An Interesting Look at What Could Happen to JT Miller's Production into his 30s

[Gawdzukes]

1 hour ago, stawns said:

That's a bubble playoff, same as it is now and it will only decline, year by year.  But hey, clearly that's good with you.  I have higher aspirations with the young core coming up

That's a disgustingly ugly line-up. The wingers are seriously suspect. There are 3 questionable wingers in the top 6. Two prospects and an aging tweener. Than you have Motte, a fourth liner playing on the third, and a AHL player on the fourth. That defence is still stale with no jam, just older. Plus it's missing a player. Teams have 23 players on it.

 

 

This is the exact reason tough decisions are required.

 

 

Edited March 11, 2022 by Gawdzukes

[khay]

Nice post.

 

Basically, no deal longer than 6 years.

 

I would do 9 mil x 5 yrs or 10 mil x 4 yrs.

 

We will need to trade Horvat in that case, very very very difficult decision lies ahead.

 

Hopefully we can re-sign Boeser to 6-6.5 mil.

 

[khay]

1 hour ago, stawns said:

That's a bubble playoff, same as it is now and it will only decline, year by year.  But hey, clearly that's good with you.  I have higher aspirations with the young core coming up

This is what I thought too but with the way Petey has been playing, I don't think we will necessarily experience gradual decline if we end up re-signing Miller.

 

For the next couple of years, Miller will still be #1C, EP will be #2C. Both of them plays 20+ minutes, including PP and PK.

 

Starting from year 3, EP will be #1C and replace Miller's production, Miller will be #2C, still good for 50-70 points.

 

If we can find an NHL ready RD by trading Boeser and/or Horvat, that should be explored. 

 

And of course, Miller may refuse to re-sign in the offseason or demand an 8 year deal... in which case, we need to trade him and hopefully get 3 pieces back: cost controlled young NHL ready RD, 3C, and a 1st.

 

But let's just enjoy the playoff push this season. Miller is putting together a special season. He's determined as anyone I ever watched to get this team to the playoffs.

 

[48MPHSlapShot]

If Miller is producing at a 50 point per season pace on the tail end of his next contract I'd be okay okay with that. Still top six numbers, and given his ability to play all forward positions and both special teams, he'd still likely be a valuable player. Overpaid sure, but valuable. Assuming that the end of the flat cap era is in sight, inflation should make the cap hit look a tad less massive as well. 9 million dollars in 2029 isn't the same as 9 million dollars in 2023.

 

This is of course all based on the assumption that Miller's trajectory falls in line with the status quo.

[Crabcakes]

Miller says that he is fed up to the teeth with all the trade chatter about him.  I wonder whether this is motivation for the career season that he is having.

 

He is at 67 points in 57 games ......1.18 ppg

 

The only other year that he was over a point per game was 2019/20....72 points in 69 games ....1.04 ppg 

[Quinn Huges]

Edited March 11, 2022 by Quinn Huges

[singing chef]

8 hours ago, HKSR said:

So I wanted to get an idea of what history has shown in regards to NHL players hitting the Top 25 in scoring at the age of 29 or 30, and what their inevitable decline looks like. 

 

I started with 2010-11, and identified players that were 29 or 30 years old, and also finished Top 25 in NHL scoring that year.  Then I took a look at their PPG that year vs 6 years, 7 years, and 8 years later.

 

For example, Daniel Sedin was 30 in 2010-11, finished top 25 in scoring, and had 1.27 PPG in 2010-11.  In 2016-17 (+6), his PPG dropped to 0.54, and in 2017-18 (+7) his PPG was 0.68.

 

So all of these players at the specific ages of 29 and 30 were Top 25 in NHL scoring for the particular years indicated.

 

 

My observations:

- 6 years after their Top 25 scoring season (at the specific ages of 29 or 30), PPG is 0.60 on average.  7 years later, it goes up to 0.69. 

- Taking generational talent Ovechkin out of the mix, results in 0.57 PPG 6 years after, and 0.61 PPG 7 years after.

- Most players don't make it to the +8 season.  They end up retiring.

- Seems like the past 5 or 6 years have some pretty unique older players.  I could see most of the players from 2015-16 onwards to maintain pretty high PPG averages well into the future.

 

So what does this mean for JT Miller? 

 

We can realistically expect by year 6 of his new deal, he would be scoring around 50 points per season. 

We can also reasonably expect that he may very well retire by Year 8 of his contract.  Anybody know what that would mean in regards to his cap hit?

 

Anyways, thought this would be a nice discussion piece. 

