2009-10 Rink Wrap: Tomas Fleischmann

Flash is looking a lil Crosby-ish in that photo.

hmm, this will not be as easy as i thought it might. wonder if he’ll exceed his 07-08 rating.

BTW, what’s the lowest recored rink wrap average? i’m guessing you weren’t doing this when jagr was here….

He put up the points I expected, but was pretty much significantly worse everywhere else. He loses some points on that. And he loses points because of his playoff disappearance. And he loses a point for that terrifying picture. 2.

These are going to be all over the board. Tough to say that someone who hits 50 points for the first time underperformed, but there was just so little improvement in most aspects of his game that it was pretty disappointing. I gave him a 4.

I actually really like Flash, and used to be a hater.
He really does have a great skill set that on most teams could be a very solid 2nd-line LW, and even a first-liner on weaker teams.
All of that said, I think Flash needs to be parlayed into assets we need more of, namely, character players who may not be present for the same months Flash is great, but come up big in the springtime.

Gave him a six for looking, well, like the player Bruce thinks he is early on. Didn’t knock him for the playoffs because as mentioned, Flash played pretty much as expected in the playoffs. I guess Flash should see a raise to 1.5 million or so, but whether the Caps should be the ones paying it is a different matter, because trying to fit all of the expected pieces is getting harder. I guess it depends on what they do with Semin.

I gave him a 6 for the regular season, and a 2 for the playoffs, so he gets a 4. As bad as he was, I honestly can’t say I expected a whole lot more. I wanted more, but expected…? No.

He gets a 2 from me. And only because he started out strongly, and faded like a tired racehorse down the stretch.

But I blame it more on the coaching staff for throwing him out there continually. With the guy coming off an injury as severe as his was, why was he playing so much? He just got gassed as the season went on.

I anxiously await F&B’s opinion today….

Cue F&B in 5,4,3,2…..

I voted 6. I expected him to put up 20+ goals this season, but not 50 points in 69 games. I was more thinking along the lines of 20 goals, 25 assists. And yeah, he disappeared in the playoffs, but then again, so did a lot of other Caps.

What should the caps be willing to commit to him in dollars and years? No dollars, no years. He’s probably our most valuable trade asset at this point, and it’s hard to see what need he fills now or going forward. He doesn’t fit into a bottom-six energy/checking role. Trying him at center wasn’t a great option for us. We have too much depth on the top-two lines on the left side, and a number of utility players who can line up on either wing. And there are a handful of teams out there who could really use a player like Fleischmann on the left side on their second line.

Let’s put it this way: looking forward to 2011, we have two choices about who to put at the left wing on the second line. One possibility is Brooks Laich. The other is Tomas Fleischmann. Who would you rather have under contract?

3. Since he’s never going to play defense, I’d have given him a 5 if his playoffs weren’t so friggin’ abyssmal.

As to the larger discussion, if he’s reupped, it shouldn’t be for more than $1.25m per, and to get a 10, not being in the bottom 3 forwards of the 5v5 GAON/60 (while maintaining his offensive production) would be nice.

Who expected anything different? I was tempted to take off an extra point for the playoff no-show and truly brutal defensive stats, but his first flash of offense (pun intended, of course) was impressive. Too bad he’s not a complete player, but I don’t think he’s getting much better.

I doubt (wishful thinking?) we’ll see him next year: either he signs an offer sheet and we get some much-needed draft picks, or he’s part of a sign and trade (2C, anyone?). I hear the Penguins need wingers… In either scenario, I bet he gets more than 2 million per—which is more than he’s worth.

Good top-line stats would get the Meat Man a 6, but they’re largely from a high shooting percentage and power play production to go with defensive indifference. So I have a 5 that loses another point on intangibles, incuding playoff suck-itude (no I didn’t have that much of it in my expectations). His next bodycheck will be his first.

He’s decent insurance on Semin, but I wouldn’t want to pay more than $1.5M for that this year. I’m not convinced Flach can produce without high quality linemates around him. Bottom line I think we trade him to whichever GM needs a scorer and wants to overvalue his top line stats. But I don’t know if we can get more than a 2nd for him, which could just mean letting him walk on any offer sheet above $1.3M.

