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2011 NHL Review

Alan Ryder HockeyAnalytics.com

Copyright 2011

2011 NHL Review

Copyright Alan Ryder, 2011 Hockey Analytics www.HockeyAnalytics.com

Table of Contents

Introduction 3

Player Contribution Basics .................................................................................................. 4

Threshold Performance ...................................................................................................... 5

Situational PC ..................................................................................................................... 6

The Currency of PC ............................................................................................................ 7

Team Performances 9

Goals ................................................................................................................................ 10

Lucky and Unlucky Teams ................................................................................................ 11

Team Success .................................................................................................................. 15

Offense ............................................................................................................................. 16

Shots and Shot Quality ..................................................................................................... 18

Defense ............................................................................................................................ 22

Goaltending ...................................................................................................................... 24

The Shootout .................................................................................................................... 31

Top Individual Performances 35

Forwards ........................................................................................................................... 35

Defensive Forwards .......................................................................................................... 40

Defensemen ..................................................................................................................... 45

Defensive Defensemen .................................................................................................... 53

Goaltenders ...................................................................................................................... 56

Transitions ........................................................................................................................ 57

Rookies ............................................................................................................................. 62

Shootout ........................................................................................................................... 65

All Star Contributions 67

NHL .................................................................................................................................. 67

West ................................................................................................................................. 68

East .................................................................................................................................. 69

Rookie .............................................................................................................................. 70

Green ................................................................................................................................ 71

Grey .................................................................................................................................. 72

Offense ............................................................................................................................. 73

Defense ............................................................................................................................ 75

Even Handed .................................................................................................................... 76

Power Play ....................................................................................................................... 77

Short Handed ................................................................................................................... 78

Most Valuable Performances ............................................................................................ 79

All Cap Roster .................................................................................................................. 80

Hall of Fame Watch 85

2011 NHL Review


Introduction

This review is focused on the most outstanding individual performances in the NHL

during the 2010-11 (“2011”) regular season. But I will also comment on certain aspects

of team performance since individual performances are difficult to assess without

understanding the team context.

My tool for measuring individual player impact is Player Contribution (PC)1. It is a

calculation that rationally attributes team results to individual players. It is focused on

results rather than process. Therefore, importantly, it contains any noise associated with

non-repeatable performance (luck). Noise cancellation techniques are available

elsewhere to try to separate skill from results2 and I applaud those who try. In any case,

PC remains the most comprehensive assessment of individual performance in hockey.

This kind of analysis is done in other sports (and by others in hockey). But buyers

beware. The methods used elsewhere may not import so well. Hockey is unlike baseball,

football and basketball in two material ways.

The first difference is the position of goaltender – a single player with a disproportionate

accountability for goal prevention. The closest match in another major North American

sport is the pitcher in baseball. The potential impact of the goaltending role is very large.

The actual impact depends on a „first to worst‟ analysis – a large span between best and

worst performances implies high value (and low span equals low value).

The second difference is that skaters (i.e. players other than the goaltender) play offense

and defense simultaneously. In the other three sports, teams effectively take turns on

offense. Football even has offensive and defensive units. While, in football and

basketball turnovers can and do happen, such an event is relatively rare. In hockey,

however, the puck is a slippery little sucker. Puck control is very challenging and

turnovers happen all the time (whether or not the NHL calls them „giveaways‟ or

„takeaways‟).

What this means is that, in hockey, offense and defense overlap. Players have concurrent

roles and need to be constantly assessing both offensive and defensive opportunities and

risks. Forwards have an offensive bias. Defensemen have a defensive bias. But the

concurrence still prevails. One cannot truly separate offense and defense in hockey.

The conclusion is that the ebb and flow of opportunity and danger in a hockey game tells

us something about individual player impact. The most glaring example of this is in

1 PC is described in http://www.HockeyAnalytics.com/Research_files/Player_Contribution_System.pdf

but has been refined considerably since I wrote the paper.

2 There are now too many contributors to the advancement of hockey analytics to name all the names,

but they know who they are as they run faster and faster with the larger and heavier baton.

http://www.hockeyanalytics.com/Research_files/Player_Contribution_System.pdf

2011 NHL Review


penalties. The taking of a penalty (typically) puts a team on its heels for (up to or maybe

more than) two minutes. Defensive risk increases. Offensive potential is reduced. The

drawing of a penalty has the opposite effect.

The game has many other „transitions‟ that alter the offensive or defensive „potential‟ of

the game. These include the obvious candidates of faceoffs, takeaways and giveaways

and the less obvious (and unrecorded) events like the battles for position and possession

along the boards and in front of the net. Transitions also include the lightly documented

but critical result of moving the puck up (or down) the ice.

A player that generates positive transitions is adding value because he elevates the ratio

of offense to defense (and vice versa). On balance each of these other transitions have

small impact (relative to penalties), but there are players that consistently transition well

and it adds up to something.

Transitions matter a great deal in the same way that probabilities matter. But goals are

more like lightning storms than warm or cold fronts. Goals defy the odds and create

finite counts from infinite possibilities. Goals char the scorecard, jarring perceptions

rooted in a careful visual or analytic assessment of the rest of the game. In other words,

while transitions matter, it‟s (nearly) all about the goals.

Player Contribution Basics

The PC method is a system of credits and debits. The credits are for the observed

elements of individual performance that aggregate to team success. That part is easy to

understand. The debits are to subtract the “marginal” aspects of performance – more on

that below.

„PCO‟ is PC from offense, based on „goals created‟ (credits) in excess of a threshold level

of performance (debits). To determine PCO a player is credited for creating goals but

debited for ice time (greater ice time, especially for forwards and on the power play,

means greater offensive expectations).

„PCD‟ is PC from defense, based on „goals prevented‟ in excess of a threshold level of

performance. To determine PCD players get credited for ice time (greater ice time,

especially for defensemen and on the penalty kill, means more defensive responsibility

and exposure to goals against) but debited for goals allowed while on ice.

„PCG‟ is PC from goaltending – again based on „goals prevented‟ in excess of a threshold

level of performance. Goaltender contribution is essentially measured by save percentage

(credit) in excess of a threshold (debit), factoring in shots faced.

Defense and goaltending are challenging to disentangle. PC is based on the premise that

the role of defense is to reduce both the quantity and quality of shots. Goaltending is

whatever goal prevention is left over. The assessment of the contribution of goaltending

therefore reflects various team defense factors.

2011 NHL Review


Threshold Performance

In the Player Contribution calculations, threshold performance is determined

mathematically, by inference. It is determined by observing that (a) the marginal impact

of more/fewer goals on wins/points is virtually linear3 over the normal performance

range of teams and (b) the “slope” of that linear relationship is the average number of

goals scored per game. Marginal or threshold performance is determined by figuring out

what level of performance predicts zero contribution to winning when using this linear

relationship. This is close to, but not the same as, „value over replacement performance‟

(VORP).

The notion of threshold performance is critical to the analysis of individual performance.

If a typical AHL goaltender gets promoted to the NHL and posts an .898 save

percentage4, we should think of an NHL regular with a .900 save percentage as not

contributing a performance of very much value, there being a large number of others

(minor leaguers) lined up to play nearly as well. This is VORP think.

Although not really true, you can think of a „marginal‟ player through the VORP lens –

as a borderline NHLer (my AHL goaltender). It is difficult to be precise about where the

borderline is, but the PC method draws a line in the sand somewhere near it.

Why subtract out borderline performance? Because performance at that level is worth

„nothing‟. Borderline players sit on the end of the bench and / or spend a great deal of

time in transit to / from the minors. Marginal performance is so far from average as to be

zero valued5.

The (VORP) assessment of marginal (valueless) performance based on the contribution

of a replacement player (my AHL goaltender) is a common approach used in baseball

analytics where most players are either (a) regulars or (b) replacement players. The

3 This is critical to the success of any measurement of individual contributions to team success.

“Linearity” means that individual contributions are additive. Every goal scored or prevented has the same impact on winning percentage. Non-linearity (curvature) would mean that not all goals have the same impact on winning percentage and, by extension, that the attribution of team success to individuals would involve very complex assessments of the nature of the curvative relationship between goals and wins. The relationship between goals and wins is curved for teams winning 70% or more of the time (or losing 30% or more) but those are very rare teams. PC does make an adjustment for whatever curvature (or statistical noise) is detected so that individual performances do sum to team performance.

4 For 2011 my “threshold save percentage” is.898 (based on a league average save percentage of

.913). Both are up .002 from last season. Over the 1996-2011 period, goalies playing 5 or fewer games (some partial) have averaged a save percentage of about .885. That is one way VORP might be defined. The standard baseball definition is to average the performance of non-starters. This approach might make you inclined to look at the average performance of goaltenders with (say) less than 30 games played. If you do that you get a threshold level of performance of about .905. My mathematics (not a „view‟) is approximately equivalent to averaging across goaltenders with less than 10 games played.

5 Not exactly. The NHL has a minimum wage. But one can easily adjust for this factor.

2011 NHL Review


application of that thought process (and various rules of thumb derived from it) is

tempting but, for hockey, the notion of replacement level performance is much trickier.

Other than in goal, especially with player changes every 30-40 seconds, it would be

difficult to sort players into the categories of “regular” and “replacement”. A third line

forward or third pairing defender is used regularly, frequently in special roles. These

players are a core part of a hockey team.

In fact the notion of a “replacement player” is quite tricky in hockey. When the first line

centre is injured, the second line centre gets a promotion (gains more ice time). Or

perhaps the third line centre is a better fit on the “first” line. Yes, somebody from the

“fourth line” is going to get more ice time (and a call up player will dress). But it may

not be the centre and players can and do shift position. And it may not be much ice time

as second and third line players may get incremental special team duty.

A hockey team is not comprised of “regulars” and “replacement players”. Instead there

is an allocation of ice time along the spectrum of superior to inferior players (even in

goal). The cascading effect of replacing a player is difficult to model and highly

situational. With all of this in mind I stick with my approach to the assessment of

marginal performance. And it tests out just fine. Players with any amount of playing

time and PC scores of around zero get deployed by coaches as if they were „replacement

players‟.

Situational PC

Where we can, PC is measured separately for even handed (EH), short handed (SH),

power play (PP) and shootout (SO) situations. This ensures that specialty team

performance is assessed relative to marginal performance on specialty teams. In other

words, a player who runs up big offensive numbers on the power play is judged against

other power play performances while a penalty killing specialist has his offense and

defense judged against other penalty killers. Perhaps more importantly, assessing

contribution by situation permits a much better assessment of overall performance as the

pieces are more easily assessed that the whole.

PC is also determined for transitions. This is mainly about penalty taking and drawing

and is best interpreted as an adjustment to the other PC scores. I valiantly attempt to

attribute transitions to offense

(„increases offensive potential‟) or

defense („increases defensive risk‟),

but transitions are really a shift in

balance and have both offensive and

defensive implications. The

offensive (mainly penalty drawing)

and defensive (mainly penalty taking)

components are called PCOTR and

PCDTR. This is a somewhat

arbitrary split as transition events

only tilt the „game‟ whereas other

Components of Player Contribution

Situation Offense Defense Goaltending

Even Handed PCOEH PCDEH

PCGRO Power Play PCOPP PCDPP

Short Handed PCOSH PCDSH

Transitions PCOTR PCDTR

Shootout PCOSO PCGSO

TOTALS PCO PCD PCG

2011 NHL Review


offensive and defensive events involve goals scored (a measurement of offense) or

allowed (a measurement of defense). One should think of PC from transitions as the fine-

tuning of the other PC scores.

