle have really hurt the team. When Kozzy is at his best on the man-up, the professor works the PK. Atlanta doesn’t really have any forwards that are powerplay specialists at the NHL level (yet). Think about it: Peverley is in his first full season. Little did well last year but his struggles this year are documented. Bergfors is a rookie. Antro was a 2nd PP unit guy in Toronto. Max didn’t play on the PP the last three years in Buffalo.

Enstrom is the least of our worries on the powerplay. Could he shoot more? Sure, but so could Antropov. Bogosian needs to learn how to hit the net and Little has been snake bitten all season long.

well said.

Of course, a good bit of Enstrom’s time was spent playing with Ilya Kovalchuk on the other point. I’m not knocking the d-men, but there’s a big dropoff between Kovy and the other d-men in terms of scoring. If playing without Kovy has had a negative effect on Enstrom’s PP performance, your graphs won’t show it – yet.

Didn’t Enstrom score a goal in his first game during the Olympics? I do remember his sister scoring one…

I think since they switched to the Coca Cola ZERO Power Play it has gotten worse (if that is possible). However the name is appropriate. The whole PP is off, I don’t feel we have had the same number of short handed opportunties we had last year and at the beginning of this year.

Ever been to a Braves game and heard fans yell, “C’mon Chipper…Swing the bat!”? Happens pretty much every game. Do you hear other fans say, “Uh…He’s a professional…I think he knows what he’s doing better than you do.”? No. The main reason is because when fans buy a ticket to a sporting event, they have a right to yell pretty much anything (minus obscenities) they want at whoever they want. If we had tape put over our mouths at the entrances, nobody would go anymore.

At Sunday’s game, you probably heard me yell, “SHOOT IT!!!” twice during our PPs (it was definitely quiet enough). I don’t yell it 30 times a game…But when your team takes 4 shots in 20 minutes, a normal fan reaction is to yell at them to shoot the thing. Other teams consistently score on us just by getting the puck in front of the crease on their PPs…While on our PPs, our guys play keep-away and struggle at that even with a man advantage. In fact, Green just scored for the Caps on a PP with 6 guys + Legace between him and the net. That’s one reason they win often.

I’m not saying it’s right or wrong to yell SHOOT! at a Thrasher’s game. But when you go to a hockey game in Atlanta, GA (which ranks somewhere below college football, pro football, pro basketball, college basketball, pro baseball, NASCAR, rasslin’ and deer hunting), you’d better be prepared to hear it or stuff cotton in your ears.

On the analysis, can you really conclude that we’d score less if we shot more? Although not as technical and not factual, if a “team” avgs 10 PP shots per game and avgs 2 PP goals per game, then what would happen if they all of a sudden started taking 20 PP shots per game? Isn’t it reasonable to conclude they would score more than 2 PP goals per game (given ample PP opportunities)? Wouldn’t this be especially true with a team like the Thrashers who are already pretty abysmal when it comes to SCORING on the PP? I certainly don’t see how the Thrashers shooting LESS on the PP could somehow result in MORE PP goals.

The (disproven?) premise seems to be “we don’t score enough on the PP because we don’t shoot enough”. If a ficticious team avgs 2 PP goals for every 10 PP shots (over the course of several games or a season), but only takes 9 PP shots in any given game, then they would be expected to score only 1 goal. By taking that one extra shot in that game, they would be expected to score 2 PP goals that game, which could be the difference. Of course this assumes ample PP opportunities (and not only 1 per game). The next shot could always result in a goal, even if it’s on a rebound. Thus it should always be beneficial over the long term to shoot, shoot, shoot on every PP opportunity until the puck finds the net or time runs out. Teams do this against us all the time and score…Frequently.

but what’s toby’s participation rate WITHOUT kovalchuk’s onetimer in the pp? of course it was highest among dmen when kovy was with us, because toby was on the top line right alongside one of the best snipers in the league. im not saying toby’s the only one at fault for a crappy and predictable pp, but there have been plenty of times when he’s had a wide open lane but chose to pass to someone who just ends up losing the puck. so instead of putting pressure on the goalie and creating rebound opportunities, we just pass the puck away. the problem is, NO ONE has assumed kovys role as a sniper on the pp. bogosian comes the closest, but hes extremely inaccurate which ends up hurting the pp even more as the puck curves off the boards often creating SH odd man rushes.

and you think athletes always know better than fans?? why have coaches then? if athlete’s were flawless, then why do they, especially the thrashers of late, make so many mistakes? i think it’s a little misguided to say fans are just being stupid when they think a player should shoot in a wide open lane on the pp even JA has urged toby many times (ive heard him say it a lot) to become more confident shooting, especially when he has great opportunities. I guess JA is just being stupid too though, because toby knows EXACTLY what hes doing.

i see what youre saying, but the whole dynamic of the pp has changed now that kovy’s gone. i think the main problem of the pp all year has been it’s ability to gain the zone with guys dumping the puck to no one for example. that applies now, and it applied to when we were struggling under kovy. that’s still a big issue with this pp, but now the few times when we do manage to gain the zone and move the puck around to the point, we dont have a kovy waiting to take a shot. we instead have several indecisive guys who are too reluctant to shoot in an open lane when the opportunity presents itself. i think this bad pp is related to everyone who’s currently seeing time with the advantage, and that definitely includes toby who sees A LOT of time.