Brett Pesce

Last Season

One goal and six assists in 37 games — seven points, minus-11, at 20:18 a night with six penalty minutes. Forty-five games missed. His 736th career game.

The Finesse Game

Almost none, by design. Sixty-two unblocked attempts from a median of 51 feet, 71 per cent of them from beyond forty, one goal. Forty-three goals in 736 career games.

Six assists in 37 games. The first pass is clean and quick and that is the whole offensive contribution; a hundred and seventy-nine career assists against forty-three goals says which half of the game he plays.

The Physical Game

Six foot three, 206, and he defends by closing space early rather than by finishing checks. Six penalty minutes in 37 games is remarkable discipline for a man taking twenty minutes a night against top lines.

He owns his net front, blocks shots, and does not run out of position to do either.

The Intangibles

Fifty-two point five per cent of the expected goals, 75th percentile, and 52 per cent of the shot attempts, also 75th, across 663 minutes. Those are good numbers in hard minutes.

And then this: he was on the ice for thirteen goals against an expected 28.7. Nearly sixteen goals that the chances say should have gone in did not.

That is not a defenceman’s failing, it is his club’s — New Jersey scored 136 goals at five-on-five against an expected 173.9, the worst finishing gap in the National Hockey League by sixteen goals. Pesce simply caught the worst of it.

One point in his last ten. He is 31, a third-round pick, and the underlying work here is a good deal better than minus-11 and seven points make it look.