Above is a summary of the component parts of PC.

The ‘Currency’ of PC

Since advancing in the standings (winning) is the one and only team objective, PC is

denominated in points in the standings (wins). Goals created/prevented are translated

into points in the standings on the same basis that teams do so. A PC „point‟ is scaled to

be 1/10th

of a standings point and the PC points allocated to a team are therefore 10 x

points in the standings. The end result is that offense, defense and goaltending (including

shootout performance) are all on the same page, in the same currency. This

denomination of player contribution is also „inflation proof‟ – it is unaffected by changes

in scoring levels (but is affected by schedule length and the number of regulation ties).

To get a lot of PC points one needs to both (a) play a lot and (b) play well. As (a) and

(b) tend to be highly correlated, PC is also a measure of „talent‟. The distortion , if any,

has to do with over- or under-playing talent.

As a rough rule of thumb it takes about 100 PC points for a skater to be an all-star

candidate (the story with goaltenders is different). At 80 points you would consider a

skater to be a team star, 60 is a team leader, 40 is a solid contributor and 20 is a weak link

or a role player. With a salary cap of $59.4 million (all figures U.S.) for the 2011 season,

a rough guide to player value is $59,400 per annum per PC point or $1,188,000 for every

20 PC points). This is based on a team spending the cap amount and targeting a 100

point season, a comfortable target for a berth in the playoffs. In 2011 the Rangers

claimed the final berth in the East with 93 points while the Blackhawks needed 97 points

to do the same in the stronger Western Conference. A serious Stanley Cup aspirant

would need to target a lower cost per PC point (8 NHL teams cleared the 100 point

plateau in 2011, down from 11 in 2009). And, of course the market value of a player

may be different due to supply and demand and other factors.

As an illustration I have shown below the cap costs (all dollars are US), PC scores

(rounded to the nearest integer) and the dollar cap costs per PC point for the Vancouver

Canucks. Note that cap costs in this table are (a) annualized (the actual “cap hit” depends

on days on the roster, which is a big factor for those at the bottom of the table) and (b)

not salary (cap costs are the average salary/bonus over the contract). Cap costs per point

are nonsense when PC is negative or very small and will be higher for players sustaining

injuries than for healthier players.

Vancouver was the NHL‟s best team during the regular season. This analysis shows how

the Canucks success was driven by high value goaltending and a minimum of salary cap

baggage.

Success within the salary cap is always based on strong performances from well-priced

players. Vancouver got great value from goaltending. Luongo cost about $23K per PC

2011 NHL Review


point and Schneider, who put in the

same kind of performance in more

limited playing time, cost about $9K.

Kesler, Ehrhoff, Burrows and Malhotra

were value leaders, coming in under

budget with substantial contribution. It

is challenging to get value out of

contracts north of $4 million so the

Canucks should be very pleased with

the performance of Kesler. At the other

end of the pay scale Hansen, Torres and

Tambellini punched above their weight

class.

Salary baggage was generally light.

The headline numbers of the Sedin

twins were good, but PC recognizes

that coaching and teammates put them

on their pedestal and then takes some

air out of their numbers. Nevertheless

their matching contracts are not (yet)

oversized luggage. Edler had a big

contract but missed 31 games. Bieksa

had a bigger contract that he more or

less lived up to while missing about

20% of the season.

Ballard was the biggest bust with a $4.2

cap hit and only 25 PC points in 65

games. Hamhuis has a big contract but

missed about 20% of the season.

Salo‟s contract was heavy but he

missed 70% of the season.

Peter Schaefer, at $220 million per PC

point (!) was not the worst of the

Canucks, just the worst of those who

managed to eek out a positive PC score.

He dressed for 16 games and did

approximately nothing for Vancouver‟s

success.

2011 Vancouver Canucks

Player $ Cap Cost PC Cost per PC Point

Roberto Luongo 5,333,333 234 22,765

Ryan Kesler 5,000,000 103 48,470

Cory Schneider 900,000 102 8,797

Daniel Sedin 6,100,000 86 70,869

Christian Ehrhoff 3,100,000 77 40,488

Henrik Sedin 6,100,000 66 92,230

Alexandre Burrows 2,000,000 61 32,759

Manny Malhotra 2,500,000 53 47,585

Dan Hamhuis 4,500,000 51 88,616

Kevin Bieksa 3,750,000 48 77,664

Alexander Edler 3,250,000 45 72,809

Mason Raymond 2,550,000 43 59,357

Jannik Hansen 825,000 37 22,240

Mikael Samuelsson 2,500,000 35 70,918

Keith Ballard 4,200,000 25 169,819

Raffi Torres 1,000,000 23 43,025

Jeff Tambellini 500,000 17 28,915

Aaron Rome 750,000 15 50,392

Sami Salo 3,500,000 14 245,325

Andrew Alberts 1,050,000 11 93,339

Chris Tanev 900,000 7 124,963

Alexandre Bolduc 500,000 5 100,161

Chris Higgins 1,600,000 5 321,794

Lee Sweatt 650,000 4 184,049

Tanner Glass 625,000 3 249,662

Sergei Shirokov 1,300,000 2 649,103

Mario Bliznak 550,000 1 373,791

Cody Hodgson 1,666,666 1 1,906,266

Evan Oberg 1,562,500 1 2,404,860

Aaron Volpatti 612,500 0 1,867,785

Ryan Parent 925,000 0 4,922,418

Victor Oreskovich 575,000 0 9,332,668

Jonas Andersson 675,000 0 19,687,314

Peter Schaefer 875,000 0 220,108,793

Yann Sauve 875,000 0 999,999

Maxim Lapierre 900,000 -1 999,999

Joel Perrault 510,000 -1 999,999

Guillaume Desbiens 550,000 -1 999,999

Rick Rypien 550,000 -2 999,999

2011 NHL Review


Team Performances

The NHL‟s standings are very unfortunate. The problem is the „overtime loss‟.

When a game is not „close‟, teams split two points – the winner collects two points and

the loser collects zero. The NHL defines „close‟ as a regulation tie.

But when a game is „close‟, teams split three points – the winner collects two points and

the loser collects one. The extra point does not really result from an „overtime loss‟ as

both teams effectively win a point in regulation time. It comes from winning the follow-

on competition (overtime) or its follow on match (the shootout).

There is very little evidence that overtime and, especially, the shootout are anything other

than elaborate coin tosses. While skill is present,

random influences are so large as to overwhelm

the effects of talent.

What this does is encourage the implicitly

collusive behaviour of playing for a regulation

tie. The risk/reward relationship of a game that

is tied in the third period is quite asymmetrical.

While a goal scored or allowed in a third period

tie is close to a point gained or lost, a regulation

tie creates the certainty of (at least) a single

point while preserving the potential of two

points.

A good point system would encourage

competition and discern strength of performance.

Many would like to simply eschew the point for

an overtime loss. I prefer the following scoring

system – 5 points for a regulation win, 4 points

for an overtime win, 3 points for a shootout win,

2 points for a shootout loss, 1 point for an

overtime loss and 0 points for a regulation loss.

Each game is worth five points and the more

decisive the victory the greater the reward. Such

an approach would motivate teams to play to win

(not just to tie) in the third period and in

overtime. The result would be fewer overtime

and shootout games.

Revised NHL overall standings based on these

„Ryder points‟, a better measure of relative

performance, are shown to the right. This

approach to the standings clearly affects one‟s

view of team performance.

2011 Overall NHL Standings

Team Ryder Points

NHL Points

Goal Differential

VAN 272 117 70

PHI 245 106 35

BOS 242 103 49

SJS 239 105 30

WSH 238 107 17

DET 232 104 19

PIT 231 106 28

TBL 227 103 5

ANA 225 99 6

PHX 222 99 -5

NSH 221 99 15

MTL 220 96 11

CHI 218 97 32

LAK 217 98 11

DAL 213 95 2

NYR 207 93 30

BUF 206 96 16

CGY 204 94 17

CAR 200 91 -1

MIN 197 86 -23

STL 196 87 6

TOR 190 85 -26

NJD 184 81 -39

CBJ 176 81 -42

ATL 169 80 -31

OTT 169 74 -55

FLA 155 72 -25

NYI 154 73 -31

COL 141 68 -55

EDM 140 62 -66

2011 NHL Review


Ryder points let some air out of Washington‟s season. The Capitals were in overtime 25

times, compiling a 14-11 combined record in OT and the shootout.

Compare that to the Bruins‟ story – just 14 trips to OT (and a poor 3-11 record after

regulation time). Ryder points says that the Bruins were a better (regular season) team

than Washington, Pittsburgh and Tampa.

You can see that this approach lets the air out of the Penguins‟ (10-3) and Kings‟ (10-2)

records in the Monte Carlo event known as the shootout. Both teams slide down in the

Ryder point rankings.

This approach would not have changed playoff qualifiers but would have affected playoff

seeds. In particular the Kings would have drawn the tough Vancouver matchup in the

first round rather than the Blackhawks.

Goals

Also shown in the table above are the goal differentials (GF – GA) for each team. There

is an obvious and strong correlation between goal differential and points in the standings.

I exclude empty net goals from this calculation because they don‟t contribute materially

to winning. In 2011 Phoenix scored a league leading 14 empty net goals. All this really

tells us is that they won a lot of close games. Atlanta allowed 15 ENGs – they lost a lot

of close games.

The goal differentials shown above would lead you to question the success of Tampa

Bay, Anaheim and Phoenix. The Coyotes, in particular, collected 99 NHL points and 222

Ryder points but were outscored by 5 goals on the season, ignoring empty net situations.

These goal differentials generally correlate better to playoff and subsequent season

success than do points in the standings. They tend to better reflect true team strength.

While winning is what the game is about, one problem with a focus on the results of

games is the small number of events being studied (82). Small sample sizes give rise to

statistical fluctuations. I call this the “law of small numbers” (which is essentially the

opposite of the “law of large numbers”). The study of goals gives a richer picture of

teams and especially individuals. An even better story may be told by shot totals (more

on that below).

A problem with studying goals is that they come in two flavours – for and against. One

solution is goal differentials. Another all encompassing measurement of goal scoring and

prevention is „marginal goals‟:

a. goals scored in excess of a threshold, plus

b. goals allowed subtracted from a threshold.

Marginal goals, a building block for Player Contribution, have the benefit of putting

offense and defense in the same currency so that they can be aggregated and

disaggregated at will.

2011 NHL Review


Lucky and Unlucky Teams

The Cost of a Win

Wins are about 94% predicted by goals for and against, marginal goals totals or goal

differentials. When teams like Phoenix, Anaheim and Tampa Bay win in spite of a low

marginal goal performance they are either very skilled at winning close games or just

plain lucky. “Hockey people” will tell you that winning close games is about character.

Historical analysis suggests that this is mostly luck. I would not completely rule out

some intangible, but nobody has found it yet. Lucky teams tend to regress the following

season (and vice versa). But these teams may also be systemically able to win tight

games.

