Vladislav Namestnikov

This Season So Far

The 2023-24 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

8 goals and 17 assists in 77 games — 25 points — at 12:38 a night between Tampa Bay and Winnipeg. Plus-5, 108 shots at 7.4 per cent, one on the power play, 35 penalty minutes.

55.5 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five, the 87th percentile — the second-best of any forward on this roster — across 843 minutes, with his ice at 34-28 against an expectation of 36.01-28.86.

He started 56.9 per cent of his shifts in the attacking zone, the 81st percentile. Soft minutes on a third line, and a very good chance share out of them.

The Finesse Game

108 shots at a median of 17 feet, with 60 per cent of his attempts from inside twenty and 8 per cent from beyond forty.

Inside twenty feet: 66 shots on goal and seven goals — 10.61 per cent, well below the league forward rate of 17.71. From twenty to forty: 29 shots and one goal, 3.45 against a league rate of 11.05. Beyond forty: 12 shots and none.

Eight goals from a hundred and seven shots on goal, sixty-six of them from the slot. The places are right and nothing goes in, and a career 12.4 per cent across 630 games says he is a better finisher than that — on 108 shots the gap is about five goals.

142 tracked attempts, 77 of them wrist shots, 21 tip-ins and 21 backhands.

His shot is measured at 78.6 mph, the 1st percentile — the eleventh-softest of any skater in this book. That is the ceiling stated as a measurement: at 78 miles an hour a goaltender who sees the puck stops it, and everything has to come from a rebound or a redirection.

115 goals in 630 career games.

The Physical Game

6-0 and 181 pounds, with 35 penalty minutes in 77 games and 331 in 630 career games.

A top speed of 23.2 mph, the 93rd percentile, with 1.0 bursts above twenty a game at the 53rd and 2.01 miles a game at the 17th, which is twelve minutes of ice time.

Genuinely fast at thirty, and it is why a third-line role has been available to him on seven different clubs.

He is not physical and at 181 pounds does not win a battle he arrives at second.

He kills penalties and reads a breakout early, and seven career shorthanded goals from a man with 115 in total says where his ice has been spent.

The Intangibles

Twenty-seventh overall in 2011, ten seasons, 630 games, 261 points across Tampa Bay, the Rangers, Ottawa, Colorado, Detroit, Dallas and Winnipeg — seven clubs in ten seasons.

115 goals and 146 assists, and a plus-9.

He is thirty, and he has been traded five times.

A first-round pick who becomes a much-travelled third-liner is not a failure; it is what a first-round pick usually becomes. The 87th-percentile chance share says the hockey is better than the record, and the 78 mph shot says why nobody keeps him.