Just Who Is Teddy Purcell

First off, I want to sincerely thank everyone that read my blog from this morning. If you haven’t you can check it out here. The responses I received on Twitter, Facebook, and by email were absolutely amazing. I am flattered that you all would read it, know that it means a lot to me that I made an impact today raising awareness of MS, and I know a few of you went out and bought a teen burger because of me. I have had the best day, Thank You.

Now Back to Hockey

When the Oilers knew it was time to trade second line center they knew they had to get bigger when the trade was made or it was going to be a miserable failure. It seems that Craig MacTavish felt like Mark Arcobello and the selection of Leon Draisaitl would be enough to replace the offensively gifted defensively challenged Gagner. So instead of bringing in a center to replace Gags, they brought back Teddy Purcell from the Tampa Bay Lightning, a team that had to shed some salary and Purcell would soon be replaced by some of the talented prospects forcing their way up the depth chart. Purcell was never drafted but became a sought after free agent after turning in a great performance in the University of Maine in 2006. He eventually signed with the Los Angeles Kings. He had some decent seasons with the Kings but like his Tampa situation prospects and signings kicked him down the depth chart and he was traded to the Lightning. With the Lightning he had some successes. In fact if you look at his boxcars he was a hell of a player, in four full seasons with the Lightning he score 194 points in 291 games or 0.66 points per game. That’s a pretty good number for a guy that is slated to play on the Oilers third line. The other noticeable chunk of goodness from that data is that in the last four seasons he has only missed 3 games. Hopefully we can see both those trends continue, if he can score at a similar pace (obviously less points with lower ice time) he’s going to quickly become a fan favorite. If you look at his points per 60 minutes of ice time, Purcell scored 1.40 at even strength last season, and 3.38 on the powerplay. Those are decent numbers, when compared to his career average at even strength it was a bit of a drop, he was 1.895, 2.398, and 2.069 in years 1 through 3 with Tampa respectively. 1.40 would have been good enough for 6^th on the Oilers last season, and 3.38 on the pp puts him 5^th on his new team. Purcell did have a drop last season, and this season if he is on the 3^rd line numbers like that would be amazing. I’m not even sure he’s suited for the third line, as a traditional checking third line anyway, he’s big and skilled not to mention he gets paid like a second liner. He doesn’t kill penalties and has been sheltered by his coaches, getting a whopping 56.2% of his zone starts in the offensive zone. Really if you did the comparison his numbers are similar to Yakupov but of course Yak has way more potential. His possession numbers and offensive contributions are pretty good, I think we see the official writing on the wall that the oilers are going to try and go with three scoring lines and a very tough minute fourth line. Figure Draisaitl – Pouliot – Purcell, this gives Dr. Drai some reliable linemates and also the ability to throw Boyd Gordon in there for the defensive zone faceoffs. I’ve long been a fan of the three scoring line idea and this is why I’m a fan of the trade for Teddy Purcell. Once again and as I like to with this series, I’ll leave you with some video highlights of Purcell in Action. Thanks For Reading [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nss7iAtwBNU] [adsanity id=3329 align=alignnone /]