To the right is a table of the marginal

goals per point during the conventional

part of the game („skating time‟) and

during the shootout. The five most

efficient/lucky teams are highlighted in

green and the five least efficient/lucky

teams are highlighted in red.

Scoring was down in 2011 and an average

point in the standings was less expensive

(required fewer goals to obtain) as a

result. During skating time it cost, on

average, 2.58 goals to generate a point

(versus 2.64 in 2010, 2.71 in 2009 and

2.60 in 2008). In a reversal of a trend, it

required fewer goals to resolve a shootout

in 2011 (an average of 2.17 per shootout)

than in the past (2.44 in 2010, 2.25 in

2009 and 2.21 in 2008).

The Ottawa Senators repeated as the most

„efficient‟ team in the NHL during

skating time, requiring only 2.35

marginal goals per point. Tampa Bay

(2.38) also repeated as one of the NHL‟s

most efficient (luckiest?) teams.

The chances of a repeat happening

randomly are quite high. But Toronto

(2.40) has now posted a four-peat as one

of the league‟s luckiest teams. Other

lucky teams were Minnesota and Atlanta

(both at 2.40).

Marginal Goals per Point

Team In Skating Time

per Skating Point In Shootout

per Shootout Win

ANA 2.64 2.59

ATL 2.40 2.27

BOS 2.76 1.17

BUF 2.59 2.29

CAR 2.57 1.61

CBJ 2.42 3.20

CGY 2.77 1.46

CHI 2.81 1.76

COL 2.55 2.28

DAL 2.44 2.26

DET 2.44 2.49

EDM 2.58 2.24

FLA 2.84 1.45

LAK 2.69 2.40

MIN 2.40 2.14

MTL 2.48 2.86

NJD 2.41 2.28

NSH 2.66 2.30

NYI 2.77 2.01

NYR 3.01 2.63

OTT 2.35 0.85

PHI 2.56 1.58

PHX 2.45 2.18

PIT 2.67 2.40

SJS 2.59 2.27

STL 2.80 2.67

TBL 2.38 2.48

TOR 2.40 1.80

VAN 2.67 1.67

WSH 2.47 2.00

AVG 2.58 2.17

2011 NHL Review


Chicago (2.81) also concluded a four-peat – as an unlucky team. The Blackhawks had

the fourth best goal differential in the NHL but only just made the playoffs.

A four-peat in the top or bottom five should happen randomly to a given team only about

1 in 1,300 times. The probability of a four-peat somewhere in a thirty team league is

much higher – about 2%. This suggests that something odd is going on in Toronto

(something that makes this team more successful in close games than in blowouts) and

Chicago (an unsuccessful team in close games). I live in Toronto, but I haven‟t seen the

Leafs exhibit stronger character in close games.

A case study in close games and blowouts was the 2011 Stanley Cup final. Vancouver

won games 1 and 2 with goals in the 60th

and 61st minutes respectively. Boston

proceeded to blow out the Canucks in games 3 and 4. At this stage the statistical (goal

scoring) evidence was that Vancouver was the weaker team. Vancouver shrugged off the

big losses – “a loss is just a loss” – and took game 5, by one third period goal. The

Bruins responded by smoking the Canucks to set up game 7. At this stage the statistical

evidence was still that Vancouver was the weaker team. Sure enough, the better team

(goaltender?) prevailed.

Back to the regular season: The Rangers (3.01) were the NHL‟s unluckiest team during

skating time, just behind the Hawks in goal differential but also just making the playoffs.

The Blues and Rangers were double-unlucky –ranking as one of the NHL‟s least efficient

teams in both conventional and shootout play. New York had a very good 9-3 record in

the shootout, but they deserved more. Columbus was the NHL‟s most unlucky shootout

team, requiring 3.20 marginal goals to earn a shootout point. They posted a 5-8 record.

Ottawa was the NHL‟s most fortunate shootout team with a 2-5 record despite just 3

goals scored in 22 attempts (in marginal-goal-speak 0.85 marginal goals per point). The

Bruins (1.17 marginal goals per point) were also pretty fortunate (2-6) despite awful

shootout goaltending.

I have never detected any season to season correlation in shootout efficiency. This is part

of the evidence that the event is an elaborate coin toss.

Historically there has been very low season to season correlation in marginal goals per

point during skating time. This is part of the evidence that (in) efficiency is just (bad)

luck and most likely will not repeat next season – „unlucky‟ teams are more likely to

improve and „lucky‟ teams are more likely to regress. However, 2010 and 2011 marginal

goals per point were about 55% correlated and the Toronto – Chicago pattern makes one

wonder. Baseball eventually discovered that it was not just runs scored and allowed but

also closer effectiveness that mattered in winning. There could be a „third variable‟

resent in hockey – or just some randomness that looks like it has a pattern.

Measuring Luck

Below is another way of looking at the question of luck. The blue bars are expected

points during skating time, given goals scored and allowed, the red bars are expected

2011 NHL Review


points for the shootout, given goals scored and allowed, and the gold bars are the

difference between actual and expected points, or overall luck in the standings.

The rank order is marginal goals during skating time (the blue bars) so that you can see

what (a) the shootout and (b) randomness

does to the overall result. There are

various models one could use to get to

expected points. As the answers don‟t

vary much I have used a simple one –

marginal goals.

This says that the Rangers were a very

(16 points) unlucky team in 2011 and are

therefore the best candidate for most

improved team next season.

Shooting and Saving

But there is more „gold‟ than meets the

eye. The blue and red bars above have

some luck embedded within them. The

best illustration is in the shootout data.

The Kings went 10-2 in the shootout.

Pittsburgh was 10-3 and the Rangers went

9-3. The actual goals scored and allowed

supported those kinds of record – my

analysis indicates that they all were

expected to earn 11 shoot out points,

given goals scored and allowed. But

hockey is full of random events and it is

doubtful that these teams would have had

similar records had they replayed these

contests.

During 2011 each NHL team was in 82

competitions, scoring and allowing an

average of 224 goals. Studying the

(average of) 448 goals scored and allowed

roughly doubles the statistical information

about team quality that is provided in the

points column. Any one goal can be quite

a random event and affect the outcome of

a game. Patterns of team quality are

clearer with a larger database.

An even larger database is developed if

one studies shots (an average of 2,492

2011 NHL Review


taken and allowed per team). Shots provide us with about 8 times the statistical fuel of

wins.

However … while goals clearly matter directly to winning, shots clearly don‟t. Shots

(taken / allowed) are what I call a „first derivative‟ of goals (scored / allowed). In other

words they are material drivers of goals but only weaker drivers of winning6. Other

obvious first derivatives of goals are

shooting percentage (goals for) and

save percentage (goals against). For

completeness, the obvious second

derivatives for goals are things like

penalties, turnovers, faceoffs and other

events that tilt the ice in favour of one

team or another.

These first derivatives tell us something

about luck. Consider the bookends of

Anaheim and New Jersey. The Ducks

led the NHL with a 10.1% shooting

percentage, up from 9.4% in 2010,

while the Devils were the league

laggards at 7.3%, down from 8.8% in

2010. There is certainly a great deal of

luck in these results. One would be

inclined to believe that if these two

teams had a chance for a do-over of the

2011 season, both would find

themselves much closer to average.

To the right is a ranking of NHL teams‟

shooting percentages. Those teams at

the top of the list are most likely to

have been lucky and are most likely to

have offensive regression next year.

Those at the bottom are most likely to

have been unlucky and are most likely

to have favourable regression to the

mean. One can refine this analysis

deeper (for instance, shooting

percentage is about 20% explained by

power play opportunities), but I won‟t

go further here.

6 Ironically, while goals are, by definition, 100% correlated with goals and shots are not, shot counts

are more predictive of future goals due to a larger sample size.

Shooting and Saving

Team Shooting

Percentage Team Save

Percentage

ANA 10.1% BOS .932

VAN 9.8% VAN .928

PHI 9.8% NSH .926

DAL 9.8% NYR .922

CGY 9.6% MTL .922

CHI 9.6% WSH .920

STL 9.5% PIT .919

MIN 9.5% PHX .919

NYI 9.3% FLA .918

DET 9.3% MIN .917

TBL 9.3% CAR .916

COL 9.2% LAK .916

CAR 9.2% PHI .915

NYR 9.1% ANA .915

PHX 9.1% DAL .914

BOS 9.1% SJS .914

TOR 9.0% BUF .913

NSH 9.0% CHI .910

BUF 8.9% DET .908

LAK 8.8% TOR .907

PIT 8.8% OTT .907

EDM 8.7% NJD .906

SJS 8.6% CGY .906

WSH 8.5% ATL .906

ATL 8.4% NYI .905

CBJ 8.4% EDM .903

MTL 8.2% TBL .903

OTT 8.0% STL .902

FLA 7.7% CBJ .900

NJD 7.3% COL .895

2011 NHL Review


Also shown in the table is a ranking of NHL team save percentages. But there is a big

difference here. Whereas shooting percentages are a true team statistic (a weighted

average of all the individual performances), team save percentages are highly influenced

by one (or two) goaltenders. With saves it is much more plausible that skill is in

evidence. Regression to the mean is also

likely with save percentages, but it is a

less powerful force due to larger sample

sizes. Again, one can further refine the

analysis (e.g. save percentage is

influenced by shot count bias and shot

quality influences, including short handed

situations).

Player Contribution Allocates

Observed Team Performance

Note that PC allocates team performance,

whether lucky or skilled, to individuals.

It does not set out to determine whether a

performance is from luck or skill. It

translates a player‟s marginal goals into

PC points using the marginal goal factors

shown above. The implicit assumption

here is that these observed team

performances are a result of skill. This

means that a goal scored (or prevented)

by a Senator is worth more PC points than

a goal scored (or prevented) by a Ranger

(in 2011). You need to do more work to

try to separate skill from performance.

Team Success

A marginal goals analysis helps us to

deconstruct team performance (during the

first 65 minutes of play) into offense

(MGO), defense (MGD) and goaltending

(MGG). To the right is the composition

of marginal goals by team. This analysis

ignores the shootout as marginal goals in

the shootout are in a different scale.

We don‟t need this analysis to rank

overall performance during the

conventional part of the game. We know

that Vancouver was the NHL‟s top team

and that Edmonton was its worst. But

2011 NHL Review


this view lets us make a number of observations:

The Bruins were the top marginal goals team in the East. Boston had the

strongest team MGG (92) in the league AND the strongest MGG since I

developed Player Contribution. Who‟s your MVP?

Vancouver had the second best MGG (84) in the NHL. Interestingly, the Canucks

goaltending was middling through about the middle of the season. Then Luongo

woke up. Vancouver had the NHL‟s best offense but a below average defense.

Calgary and Tampa Bay were the NHL‟s two best teams, before one considers

goaltending. Unfortunately for the Lightning and Flames, goaltending matters. In

the case of the Flames, this cost a playoff spot. Fortunately for Guy Boucher,

such problems can be fixed (e.g. Dwayne Roloson) and such a repair has

tremendous leverage. More on this later.

Many other teams suffered in goal. Ironically, both the Blue Jackets and the

Blues had blue-paint blues.

In New Jersey, the NHL‟s best defense was neutralized by the league‟s most

awful offense (and, finally, a lack of goaltending).