Great post HKSR - thank you.  An observation:  Miller plays a complete game and a robust game, including PP, PK, blocking shots, loves to hit.  Many of the players on your list don't/didn't get so involved.  The way Miller plays may suggest that his body might not stand up to the rigours of the type of game he plays and accordingly, his production may drop off more quickly than the average.  i.e. if he re-signs for 7 or 8 years, his production may start to significantly decline after 3 or 4 years in which case his contract/cap hit would be an anchor.  This is merely speculation on my part but.........he does put his body on the line with the way he plays and bodies tend to wear out !

 

Cheers.

[Phil_314]

7 hours ago, IBatch said:

Seems pretty clear to me, unless your a rare breed of HHOF caliber material your production goes down significantly.  That is unless you haven't already retired.  Also have to include games played, pretty sure it's easy to say that a lot of cap sitting on the sidelines doesn't help a team (Getzlaf over the years) ... gets tougher and tougher for most guys.

Agreed with all of this.  Hopefully by the time his contract gets to its later years and he declines in usefulness, he would have lower actual dollars owed (front load the contract), such that if he's still a 40ish point guy there could still be a trade to a contender if he still wants an attempt to win it all as a swan song.  If he plays his cards right with fitness and picks his spots with physicality I think he can still be productive, since some of his scoring lately has been off primary assists -- with his vision I'm sure he can be the facilitator off the rush for his linemates who would be in their prime, and they can do the rest.

[Baggins]

8 hours ago, stawns said:

First of all you're using the assumption he wants to stay and I'll bet my bottom dollar he doesn't.  "If" he did, the team would look relatively the same as it does now, with a weak dcorp and no wiggle room to sign people.  So unless you think this is the team to win a Cup, signing him to a monster deal, long term is a death sentence to the Cup dreams of this org.

League standings by Win % since Dec 5....

 

[DrJockitch]

I think with what Miller is going to get paid we are in a Miller, Boesser, Garland, pick 2 out of 3 situation.

Have to consider the returns as well, frankly given Garland is long term at 5M and is a more dynamic player I would probably keep him over Brock if he is looking for 7.5M range contract. 
Unfortunately it doesn’t look like anyone coming soon to fill a role, Klim is at least a couple years away, Lockwood is more of a bottom 6 player and McDonough may or may not sign and may or may not go back to school. 
For a draft guy, Benning sure did leave the cupboards bare.  

[grandmaster]

9 hours ago, Crabcakes said:

Miller says that he is fed up to the teeth with all the trade chatter about him.  I wonder whether this is motivation for the career season that he is having.

 

He is at 67 points in 57 games ......1.18 ppg

 

The only other year that he was over a point per game was 2019/20....72 points in 69 games ....1.04 ppg 

1) He finally got a proper coach

 

2) He wants to win and make the playoffs

[timberz21]

You really needed to research that to determine that 30 years old player produce more than their 36/37 years old self?

[kloubek]

8 hours ago, singing chef said:

Miller plays a complete game and a robust game, including PP, PK, blocking shots, loves to hit.  Many of the players on your list don't/didn't get so involved.  The way Miller plays may suggest that his body might not stand up to the rigours of the type of game he plays

I agree this is a factor which needs to be considered.

In my own mind, Miller has made me a believer. I always knew he was the kind of player we wanted and was absolutely stoked when we traded for him, but I will be honest in saying I had no expectations he was going to perform at this level. I thought he was a borderline 1st line player but more likely a good 2nd line guy. I was wrong.

 

I think many are basing his worth on this particular season. And admittedly, he's been fantastic. But I wouldn't say that if we kept him that we could expect this level consistently, even for the first few years of the contract. Nevertheless, if the cap hit and length was reasonable, I could absolutely see the case in keeping him.

 

But then back to the regression matrix put together by the OP, combined with your own comment. The two of which make me think his final years would look more like around 40 points a season, which is ok, but certainly a liability with a contract nearing 2 digits a year salary. I think the only way that makes sense for this team in the long term if we keep Miller is to try to ensure he is tradable in the 2nd half of his contract. Then if we start to see that regression, we can move him before the rest of the league notices and hopefully recoup an asset or two in the process.

 

On the flip side, his worth will never be more than it is currently. Given all of the above, I would also be ok if we traded him and got serious assets back.

[HKSR]

20 minutes ago, timberz21 said:

You really needed to research that to determine that 30 years old player produce more than their 36/37 years old self?

Uhhh, I think you missed the point of the post completely.  Let us know when you catch up.

[Provost]

You have cherry picked, made so many assumptions, and excluded so many players  that this is pretty spurious.

