Patrick Kane Is Overrated
Patrick Kane is an excellent player and will go down as one of the best American born players, if not the best, in NHL history. In my opinion though, he’s overrated. Before you go straight to comments and tell me why I am wrong, please read the whole article first, and then feel free to do so.
There’s no doubting Kane’s world class offensive talent, but offense is not everything. The best players are often elite at all aspects of the game, and Kane lacks one key aspect… defense.
Offensive Ability and Transition
Patrick Kane has loads of offensive ability and talent. He consistently makes something out of nothing, and often makes his teammates better. His vision and hand-eye coordination are what make him so successful in the league. He is one of, if not the best, player(s) in those two categories. His shot is also lethal and he’s very strong and fast on his skates.
Everything about his offensive game is mesmerizing. Even someone new to the game could see his insane offensive skill.
In 973 career NHL games, Kane, has scored 389 goals and has assisted on 633 others for 1,022 points. He has won three Stanley Cups, a Hart trophy, a Ted Lindsay trophy, an Art Ross trophy, a Conn Smythe trophy, a Calder trophy, has been named to NHL All-Star First team three times, the NHL All-Star Second Team once and was named to the 100 Greatest NHL Players list. With those achievements, Patrick Kane, is a surefire Hall of Famer.
One reason why Patrick Kane is among some of the best is because of his ability in transition. He’s able to flawlessly move the puck consistently in all three zones. He’s also able to create chances with his ability to exit and enter the zone.
His expected goals for (xGF) might not be that high, but this is because he does a lot of magic in the neutral zone, and moves the puck up the ice. That’s one of his strongest abilities. Consistently, he delivers the puck straight to his teammates.
Defensive Ability, or lack thereof
Where do I even start with Patrick Kane and defense? Kane, provides nothing on the defensive end, heck he’s a negative impact on his team. Often times you see him just glide around the blueline and cheating up. Yes this can create a chance here and there for your team, but often times it leads to a lot of high danger chances and possible goals against.
I’m going to share a few clips showing his defense/lack of effort in the defensive zone. Kind of similar with what I did with my Lucas Carlsson piece. I think it’s important to use both advanced analytics and the eye test and make conclusions from there.
In clip #1, you can see that Patrick Kane starts gliding in the defensive zone. Forwards, wingers especially, glide a lot in the defensive end. I have no problem with this, unless it leads to a potential high danger chance and/or a goal. In this case it was both. He starts gliding in the middle of the ice and allows a high danger chance to Michael Grabner. After that, he pressures the puck carrier, but doesn’t give a whole lot of effort. Eventually, this lack of defensive play leads to a goal against.
In clip #2 the situation is a little different. The Colorado Avalanche are starting their breakout. You can see at the start of the clip, Patrick Kane, once again is gliding when he should be back checking in case his defenseman, Calvin de Haan, doesn’t see the man behind him. De Haan, in fact didn’t see the player, Nazem Kadri, and ultimately it led to a goal.
Clip #3 is a similar situation to clip #2. Kane doesn’t backcheck again, and this time it leads to a two-on-one, which could have been a two-on-two. Ryan Graves makes a pass to a wide open Joonas Donskoi for the goal, with both Kane and Alex Nylander a step or two behind.
This clip is a tad different than the others. Patrick Kane, is in the defensive zone while the Winnipeg Jets are cycling the puck and trying to create a scoring chance. First off, Kane doesn’t really provide much of a challenge to Blake Wheeler. Wheeler then throws it to the boards. Kane then proceeds to glide back to the blue line, and leaves Wheeler wide open for a high danger chance. Maybe he thought that David Kampf would cover him, but that didn’t happen and a high danger chance was allowed.
Finally, here’s clip #5, and it’s very similar to clip #4. Kane once again is in the defensive zone covering the point. When the puck is rounding the boards at about eight seconds, you can see Kane starting to cheat up and lost sight of his man, John Carlson. Carlson, then proceeds to make an excellent pass to Alexander Ovechkin for the goal.
At the same time, Kane, plays in a weird system for Jeremy Colliton. His system can sometimes cause these issues. The weak-side winger in the defensive zone cheats up in this system. But, Kane has been declining defensively these past few years too, so I wouldn’t say the defensive system change really made an impact.
If we switch back to the analytical way of thinking, we can see that Patrick Kane gives up a lot of high danger chances. At even strength (Minimum 1,000 minutes played), he ranks second worst in expected goals against (xGA), second worst in scoring chances against (SCA) and second worst in high danger chances against (HDCA) among forwards.
It’s generally hard to analyze defense in forwards because it goes unnoticed most of the time. Your eyes don’t usually catch it, they usually catch on to high event plays like goals and hits. In Kane’s situation I agree that it goes unnoticed most of the time, but there are times where it’s very noticeable and puts the team in a bad spot. And when the analytics shows that he’s one of the worst defensive players in the league, he’s doing something wrong.
Final Thoughts
Patrick Kane is overrated, and the eye test and analytics back it up. When a player can’t carry his weight in all three zones he isn’t a top five player at any point. Kane is still a top 20 player, but he isn’t top 10 like a lot of people think. In forwards, I definitely value offensive production over defense, but that doesn’t mean it can be ignored.
His ability to create, produce and transition the puck is one of a kind, and he should continue to do so later in his career. Defensively though, Kane is one of the worst and needs to put more effort forth in the defensive zone.
stats via: Natural Stat Trick
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