Offense

A marginal goals analysis helps us to further deconstruct offenses. Below is a summary

of marginal goals from offense (MGO) by situation – even handed (MGOEH

), power play

(MGOPP

) short handed (MGOSH

) and transitions (MGOTR

) which, at the team level,

reduce to penalty drawing. Also shown is the change from 2010. I will address the

offense in shootouts separately.

Year to year variations in scoring are large in the NHL, evidence of the pronounced

effects of randomness in observed offense. The proof is in the mean reversion of

shooting percentages discussed above.

Here is what I said last year about Colorado:

“The biggest offensive improvement in the NHL came from the Avalanche. They went

from worst to sixth, increasing marginal goals by 51. This looks like it could be a case of

mean reversion as they had fallen off 40 (marginal) goals in 2009.”

Look them up in 2011 and you will find more mean reversion – the Avalanche ranked

18th

.

Let me now use nearly the same words to describe the 2011 Bruins:

The biggest offensive improvement in the NHL came from the Bruins. They went from

worst to fifth, increasing marginal goals by 50. This looks like it could be a case of mean

reversion as they had fallen off 70 (marginal) goals in 2010.

2011 NHL Review


Get the picture?

Here is more detail on the big swings in Washington and Boston:

Team 2009 2010 2011

WSH

Goals 268 313 219

Shots 2,748 2,693 2,566

Shooting Percentage 9.8% 11.6% 8.5%

BOS

Goals 270 196 244

Shots 2,482 2,599 2,696

Shooting Percentage 10.9% 7.5% 9.1%

Marginal Goals - Offense

Team vs 2010 MGO MGOEH MGOPP MGOSH MGOTR

VAN -8 127 84 41 2 1

DET 36 126 89 35 1 1

PHI 26 125 98 18 9 0

CHI -8 121 86 35 2 -1

BOS 50 113 94 15 7 -3

SJS -12 112 73 38 2 -0

CGY 42 110 76 29 3 3

TBL 30 110 75 34 -3 5

BUF 11 109 88 25 -2 -1

STL 20 105 81 23 3 -1

ANA 4 104 65 37 3 -1

CAR 7 100 73 19 3 6

PIT -19 97 70 16 9 2

PHX 17 95 79 16 1 -0

NYI 13 94 62 20 11 1

NYR 7 93 68 19 7 -0

DAL -6 91 61 23 6 2

COL -14 90 68 21 4 -3

WSH -92 88 70 18 3 -3

ATL -10 87 63 23 2 -0

MTL 5 82 55 27 1 -0

NSH -2 82 71 13 1 -2

TOR 5 82 60 18 1 4

CBJ -2 79 66 10 2 1

LAK -20 78 62 16 -0 0

MIN -9 72 47 22 3 0

EDM -13 60 43 12 4 1

FLA -9 60 56 7 -0 -2

OTT -28 59 43 18 2 -4

NJD -43 40 38 9 -1 -6

2011 NHL Review


The Bruins shooting percentage went from a league best in 2009 to a league worst in

2010 to slightly above average in 2011. Washington went from above average in 2009 to

league best in 2010 to below average in 2011. There is some variation in shots, but the

main driver of the enormous swings in goals scored is in shooting percentage. Some of

that is explained by penalties and some is explained by changes in personnel, but most is

explained by (random) variation in shooting success.

Other really big swings in 2011 MGO were in Detroit (+36), Calgary (+42) and New

Jersey (-43). The Devils has the NHL‟s worst offense overall (worst even handed and

second worst on the power play). A big part of this was the absence of Zach Parise.

Calgary had mean reversion going on (having dropped 46 marginal goals in 2010).

Detroit had mean reversion (having dropped 62 marginal goals in 2010).

Enough about mean reversion, for now …

Philadelphia had the NHL‟s top even handed offense, Vancouver had the league‟s best

power play and Detroit was in between. The three teams were in a virtual dead heat for

best offense. The Flyers nearly won it with the second-best (9 MGOSH

) short handed

offense (which is a very random success), behind the skillful Islanders (11).

Boston would have been in the mix if not for a woeful power play (just 15 MGOPP

). The

NHL‟s worst power play was in Florida (7 MGOPP

).

At the team level, MGOTR

(transitions) reduce to a team‟s relative ability to generate

power play opportunities (draw penalties). Carolina (with 6 such marginal goals) earned

an extra two points in the standings by their ability to draw penalties. This was the sixth

year in a row for a strong performance by the Hurricanes in this metric. Tampa (5) and

Toronto (4) also did well here. New Jersey (-6) and Ottawa (-4) were the poorest

performing penalty drawing teams.

In general, weak offensive teams were not playoff teams while strong offensive teams

were. The Kings were the weakest offense to gain a playoff position (MGO of 78). But

105 MGO was not enough for St. Louis.

Defensive Measures – Shots and Shot Quality

Marginal goals analysis is an even more helpful tool for assessing defenses. But, to get at

this, it is necessary to separate goal prevention into defense and goaltending. To identify

a team‟s contribution from goaltending I compare its goals against, adjusted for shot

quality and shot recording biases, to a threshold level (based on the shots allowed).

A goaltender facing no shots cannot make a contribution. When he faces a high number

of shots he can make a high contribution. So the number of shots faced is a significant

factor in assessing goaltending contribution. For a given number of shots a high (shot

quality neutral) save percentage implies a big goaltending contribution (and a low shot

quality neutral save percentage implies a small goaltending contribution).

2011 NHL Review


And whatever is not goaltending must be attributable to defense. This is clearest with

shots (low shots allowed suggest a strong defense).

If you do this math you are attributing to defense the responsibility for the number and

quality of shots on goal. Below are the defensive leader boards for the 2011 season.

Shots

Average shots allowed per game is a

very familiar metric and the dominant

part of the assessment of team defense.

New Jersey continue to play devilish

defense, moving from 2nd

in 2010 to 1st

in 2011 and giving up just 26.2 shots

per game. For the third year in a row

the Kings were a top four shot

prevention team. Calgary moved up

from 7th

to 4th

and Pittsburgh went from

6th

to 5th

.

The Blues were the biggest mover near

the top, moving from 16th

to 2nd

.

Tampa Bay had a similar improvement

– 8th

last to 7th

best.

The Bruins (14th

to 29th

) and Coyotes

(12th

to 28th

) went the other way.

Teams tend to open up (trade defense

for offense) in front of good

goaltending.

Carolina slipped 8 spots in the shots

allowed rankings to claim the title of

“most open defensive team”. Anaheim

is hanging around the hoop (2nd

worst

in 2010, 4th

worst in 2011). Winnipeg

inherits a similar profile from Atlanta

(4th

worst in 2010, 5th

worst in 2011).

Shot totals were up again in 2011.

Average shots on goal per game

increased slightly from 30.3 to 30.4.

The dispersion of team results („worst to first‟) decreased a fair bit in 2011, from 9.0 to

7.0 shots.

Warning! There are serious issues with something as simple as shot counts. The only

objective event around the net is a goal. Saves, misses and blocked shots are all

subjective events.

Defensive Measures

Team Avg

Shots Team Shot

Quality

NJD 26.2 TBL 0.877

STL 27.7 MIN 0.880

LAK 27.9 DAL 0.914

CGY 28.5 LAK 0.915

PIT 28.7 CGY 0.923

CHI 28.7 NYR 0.929

TBL 28.7 NJD 0.940

SJS 28.9 CBJ 0.946

WSH 29.0 BUF 0.952

NYR 29.4 PHX 0.968

CBJ 29.8 WSH 0.981

VAN 30.1 FLA 0.989

PHI 30.1 SJS 0.990

DAL 30.5 NSH 0.995

NSH 30.6 CHI 1.007

BUF 30.7 PIT 1.007

DET 30.7 BOS 1.015

MTL 31.0 OTT 1.016

TOR 31.0 STL 1.019

OTT 31.2 EDM 1.019

EDM 31.7 TOR 1.024

COL 31.8 DET 1.033

FLA 31.8 ATL 1.042

NYI 32.0 MTL 1.046

MIN 32.0 PHI 1.056

ATL 32.2 CAR 1.059

ANA 32.3 VAN 1.090

PHX 32.6 COL 1.101

BOS 32.7 ANA 1.102

CAR 33.2 NYI 1.119

2011 NHL Review


Below is a table of total (for and against) shots recorded for each team at home and on the

road. This home versus road, total shots analysis reveals some or all of (a) recording

bias, (b) shift in openness of play and (c) randomness. Colorado‟s 8.2% „shot inflation‟

at home could be the result of a more open style of game at home (less open on the road)

or an upward recording bias in shots. Minnesota‟s 11.0% „shot deflation‟ at home could

be the result of a less open style of

game at home (more open on the road)

or a downward recording bias in shots.

Note that the home/road ratios are about

25% explained by the prior year data.

This suggests some recording bias.

Consider the „miss‟. A puck directed

wide of the net but touched by the

goaltender might be a shot in one rink

and a miss in another. What are we to

make of the scoring in a rink where shot

totals are high and miss totals are low?

This might indicate that the scorer has

widened the net. There are other issues.

There are rinks where scorers look lazy

(or overzealous) with the recording of

certain events.

Scorers in Toronto reported a league

leading 1,353 „misses‟ in the Leaf‟s

defensive end. On the road scorers

reported just 1,126 „misses‟ in the Leaf

zone. In New Jersey scorers reported a

league lagging 686 „misses‟ in the

Devil‟s defensive end whereas road

scorers logged 1,039 „misses‟. Do

Toronto scorers shrink the net? Are

they overzealous in recording misses?

Do New Jersey scorers expand the net?

Are they lazy reporters of misses?

In assessing defensive performance (see

below) I have attempted to isolate and

correct for reporting biases. An upward

(downward) reporting bias in shots

means that we need to reduce (increase) our measurement of defensive performance and

increase (reduce) our measurement of goaltending. But this is increasingly art rather than

science.

Shots Recorded

Team Road Home Home

vs Road

COL 2,395 2,591 1.082

DET 2,554 2,704 1.059

NSH 2,361 2,495 1.057

SJS 2,526 2,662 1.054

TOR 2,383 2,505 1.051

WSH 2,410 2,518 1.045

NYI 2,451 2,560 1.044

MTL 2,517 2,611 1.037

PHI 2,491 2,568 1.031

TBL 2,445 2,499 1.022

ANA 2,464 2,507 1.017

BOS 2,661 2,700 1.015

VAN 2,526 2,554 1.011

ATL 2,600 2,602 1.001

CAR 2,620 2,610 0.996

FLA 2,551 2,540 0.996

PIT 2,464 2,454 0.996

BUF 2,602 2,586 0.994

OTT 2,477 2,449 0.989

CBJ 2,498 2,439 0.976

STL 2,401 2,335 0.973

NJD 2,273 2,208 0.971

DAL 2,416 2,341 0.969

LAK 2,365 2,274 0.962

NYR 2,473 2,375 0.960

EDM 2,435 2,334 0.959

CGY 2,465 2,357 0.956

CHI 2,544 2,427 0.954

PHX 2,651 2,491 0.940

MIN 2,516 2,239 0.890

2011 NHL Review


Shot Quality

Shot quality7 is based on an assessment of the characteristics of each shot allowed. The

expected goals allowed8 from this assessment, normalized for variations in shots on goal,

can be compared to average. My shot quality factors are the ratio of these normalized

expected goals to average (a shot quality factor of 0.950 means that shots taken are, on

average, 5% less likely to result in goals).

