Jaden Schwartz is statistically one of the better two-way forwards in the NHL.
That sentence cause quite a buzz around here yesterday, and many of you flat out disagreed with me. Well that is fine, you may believe what you want to believe, however today I'm going to be looking at the stats to help breakdown why Jaden Schwartz is one of the better two-way players in the game.
Lets looks at who lead the league turnovers this season. Ryan O'Rielly was first in the league with 83 takeaways. Jaden Schwartz, was ranked eighth among all forwards in takeaways with 66.
While he only gave the puck away just 15 times, he also lead the league in takeaway +/- with a 51. Meanwhile, lets take a look at the other top defensive forwards around the league. So lets start with Anze Kopitar, Jonathan Toews, Pavel Datsyuk and Patrice Bergeron.
Anze Kopitar finished the season with 52 takeaways, 26th among NHL forwards. His takeaway +/- was +11, good for 105th in the league.
Jonathan Toews? He finished 30th among forwards with 51, with a takeaway +/- of +22, good for 33rd in the league.
Datsyuk finished 15th in the league with 59 takeaways, and was sixth in the league with a +38 at takeaway +/-.
Lastly, we look at Patrice Bergeron, who finished 46th in the league with 49 takeaways. Bergeron was also tied with Toews with a takeaway +/- of +22, good for 33rd in the league.
Looking at blocked shots, Schwartz finished with 32 shots blocked, Datsyuk finished with 22, Toews had 20, Bergeron was a warrior with 57, while Kopitar finished with 44 blocked shots.
Looking at giveaways per game, Schwartz had the best numbers with a 0.1875 giveaways per game. Bergeron had 0.35, Toews had 0.3947, Kopitar had 0.4667, while Datsyuk had 0.5 giveaways per game. In case you were curious, the higher the number, the worse your ranking.
The same thing, but this time we're going to look at giveaways per 60 minutes. Schwartz, again, has the better numbers here as well. Schwartz averaged 0.6419 giveaways per 60 minutes. The rest? Toews averaged 1.1576 Bergeron averaged 1.1675 per 60, Datsyuk averaged 1.3816, while Kopitar finished with 1.4369. Again, you want the lower number.
Lastly we'll look at takeaways per 60 minutes. Here you obviously want the higher number. Kopitar finished last among the players we're ranking with a 1.8224 takeaway per 60 minutes. Toews finished just ahead of him with a 1.9678 average. Bergeron had a solid 2.0431 average, followed by Schwartz with a 2.8245 average. Datsyuk was clearly the best with an incredible 3.8816 takeaway average per 60 minutes.
Now Anze Kopitar, Jonathan Toews, Patrice Bergeron, and Pavel Datsyuk are some of the best defensive players in the entire league. Meanwhile, Schwartz's defensive number are right on par with these players. Schwartz's defensive numbers rank higher than anyone else on the Blues as well, and it's no secret that David Backes and Alexander Steen are considered to be some of the top defensive forwards as well.
Reputation plays a key role here. The previously named players have been in the league for a lot longer than Schwartz, so obviously, they have been able to prove it much longer than Schwartz has, but to say that Schwartz isn't up there, would clearly be false. Give it another few seasons, and you'll all be able to see that Schwartz will gain that reputation of one of the better defensive players in the league.
I'm not saying he is the best, but he could certainly listed as a top 15, maybe even a top 10 two-way player in this league. Fact is, the stats prove it.
I do want to hear what you have to say, so be sure to comment, let me know if you agree or disagree and why?