I succumbed to the temptation to display my general disgust with Flash. He’s a one-trick pony that only performs that trick when the stakes are lowest. He makes Wellwood look like a bastion of manly fortitude.

His entire performance was so predictable that I ought to have given him a 4, docking him a point for not even scoring in the playoffs, but I dislike him so strongly that I can’t bring myself to do it.

He sucks.

Fleischmann’s problem is summed up perfectly here:

[Fleischmann] had the worst 5-on-5 Corsi rating and goals-against-on-ice-per-sixty (GAON/60) of any forward that spent the entire season on the team and the worst 5-on-5 penalty plus-minus (penalties drawn minus penalties taken) of any skater who played at least half of the team’s games other than John Erskine. Fleischmann was also arguably the team’s worst penalty-killing forward, considering his GAON/60 at 4-on-5 and the quality of competition and teammates contributing to that number. Lastly, Flash only won 43.1% of his face-offs, rendering him largely unplayable at center.

Basically, he’s a wing who stinks at everything other than scoring. Not even mediocre, downright bad on defense, in penalty differential, in physical play, etc. To compensate for that you need to bring it with your offense. And Fleischmann doesn’t bring enough offense to make up for his failings in other areas.

As a restricted free agent, how much (in dollars and years) should the Caps be willing to commit to Fleischmann this summer? Where does he fit in on the 2010-11 Caps?

If I’m the Caps I at least tender him for a year, rather than lose the asset outright, but I’d really like to see them move him in the offseason. If he can be part of package that addresses one of the team’s needs, great. If not, deal him for a pick (or picks) and recoup some of the drafting depth they lost at the trade deadline. But the guy, in my mind, doesn’t have a place with this team right now, and the need to move him is greater because of Boudreau’s infatuation with him.

He exceeded my meager expectations, but sometimes it’s now where you finished as much as it is how you got there. Fast start, dud of a finish. At this point, I think there is a pretty clear picture that he is what he is… sort of an Ales Hemsky-lite (a reasonably gifted offensive performer who isn’t sturdy enough at many of the other aspects of the game). Very lite.

He is on a very cap-friendly contract ($725K), and he could end up being back next year if he gets a similarly cap-friendly contract (he is an arbitration-eligible RFA). The Caps have an adequate supply of skill among their forwards. Fleischmann is not a top-six forward on this team unless he plays center, and it is not a position to which he seems suited at this level of play (right now, Mathieu Perreault is a better center, but then again in fairness to Flesichmann, he’s actually played the position regularly in recent years). He is not a third-liner sort unless you’re trying to build three scoring lines.

I’m scratching my head at just what sort of role he has with this team next year.

I gave him a 3. I expected a breakout year with strong defensive improvement and a potentially lethal PP2 unit with him. I was in the flash lobby until this year and after defending him for the first half of the year I have flopped to the anti-flash lobby and don’t want him back. His stats will get him way too large of a raise than he is worth in a cap constrained environment. I hope we can sucker some team into a trade for his RFA rights.

He pretty much did exactly what I expected: over 20 goals, nice regular season that tailed off as the season went on, disappeared for long stretches, was a defensive liability, received more ice time than he deserved (though the PP numbers noted above were a surprise to me), and was nowhere to be seen in the playoffs. Nothing that he did really surprised me in a good or bad direction.

The Discussion: As a restricted free agent, how much (in dollars and years) should the Caps be willing to commit to Fleischmann this summer? Where does he fit in on the 2010-11 Caps? What will it take for him to earn a 10 rating next year?

Flash needs to be traded to clear up roster/salary space, plain and simple. He was a bargain at 750k even though he is useless in the post-season/when he’s not scoring, but at his new rate of pay (likely approaching $2M) he’s a luxury the caps should neither need nor want (regular season solid depth scorer, not much else added). A team that needs more goal production could certainly use him and be quite happy with him at that rate, but not the caps. Flash, begone!