There is pretty strong evidence that shot quality is not very descriptive on offense. To the

extent that one can sift through the statistical noise it turns out that the shooter‟s skill

supersedes the circumstances of the shot. However on defense, after you have effectively

averaged across a lot of shooters, shot quality turns out to be an important descriptor of a

team.

There is a clear shot distance recording bias9 in certain arenas. The worst such reporting

bias is in Madison Square Garden where the raw data suggests that the Rangers give up

(and take) much shorter shots than average (shorter shots are more likely to be goals).

But further analysis reveals a big distance recording bias. I address this problem directly

in my assessment of shot quality.

The 2011 shot quality leader was Tampa Bay (up from 7th

in 2010). Minnesota, Dallas,

Los Angeles and Calgary rounded out the top five. The Wild were up from 5th

, but the

others moved up considerably from the bottom of the heap. The Stars ranked 28th

in

2010, LA was 20th

(28th

in 2009) and Calgary was 23rd

.

The Devils slipped from 1st to 7

th, Phoenix went from 2

nd to 10

th and Buffalo slid from 3

rd

to 9th

. The Flyers had the worst fall from grace (4th

to 25th

).

The Islanders, Ducks, Avalanche and Canucks were the biggest laggards in shot quality.

All were around average in 2010. Last season‟s stragglers, the Leafs and Blackhawks,

both became average.

One should not necessarily expect a correlation between shots allowed and shot quality.

These are two very different dimensions of a defensive profile (but shot counts still

matter more). This year the R-squared of these two data sets was 0.19 (19% of one

variable is explained by the other).

7 My original approach to Shot Quality is described in

http://www.HockeyAnalytics.com/Research_files/Shot_Quality.pdf

8 Expected Goals is the sum of goal probabilities, across all shots. It is a weighted shot / Corsi /

Fenwick assessment, the weights being shot quality (the probability of a goal given the circumstances of the shot). It is such a useful measure that it has been borrowed, repackaged, renamed and sold to one or more NHL teams.

9 See http://www.HockeyAnalytics.com/Research_files/Product_Recall_for_Shot_Quality.pdf

http://www/

http://www/

2011 NHL Review


Defense

Goals allowed reflect both defense and goaltending. But when you look at shots allowed,

adjusted for shot count biases, together with shot quality, adjusted for distance recording

biases, you end up with a comprehensive assessment of team defense.

Marginal goals provide a sophisticated look at team defense. Below is a summary of

marginal goals from defense (MGD) by situation – even handed (MGDEH

), power play

(MGDPP

), penalty killing (MGDSH

) and transitions (MGDTR

) which, at a team level,

reduces to penalty taking. Also shown is the change in MGD from 2010.

Marginal Goals - Defense

Team vs 2010 MGD MGDEH MGDPP MGDSH MGDTR

NJD 8 142 98 3 28 14

LAK 15 130 91 4 32 3

CGY 24 124 93 2 27 2

WSH 22 122 88 4 32 -2

TBL 24 121 92 -5 37 -3

STL 18 117 78 9 26 3

SJS 24 116 92 3 18 4

PIT 12 111 81 3 33 -7

DAL 30 106 86 -3 20 3

CBJ 4 105 84 0 28 -7

NYR 7 104 73 4 20 6

NSH 1 101 70 5 22 3

BUF 3 101 77 -2 27 -2

CHI -23 100 73 5 15 8

MIN -7 98 72 3 27 -4

VAN -7 90 66 5 23 -3

DET -14 88 63 3 24 -2

MTL 8 87 65 3 25 -6

PHI -39 86 64 4 22 -4

OTT -26 83 51 5 27 -1

FLA 32 83 53 4 22 4

PHX -28 83 68 3 13 -1

TOR 5 82 65 2 12 3

BOS -24 73 54 3 13 3

EDM 10 73 59 7 14 -7

COL -26 59 53 -0 13 -6

ATL -12 57 45 1 11 1

CAR -16 56 39 2 12 2

ANA -28 51 39 2 13 -2

NYI -34 51 33 2 19 -3

2011 NHL Review


The Devils repeated as the NHL‟s top defensive team (MGD of 142, up 8) in 2011 based

on a number two rank for even handed defense (MGDEH

of 98) and a league leading

penalty avoidance record (MGDTR

of 14). Their league lowest total of short handed

situations (241) was worth about 6 points in the standings.

Ordinarily such a ranking would result in a playoff spot, but not for the Devils in 2011.

All this hard work was undermined (necessitated?) by awful offense and gloomy

goaltending.

It was a season of big swings in defense. The biggest gain in MGD came from the

Florida Panthers. Over very many years Florida has been a chronically appalling

defensive team. My thesis has been that (a) someone thinks that offense sells better near

the beach, (b) goaltending has been generally good so “let‟s run and gun” and (c) the

team is badly managed and/or coached. But the 2011 version was up +32 to 83 MGD

(yet still ranked just 21st). A good part of this gain was on the PK where they had 84.6%

success. There was no change in coaching but a new GM (Dale Tallon) was in place.

The leaderboard was dominated by teams getting better. Dallas had a big gain of 30

MGD. San Jose bounced back in 2011 – MGD was up 24 after falling 39 in 2010.

Calgary and Tampa Bay were both up 24 MGD. Was this necessitated by inferior

goaltending?

The Lightning led in short handed (MGDSH

of 43) defense. Tampa‟s penalty killing

percentage of 83.8% was bettered by seven teams but all had much better goaltending.

The PK% leaders were Pittsburgh (86.1%), Vancouver (85.6%), Washington (85.6%) and

Los Angeles (85.5%). When you disaggregate the results into defense and goaltending,

Vancouver slides backwards in your assessment of short handed defense (MGDSH

of 23)

and the other three remain nearly deadlocked.

From my 2010 Report:

“The biggest defensive gains in 2011 were in Philadelphia where the Flyers improved by

36 to 125 MGD in spite of league worst penalty discipline (MGDSHO

of -8). They lead in

even handed defense (MGDEH

of 95) and were tied with Ottawa as the second best team

on the penalty kill – MGDSHK

of 36.”

In 2011 the Flyers had the largest reduction in defense, where MGD was off 39 to 86.

Penalty killing became ordinary. Even handed defense became sub-standard. Mean

reversion? In the 2011 off season GM Paul Holmgren decided to blow up his offense

(shipping out Mike Richards and Jeff Carter in blockbuster deals) to allow him to

upgrade goaltending (he signed Bryzgalov) that was actually better than passable.

In what looks like more mean reversion the Blackhawks were off 23 to 100 MGD.

Anaheim continued to slip defensively. The Ducks MGD was off 28 to rank 29th

in 2011,

after having dropped 26 MGD the prior season. This team was very fortunate to make

the playoffs and then disappeared fast.

2011 NHL Review


The Avalanche continued to slide. Colorado‟s MGD dropped by 26 after falling 30 in

2010.

Detroit‟s defense deteriorated for the third straight season (MGD down 14 in 2011, 16 in

2010 and 29 in 2009) and is now ranked as below average. Yet Lidstrom won another

Norris Trophy.

Boston‟s defense was off 24 MGD. There is little doubt that greater confidence in

goaltending leads to a more open approach to the game and, by implication, less defense.

“They” say that defense wins. New Jersey failed to win a playoff berth yet led the NHL

in team defense. Anaheim was fourth seed in the West with the NHL‟s second worst

defense. Boston won a Stanley Cup with a defense that was as productive as that of

Edmonton (don‟t misunderstand my comment – the Bruins chose to invest skating energy

in offense because of their goaltending).

In 2011, the correlation between defense and winning was weaker than I have seen it in

some time. The correlation coefficient for points and MGD was just 35% (versus 69%

for MGO and 39% for MGG).

Goaltending

Isolating shots and shot quality lets one better assess goaltending. The impact of

goaltending is highest when a strong goalie allows „few‟ goals notwithstanding a high

number of shots faced and / or shots of high quality.

Below is a table of the marginal goals from goaltending (MGG) by team (excluding the

shootout which is discussed separately)10

.

Although it is certainly possible, you won‟t normally find impactful goaltending behind a

great defense. It just does not get the opportunity to shine. So it is not so surprising to

see the low goaltending contribution in New Jersey, Tampa Bay, Los Angeles and

Calgary. This does not mean that goaltending for these teams is necessarily weak (it was

in some cases), just that it did not contribute much to overall team success.

For each of the last three seasons Florida has topped this list. That story was the

confluence of (a) Tomas Vokoun and (b) really bad defense. But the champion has been

dethroned and, after two years of ranking at number two, the Boston Bruins ascended to

the top of the 2011 goaltending rankings.

A season ago Tuuka Rask turned the Vezina incumbent into the NHL‟s top number two

goalie, and the hockey world wrote Tim Thomas off. I have always been a very big fan

of Thomas. But one of the safest bets anywhere is that old guys who have career years

10 This season I changed my MGG/MGD algorithm to „disallow‟ negative MGG. In prior years I had

permitted this outcome but I have concluded that it probably results in the over-statement of defence on teams with sub-marginal goaltending.

2011 NHL Review


will swoon the following season. So … who saw

an NHL record save percentage coming?

In 2010 “hockey people” concluded that

goaltending was over-rated. This is what happens

when two teams with no-name goaltenders compete

for the Stanley Cup. The 2011 Stanley Cup will go

down in history as one of those goaltending years,

of which there are many. It may surprise you that

over 40% of all Conn Smythe Trophies have been

won by goalies. You should not be surprised.

In the past couple of years there has been a fair bit

of discussion amongst hockey analysts of the

possibility of „parity‟ (a narrow range of results)

amongst NHL goaltenders. This is a very important

conversation as a very narrow range implies low

value added from goaltending. If parity is the case,

then goaltender wages are high since parity would

imply that goaltending assets are quite fungible

(which implies lower wages).

The range of MGG results widened considerably in

2011 – the best (BOS) to worst (TBL) span was 92

goals. In 2010 the spread was just 66 goals (hence

the blooming parity talk). But this season looked

more like normal (the span was 98 in 2009, 92 in

2008, 104 in 2007 and 88 in 2006).

If parity is the case, then PC‟s approach overstates

goaltending contribution as my approach is based

on the historical contribution of goaltending to team

results. I continue to see little current evidence of

parity, but the reader should understand that the

comparison of skater and goaltender contributions

is still very challenging and subject to considerable

error.

Elsewhere you might read something like:

“Recent statistical studies have suggested that the difference between average and top-

level goaltending doesn’t have enough of an impact on the standings to justify breaking

the bank for it. While high-priced talent like Roberto Luongo and Tim Thomas are an

upgrade over the league-average goalies, spending the extra five or six million

somewhere else instead will generally provide greater value overall.”

