To be honest, these expectations aren't "realistic." They're rather optimistic. Every forward is not going to post an improvement over last year. That never happens. Players under-perform and players get injured. There are also only so many opportunities and only so much ice time. For example, Lewis and King are not both going to score more than last season if they're competing for the same spot again (Lewis was promoted from the 4th line to the 3rd when King was injured).
xGF60 - GF60
Lewis - 2.56 - 1.47
Shore - 2.49 - 0.91
Brown - 2.59 - 1.58
Players that scored at about their right expected totals were Kopitar, Toffoli, and Milan Lucic.
- Jason Lewis
Actually, Kopitar, Toffoli, Lucic and Carter all scored a little above their expected totals.
xGF60 - GF60
Kopitar - 3.22 - 3.70
Toffoli - 3.40 - 3.74
Lucic - 3.47 - 3.92
Carter - 3.42 - 3.95
Between the four of them, by my calculations, that translates to about 12 more goals scored than they were expected to. So, you have to account for the possibly that they may regress toward the mean a bit, at least if you're going to account for under-performing players doing the same.
Just as importantly, if you compare the expected totals between the two groups, you can see how messed up the expected totals for Lewis, Shore and Brown must be. There's no way that those three, especially Lewis and Shore, would ever be expected to put up 75% of the production of Kopitar. That's not going to happen, so the data in the left column means nothing. It's much more likely that they'll continue to put up data more in line with the right column, which shows no more than 40% the production of Kopitar and is about what you'd expect.
In total that's around 140 goals or so from the Kings Top 9 forwards. The Kings forwards last year scored 182 goals, and that was for league average, which you would more than settle for for such a good defensive team. Basically the Kings will be asking, Nolan, Andreoff, Dowd, Purcell, Latta, Clifford and Michael Mersch to contribute 40 some odd goals. Between seven guys that should be more than doable.
- Jason Lewis
If you're counting up 140 goals from your top 9 players, then you're expecting the 4th line to chip in 40 goals. That very unrealistic. Yes, those 7 players, with the right opportunities, could collectively score 40 goals, but the team doesn't get to dress 16 forwards. They can dress only 12, and you're not going to have just 3 of those players account for 40 goals, especially not on the 4th line. If you get more than 3 in the lineup at the same time, with one on a higher line, then someone else (and his goals) that you included in the 140 goals from the top 9 has to be coming out. It all just doesn't add up.
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All of that said, I agree that the actual number of goals scored isn't as important as the differential and that they could afford a drop in goal scoring
if they get defense like they have in the past. That's the issue, though, IMO. With all of the kids and new players being thrown into the mix, it stands to reason that the defense may take a bit of a hit as these players adjust to the NHL and the Kings system and make novice mistakes. It'll still be quite good, but if defense takes a small hit and offense takes a small hit, both of which seem likely, it could spell trouble. Allowing only 10 more goals over 82 games and scoring only 10 fewer may seem rather insignificant, but that's a 20-goal differential, which can easily be the difference between a divisional playoff spot and missing the playoffs entirely.
