Best Oiler Rookie?

With the season winding down it is an appropriate time to start gauging the performances of the future of this hockey team. The guys that I am going to look at are Sam Gagner, Andrew Cogliano, Tom Gilbert and Curtis Glencross.

Bios

Name	Age	Contract status
Sam Gagner	18	3 year entry level 875,000 per ~750,000 in bonuses
Andrew Cogliano	20	3 year entry level 850,000 per ~ 350,000 in bonuses
Tom Gilbert	25	Pending RFA 835,000 ~ 75,000 in bonuses
Curtis Glencross	26	Pending UFA Group VI 522,500

*all figures from www.nhlscap.com

Let’s look first at some overall statistics

Player	Goals	Assists	Points	PP/60	TOI/G
Gagner	12	36	48	2.50	15:33
Cogliano	18	25	43	2.49	13:30
Gilbert	12	19	31	1.09	22:10
Glencross	12	10	22	2.04	11:19

First off, Gagner does lead all these rookies in scoring, but when you break it down into points per 60 minutes Cogliano is right there with him with Glencross only trailing by 0.46. As well, Gilbert is logging an incredible amount of ice time for a rookie rear guard.

Ranking:

1. Gagner
2. Cogliano
3. Gilbert and Glencross

Now let’s look at some even strength statistics

Player	Goals	Assists	Points	EV PP/60	EV TOI/G	+/-
Gagner	8	24	32	2.05	12:39	-19
Cogliano	15	19	34	2.46	10:43	0
Gilbert	10	11	21	0.94	17:24	-8
Glencross	11	9	20	2.04	10:18	+8

Looking at the even strength stats a couple of things jump out, first Cogliano is out producing Gagner even with playing less time. As well Gilbert being a D-man will take a hit in his point production. However the other glaring statistic comes from the +/- category. Gagner’s number is pretty atrocious (lupulesque) whereas, Glencross, Cogliano and Gilbert are significantly better.

Ranking:

1. Cogliano
2. Gilbert and Glencross
3. Gagner

Now let’s look at power play statistics

Player	Goals	Assists	Points	PPP/60	PP TOI/G
Gagner	4	12	16	4.64	2:47
Cogliano	1	5	6	2.33	2:00
Gilbert	2	6	8	3.48	2:12
Glencross	1	1	2	2.15	0:58

Obviously, playing on the top power play unit has helped Gagner pad some of his stats, however, for a rookie scoring 4.64 power play points per 60 minutes is fantastic. In comparison the top power play scorer in the league Alex Kovalev scores at around 8.3 PPP/60 and Jaromir Jagr is scoring at 4.62 PPP/60. Then looking at Gilbert’s numbers he is scoring at 3.48 PPP/60 on the second unit and the leading PP scoring D-Man is Sergei Gonchar scoring at 6.28 PPP/60 while playing 3 minutes of PP time more per game. Not to be overlooked is Glencross scoring at a 2.15 PPP/60 which make me wonder why is Pisani in front of the net on the second line and not Glenner?

Ranking

1. Gagner
2. Gilbert
3. Cogliano and Glencross

Now let’s look at some short handed statistics

Player	Goals	Assists	Points	SH TOI/G
Gagner	0	0	0	0:06
Cogliano	2	1	3	0:47
Gilbert	0	2	2	2:33
Glencross	0	0	0	0:02

Now I know that this seems like an unfair stat to look at since 2 of the 4 players do not kill penalties. However, I think that it would be unfair to Gilbert as he does eat up some serious PK time and that in his limited time Cogliano is a threat when out killing penalties.

Ranking

1. Gilbert
2. Cogliano
3. Gagner and Glencross

Now we will look at some of the more trivial statistics

Player	Hits/60	Blocks/60	TA/60	GA/60	TA GA differential
Gagner	0.89	1.56	1.35	2.24	-0.89
Cogliano	1.33	1.62	1.68	2.66	-0.98
Gilbert	0.81	5.30	0.98	2.49	-1.51
Glencross	8.15	1.02	1.02	1.94	-0.92

TA = Take Away

GA = Give Away

Looking at these statistics a couple of things are noticeable first, Glencross has added an aspect that the Oilers sorely missed for the first 50 games in that he goes out and attempts to hit anything that moves. Second, obviously being a defenseman Gilbert will lead this quartet in blocks as he is the last line between the shooter and Rolie the rebound factory. As well, it is good to see that 3 of the 4 of these rookies are less than 1 in the take away give away differential.

Ranking:

N/A

So now that we have looked at how the rookies stack up against each other in each of the categories I will try to rank their seasons. The one factor that I think is greatly overlooked is the age of the rookies. Does being 25 and 26 detract anything from Gilbert and Glencross as they have had 5 years of extra development over Cogliano and 7 over Gagner? Does being the youngest player in the NHL and making the jump from junior straight to the NHL add anything to what Gagner has accomplished? Is it a good sign that Cogliano showed no second half slow down that has plagued other players making the jump from the NCAA to the NHL? Looking at the arbitrary rankings that I have given after each statistic the break down is as follows:

Gagner:

2 – 1^st place finishes

0 – 2^nd place finishes

2 – 3^rd place finishes

Total = 8 points

Cogliano:

1 – 1^st place finish

2 – 2^nd place finishes

1 – 3^rd place finish

Total = 8 points

Gilbert:

1 – 1^st place finish

2 – 2^nd place finishes

1 – 3^rd place finish

Total = 8 Points

Glencross:

0 – 1^st place finishes

1 – 2^nd place finish

3 – 3^rd place finishes

Total = 5 Points

Looking at this there is a 3 way tie between Gagner, Cogliano, and Gilbert. My vote however, goes to Gagner as when he is 20, 25 or 26 he will be the franchise player of the Oilers.