Marginal Goals - Goaltending

Team vs 2010 2011

BOS 21 92

VAN 40 84

ANA 33 71

CAR 28 64

NSH 26 64

MTL 0 62

NYR 8 56

PHI 41 53

PHX 0 52

FLA -24 50

PIT 23 48

NYI 30 46

WSH 9 42

ATL -5 35

CHI 2 35

SJS -28 31

DET -20 29

MIN 14 29

LAK -5 29

TOR 9 27

OTT 10 27

BUF -34 26

DAL -17 23

EDM 3 22

STL -32 10

COL -38 8

NJD -33 6

CGY -54 1

CBJ -8 0

TBL -8 0

2011 NHL Review


This is bollocks. The average NHL team spent (cap hit) about $5 million on goaltending

in 2011. Boston spent $6.3 million and Vancouver spent $6.2 million. The issue is

execution and, yes, there is much wastage. Calgary spent $6.3 million and Tampa Bay

spent $4.5 million and both teams got nothing for it. The range of goaltender spending in

2010-11 was Anaheim ($8.7 million) to Chicago ($2.1 million, ignoring the Cristobal

Huet buyout) – only a $6.6 million span.

The math on value is very simple. Over the course of a season an average NHL team

allows about 2,500 shots on goal. The average NHL team sports a .913 save percentage.

Exchange that for a .923 save percentage and you save 25 goals. That would get you

about 9 points in the standings (or about 90 PC points). And that is worth around $5.3M

in incremental goaltender salary (for a team targeting 100 points in the standings). We

are not yet thinking about the elite goaltending in Boston (.932) or Vancouver (.928),

merely the very good goaltending of, say, the Rangers or Canadiens. And we haven‟t

considered the shootout yet (it ups the value of goaltending by about 10%).

The challenge is to spend the money wisely. Contracts are for future performance

rather than for past performance. Paying up for a goalie that has had a limited amount of

out-performance is just plain dumb and is the principal reason people want to feel that

goaltenders are overpaid. And long term contracts are very risky business at any

position. But acquiring credible out-performance is the smart move, in fact the essence

of the job of the GM. While mean reversion is a powerful force, individuals revert to

their personal mean.

The other reason people want to feel that goaltending is over-rated is the sense that “all

your eggs are in one basket”. If you spend a lot of money on a goaltender and he is

injured or (worse) goes on vacation for a couple of weeks, then you have a big problem.

The Bruins had this problem in April and very nearly drowned in the first round of the

playoff pool. Luongo laid an egg in the final, while Thomas was unbeatable. “All your

eggs” means risk. And, from that perspective, it is much easier to sign Evgeni Malkin to

a really big contract than Marc-Andre Fleury.

But the reality is that hockey teams are simply highly „levered‟ in goal. Even a stingy

defense leaves a goaltender with much work to do. Small variations in goaltending are

amplified to large results. Henrik Sedin can have an off night, but not Roberto Luongo.

Daniel Sedin can have an off season, but it will attract less attention than a crisis of

confidence in the crease. Are goaltenders any less consistent than skaters? I don‟t think

so. But the leverage means that it frequently feels like netminders are less consistent.

Biggest Improvements in Goaltending in 2011

Philadelphia (+41 MGG)

The most improved goaltending in the NHL in 2011 was in the City of Brotherly Love. It

improved so much over a very messy 2010 (-37 MGG versus 2009) … that the Flyers

decided to clean house in the off season.

2011 NHL Review


In 2009 Martin Biron carried the bulk of the load (with a .915 save percentage) and

Antero Niittymaki provided very solid relief (.912). This was a serviceable performance

but both goalies were gone in 2010 in favour of a bet on Sugar Ray Emery that did not go

according to plan. Feeling vulnerable in net, the Flyers acquired Michael Leighton from

Carolina to serve as the backup. When Emery went down with an injury, Leighton was

pressed into service with better results (save percentage of .918 versus .905 for Emery).

Things were looking up until Leighton went down and Brian Boucher was suddenly the

main man. By the end of the season these three had split the goaltending duties nearly

equally but Boucher ended up with the most minutes (1,742) and the worst save

percentage (.899), which is a deadly combination.

Boucher was back in 2011 (Emery and Leighton shuffled off into the sunset) with a

considerably stronger game (.916 save percentage) in slightly more playing time (1,885

minutes). The main load was carried by Sergei Bobrovsky (3,017 minutes), who posted a

solid .915 save percentage.

Apparently this was not good enough. For 2012 the deck chairs have been rearranged

again as the Flyers hope that Bryzgalov can carry over his spiffy 2011 save percentage

(.921) from the Desert Dogs (his career average is .916). While the goaltending situation

is probably stabilized at a higher than historic level, the cost was high and the 2011

goaltending results may turn out to be challenging to improve upon. By the way –

Bobrovsky, Boucher and Bryzgaolav each had a Neutral Save Percentage (NSV)11

of

around .920 in 2011.

Vancouver (+40)

In 2010 Roberto Luongo posted his worst save percentage (.913) since his rookie year.

Mean reversion looked like a good bet and in 2011 he recorded his second best career

result (.928). Of course, he will be remembered best as the losing goaltender in the

Stanley Cup (which he did with considerable style). But don‟t miss the side story of

Cory Schneider. He delivered a .929 save percentage in 1,372 minutes, a very large

upgrade from the Andrew Raycroft backup performance (.911) in 2010 and worth over

100 PC points.

What do Boston and Vancouver have in common? The deepest goaltending in the NHL.

What is so bad about that? It is hard to hold it together. Schneider and Tuuka Rask are

both restricted free agents in 2012. Both want to play. They both look like they will

need a pay hike that would be inconsistent with backup roles. In Vancouver I think this

plays out with ~25 starts for Schneider in 2012.

It is unlikely that the Canucks get as much out of goaltending in 2012.

11 Neutral Save Percentage is a goaltender‟s save percentage adjusted to reflect variation in team shot

quality and scorer bias in shot counts.

2011 NHL Review


Anaheim (+33)

The Ducks used five goaltenders in 2011 but Jonas Hiller was again the main man in the

crease and most of the improvement story. His save percentage was up (.924 vs .918 in

2010) but his minutes were down (2,672 vs 3,338) due to struggles with vertigo. Peeling

away the layers of the onion shows that he was actually much more valuable in 2011

despite reduced playing time. His NSV went from .914 in 2010 to .932 in 2011,

reflecting much tougher working conditions.

But about one third of the overall improvement came from others. In 2010 J-S Giguere

(.900 save percentage) and Curtis McElhinney (.917) logged 1,109 and 522 minutes

respectively. McElhinney was back with a nearly doubled workload but his save

percentage (raw: .890, NSV: .902) did not inspire and the revolving door commenced.

Sugar Ray Emery (527 minutes) and Dan Ellis (729) were brought in to salvage the

situation (McElhinney and Ellis were swapped in a trade). They delivered .926 and .917

save percentages respectively to account for the uptick in the overall quality of backup

goaltending.

Hiller and Ellis return for 2012. I doubt that these players individually can match their

2011 performances, but the once mighty Ducks shouldn‟t have to carry the McElhinney

baggage this season and I would expect them to sustain this level of goaltending overall

in 2012.

New York Islanders (+30)

I guess the Islanders had to have an uptick in goaltending someday. The Rick DePietro

related decisions, the trade of Roberto Luongo and the lifetime employment contract,

both turn out to be very bad moves. His situation has hampered strategic decision

making for some time.

In 2010 Dwayne Roloson was the main man with 2,897 minutes in 50 games and a .907

save percentage. Martin Biron (.896 in 1,634 minutes) and DiPietro (.900 in 462

minutes) filled out the twine minding time. Collectively this group delivered just 16

marginal goals, which is not very good.

Last season Roloson upped his game (.916), earning a mid-season trade to the

goaltending starved but otherwise capable Tampa Bay Lightning. The trade meant, of

course, that his contribution to the Islanders was limited (he played 1,206 minutes).

DiPietro continued to suck (.886) but was in better health and, with the hope that the

lifetime contract could yet prove to be of value, had more time in the net (1,533 minutes).

If you put these two performances together you quickly see that they don‟t add up to

anything more than they contributed in 2010. The difference mainly came from

upgrading the Biron performance to that of Al Montoya (.921 in 1,154 minutes) and

Kevin Poulin (.924 in 491 minutes).

DiPietro is, of course, back for 2012. So is Montoya. New is a recycled Evgeni

Nabakov. I don‟t see this group delivering the same kind of goaltending that we saw in

2011.

2011 NHL Review


Carolina (+28)

The Hurricanes have been swirling in the wake of Cam Ward‟s playing time. The former

Conn Smyth Trophy winner spent some time getting his legs underneath him before

turning in a save percentage of .916 in 2009 (and Carolina was +47 MGG). Last season

he delivered the same kind of result but injuries held him to just 2,651 minutes in 47

games (versus 3,928 in 68 games in 2009) and MGG was off by 23. In 2011 Ward led

the NHL in minutes played (4,318), and upped his save percentage to .923, to fuel the 28

MGG turnaround. One of the reasons Ward played so much is that Justin Peters stunk

(.875 save percentage vs .905 in the prior year). And this undermined the gains that

Ward delivered.

In 2012 Carolina will again sink or swim with Cam Ward‟s performance and health.

Nashville (+26)

The story was pretty simple with the Predators – Pekka Rinne was terrific, sporting a .930

save percentage in 3,789 minutes. His save percentage was way up from 2010 (.911) and

this kind of performance moved his playing time up as well (from 3,246 minutes in

2010). The real Rinne is probably in between (and .930 is a lofty performance) so we can

expect some regression in 2012. Backup Anders Lindback chipped in a nice .915 save

percentage (in 1,131 minutes) which was an improvement of the work of Dan Ellis (.909

in 1,715 minutes in 2010) and may also be hard to sustain.

Biggest Deteriorations in Goaltending in 2011

St. Louis (-32)

The real story in St. Louis was not the replacement of Chris Mason (.913 in 3,512

minutes) with Jaroslav Halak (.910 in 3,294). That competition was nearly a draw. No

the tale to follow was that of Ty Conklin. As the principal backup (1,451 minutes) in

2010 he sported a sizzling save percentage of .921. In 2011he simply sucked (.881 in

1,285 minutes).

Depth matters. The outlook is for improved backup goaltending in 2012 (although Brian

Elliott‟s career save percentage is just .901).

New Jersey (-33)

While I have been letting some air out of the Brodeur balloon for years, I cannot deny

that the future hall of famer has been a material asset to the New Jersey Devils. But it

had to happen sometime. And it did. The Brodeur run is probably over. After posting a

solid .916 save percentage (in 4,499 minutes) 2010, Brodeur slumped to .903 in 2011. As

one might expect, the playing time declined with the performance (3,116 minutes). The

good news for the Devils was the work of Johan Hedberg who delivered a respectable

.912 save percentage in 1,717 minutes. The bad news was that this performance was off

from that of Yann Denis (.923) in 2010 (in just 467 minutes).

2011 NHL Review


I have to say that 2012 does not look good for the Devils. Although he has cleared a .910

save percentage in each of his last two seasons, Hedberg‟s history suggests that he is a

marginal NHL goaltender. And Brodeur may now be as well.

Buffalo (-34)

The Sabres were +27 MGG in 2010 on the strength of a very hot hand. Ryan Miller

delivered 4,047 minutes (in 69 games) of high quality goaltending – a stellar .929 save

percentage (.924 NSV) and a Vezina Trophy. This was the second consecutive jump in

performance from Miller, who posted a .918 save percentage in 2010, up from .906 in

2008. However, .929 is a save percentage that can be sustained by very few (any?)

goaltenders and, for 2011, mean reversion kicked in - .916 in 3,829 minutes. This was

not quite the whole story. Backup goaltending in 2010 was largely comprised of Patrick

Lalime (.907 in 854 minutes). In 2011, Jhonas Enroth got more number-two minutes

(769) and matched Lalime‟s save percentage from the prior year. But Lalime also got

some playing time (365 minutes) and disappointed (.890).

