Pius Suter

Last Season

Thirteen goals and 16 assists in 64 games — 29 points, plus-13, at 15:54 a night with twenty penalty minutes. Eighteen games missed.

The Finesse Game

A quick, intelligent forward who has scored at a fair clip in five NHL cities. Fifty-six per cent of his unblocked attempts came from inside twenty feet with a median of seventeen, and thirteen goals came out of 138 tries.

That is a hundred and seventy-two pound centre doing his shooting in the crease, which almost nobody his size manages. A hundred and ninety-one points in 428 career games.

Sixteen assists is fair for a third-line centre.

The Physical Game

Five foot eleven and 172 pounds — one of the lightest forwards in this edition. Twenty penalty minutes.

He is moved off pucks by anybody who chooses to and gets to the interior on timing rather than strength. He kills penalties and wins his share of draws.

The Intangibles

Fifty point seven per cent of the expected goals, 60th percentile, and 48.3 per cent of the shot attempts, 38th, across 829 minutes, with the goals level at 35-35.

Level chance share in a middle-six role is exactly what he has produced everywhere, which is why he keeps getting signed and keeps getting let go.

Six points in his last ten. He is 30, undrafted out of Switzerland, and a genuinely useful third-line centre on a club whose fourth line was the worst part of it.