Number Crunch: What to expect from Jack Eichel in Vegas

One of the most interesting stories in hockey right now is centered around three players who aren’t currently playing.

The Vegas Golden Knights have Max Pacioretty and Mark Stone on the Injured Reserve, as well as the newly-acquired Jack Eichel, who finally went in for his preferred surgery on Friday.

In this week’s edition of Number Crunch on The Daily Faceoff Show, Rachel Doerrie talked about Eichel and what we can expect when he’s healthy. She noted his impressive numbers on a poor Buffalo team and suggested that Eichel will see a major bump playing with a new pair of quality forwards on his wing.

Seravalli: “I want to talk about Jack Eichel. When you look back at Jack Eichel’s last three seasons, what kind of indication does that give you in terms of what we might be able to expect from him when he’s healthy in Vegas?”

Doerrie: “He’s having surgery today [Friday] and when you have an injury as serious as this, it’s never a good thing to just expect he’s going to be the player. But, right now, that’s all we have to go off of.

In the last three seasons, 186 points in 174 games. That’s over a point-per-game, that’s an elite player. You look at his five-on-five points per 60, he’s averaging just over two per game. And then there are his power-play points per 60, 6.13, which is on the higher end.

And, on an absolutely abysmal Buffalo team, he still managed to win the possession battle. The real key here is that not only did he have 58 percent possession, but he was 14.16 percent relative, which means relative to the rest of his team, his possession metrics were 14 percent higher than everybody else.

That tells me that’s an elite player in a bad situation. If you put him with Max Pacioretty and Mark Stone, I expect that to be one of the best lines in hockey, right up there with Edmonton, Boston, and Colorado.”

You can watch the full episode here…