The Blackhawks are still a rebuilding organization. Over this past summer, the front office intentionally chose to go into the free agent market and rent veterans to buy their next wave of prospects — really the first wave of this administration’s picks — to properly mature in Rockford.
As we have discussed before, the veterans who were brought in fit the profiles of some of those prospects and can, in theory, be a model for the younger players. When the Blackhawks signed TJ Brodie, a left-handed defenseman who primarily plays the right side, I saw an opportunity for a young player like Nolan Allan, who also occasionally plays his off-side, to learn something while buying time for Artyom Levshunov to be ready for the NHL as a right-handed defenseman.
The Blackhawks are admittedly still getting used to each other and some new roles. Last night after the loss Alex Vlasic mentioned that he was disappointed in his own performance on the power play but noted that he’s still learning through experience how to better enter the zone on the rush and when/where/how to move the puck. Those are growing pains we’re going to see from young players in roles they haven’t played at the NHL much before.
But players like Brodie were brought in because they should be known commodities and be able to adjust to the new systems quicker.
Unfortunately, the known commodity with Brodie has been a continuation of the struggles that haunted him in Toronto last year. And it’s starting to cost him opportunities — and ice time.
Here’s Brodie’s ice time in the Blackhawks’ first eight games this season:
- at Utah — 16:45
- at Winnipeg — 18:18
- at Edmonton — 15:52
- at Calgary — 15:29
- vs. San Jose — 16:24
- vs. Buffalo — 16:15
- vs. Vancouver — 14:17
- vs. Nashville — 10:25
I’m not going to point to the 10:25 last night and the four minute dip in ice time fully as a direct result of play because Brodie doesn’t contribute to either special teams group and the Blackhawks spent more than one-third of the game on either the power play or penalty kill last night. But… here’s last night’s GameScore Impact Card:
It has not been a good start in Chicago for Brodie.
You might be reading this and think “man, I feel like someone has said the Blackhawks have a Brodie problem already.” I did. On Oct. 9. And here we are 17 days and seven regular-season games later… it’s still an issue.
Brodie has put four shots on goal and has two assists. It just so happens that Brodie’s two assists have come in the Blackhawks’ two wins (in bold). He has been credited with nine blocked shots and three hits. For the sake of comparison, Wyatt Kaiser has been credited with 11 hit and 22 blocked shots (he leads the team in blocks).
According to Natural Stat Trick, Brodie has been on the ice at 5-on-5 (117:25 TOI) for a team-worst seven goals against. He’s tied for that mark with Vlasic, who has skated almost 20 more minutes and against better competition. Again, for the sake of comparison, Kaiser has been on the ice for 105:51 of 5-on-5 play and the Blackhawks’ opponents have scored twice. (I’ll also note here Brodie has been on the ice for two Blackhawks’ goals while Kaiser has been on the ice for three at 5-on-on-5).
Again according to Natural Stat Trick, the only Blackhawks who have been on the ice for more shots on goal against at 5-on-5 than Brodie (62) are Seth Jones (74) and Vlasic (65). And, again, Vlasic has skated almost 20 more minutes than Brodie and Jones has been on the ice for 25 more minutes. And they’re both also contributing to special teams play — which Brodie is not.
One byproduct of Brodie’s struggles and limited ice time is the coaching staff being forced to rely on Jones and Vlasic heavily in the second half of games. Jones is averaging 25:37 per game, which is his highest ATOI since his first year in Chicago. Vlasic is averaging 22:24, almost a full minute more than last year. The emergence of Kaiser has helped provide the Blackhawks with another strong top-four defenseman, but he’s still young and learning as he goes. We’re hoping this is his first full NHL season and it continues on the track he’s on thus far.
Brodie started the season on the Blackhawks’ second defensive pair and has since been moved down to the third. When Alec Martinez is ready to return to the lineup, could/should there be another move down the roster?