Oh, to get a 10 next year he’d need to put up similar offensive numbers, but show the ability to play a more physical game and be a consistent performer throughout the regular season and playoffs. And by more physical, I don’t mean hitting people; I mean successfully going to the high traffic areas for the “ugly” goals, doing a better job of posessing the puck and working with it below the goal-line (rather than just floating on the perimeter), don’t be knocked off the puck / out of the play as easily, things like that. Also, become a reliable and solid PK’er.

8 for the first half of the season, particularly after missing training camp and the first 11 games of the season.
4 for the second half of the season. not a 2 because he did step up when ov was out and did play out of position for some of those games.
1 for the playoffs. ’nuff said.

overall a 3.

i’m sure there’s a price at which it makes sense to retain him. i’m thinking its got to be at or below the $1.1 that stecks is getting. i would not mind seeing him moved, particularly in december when his trade value may be at it highest. he’s a 26 year old 30 goal scorer who will probably have a nice easy cap number. who wouldnt want that? well, the caps i hope. this team has enough firepower that losing flash’s offensive upside wont kill them. we just cant have a playoff ghost on this roster this time next year.

to get a 10 next year, he’d need to put up similar numbers but more consistently and in the playoffs. if he were to score a 10 next year, he’s be the most unlikely guy to score a 10 since seal.

A lot of us are on board with moving Flash this offseason. What are the realistic odds that it happens? My concern is that McPhee and Boudreau will preach "patience with the 25-year old and claim that he can still develop. The problem, obviously, is that if he’s on the roster next year he’ll probably play every single night.

Also, if they bring back Flash, it restricts what the team can do in the offseason since there aren’t a lot of openings in the lineup that the team can make changes with.

And only because of his decent regular season (first half), otherwise he would have gotten a 1. If there was a 0, I would have considered it.

He is a travesty of a hockey player, an absolutely gutless waste of space. He should be ashamed of himself. I honestly expected at least tolerable mediocrity; Flash’s playoff performance was so far below it that it practically eviscerates whatever he did in the regular season for me. He was an ECHL player out there, with the heart of a little girl Squirt B player.

My vote is an average of the first half (8) and the second half (2). If there was a vote for only the post season, he would get a 1 or less.

If the first half is any indication, the guy can play, but the second half showed he needs to work on conditioning, and work on consistency. If he were half as good in the last 30 games and playoffs as he was to start the season, his play might have been enough to beat the Habs (remember, three of the Caps 4 losses in the series were by a goal.)

What does he have to do to get 10 next year? 30 goals. He has shown the potential for it… now he has to do it.

I seem entering camp hoping to win a job as a top 6 guy,but I don’t think he is going to do it.

As for salary… when the Caps make his QO, he better sign it, or they’ll pull it off the table and offer him less.

Look, most of you don’t like him, but he’s a decent NHLer who can put a few pucks in and generate some offense, and that’s it. Guys like this have existed, believe it or not. The only problem is, now the talent level is so thick that guys like this don’t amaze us with their offense to the point of we need to ignore their defense.

The guy, at this point, is a poor man’s Jaromir Jagr or Marian Gaborik, and I mean like Birmingham, Alabama poor. He’s a good offensive player (20 goal scorers don’t fall off trees yet, though). With top minutes, he could put up the numbers those guys do. The problem is, on the Capitals, we have too many better players to put into situations.

I’m a Flash fan, and I’ll probably want him to do well wherever he goes, but his place on this team is gone unless he starts doing the little things in the corners, winning faceoffs, doing something in the defensive zone, etc., and I don’t see him doing it next year, or any year until he gets a coach who pounds those values into players heads instead of just “Hey, score more goals than the other team. Defense? uh…shit, Bob, can you handle this one?” And yeah, Flash’s issues are mostly coaching based. His minutes compared to other players (I’m not just going to say Fehr, because there’s other guys on the team he leeched minutes from, and maybe there’s a story behind Fehr that he can’t play but so many minutes per game because of an injury instead of just “he’s in the fucking dog house”) are far too high, and he needs either a new coach or a change of scenery.

