Daniel Sprong has never seen a shot he didn't like. He also has one of the best shots in the world.
A look at the Red Wings depth forward who doesn't shoot like a depth forward.
Daniel Sprong has never seen a shot he didn’t like.
I feel pretty confident in that claim because I’ve both watched him play and practice this season and, well, he told me.
“I know I can score from anywhere,” Sprong said. “That’s kind of the confidence you have to have in your shot, and I do.”
Sprong’s NHL career, which is now in its eighth season and fifth team, has featured 83 career goals in 328 games. He’s averaged 2.15 shots on goal per game for his career, despite effectively playing fourth-line minutes his entire career.
This season he ranks 11th for Detroit Red Wings forwards in average time on ice, 12:36 per game, but ranks third on the team in shots with 146 behind Dylan Larkin and Andrew DeBrincat (who also happen to be first and third in time on ice).
Part of the reason for this is Sprong is looking to shoot every opportunity. He’s always hunting for opportunities to score, sometimes to a fault, and there are shots he takes that would probably be ill-advised for most NHL players.
For example, here is where Sprong is shooting according to NHL Edge Data.
And here are all of his attempts, courtesy of our friends at InStat.
Here’s some video of Sprong’s shot attempts from just his last five games. He’s No. 17 on Detroit.
And the reason Sprong gets away with it — and happens to be fourth on the team with 16 goals behind Larkin, DeBrincat, and Lucas Raymond — is because he has one of the best shots in the world.
Seriously.
“Ask any goalie, Sprong has one of the best shots you’ve ever faced, it’s a shot that is probably top-10 in the entire NHL,” Red Wings goalie Alex Lyon said. “He has the shot where he scores in practice on you from a bad spot or angle, and other guys don’t ever score on you from there. That’s how good his shot is.”
So, what makes it so good?
“There are three things that make his shot elite,” Red Wings goalie James Reimer said. “The speed of the shot, the release of the shot, and the accuracy of the shot. It’s so rare for players to have all three. Usually a player has to take something off the speed to be more accurate. Or they have may have a great release, but not the speed.”
How rare is it?
“Other than maybe Lucas Raymond, no one else on this team has all three like Spronger,” Reimer said. "That’s just the reality of how good his shot is.”
“It’s an exceptionally quick release and an odd release at the same time, and then it’s heavy at the same time,” Reimer added. “It’s one of the best shots I’ve faced or played against and I’ve played a while now. It’s up there with the top goal scorers in the world, like he has a shot that is as dangerous as guys like David Pastrňák.”
Reimer recently played against the Chicago Blackhawks and Connor Bedard. He said he has a small sample size against Bedard, but would consider Sprong and Bedard similar level shooters.
“(Auston) Matthews also has it, Pasta has it, JT Miller in Vancouver has it, (Alexander) Ovechkin has it,” Reimer added. “I would also say Frank Vatrano has it, but it’s such a rare group of players around Spronger. You can be a goal scorer without having all three, but being able to shoot from anywhere and distance, that’s one of the most rare gifts in the NHL.”
Going back to some of Reimer’s earlier comments, he used the word, “heavy,” when describing Sprong’s shot.
Let’s talk about that for a second, because it’s something I’ve always wanted to better define, especially as someone who still attempts to stop pucks on Wednesday nights in beer league.
Heavy and speed aren’t exactly the same. They are related, a faster shot certainly feels “heavier,” but I like to define a heavy shot as one that can continue to sneak through after it’s been initially saved.
Former NHL goalie Mike McKenna had the best explanation for me, and said the “heaviness” of a shot is related to the spin and rotation. A shot on either side of the spectrum — one that’s spinning a ton or one that is incredible flat — tend to sting a bit more, those rare times a goalie can smell burning rubber on the puck, that’s a heavy shot.
For a beer league goalie, like myself, I probably face a shot that I can smell the burning rubber on maybe once or twice every season, it’s that rare. For an NHL goalie, it can be a daily occurrence, that few people in the world get to experience.
I brought up this spin rate to Reimer.
“That’s one of the better ways I think I’ve heard someone try to explain it,” Reimer said. “It’s like a rising fastball in baseball that doesn’t actually rise. I think that’s how I compare a heavy shot to other sports. That ball might not actually be rising, but try to tell anyone that when they are standing in the batter’s box.”
Sprong says his shot has also changed slightly thoughout his career. It’s always been a strength, dating back to taking “thousands of shots,” as a kid, but he’s worked on adding different release angles in recent years.
He said it’s not something he thinks about during the game — shooter’s shoot — but the mechanics and angles have naturally started to vary in his shot, making him harder to read according to both Red Wings goalies.
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