Wings Nation 2016-17 Player Review: Gustav Nyquist
By David Law
6 years agoIt is time for the Gustav Nyquist Year in Review! That means it’s time to ask ourselves just how loose the Goose was this year? The answer is… actually kind of hard to say. Nyquist certainly didn’t have a dominant year. He didn’t take the next step that Wings fans are (justifiably) expecting him to take. This made his season frustrating to many. Bob Duff sums up his season by saying simply, “not good enough.”
Let’s take a closer look at why Duff and so many others feel that way.
Hero Chart:
The Zetterberg Hero chart shows that Nyquist generally receives top 6 ice time, while occasionally dipping down into the bottom. This puts him squarely in the mid-6 column that the Hero format uses to differentiate between players. His shots metrics all show him in that mid-6 range. The problem is that Detroit needs him to start to push up towards the top end of the mid-range or top line range. He is one of the vets on the team, and his performance needs to start showing it. The most interesting thing about his Hero chart, however, is his Primary Points. His goals metric is abysmal. This is balanced out by a very strong primary assist showing. We know that Nyquist is a pass-first player, but anyone who can output primary assists at the level he can needs to get his goal scoring up to at least a mid-range level.
Crunching Numbers:
Boxcars:
(Stats courtesy of nhl.com)
This is a strange category for Nyquist. He actually matched the second highest output year of his career. His 48 points is also only 6 points off his career best. The issue as I see it is with both his goal scoring and the fact that he seems to have plateaued. His last 4 seasons all have been in roughly the same point total. When he had his first 48-point year in 2013-14 the feel was one of excitement. Fans were just waiting for him to keep climbing and eventually be one of the players to help the Wings get through the eventual loss of Datsyuk and Zetterberg. That now seems like it was a pipe dream. Nyquist needs to be able to put together a season where he keeps his assist total as high as it was this year, but with the scoring touch to go along with it.
Corsi:
(Stats courtesy of puckalytics.com)
Nyquist had a CF% this year of 49.87. This put him 5th on the team. While him being in the top 5 CF%s on Detroit is a good sign, it is important to keep in mind that Detroit had the 24th CF% in the league. They were not a very good team this year. Nyquist is undoubtedly a talented playmaker. His assist total (especially on a team like Detroit) shows that he has a very strong set-up game. He just desperately needs to get his goal totals up. Overall his possession numbers were average.
Goal Based:
(Stats courtesy of puckalytics.com)
Nyquist’s GF60 was the tops on the team this year. This is a great sign, and shows how good his passing game is when you remember that he personally only scored 12 goals this year. Again, while it is nice to see him leading the team in an important metric we must keep in mind the overall team performance.
2017-18 Prediction:
Next year! I honestly think that Nyquist is as disappointed in his year as Wings fans are. He’s a genuine guy, and he wants to earn that spot as the successor (or as close to it as you can get) to Datsyuk. I think he’s going to come out with the scoring touch he finally discovered late in this year and put on a show. He clearly has the vision and touch to be a high-level passer in the league, and if he can get the scoring there he has the potential to lead the team. He will be deployed in some less-favourable positions next year as Zetterberg continues to age, however, so this will be a challenge. Let’s hope it pans out!
Conclusion
Not a great year for Nyquist overall. His assists were great, and his point total matched the second highest he’s ever accumulated. He failed to take the next step that many were anticipating, and he had absolutely no scoring touch this year. He only had 10 more goals than Riley Sheahan, and Sheahan didn’t score until game 82. This review has been harsh on Nyquist, and he did have the second most points on the team. In my mind, however, this is more an indictment of the Wings year than a positive for Nyquist.
Even so, he had a better year than most of the team.
Grade: B-
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