He’ll be a cheap signing, and if he gets more than 1.1 million and more than two years, even as a fan of his I’ll be upset, but I wouldn’t cry if someone gave him a contract offer for ~2 million with his skillset, and I wouldn’t cry if we let him go. I don’t see what he brings outside of scoring that Francois Bouchard, Chris Bourque, or Matthieu Perreault can’t bring more of in a year or two, and the scoring isn’t what’s hurting our team.

To get a 10 next year, he’d have to play ~75 games, gain 15 pounds of muscle, start winning corner battles, score ~25 goals, ~35 assists, ~60 points, get ~20-30 PIMs, and win ~50% of his draws.

To get a 5, he’d have to stay the course. I don’t expect shit else from him.

To get a 1, he’d have to stop scoring.

Well, I thought the spread would be bigger here, but it looks like on the whole people were disappointed with Flash. He was 86th in the league in points per game, which may not necessarily sound impressive, but consider his medium-smallish amount of PP time and look at it another way: he was 57th in the league among all skaters in points/60minutes (minimum 40 games), and at 1.12 he was 34th… yes 34th in goals/60 minutes (Ovie was 1st, Sasha 2nd, Fehr 5th. Yea, the Caps are good.) In terms of putting the puck into the net, that efficiency is hard to overlook. Howevvvveeerrrrrr, yes, to put it nicely…he was a liability on defense. Horrible, awful, craptastic, are words that might better describe it. At 2.92 He was 319th among forwards in Goals against/60, and to give some perspective, that is out of 385 players.

In the end, no matter how much you hate his foppish, floaty, don’t-want-to-get-my-jersey-dirty style… he put the puck in the net, a lot. Way more than I expected, and more than the other team put the puck into the net against him. Which, ultimately, is all that matters. And when you consider how bad he was on the otherside of the puck, this is pretty impressive.

But moving onto JPs discussion point: What do you pay him (if anything)?

Considering his ridiculously unsustainable 19.0 SH%, it’s hard to expect he’s going to be a plus player next year, unless he drastically changes his game, or is carried by his line (again.) I let him walk everytime, considering our logjam on the wing and his inability to win draws. I think his actual value is around ~1.5-2mil and would entertain signing him at that to play on the third line, but that just doesn’t make an ounce of sense considering who he’d be playing with and the role that we and most teams expect out of our thrid line. He was a weak 2nd liner for us, and that’s exactly what he’s going to be wherever he ends up.

I think any team in the league that pays him more than 2.5 is making a mistake, but since he had raw numbers this year he will probably get ~3mil@3-4y on the open market.

The aggregate numbers are fine, but the drop-off troubling. Right around expectations entering the year (but way below the expectations he re-calibrated by the midpoint), and quite a bit below expectations for the playoffs.

Is he the perfect KHL player?

Considering he had zero off-season conditioning due to his DVT, the fact that he kept pace with his previous year’s totals impressed me. But his horrendous PK play and drop off over the season kept my vote at 5.
If they can keep him below $1M (and he gets some good endurance training over the summer) I wouldn’t object to him staying on. But considering he’s eligible for arbitration, I wouldn’t be surprised if it becomes a bigger contract number. Another 20 goal scorer may be something the Caps may not need, but it’s still a plateau that the NHL sees as an accomplishment worthy of a pay raise.

Flash did exactly what I thought he’d do: disappoint.
I thought I was going to have to eat crow at the halfway point. I thought that maybe I was wrong about the guy, and that Bruce’s crush on him was warranted; perhaps he had some diamond in the rough upside that would negate his deficiencies.
Nope.
I wanted him gone at the deadline, or before, for one specific reason, and its the reason we are now confronted with: If the Caps flame out, or their post season goes awry, and Flash doesn’t show up again, trading him for a good return will be all but impossible. Well, that’s were we now find ourselves. We have to sign him just to trade him and get something, or else there is an accumulated loss for the deadline moves (albeit, not truly harmful ones). Problem is, its now clear to every gm exactly what Flash is- a disappearing act, when it counts most. invisible at the Olympics, Invisible in the playoffs, no physical acumen, no defensive ability, no special teams ability unless he’s fed on the PP because he doesn’t really create much on his own, no PK skills what so ever… He’s a one trick pony and its a trick a lot of other players can pull off as well. He’s built for a league that plays half as many games and shies away from hitting.
I don’t want him on the team because he can’t play 3rd or 4th line duties and will just eat up a spot on the 2nd line. You have to bring him back to get something for him, or you let him walk. He’ll bring in a 4th round pick, or could be packaged to a GM in cap trouble and in need of some offensive without the dough to afford his upgrade.
Hate to say it (not really) but I knew he was going to be what he is when Detroit let him go.

