What is Going On with Craig Smith?
Most Predators found themselves getting off to a slow start this season as the team struggled to find its way. Now that we are more than 70 games into the season, Nashville has righted the ship and players such as Filip Forsberg and Viktor Arvidsson have heated up to propel the team into a playoff position. However, a player once considered a core member of the team has been shunned by fans and cast aside for his strikingly poor results which have lasted all season.
Craig Smith, a versatile forward who has scored at least 20 goals in each of the last three seasons, is on pace for 11 goals and 11 assists. Those would each mark his lowest totals since the lockout-shortened 2012–2013 season, surely a sign of disappointment for a player who has ranked among the Predators’ top scorers in the past few years. Fans on Twitter have been clamoring for Smith to be scratched, opening up a spot for seemingly anyone else to produce.
For a player to experience such a precipitous drop in production overnight, there must be a sign of an underlying issue. We are going to dive deeper and look at a series of graphs in order to determine why Smith might be struggling.
This first graph, which shows Smith’s even-strength scoring rates, highlights the clear decline in his production this season. Not only will this be his lowest total production since that short season, but even when accounting for ice time it is a disappointment. Now that we are certain that he is having trouble scoring this year, we can look at the two separate parts of scoring: the chances generated and the success rate.
Smith has been creating shots and scoring chances at rates equivalent to his career average. Furthermore, he is second on the team in individual scoring chances generated. Clearly, the issue does not lie in the chances he’s generating, so let’s take a look at whether shooting percentage explains it:
It is clear after looking at these two graphs that the issue lies in the shooting percentage of Smith and his linemates this season. He is experiencing much worse shooting luck than he has had in the past three seasons, something that we know fluctuates greatly from year to year. Common wisdom seems to lend credence to these statistics: much of the complaints about Smith that I have seen on Twitter and across the internet are those lamenting how he has failed to capitalize on easy opportunities. Simply put, Craig Smith is creating the same great opportunities that he always has, but his poor luck has stretched across the entire season. Expecting a bounceback season of around 20 goals next year would be reasonable.
Finally, let’s take a look at one last metric to see his impact on the team outside of scoring. Expected Plus Minus (XPM) is a measurement developed by DTMAboutHeart which begins with shot differentials but incorporates a plethora of variables for teammates, competition, coaching, deployment and more. Its results align well with existing statistics as well as common opinions of many players.
His offensive value seems to have taken a bit of a hit. This is not entirely surprising, as his lack of success may be causing him to change things up or get frustrated with his performance. What is interesting, however, is that Smith’s defensive value this season has skyrocketed. Even despite his lack of production, he is finding ways to contribute positively to his team. The Predators should be happy to have Smith in their lineup down the stretch. At worst, he’s playing strong defense and generating a lot of opportunities. If his luck turns, however, they’ll have another weapon in their arsenal as they prepare for the playoffs.
