Besides providing further information on the roster shuffling on defense, John Glennon's afternoon update today includes a look at some new lines at practice today:
Not too much else going on today for the Predators, aside from a little line tinkering. Preds coach Barry Trotz reunited one trio that was effective earlier in the season - Jordin Tootoo, Marcel Goc and Martin Erat. Here's what the lines looked like at practice today:
Sullivan-Arnott-Hornqvist
Smithson-Legwand-Ward
Tootoo-Goc-Erat
Jones-O'Reilly-Dumont
My question is, what has J.P. Dumont done to deserve getting dumped further and further down the depth chart like this?
Despite nearly identical basic stats as Steve Sullivan, for example, Dumont hasn't had a chance to play regularly alongside Jason Arnott for a long time.
Take a look at how J.P.'s Total Ice Time and Power Play Ice Time have gone this season on a game-by-game basis in the chart below. It appears that both are on a downward trend in recent weeks:
Given that J.P. is the #2 player on the team in terms of Points per 60 minutes of 5-on-4 play, and 4th on the team in Points per 60 minutes in 5-on-5, shouldn't he be playing a more prominent role? At the very least, I'm struck that we haven't seen more of the Sullivan-Arnott-Dumont line which carried the team in the 2nd half of last season.
Is anybody else surprised by Dumont's freefall through the lineup lately?
UPDATE: In Thursday's night's win over Colorado, Dumont got only 8:45 of ice time, his lowest since the first game of the season, when he got knocked out of the game in the 2nd period. Playing on that line with O'Reilly and Jones, J.P. got just 4 shifts in each of the first two periods, and 3 in the third. Very odd stuff here...