Jay Rosehill

Age: 28 (July 16, 1985)

Contract Status: $675,000 per year through 2015

2013-14 Stats

GP TOI/GP Goals Assists Points 34 4:57 2 0 2

Corsi For Corsi Rel Quality of Comp. (TOI%) Zone Start % PDO 44.1% (12) -6.5% (12) 25.5% (13) 47.7% (9) 93.0% (13)

(Numbers in parentheses indicate descending rank among regular Flyers players at his position, i.e. one of the team's top eight defensemen or top 13 forwards.)

Most frequent forward lines

Rosehill rules

Pay no attention to those ridiculous "stats" that my misguided and nerdy editors made me put at the beginning of this article. After all, those silly fancy stats really can't measure a lot of things, much like no human can explain why the tides change.

Seriously, just pretend they aren't even there, because if you do, you might be distracted from realizing one simple truth: Jay Rosehill is one of the best players on the Flyers.

No, seriously, it's totally true.

High-value production

One of the fundamental principles of sound economics is that people are paid exactly what they are worth. And given that there has never been a bad contract in the NHL (much less on the Flyers), this economic law applies perfectly to hockey.

Given that fact, it's clear to see the value that Rosehill brings to the Flyers (hint: it's huge). Take a look at the chart below, which shows how much the Flyers paid per player per point in the 2013-2014 regular season.

Who stands out the most? Well, Chris Vandevelde, but don't pay attention to that. Look at Jay Rosehill, providing points that are worth about $338,000 a piece. Damn, Rosehill! Those are some quality points!

I know what you're thinking, stats nerds -- points aren't everything. While I normally think you are idiots who need to put down the calculator and watch the game, we're totally in agreement here. Maybe we should just take a look how much money Rosehill made every second he was on the ice.

Look at that glorious chart. Again, Rosehill is providing some of the most highly valued play, earning about $67 per second on the ice. Some of you might think that's pretty pricey, but it's not, especially when you consider Claude Giroux earned about $50 per second and what the hell has he even done lately?

For those questioning my methods above, remember this simple fact: more money = better than.

Pugilism

We all know that if there's one thing lacking in modern hockey, it's fighting. Just listen to totally level-headed hockey historians like Mike Milbury pine for the days when you could beat the hell out of a fan with his own shoe, and you'll undoubtedly agree. There's just no use arguing with the experts, especially ones on TV.

Obviously Paul Holmgren thought his team was a bunch of whiny sissies that were as soft as Lebron James in a hot San Antonio arena, and understanding that no NHL roster is complete without a guy who can theoretically play hockey but mostly just punches people, he brought in Jay Rosehill.

Rosehill logged 10 fights in 34 games this season (side note: what the hell did he do in those other games?), and if you believe the guys over at hockeyfights.com, he did a good job of beating the crap out of the opposition.

Do the results of a fight win ever show up in the stats? Probably not, I'm too busy to figure it out anyway. However, we do know that fights change the Momentum™ of the game and Inspire™ teammates to Play Better™.

So Rosehill is not only providing value by punching people, but he's also making his teammates better by giving them a much needed dose of inspiration. Both important qualities for a leader for sure, but more on that below.

Leadership

Remember early last season when the Flyers were poop and couldn't buy a win? Yeah, me too, but what you probably don't remember is that their later success was all sparked by Jay Rosehill's leadership. No, really.

Rosehill scored his first $338,000 goal of the season on November 9, 2013, against the Edmonton Oilers and whatever goalie they were sold on for the future that particular minute. Before that goal the Flyers had only scored 21 goals on the season. After, they scored 211.

Talk about leadership.

To put that into perspective, after Claude Giroux scored his first of the season, the Flyers only scored 210 more. Simple math will tell you who the better leader here is -- let's just take the "C" from _laude Giroux and call him Jay Rocehill, already.

Intangibles

I've spent a lot of words here explaining why Rosehill is amazing in terms of his on-ice production, but we all know that truly great hockey players are simply well-rounded human beings. Rosehill is one hell of a human being.

Probably the best example of the kind of value Rosehill brings off the ice is his remarkable ability to commit crimes, but still allow the cops to catch him easily. Consider this story from back in 2007, when Rosehill stole a car from the parking lot of one strip club, only to be apprehended in the parking lot of another strip club. How far did he get? Well, about four minutes by foot.

Now, we all know that if Rosehill really wanted to keep that car, he would have been able to easily do it. It's a well-known fact that hockey leaders are masters of grand larceny, and Rosehill is no exception.

What really happened here is Rosehill voluntarily committed a crime, but did not put too much pressure on the police to catch him. He knew all along that the result would be an arrest, and he encouraged it. Think about it, Rosehill (leader that he is), provided a service to the community by not only giving the cops something to feel good about, but also by providing the younger guys on the police squad with a learning experience.

What a guy.

Preseason expectations

Let's check back on our season preview for Jay Rosehill and see what we thought could happen with him this year.

Best case... In the limited number of times Rosehill sees the ice, he's able to win his fights, fire up the team in doing so, and maybe even score a couple of points here and there. Worst case... Rosehill is relied on to do much more than fight people, and he ends up caught on the ice for a large number of goals against.

Verdict

Look at what we wrote as the best case scenario and then read this post again. There's really no argument here -- Rosehill is one of the few players on this team with heart, and we should all thank our lucky stars that he's already locked up for next season.

***

Feel free to vote in the poll below to grade Jay Rosehill's season on a scale from 1 to 10. Vote based on your expectations for him coming into the season -- i.e. 1 being "he was incredibly disappointing and I want him out now", 10 being "he was outstanding even beyond my craziest expectations".