Nashville Predators: Is JoFA A Top Five Line In The NHL?
The Stamkos Line
The Tampa Bay Lightning have been absolutely incredible through the first half of the season. Their top line consists of Steven Stamkos, Nikita Kucherov, and Vladislav Namestnikov. Stamkos is a top 10 player in the NHL and Kucherov has been the best player to come out of the “triplets line” from a few years ago. Namestinkinov has been a decent power forward for a few years but has broken out this season. To be fair though, I’m sure I could have a breakout year while playing with these two. Let’s see if their dominance on the scoreboard translates to dominance on the spreadsheet.
| Total Ice Time | Fenwick % | HDCF% | Goals % | Offensive Zone Start % | |
| Stamkos Line | 4 50:27 |
52.79% |
52.76%
59.62%
65.56%
JoFA
2 43:28
57.88%
50%
70.00%
61.43%
The Nashville Predators conquer this one almost going away. The story of the Lightning is that they always find a way to keep winning. If it’s not Stamkos or Kucherov, it’s Brayden Point or Yanni Gourde or Tyler Johnson or Ondrej Palat. Jon Cooper trusts his bottom lines to cancel out top competition so much that he shelters the Stamkos line more than any other in the entire NHL. The biggest difference between these two lines is capitalization. Well, that and the fact that Stamkos and company not very good in their own zone.
JoFA has evolved into a two-way line where the Stamkos line is much more offensively focused. Both have their benefits, but both have their pitfalls. Without any analytics, I’d say that Stamkos is better. But staying consistent with the numbers, I have to give this to the JoFA line. Which is not something I thought I’d write this season. Now that we looked at the best team, let’s look at the youngest line on one of the youngest teams.