Calculated struggles of the Carolina Hurricanes (Trending Topics)

The Carolina Hurricanes became the first official seller of any consequence in this year’s trade season by sending Ron Hainsey (with half the AAV on his expiring contract retained) to Pittsburgh for a second-round pick and an AHLer.

And why not? The ‘Canes entered the day 10 points out in the East, playing in the toughest division in hockey. Ron Francis saw the writing on the wall and dumped a 35-year-old depth defender on a team that, all of a sudden, desperately needed blue line help. In doing so, they bumped the total number of picks they have in June’s draft to nine, and that number now includes six in the first three rounds alone.

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If they’re smart — and they, of course, very much are — that number will continue to climb as the deadline approaches and, perhaps ahead of the draft. This is a team with some moderately sellable assets. Maybe someone wants Viktor Stalberg. Maybe someone wants Jay McClement. Maybe they’d be tempted to part with Lee Stempniak (even though they just signed him for two years this past summer).

Point being, why not listen? You are where you are, so if you have the ability to retain salary and give up guys you don’t really care about long-term, see what’s out there. Get more picks, increase your chances to get better in a season that is decidedly not this one.

For Pittsburgh fans interested in learning more about their newest defensemen, one of the things that stands out the most when you look at Hainsey’s underlying numbers is the almost incredible disparity between his expected-goals-for percentage, which measures the quality of shots the Hurricanes both took and conceded when he was on the ice, with his actual goals-for. Hainsey led the Hurricanes in 5-on-5 time on ice this season, and was a little above water in expected goals (51 percent, not bad). He was also aboard the Nautilus in terms of real goals (only a little more than 36 percent, which is incredible).

Suffice it to say this is not a problem unique to Hainsey on this club. Overall, the Hurricanes have the third-biggest disparity in the League between the goals they “should have” scored, and the goals they have actually scored. Only Boston (minus-9.8) and Colorado (minus-8) are bigger under-performers.

The Hurricanes do a lot of things at least passably well. They’re 15th in adjusted shot attempts and 14th in scoring chances. I would argue they don’t get enough of those attempts on net and cut down on the number of blocked shots, but that’s not the hugest issue in the world, no matter what Don Sweeney says. That they’re also 14th in the league in expected goals feels just about right, overall. They are also plus-25 when it comes to drawing penalties, good for the fourth-highest differential in the league. That also helps you win games, in theory.

So why, then, are they third from the bottom in terms of actual goals?

You can very easily argue that some of it is bad luck. Any time you have a PDO that starts with “97” things really haven’t gone your way. With that having been said, though, this was always going to be a possibility for this team in particular, no matter how good their process was.

For one thing, the decision to re-sign Cam Ward for two more seasons at middling money is one that was rightly derided when it happened. Ward is not an NHL-level goaltender and hasn’t been for a few years. That the team consequently has the lowest 5-on-5 save percentage in the league (.904) and the third-lowest in all situations sounds just about right. But again, the Hurricanes aren’t dumb. They didn’t think to themselves this would be the year Ward turned it around, after he’d already turned 30. They knew this was probably about what they’d get out of him.

One imagines they perhaps also hoped they’d get a lot more out of Eddie Lack, who was a .917 as a backup with Vancouver before Carolina got him. In the past two seasons, in which he appeared in just 40 games, Lack is .895. And moreover, they didn’t really have a ton of sure-thing options out there in the summer either. Run down the goalies who got contracts from July to September: Apart from Chad Johnson and James Reimer, there weren’t any really exciting options available to serve as any sort of stopgap or insurance policy if (when) Ward was awful again. They signed Michael Leighton in September, to really highlight how dire the situation was.

So obviously that’s a big reason for the low PDO at 5-on-5. What’s amazing is how effective this team has been when it comes to the PK (above 86 percent!) despite these problems.

Overall, Carolina goalies have cost the Hurricanes a little more than 20 goals versus what an average goaltender would have allowed. Call that about seven points in the standings. That alone makes them playoff-competitive — though not, like, actually competitive — and might have kept them from selling, which they shouldn’t have done. But you see the point.

The other aspect of PDO, though, highlights what has been a problem for the Hurricanes for more than just this season: They don’t shoot the puck all that effectively. They generate the fourth-most scoring chances per 60 minutes in the league. They score the ninth-fewest goals. Their shooting percentage is 23rd.

This, too, was a calculated risk. Carolina added plenty of offensive talent in the summer, most notably Teuvo Teravainen, as well as bringing in some of their younger high-end prospects (Sebastian Aho and so on) to hopefully round out the attack. The very impressive but still very young D corps for which Hainsey was the greybeard also plays a role, given that they look pretty good getting the puck up the ice most nights.

But the big offensive jump didn’t happen, which I guess is going to be a risk when most of your forwards are under the age of 24 and still improving as goal producers. They had to know that because they went through it last year. Before the talent infusion, of course, Carolina was a very good “process” team that was lacking in results. They finished 11th in share of attempts, 13th in shots on goal, 16th in expected goals. And because they were only 22nd in scoring chances — they likely just didn’t have the talent to get to the net consistently — and the seventh-lowest shooting percentage to go with their rotten goaltending, they finished third-bottom in goal share.

No real surprise.

These are guys whose quality is obvious, but whose finish remains an unrefined weapon in their arsenal. Again, some of this is luck, but if it’s the second year in a row of this level of bad luck, it’s not bad luck alone. Here’s what the goal totals for all Carolina skaters with at least 500 minutes at 5-on-5 look like versus what they “should have” scored:

When you actually sit down and watch a Hurricanes game, you can see that a lot of what they do is very impressive. You can also plainly see the deficiencies that come with that young roster that, while increasingly talented, still doesn’t have the finish to make a huge difference most nights. If they’re going to take the step forward a young core like this needs, they should either try to acquire someone who can more immediately make an impact (you don’t stockpile picks just to control the rights to half the players in the OHL, after all), or just let this group mature together.

As for this year, well, it’s a wash in terms of the standings. Again. That’s fine. They knew this was a possible outcome. You can see something forming down in Raleigh, and even if it’s not here yet it seems as though it could be soon. They just need that little extra something to push them over the edge offensively. And a goalie who can make a save.

Both are correctable problems.

Ryan Lambert is a Puck Daddy columnist. His email is here and his Twitter is here.

All stats via Corsica unless otherwise stated.

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