The Puck Stops Here

In October, I wrote about Jaromir Jagr's fast start. I speculated that he likely would not end the season as the NHL's leading scorer, but would likely remain in the top few scorers (if he remains healthy). Its nearly two weeks later and Jagr is still the NHL's top scorer. His 50 points give him a five point lead over the second highest scorer Joe Thornton of San Jose.

I argued that Jagr's lead at the time was due to the fact that he had more games played then players on most other teams and because most of his scoring had occurred on the power play (which I doubted was sustainable as power plays were bound to drop as the obstruction crackdown slowed down). It is true that penalties (and thus power plays) have dropped. Here are stats showing this fact courtesy of James Mirtle.

Jagr is still one of the better power play scorers in the NHL. Currently only Ilya Kovalchuk, Bryan McCabe and Nicklas Lidstrom have more power play points.

In October, I had speculated that by season's end, Jagr might be beaten in the scoring race by some of Jarome Iginla, Markus Naslund, Ilya Kovalchuk, Marian Hossa, Peter Forsberg and Martin St Louis. Of the players on that list, Kovalchuk and Peter Forsberg (who was injured) are the closest to Jagr with 42 points - which is eight back. Its a long season, and I am still not sure that Jagr will wind up winning the Art Ross trophy. These players and others like Joe Thornton, Dany Heatley and Daniel Alfredsson might still wind up winning the scoring title.

Jaromir Jagr's return to the scoring lead for the first time since 2001 is a bit of a suprise, but much stranger things have happened in the world of hockey.