This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Nick Perbix
Nashville Predators Defense
Six foot four, right-handed, plus-8 in Tampa, and signed to be the settled top-four partner this blue line has not had.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-23 | TBL | 69 | 5 | 15 | 20 | +11 | 22 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 111 | 4.5 | 15:24 |
| 2023-24 | TBL | 77 | 2 | 22 | 24 | +8 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 57 | 3.5 | 17:05 |
| 2024-25 | TBL | 74 | 6 | 13 | 19 | +8 | 20 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 66 | 9.1 | 14:41 |
| 2025-26 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 220 | 13 | 50 | 63 | +27 | 52 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 234 | 5.6 | 15:45 |
This Season So Far
The 2025-26 season has not started. The empty row above is his, and both it and this paragraph fill in on their own from the morning after he first plays: what he has done, what it is worth against his own last season, and the run he is on when the two disagree.
Last Season
74 games with Tampa Bay, 6 goals and 13 assists for 19 points at 14:41 a night, on 66 shots at 9.09 per cent. 20 penalty minutes. Plus-8. He signed with Nashville in the summer.
Three seasons in Tampa in a sheltered third-pair role, with consistently good underlying numbers inside it. Fourteen minutes a night is the entire sample; whether it holds at twenty is why he was signed and why the price was reasonable.
The Finesse Game
A right-shot defenceman who moves the puck quickly and accurately and does not hold it longer than he should. 9.09 per cent on 66 attempts is a decent point shot, and 19 points at fourteen minutes projects respectably at a larger assignment.
The skating is fine rather than notable. He is not beaten wide often and he does not join a rush to change a game.
The Physical Game
6-4 and 206, and he uses the reach far more than the body. He closes a rush by taking away the space rather than by hitting, and boxes out competently in front of his own net.
20 penalty minutes in 74 games is very good discipline for the size, and exactly what a club with Nashville’s shorthanded problem was shopping for.
The Intangibles
A sixth-round pick who spent four years at St. Cloud State and did not arrive until 24.
He has never been asked to play top-four minutes and Nashville is about to ask. That is the entire bet, and it is a cheap one — which is the correct kind of gamble for a club in this position to be making.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 1,000 minutes
- Expected goals
- 49.4%
- 45th pct
- Shot attempts
- 51.6%
- 70th pct
share of the chances while he was out there
share of the attempts while he was out there
Goals while he was on the ice: 45 for, 34 against. Expected: 38.7 and 39.6.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe numbers rank him 39 points above where the report does. It was written for a back edition, with the seasons that followed already known. Neither the agreement nor the gap says anything about the eye, and this report is excluded from the club-level comparison for the same reason. Why the numbers land there sets out the club he did it on, the minutes he played and the men he played them with.
Both bars are percentiles among the 357 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 61 on their own scale — against every other report's mean. The numbers bar ranks his share of expected goals. A gap is a disagreement about where he belongs, not two scales talking past each other.
Usual linemates
2024-25 with TBL · 1000 minutes at five-on-five
- Emil Lilleberg65%
- Victor Hedman14%
- J.J. Moser9%
Share of his five-on-five ice time spent alongside each player, measured from shift charts. Special teams are excluded: a power-play unit is not a line.
Why the numbers land there
Five-on-five, 2024-25
- The club
- TBL took 50.8% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 49.4% — 1.4 below the club he did it on.
- The role
- Third pair, 1,000 minutes at five-on-five — 61st percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Emil Lilleberg | 48.8% | 50.8% | 48.0% |
| Jake Guentzel | 49.6% | 49.3% | 51.8% |
| Brayden Point | 47.6% | 50.1% | 50.4% |
48.8% together, 50.8% for him apart and 48.0% for Lilleberg apart. Splitting them up moved neither man. Whatever is driving the share, it is not this pairing.
Expected-goal share while both were on the ice, and for each man in the minutes he played without the other. Apart is the pair subtracted from his own totals. It does not settle who was carrying whom — apart from each other, both were still playing with somebody — but it does say whether the share travelled when the pairing broke up.
Where he shoots from
goal on goal missed
115 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 6 of them goals. His median goal came from 28 feet. 10% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 65% from beyond forty.