Colorado (-38)

In Colorado the loss of Jose Theodore‟s 2008 performance (.910 save percentage) was

the root cause of a 34 MGG slump in 2009. But Avalanche goaltending bounced back in

a big way in 2010 (+44 MGG) with the arrival of Craig Anderson (71 games, 4,235

minutes, .917 save percentage). The problem with 2011 was that Anderson lost the

handle and his save percentage slumped badly to .897. This kind of thing trims your

playing time (1,810 minutes) and, in this case, resulted in exile to Ottawa in a mid season

trade (where the sizzle returned to his play).

Peter Budaj ended up carrying the bulk of the load (2,439 minutes in 47 games) but, with

a save percentage of .895, was no better than Anderson. His performance was well off

his 2010 pace (.917) but consistent with a profile (.899 save percentage in 3,232 minutes)

that resulted in the Anderson acquisition. Brian Elliott, acquired in the Ottawa trade was

also uninspiring (.891 in 690 minutes).

Could Colorado goaltending get worse in 2012? Probably not. It might even get a lot

better. The Avalanche completely cleaned house, acquiring Semyon Varlamov from

Washington to be the main man in the blue paint (2011: .924 in 1,560 minutes, 2010:

.909 in 1,527). He figures to get a lot of ice time as his back up is the very long in the

tooth J-S Giguere (2011: .900 in 1,633 minutes).

Calgary (-54)

In Calgary, the steady erosion of Miikka Kiprusoff‟s play seems to be confirmed. He

went from a save percentage of .923 in 2006 to .917 in 2007 to .906 in 2008 to .903 in

2009. In 2010 we saw the second coming of Kipper (.920 in 4,235 minutes), but 2011

was a return to the trend line (.906 in 4,156 minutes). A 14 point erosion in save

percentage is a big swing for a goalie with all those minutes (third in the NHL behind

Cam Ward and Carey Price). But digging deeper reveals that the story was actually

2011 NHL Review


nearly twice as bad – a reduction in NSVfrom .923 to .898. You see, the Flames were a

different defensive team in 2011 with a much improved shot quality profile.

The Sad Senator Saga

There was not much change in Ottawa (+10) including change itself. But it is sure is fun

to continue to follow the bouncing puck:

Where should I start? How about … Martin Gerber was acquired for the 2007 season to

succeed Domenic Hasek who was acquired to lead the Senators out of goaltending

purgatory to the Promised Land (the story is much too long to start with, say, Patrick

Lalime). The problem with Gerber was that he got off to a rough start. Ray Emery

surprised and won the starting job.

The 2008 season opened with the Senators seeking to trade Gerber but an injury to Emery

made Gerber the go-to guy in the early season. He was white hot so Sugar Ray sat for a

while and began to pout. He got his chance as Gerber cooled considerably, but his

performance was not compelling and he returned to the bench (and to pouting).

Emery‟s behavior got him sent to Siberia (no, not Tampa Bay) for 2009. Enter, stage

right, Alex Auld, who posted a respectable .911 save percentage, and, stage left, Brian

Elliott, (.902). At the 2009 trade deadline Pascal Leclaire, who was injured at the time,

was acquired and penciled in as the saviour.

But in 2010 Leclaire played poorly (.887) and Elliott was so much better (.909) that he

got the lion‟s share of the playing time (3,038 minutes).

In an unusual fit of patience, both goalies were back in 2011. Elliott (.894 in 2,293

minutes) was the great failed hope. Leclaire was a better (.908) but was hampered by

injuries for most of the season and could only deliver 763 minutes. The Senators used

4(!) other goalies in 2011. Mike Brodeur (.833) got in just a few minutes over four

games. Robin Lehner (341 minutes) failed to deliver (.888). The much travelled Curtis

McElhinney was picked up off the scrap heap (a waiver claim from Tampa Bay who had

acquired him only for the purpose of dumping the Dan Ellis contract), but made a

contribution (.917 save percentage in 399 minutes).

And then the latest savior was installed. Craig Anderson, who was struggling (.897) with

the altitude in Colorado, was acquired and sizzled (.939) for the rest of the season (1,055

minutes). The difference was noticeable if not repeatable.

The Shootout

My method for assessing shootout performance for goaltenders is the same as for skating

time. To get marginal shootout goals saved (MGGSO

) I compare save percentages to a

2011 NHL Review


threshold and then multiply the difference by the number of attempts faced. For skaters I

use the same kind of logic to derive MGOSO 12

.

Below is some data from the shootout from its inception.

Other than in 2010 the number of shootouts has been relatively stable (this is a function

of what is going on during the previous 65 minutes of „skating time‟). There was some

chatter a year ago about the increase in overtime ties and overtime games. It is probably

nothing but random noise. .

In 2011 the average number of attempts per shootout was a bit above historical average

and the number of goals per shootout was slightly below average. This means that the

shooting percentage was below average (in fact the lowest in history). This is probably

just variation, but I think that goaltending is more coachable than shooting and there

could be a trend going on here.

The shooting and save thresholds I have used in my calculations are also shown. The

driver of this is the final statistic – „goalie attribution‟. Goalie attribution is a measure of

the relative team-to-team variation in shooting percentages and save percentages. Zero

team-to-team variation in save percentages would imply that shootout success was

determined 100% by the shooters. Likewise zero team-to-team variation in shooting

percentages would imply that shootout success was determined 100% by the goaltenders.

A higher variation in goaltending means that goaltending is relatively more valuable. In

2011 we observed the highest variation in team-to-team save versus shooting percentages

in the brief history of the shootout and I attributed 69% of the shootout event to goalies.

Player Contribution is focused on measuring results rather than skill so I have been

sticking with the inference of the data. But the observed fluctuation of the relative

success of goaltenders and shooters is likely nothing more than randomness at work. If

12 For a full description of my method see

http://www.HockeyAnalytics.com/Research_files/Shootout_at_the_Oval_Corral.pdf

Shootout Statistics

Statistic 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 All

Shootouts 145 164 156 159 184 149 957

Attempts 981 1215 1057 1059 1398 1059 6769

Goals 330 398 344 357 449 324 2202

Attempts per Shootout 6.77 7.41 6.78 6.66 7.60 7.11 7.07

Goals per Shootout 2.28 2.43 2.21 2.25 2.44 2.17 2.30

Shooting Percentage .336 .328 .325 .337 .321 .306 .325

Shooting Threshold .131 .141 .202 .202 .148 .212

Save Threshold .533 .531 .472 .461 .531 .483

Goalie Attribution .390 .431 .621 .599 .461 .691

http://www.hockeyanalytics.com/Research_files/Shootout%20at%20the%20Oval%20Corral.pdf

2011 NHL Review


you study the team-to-team variations over all six shootout seasons you get a goalie

attribution slightly above 50%. That could be the right factor but we won‟t really know

for a long time.

Below is a summary, by team, of the shootout in 2011 – shootout wins and marginal

goals from offense and goaltending.

So far as I can tell the shootout is a lottery of

two dimensions – opportunities and success.

In 2009 Phoenix went 3-3 in the shootout. In

2010 nearly one game of four Coyote games

was decided by a shootout and they went 14-

6 (very reminiscent of the 2008 Oilers who

went 15-4). But in 2011 … 5-6.

In 2011 the Calgary Flames had the most

chances (16) while the Devils had the fewest

(5). Both teams were quite ordinary (9-7 and

2-3 respectively).

Los Angeles and Pittsburgh led the NHL in

shootout wins (10). The Kings were slightly

better (10-2) than the Penguins (10-3), but

both had 24 marginal goals.

LA logged the most MGOSO

(10) in the

league on the back of Jarret Stoll‟s 9 goals in

10 attempts. Tied for second were Calgary

and St. Louis. The Flames trotted out Alex

Tanguay in each shootout and he certainly

delivered (10 goals).

This is the second year in a row that

Pittsburgh had an exceptional shootout

record. The thread was a repeat of the

NHL‟s (team) best shootout save percentage.

Save percentages are much more credible

than shooting percentages (much more data).

Fleury might just be the best one-on-one

goaltender in the NHL.

Only team to better the Penguins in goal was

Colorado (.926 – 25 saves in 27 attempts).

The Rangers went 9-3 in the shootout, tying the Penguins for the most MGGSO

(18) on

the basis of Henrik Lunqvist‟s slightly-better-than-Fleury shootout save percentage

(.848). Actually, Lundqvist leads the NHL in career shootout wins. So maybe he is the

NHL‟s best one-on-one goalie …

Marginal Goals - Shootout

Team SW MGOSO MGGSO

ANA 4 1 9

ATL 5 3 8

BOS 2 1 1

BUF 5 7 5

CAR 5 2 6

CBJ 5 3 8

CGY 9 8 10

CHI 6 4 7

COL 6 2 12

DAL 5 6 5

DET 4 1 9

EDM 2 -2 6

FLA 4 1 5

LAK 10 10 14

MIN 3 5 2

MTL 3 1 7

NJD 3 2 5

NSH 6 2 11

NYI 4 4 4

NYR 9 5 18

OTT 2 -2 3

PHI 3 3 2

PHX 5 5 6

PIT 10 6 18

SJS 5 3 9

STL 4 8 3

TBL 6 0 15

TOR 5 4 5

VAN 4 4 3

WSH 5 3 7

2011 NHL Review


Edmonton suffered the NHL‟s worst shootout record (2-9). Goaltending was weak (.634

save percentage) but the shooting was worse (.174).

Ottawa was the only team with a worse shooting record (.136) than Edmonton while

Buffalo and St. Louis had the hottest hands (.462 and .421 respectively). Several teams

were weaker than the Oilers in goal. The Wild were the worst (only 17 saves in 32

attempts). For the record, the Bruins were among the weakest in goal (13 saves in 24

attempts). Thomas is not a strong one-on-one goaltender.

While the shootout looks like a lottery, ignoring it is dangerous math. Over 10% of NHL

games get resolved in this contest. That means that a goal scored or prevented after

skating time in nearly as valuable as an earlier event. Think twice about Alex Tanguay‟s

10 shootout goals.

2011 NHL Review


Top Individual Performances

Hart Trophy

The Hart Memorial Trophy is awarded to the player judged to be “the most valuable to

his team”. The Ted Lindsay Award goes to the NHL‟s “Most Outstanding Player” as

selected by fellow members of the NHLPA.

This year‟s “finalists” (the top three vote getters) for the Hart Trophy were Corey Perry

(Anaheim), Daniel Sedin (Vancouver) and Martin St. Louis (Tampa Bay). The players

put Perry, Sedin and Steve Stamkos (Tampa Bay) on the final ballot.

Although a literal read of “most valuable player to his team” means that a goaltender

must win this prize each year, the award has typically (nearly 90% of the time) been

presented to the NHL‟s most impactful skater, as judged by the voters. In fact the Hart

Trophy has usually gone to a forward (about 80% of all Hart Trophies) and, especially,

the points scoring leader (about 50% of the time). The players have shown an even

greater bias towards forwards in their voting for the Lindsay award for the “most

outstanding” player.

