A GM’s Carol: The Ghost of Aging Veterans
By JP Nikota
12 years ago
On a sweatstained duvet cover, Jay Feaster tosses and turns fitfully. Suddenly, his window blows open and in drifts a ghostly spectre.
"What do you want from me?! Why are you haunting me?! Why do you look like Jarome Iginla?"
"I’m here to show you what your star player is dealing with. You’ll accompany me as we see that he shares your restless slumber."
The apparition and Feaster, after a lot of effort on behalf of the ghost, begin to float out to Jarome Iginla’s homestead.
"Take a good look at the stress that you’ve caused this great Canadian hero Jay"
“The jersey! The sweater! It won’t come off!”“NOOOOOOOOOOoooooooo!”Jarome woke up to find himself thrashing around inside of his bed sheets, momentarily unable to free himself. Sweaty, cold, and disoriented, it took a moment for his startled wife, Kara, to calm him down.“Jarome! It’s OK! It’s OK! Look at me! It’s OK! It was just a bad dream!”“It was that same dream again! I was 38, missing the playoffs, and wearing a Sundin jersey that I couldn’t take off! But this time, a… this… mysterious, spectral figure told me a prophesy!”Kara looked at her husband with a mix of concern and pity, muttered “You’ll win that Cup eventually”, and rolled over.
"By no means would even I, this all-knowing spectral figure, attempt to dictate the future to a man that has control over his own destiny, but a chilling scene it would be, the day “Iggy” left the rink for good, without a Stanley Cup ring in his possession. A Stanley Cup, he can win, but not with this Calgary Flames team, thinks I. You see, I am the Ghost of Aging Veterans, and I come with alarming news. Unless the Calgary Flames change their ways, and perhaps more to the point, their players, they shall not win a Cup."
"Huh?" *Eats a turducken in three bites*
"Certainly, there are teams that have won the Cup with many veterans in the lineup – why, just last year, a man in his forties, Mark Recchi took home the big trophy with the B’s. And what of the average age of the rosters? Here are the Cup winning rosters’ average ages, and the average age of Calgary on June 15th, 2012 (the date that the Bruins won last year)"
Team | Average Age |
Boston | 27.03 |
Chicago | 26.06 |
Pittsburgh | 27.15 |
Detroit | 29.45 |
Anaheim | 27.6 |
Carolina | 28.03 |
AVERAGE | 27.57 |
Calgary | 29.69 |
"Hmmm… they are older, these Flames. It rather reminds me of another aging group of vets that I saw shortly after the lockout: the 2005-08 Toronto Maple Leafs. Sundin always did deserve better, but his loyalty to the team, while admirable, kept him in Toronto for too long. You see, the Flames have a lot of important members that are already on the wrong side of 26 (the peak age for production by most measures), and Iggy, like Sundin won’t carry a whole team on his back much longer. Here’s a look at the core of the team and their ages"
Player | Age | NTC/NMC |
Babchuk, Anton | 27 | NTC |
Bourque, Rene | 29 | Modified NMC |
Bouwmeester, Jay | 27 | NTC |
Giordano, Mark | 27 | NTC/NMC |
Glencross, Curtis | 28 | No |
Hagman, Niklas | 31 | No |
Hannan, Scott | 32 | No |
Iginla, Jerome | 34 | NMC |
Ivanans, Ratis | 32 | No |
Jackman, Tim | 29 | No |
Jokinen, Olli | 32 | No |
Karlssen, Henrik | 27 | No |
Kiprusoff, Mikka | 34 | NMC |
Kostopolous, Tom | 32 | No |
Morrison, Brendan | 36 | No |
Moss, David | 29 | No |
Sarich, Cory | 33 | NMC |
Stajan, Matt | 27 | Modified NMC |
Stempniak, Lee | 28 | No |
Tanguay, Alex | 31 | Modified NMC |
"That’s the team that is going to finish above the Oilers for at least one more year bud."
"That’s an old core, Jay. The above-listed group includes 12 out of the Flames’ top 15 skaters, as sorted by TOI/60. Oh, and don’t forget that Scott Hannan has been brought in to replace Regehr, so they’ve replaced one old boy with another. Given the number of NMC’s and NMC’s, this group isn’t keen on being shipped out for younger players, prospects, or picks, either. It does happen, of course, but… really? Lee Stempniak?"
"He scored 14 goals in 14 games once Mr. Ghost so stick that in your…errr…bony something or other and smoke it. Plus, Iggy had 86 points last year. He still has more gas in the tank than that Sundin character."
"Now, Iginla had 86 points last year. It’s not as though his goal-scoring abilities are going to dry up overnight, and that’s great news for the Flames. But it’s tough to say how much longer he can keep it up. Here’s a graph showing the number of 30-goal seasons by an individual player from 1967 through last season"
"That’s right. Not a pretty picture. Let me leave you with one last thought: how many goalkeepers put up better than a .910 save percentage and played more than 30 games in one season since the ’67 expansion? Well, the sample size is smaller, but basically, we’re looking at a grim outlook for a goalie turning 35."
"Please, heed the warnings of math, good sense, and the Ghost of Aging Veterans. Re-build this team Jay"
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