Scoring balance is key.
While many fans were probably looking forward to a full season of Johnny Gaudreau and Patrik Laine playing on the same line, the last couple of games may have provided evidence as to why that might not be the best thing for the Blue Jackets. The past two games for Columbus, both wins, have seen the top-two lines look like this:
- Gaudreau-Boone Jenner-Gus Nyquist
- Yegor Chiankov-Jack Roslovic-Laine
#CBJ Laine (8) goal pic.twitter.com/tG6lLPGVW0
— Coby Maeir (@CobyMaeir) December 12, 2022
Per moneypuck.com, the Gaudreau-Jenner-Nyquist line has the highest xGF% at 56.1 (among lines with at least 25 minutes played), and the Chinakov-Roslovic-Laine line is fourth out of seven qualified at 50.0% xGF. The top line has a much larger sample size than the second line (151.1 minutes vs. 33.6 minutes), but the line of Gaudreau-Jenner-Laine (121.2 minutes) produced an xGF% of 50.8, less than one percent higher than the current second line and more than five percent worse than the current first line.
#CBJ Laine (7) goal pic.twitter.com/JPX5BxDCRZ
— Coby Maeir (@CobyMaeir) December 10, 2022
All good teams have multiple lines that can score. The Jackets might not be a good team right now, but splitting Gaudreau and Laine might be the way to go if they want to try and salvage something from this season.
#CBJ Jenner (9) goal pic.twitter.com/MeqHDYfUTa
— Coby Maeir (@CobyMaeir) November 29, 2022