Crickets.

The Fleischmann Lobby must be taking a three-martini lunch.

the poll requires a 5 or 6 for what I expect. I expected pretty much this. Do I like this? Not really. Do I want Flash gone? Yes, but only for value be it picks or players. Do I see BB’s mancrush gone? Nope.

Overall numbers about what one would expect, complete disappearing act in the playoffs part of the package

Hes an offensive player. And what did he do this year? Improved his offensive game setting career bests and earning more time on PP in which he was as excellent as one of the top 3 pivots in the entire league. How doesn’t that excel expectations. His stunts at center yeilded mixed results of greatness and pretty poor. Overall I’d still say his centering job wasn’t too bad for a winger to attempt though BB should of done a better job protecting a “weak” center like Flash from seasoned vets especially in the FO(or just attempt to keep Flash out of the FO altogether) but his FO trend seemed to be relatively good against team’s normal centers and very poorly against other team’s good FO centers.

Sure his defensive game could of been better. But I don’t expect much out of him in that regard. Do I want him to do better, yes.

I also pretty much wipe the slate of everyone in the playoffs because the team lost. Not any individual player. No matter how “poorly” a player did. Fact is flash is a 3rd line player and can’t be expected to regularly contribute in the playoffs, and most offensive production comes from the 1st and 2nd lines on every team.

while I’ll defend flash normally, I don’t have much motivation to defend anyone not playing in hockey in may.

Sure his defensive game could of been better. But I don’t expect much out of him in that regard. Do I want him to do better, yes.

Backstrom, Semin, Ovechkin, all of these people have taken significant strides in their defensive play. In this system. Under this coach. And they’re all younger than Flash. When does it kick in, if it ever will?

Didn’t expect a ton from him, but did expect him to take his game another step. He didn’t. There was a glimmer of hope early in the season but he went back to that same Flash and was utterly useless in the post-season. Same second half disappearing act, but without the pneumonia as an excuse this time. He’d get a 4 on the regular season alone but he loses another point for the playoffs. I didn’t think he’d go O-fer. If we factor in BB it probably goes to a 1, but that’s not Flash’s fault.

If I were GM I’d allocate 0 dollars to Flash this off-season. I’d love to try to get a second round pick for him at the draft. But he’ll get signed and dear God I hope it’s nothing higher than 1.5, though I suspect it might go to 2. He’ll fit in as another highly skilled but inconsistent and soft player. BB probably uses him as an X factor and play him in all situations. He’ll probably play W on the 2/3 and fill in as a C at times. Still a PP and PK player as well.

For him to get a 10 he’d have to not be Flash. It honestly doesn’t matter how many points he scores. If he doesn’t grow some stones and start playing a tougher game and bringing something to the table besides pure skill (which we have in abundance) then he won’t get a 10 from me.

I wish I could have been surprised by his disappearing act at the end of the season and his inability to contribute anything other than points.

Next year I’m not even sure Flash is worth the roster spot he takes up, even at his current salary, and I’m even more sure he’s not worth that spot at a salary he is likely to accept. 50 pts is nice, but if he can’t do it in the playoffs he doesn’t help the team. They shouldn’t just ditch him for nothing, but I would like to see GMGM move Flash before next season.

The voting on Flash is an almost perfect bell curve.

