Curtis Lazar: Should He Have Been Sent Down?

Curtis Lazar has played 41 games with the Ottawa Senators. He has registered 8 points. Aside from his time on the “kid” line, Lazar has been primarily used in a 3^rd or 4^th line checking role.

Lazar has the third worst ice time on the team, ahead of only Chris Neil and the now demoted Colin Greening. After all of the above it is a wonder why Lazar was brought up in the first place. Since Lazar was the 17^th pick in the 2013 NHL Entry Draft, I decided to analyze the last ten years of Centres drafted from the WHL. In doing so I hoped to glean some information on how Lazar should have been handled.

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Since 2005, 18 centres from the WHL have been drafted in the first round. Of those Centres all but three were over point a game players(based on their best seasons in Junior).   Lazar ranked 13^th out of these centres averaging 1.31 points per game in his best season of Junior. Sam Reinhart was drafted 2^nd in the 2014 draft. Buffalo had him play 9 games this year and then sent him back down to Junior.

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Leon Draisatl was the third pick of the 2014 draft. He played 37 games with the Oilers this year, registering 9 points. Draisatl was sent down to the WHL and is now excelling.

The aforementioned players were drafted higher than Lazar and have both been sent down to Junior. I imagine these teams believed that it would be beneficial for their players to play in junior and play well. The Senators have chosen to leave Lazar with the big club and have him typically play 3^rd and 4^th line minutes.

I wanted to see how much of an NHL career those WHL centres drafted in the last 10 years had. I eliminated analyzing players drafted after 2011 as they have not necessarily had time to “blossom” into NHLers. 10 centres were drafted before 2011 and 6 of them had what I would deem as meaningful NHL careers. Those players are charted below.

The players who did not have meaningful NHL careers are charted below. A meaningful career to me is either over 100 points or 200 games played in the NHL. By examining these players drafted I believe that Curtis Lazar does have a good shot at becoming a successful NHL player.

There is really no right or wrong way to develop a player. Ryan Johansen, Peter Mueller, Brandon Sutter, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Brayden Schenn all spent under 50 games in the AHL and they have had or are having successful NHL careers.

I thought that analyzing this data I would see data that indicated Lazar should have stayed in Junior. In looking at how the players who have had good NHL careers developed it does not seem to be the case. I still believe he would have benefited from time in Junior but I don’t believe it has as big an impact as I initially thought.

The Senators are not a great team. Curtis Lazar has not had a statistically strong season, but he is playing the role he is told to play. Will Lazar ever be more than a 3^rd of 4^th line centre? Will Lazar be a Ryan Johansen or a Gilbert Brule? Hopefully Lazar has a very prosperous NHL career.

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