This article will be another in my series of player profiles, where I’ll look at each player on the Anaheim Ducks and assess how their season went. This piece will focus on Max Jones.
While Jones brought a bit of an edge to the Ducks lineup, he wasn’t overly productive this season, scoring just eight goals and 12 points in 59 games, a pace of 11 goals and 17 points per 82 games. That said, he had a fairly small role in Anaheim and the team’s shooting percentage while Jones was on the ice was lower for him than any other player, while Jones’ shooting percentage was just 7.8 per cent as well.
His corsi for percentage of 49.8 per cent was decent, considering the team’s overall corsi for percentage was just 48 per cent, though he did have a fairly high offensive zone start percentage. His expected goals for percentage was quite low, on the other hand, at just 45.5 per cent (according to NaturalStatTrick.com).
You could probably argue that Jones could’ve used another season in the AHL and was brought up a bit too early. He played just eight games with San Diego this season from November to January but spent almost the entire season with the Ducks.
The good news is that Jones is still very young. At just 22 years old, he’s got a ton of time to round out his game and continue to develop. I don’t think there’s any reason to worry with Jones, though we should maybe temper our expectations a bit. He’s probably not going to become a top-six forward, that said, he can still be an important part of the lineup and could develop into a great third line player. Of course there’s always the chance he is able to become that top-six player, but I don’t think the Ducks should count on it.
Next season, Jones will have to battle for more ice time, based on the number of young wingers the Ducks have to fit into the lineup. It’ll be an important year for him and ideally, we see Jones up his production a bit and continue to take steps to becoming a quality top-nine forward.
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Here’s today’s poll question (results and discussion will be posted in a future article):
How many points do you expect from Max Jones next season?
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