He should absolutely be moved this summer. The only reason I might think otherwise is if he’s open to signing a cap-friendly multi-year contract. Otherwise, the time to sell is now. Sure, he’s RFA but he’s also arbitration-eligible. If he wants to press for a significant raise this summer, the avenue for him to do so is there. I have no faith if that were to happen that he’d be making something in line with his actual worth to the team. I don’t even know where to slot the guy in next season.

This is one of the problems with such an offensive-minded team. Scoring-line forwards are going to make out like bandits in arbitration if they choose to do so. Fleischmann, in particular, puts up offensive numbers that aren’t indicative of his worth to the team or his all-around value as a player.

20 goal season and a fade out in the playoffs. Exactly as expected.

Would love to know if a Flash for Hamhuis trade was ever an actual possibility and if so, who balked. Who knows if that would have changed things, but it couldn’t have been worse.

The first half of the season, dude was on fire. He was putting up points seemingly every game, and was just a force on offense. I’d give him an 8 for that part of the season.

The second half of the season he predictably slid, which is unfortunate. You need scorers who can consistantly tickle the twine, and Flash was not doing that. I’d give him a 4 for that part of the season.

Flash was pretty bad in the playoffs too. His slide continued, and he was even a healthy scratch in the pivotal game 7. Being a 20+ goal scorer, and being on the shelf when your team has had issues scoring in the series…that’s a pretty telling sign. I’d give him a 2 for the playoffs.

Average those three together, and we’re at 4.67, round up to a 5. But he loses a point because, really, at this point in his career, he should be expected to be advancing his game. Getting better. And he’s still basically the same streaky player who he was last season. I expected him to get better, and he did not. So, yeah, I’ll round up to a 4 and call it good.

The Caps can probably find someone to trade a pick for him (2nd or 3rd) because of his scoring numbers. If GMGM can do that, I’d say do it. The Caps can find enough scoring, and more consistant scoring, elsewhere.

He needs 30/35/65 and to not get knocked off the puck every damn time to get a 10 next year. And get off the damn PK.

5 next year is somewhere in the neighborhood of 17/20/37, playing a bit more consistently over the course of the season.

Production a bit above baseline, but he still has a lot of the problems he’s had the past few seasons. He’s also not going to have a 19.0% shooting percentage next year, you can book that (it was 11% in his career prior to last season).

He did get better staying on the puck, but I’m leaving the 10 criteria for next season at pretty much the same level. He needs to get better on defense and penalty +/- next

Where does he fit in on the 2010-11 Caps?

While he’s a quality NHL player, I hope he doesn’t. I think he’s replaceable on this team and hope he gets moved as a part for a 2C or as something we can trade to get a 2C. He’s also going to rapidly get paid more than he’s worth to this team, in my estimation.

-d

His regular season was what I expected numbers-wise. I was hoping for more this playoff year and got the same old shit. So a 4, really could have justified it down to a 3 or 2.

As for next year…heh…if you want to win 60 games in the regular season, Flash can help you do that. If you want to win the Stanley Cup, not so much. Time to cut bait on ol’ Tomas.

Poor Flash – nobody likes him.
Replace him with somebody better, OK.
Otherwise, get off his case.

The Discussion: As a restricted free agent, how much (in dollars and years) should the Caps be willing to commit to Fleischmann this summer? Where does he fit in on the 2010-11 Caps? What will it take for him to earn a 10 rating next year?

Zero, Nad, nichts; it’s time to trade his rights for whatever they can get relative to this years draft.

He doesn’t fit on the 2010-2011 Capitals, his ATOI of 16:00+ was totally unwarranted in the second half of the season and the playoffs. He steals ice time and a roster slot from someone in the pipeline who might fit. He is a totally one way player – offense, and is streakey in spades. “Flash” is what people allege of Semin. They can get something for him from a team who needs cost effective offense and already has defense in spades like … oh say Boston….

What will it take for him to be a 10 – I don’t think it’s even in him to do it in a Capitals Sweater. I don’t hate him, he just doesn’t fit. He needs to go somewhere where he can be a 2nd line left wing and work on his two way game. That’s not with the 2010-2011 Capitals…