Silver Nuggets: Which is More Likely Series: Borowiecki vs O'Brien

We have now reached day 11 in our WIML Senators player prediction series, and I have to say, each day the series gets more fun as the quality of the comments and debates get better and better. This was going to be the last day of the series as I only have 2 players left to write about, but Mark suggested last week that I keep doing it. Let me know if you’d like me to do more, maybe about other teams or about players we’ve already done, but different scenarios. Or we can go back to normal Nuggets; it is up to you, I’m here to serve the people.

Speaking of the people, in a landslide (which was probably due to me rushing to fix the post, thanks Bobby Butler) you decided Thursday that Colin Greening would likely post a career high in points, while Kaspars Daugavins would not post a career high in games played. Many good arguments were made, but in the end, the best one was made by JonathanA:

Greening

His career points-per-game (0.47) is only 0.02 higher than his points-per-game for last season (0.45), so if he meets or exceeds his career points-per-game this coming season, even by the smallest of margins, he’ll beat last season’s point totals.

Playing lots of games is difficult, even for established players, something which Daugavins is not. 2011-12 marked the first time, for example, that more than 5 players played at least 80 games (for whatever reason) with the Senators since 2007-08. You don’t have to conjure the spectre of ‘injury-prone’ to posit that it is possible that Daugavins might be hurt at some point next season (iron-man streaks in the NHL are, after all, extremely rare), and besides, it is more likely that he’ll be scratched a few times for presumably more talented players to strut their stuff than Greening will.

Today we look at two players who have no chance of being waived as this post goes up, Mark Borowiecki and Jim O’Brien. Both figure to provide depth to the Senators lineup this season. Today’s question is this:

Which is more likely? That Mark Borowiecki plays more than 20 games OR that Jim O’Brien finishes the season with at least 15 points?

Borowiecki: The Borocop has become much loved by Sens brass over the last few years; they are impressed by his hard work and his professionalism. After his first year pro, in which he made his NHL debut, Mark is hoping to push for a roster spot on the new-look blueline. With the signing of Mike Lundin, how many games will he play?

O’B: With his shiny new one-way contract and the departure of Zenon Konopka and Jesse Winchester, Jimmy looks like a lock to play this season as the Sens 4^th line centre. 4^th line production goes a long way to helping a team win, can he lead the charge?

Which is MORE likely?

Links!

Sens News:

• Peter starts his Deep Thoughts series, which should provide some laughs and will allow you to get to know the new faces of the organization. [SSS]
• Jared Cowen played in all 82 games as a rookie, and that served to give him lots of experience and a good understanding of the effort needed to play a season at the NHL level. [Sens]
• Bobby Butler was officially bought out on Friday. [Panzeri]

League News:

Which is more likely?