A general rule in statistics is the more you massage the data, the less likely you are to just go down the wrong path.

Is there something  actually unique about this specific subset of players?  Does Miller belong with them?  What rationale is there to exclude every other player?  Why use just the 29/30 year? Why not PPG over their careers?

 

There is no need to narrow down the data to just fit a narrative you want, there is excellent research about production and aging already done.

 

https://hockey-graphs.com/2017/03/23/a-new-look-at-aging-curves-for-nhl-skaters-part-1/
 

 

[erkayloomeh]

16 hours ago, stawns said:

In that thread you have Lockwood in the lineup 

 

Lockwood isn't even making an impact in Abby yet, so that's not happening at this point. 

 

 

 

And this is one of the issues with this team. We should at least have bottom 6 options on our farm and we don't.  How do we solve that? Long term drafting and development (not trading picks)  but takes a while.

 

Undervalue mindset of bottom six players( motte) and overvalued top six. ( garland) 

 

Miller is exactly the type if player you win cups with. Is Garland? 

 

I would trade garland for picks prospects.(see above, this speeds that up)

 

I would resign Motte now 

 

I would replace garland in the offseason with a grittier Motte like player for about 3 mil. 

 

Ppl sign ufas like LE to long deals but won't poney up an extra mil for 3 years fir guys like Motte who is a demon to play against.  

 

 

 

[Rindiculous]

14 minutes ago, Provost said:

You have cherry picked, made so many assumptions, and excluded so many players  that this is pretty spurious.

A general rule in statistics is the more you massage the data, the less likely you are to just go down the wrong path.

Is there something  actually unique about this specific subset of players?  Does Miller belong with them?  What rationale is there to exclude every other player?  Why use just the 29/30 year? Why not PPG over their careers?

 

There is no need to narrow down the data to just fit a narrative you want, there is excellent research about production and aging already done.

 

https://hockey-graphs.com/2017/03/23/a-new-look-at-aging-curves-for-nhl-skaters-part-1/
 

 

It's called choosing comparables.  What you're trying to do is compare Miller to a mush of superstars, 4 line grinders, and players who peaked when they were under 25.  By picking the players that are most comparable to Miller, it is the most likely age curve Miller is gonna follow.

[Provost]

4 minutes ago, Rindiculous said:

It's called choosing comparables.  What you're trying to do is compare Miller to a mush of superstars, 4 line grinders, and players who peaked when they were under 25.  By picking the players that are most comparable to Miller, it is the most likely age curve Miller is gonna follow.

You have to first illustrate how that subset of players is unique from the overall population to justify why they are comparables.  Why cut it to top 25 scorers at that specific age?  Why not the top 50?  Why not the top 10?  Why not career PPG average?  Why not pure points rather than top 25 scorers in their year?  Is the league the same now as it was more than a decade ago to make them even comparable to each other? Etc?  He hasn't done any of that work, so none of his outcomes actually mean anything statistically.  You can't just pick a random very specific criteria and decide it means something.  Do brown haired hockey players differ in results in their 30's than blonde ones? 

He also hasn't done any work to show that Miller belongs to that set of comparables.

Did those players have the same late bloomer curve as Miller?  Did most of them have a much longer resume of being top scorers than Miller?  Is he the same as Ovechkin and Crosby who had many years of being above a PPG player whereas Miller wasn't close to that for almost his entire career?

[HKSR]

5 minutes ago, Provost said:

You have to first illustrate how that subset of players is unique from the overall population to justify why they are comparables.  Why cut it to top 25 scorers at that specific age?  Why not the top 50?  Why not the top 10?  Why not career PPG average?  Why not pure points rather than top 25 scorers in their year?  Is the league the same now as it was more than a decade ago to make them even comparable to each other? Etc?  He hasn't done any of that work, so none of his outcomes actually mean anything statistically.  You can't just pick a random very specific criteria and decide it means something.  Do brown haired hockey players differ in results in their 30's than blonde ones? 

He also hasn't done any work to show that Miller belongs to that set of comparables.

Did those players have the same late bloomer curve as Miller?  Did most of them have a much longer resume of being top scorers than Miller?  Is he the same as Ovechkin and Crosby who had many years of being above a PPG player whereas Miller wasn't close to that for almost his entire career?

The fact you posted up a graph about WINS above replacement to get an understanding of individual player's offensive production tells me plenty.

[Provost]

5 minutes ago, HKSR said:

The fact you posted up a graph about WINS above replacement to get an understanding of individual player's offensive production tells me plenty.

... you could actually bother to read the entire link and detailed research provided.
 

Edited March 11, 2022 by Provost