So it is not surprising that Daniel Sedin and

Corey Perry topped the balloting for the

Hart Trophy. Voting results (points) for

the Hart Trophy are shown to the right,

showing that it was a tight, two way race.

Perry was the top choice on 67 ballots

while Sedin topped 51 ballots. For the

record, Stamkos was a very distant 11th

in

the Hart voting.

Forwards

Here is the headline case for each of the Hart/Lindsay „finalists‟:

Perry was the NHL‟s only 50 goal scorer, earning the Maurice Richard Trophy.

He got very hot in the last half of the season and carried the Ducks on his back to

a playoff spot.

Sedin was the NHL‟s leading point scorer (104 points), earning the Art Ross

Trophy. Brother Henrik was the Hart Trophy winner in 2010, bringing some

brand to the family name. Did this unprecedented story of twins at the top of a

professional sport encourage voters to select the bookends as MVPs in successive

seasons?

St. Louis was, in a quiet way, the runner up for the Art Ross (with 99 points), a

former Hart Trophy winner and the setup man for teammate Stamkos.

Hart Trophy Voting

Player Team Points

Corey Perry ANA 1,043

Henrik Sedin VAN 960

Martin St. Louis TBL 332

Pekka Rinne NSH 175

Tim Thomas BOS 171

Jonathan Toews CHI 107

2011 NHL Review


Stamkos might be the NHL‟s best trigger man. He was second to only Perry in

goals, having shared the Maurice Richard Trophy in the prior season with Sidney

Crosby.

My analysis says that Jonathon Toews was

a nose better than Martin St. Louis, earning

my Wayne Gretzky Award as top forward.

The analysis also says that Sedin and

Stamkos were well off the pace, neither

being the most valuable forwards on their

teams. The leading PC scores for forwards

are shown to the right.

The lens of Player Contribution enables us

to break down these performances and

determine who was the NHL‟s most

valuable forward, and why. Shown on the

next page are the details of the PC

calculation for the top 30 forwards.

Let‟s start with shooting fish in a barrel.

Daniel Sedin led all NHL forwards with 33

PCO on the power play based on a league

leading 18 goals and 42 points in 296

minutes. St. Louis was just off his point pace (with 41) but got there mainly as the setup

man (37 assists) and occupied 370 minutes of ice time getting there. PC digests this and

awards 27 PCOPP

. His PP partner, Steve Stamkos, had 373 minutes (tops amongst

forwards), 17 goals, 19 assists and 29 PCOPP

. This PC score is a bit higher than that of

St. Louis because of the vast difference in goals (notwithstanding the fact that PC sees the

power play as a team effort). Ryan Kesler (28 PCOPP

) and Corey Perry (26) were in the

same zone.

A notably weak performance with the man advantage came from Alex Ovechkin. He

collected 7 goals and 17 assists in 354 minutes. This power play result explains a great

deal of Ovechkin‟s drop in goal scoring and PC was not so impressed by this result (11

PCOPP

).

But the Alexander the Great was one of the league‟s top even handed weapons. His 61

points (25 goals and 36 assists in 1,330 minutes) was bettered by Corey Perry (32, 30)

however the Anaheim winger had more ice time (1,407 minutes) than any other forward

(save for Ilya Kovalchuk). PC synthesizes this (and some other factors) and awards 58

PCOEH

to each of Ovechkin, Perry and Stamkos (28 goals, 27 assists, 1,256 minutes). St.

Louis is not far off the even handed pace with 55 PCOEH (27 goals, 31assists, 1,312

minutes).

Wayne Gretzky Award Top Forward

Player Team PC



Alex Ovechkin WSH 103

Ryan Kesler VAN 103

Corey Perry ANA 99

Loui Eriksson DAL 99

Thomas Vanek BUF 95

Alex Tanguay CGY 93

Claude Giroux PHI 92

Anze Kopitar LAK 90

Jarome Iginla CGY 89

Daniel Sedin VAN 86

Steven Stamkos TBL 86

2011 NHL Review


2011 Player Contribution – Forwards (items may not total due to rounding)

PCO PCD

Player Team POS PC EH PP SH TR SO PCO EH PP SH TR PCD

Jonathan Toews CHI C 116 39 17 1 13 15 86 12 0 7 11 30

Martin St. Louis TBL R 115 55 27 -1 1 0 82 17 -3 2 17 33

Alex Ovechkin WSH L 103 58 11 0 4 9 82 18 2 0 2 21

Ryan Kesler VAN C 103 35 28 5 14 2 84 11 1 6 1 20

Corey Perry ANA R 99 58 26 10 4 -1 97 5 0 2 -5 2

Loui Eriksson DAL L 99 35 19 3 -1 0 56 18 0 8 16 43

Thomas Vanek BUF R 95 43 21 0 2 16 82 8 -1 -1 6 12

Alex Tanguay CGY L 93 38 8 -1 -2 32 75 8 0 2 7 18

Claude Giroux PHI R 92 41 12 11 7 1 72 9 1 7 4 20

Anze Kopitar LAK C 90 40 7 0 3 4 54 17 1 8 10 36

Jarome Iginla CGY R 89 50 18 0 1 -1 68 12 0 1 8 21

Daniel Sedin VAN L 86 50 33 0 -9 0 73 11 1 1 1 13

Steven Stamkos TBL C 86 58 29 0 3 -6 83 17 -3 2 -14 3

Pavel Datsyuk DET C 84 39 13 1 6 5 64 8 0 2 10 20

Brad Richards DAL C 82 39 16 0 -7 11 58 15 -1 -1 12 25

Bobby Ryan ANA R 81 57 6 1 4 5 73 6 0 2 -1 7

Sidney Crosby PIT C 80 47 13 2 8 1 71 5 0 1 2 9

Jarret Stoll LAK C 80 15 6 4 6 29 59 10 1 7 3 20

Rick Nash CBJ L 79 51 5 0 2 11 68 12 0 -4 2 10

Jeff Carter PHI C 78 52 10 -1 -1 -3 58 13 1 3 4 20

Michael Grabner NYI R 78 41 3 15 2 0 61 6 0 6 6 17

Logan Couture SJS C 76 36 12 -1 2 1 51 19 1 4 2 26

Joe Thornton SJS C 76 19 27 4 3 0 52 11 1 6 6 24

Mike Ribeiro DAL C 76 33 14 -1 -3 17 61 12 0 -3 6 15

Jeff Skinner CAR C 75 41 7 0 12 12 72 5 0 0 -2 3

Joe Pavelski SJS C 75 18 25 3 6 0 53 13 0 1 8 22

Patrick Marleau SJS L 74 36 22 4 -6 -3 54 9 0 0 11 20

Dustin Brown LAK R 74 36 7 -1 10 2 54 17 1 8 -5 20

Danny Briere PHI C 74 53 9 0 4 7 73 10 0 0 -10 0

Patrick Kane CHI R 71 42 13 0 0 5 60 8 1 0 3 11

There is much analysis yet to do. But the headline stuff is behind us and the PC

scoreboard looks like this: Stamkos (87), Perry (84), Sedin (83) and St. Louis (82). Note

that Sedin is about to fade badly from this race

A surge of shorthanded offense (4 goals, 1 assist), worth 10 PCOSH

, pushed Perry into the

lead. While short handed, nearly any offense is a bonus and Perry‟s 135 minutes of ice

time is therefore lightly taxed by PC. Nevertheless it was no real contest as St. Louis (38

minutes), Stamkos (27) and Sedin (9) had little opportunity to compete. Perry is now up

to 94 PC but, like Sedin, his engine is about to stall.

2011 NHL Review


Offensive transitions are mainly about penalty drawing. But the other transition things

add up slowly for those that can do them well. Now comes the stories of Ryan Kesler

and Jonathan Toews who, at this stage, are well off the PC pace with 73 and 57 points

respectively.

The leading offensive transition scores in 2011 belonged to Kelser and Manny Malhotra

(14 PCOTR

) of the Canucks. Both carried the very heavy load of pushing the puck up the

ice so that the Sedin line could gain the glory. Consider this data:

EH Zone Starts Faceoffs

Player Off Def Ratio Won Lost Ratio

Henrik Sedin 569 228 71.4% 721 666 52.0%

Ryan Kesler 394 394 50.0% 859 637 57.4%

Manny Malhotra 155 466 25.0% 778 483 61.7%

This is a stark picture of offensive opportunity (and defensive load). Malhotra was

routinely trotted out to move the puck up the ice while the Sedins were given the

opportunity to finish. And Malhotra did the job, gaining possession in the faceoff circle

62% of the time.

Kesler‟s positioning was clearly in between that of Malhotra and Henrik Sedin. He

added to his PCOTR

by being +44 on turnovers (versus +22 for Malhotra and +5 for

Sedin). In addition he drew 37 minor penalties (versus 16 for Malhotra and 14 for

Sedin). There is more complexity to this analysis, but the picture is pretty clear.

With the ice already tilted in his favour, Daniel Sedin went -9 on his transition game (-14

in turnovers and 14 drawn penalties).

The Toews transition tale is like that of Kesler. He was the go-to face off man, winning

57% (221 extra possessions), +63 on turnovers and drew 32 penalties.

And his story continued into the shootout where he scored 11 times in 16 tries for 15

PCOSO

. This turned out to be the performance that won Toews the Gretzky Award,

but everyone missed it because the shootout is routinely ignored. Ovechkin helped

himself in the shootout (4 goals in 10 tries) and Thomas Vanek crept up the leaderboard

with a 5 for 6 result in the shootout. Stamkos hurt himself going 0 for 7.

The aggregate PCO leaders came in with Perry setting the pace at 97. Behind him was

the field: Toews 86, Kesler 84, Stamkos 83, Ovechkin 82, St. Louis 82 and Thomas

Vanek (82). Daniel Sedin‟s awful transition story set him back badly and his PCO score

(73) was well off the pace.

Where Perry ruined his profile was on defense. He had the worst even handed goals

against average (2.94) of any of the contenders on a team that had quite good

goaltending. His penalty killing was weak (8.00 GAA), unwinding his short handed

scoring contribution. And he took too many penalties (37). Overall he was a nearly

marginal defensive forward (2 PCD).

2011 NHL Review


I assessed Tampa Bay‟s defense as the fifth best in the NHL. They were tops in shot

quality and ranked 7th

in shots allowed (a more important factor). This team performance

came from the individual players, so Lightning players have strong PCD scores in 2011.

Stamkos and St. Louis were glued together for the 2011 season. Under these

circumstances PC has a hard time differentiating performance and comes to the

conclusion that their defensive contributions (nearly) match.

While even handed Stamkos and St. Louis were no better than their teammates. But they

had a ton of ice time (St. Louis ranked 6th

amongst NHL forwards in even handed ice

time and Stamkos was ranked #13) and therefore earn a ton of the credit. PC declared St.

Louis and Stamkos to be two of the top even handed forwards in the NHL.

Both players dissipated what little credit they received on the penalty kill with poor

power play defense (yes, there is such a thing).

And then they diverged radically.

Martin St. Louis keeps his nose cleaner than just about any player in the NHL. He took

just 6 minor penalties in 2011. Steve Stamkos, on the other hand, was assessed with 32

minor penalties. As a rough rule of thumb, a minor penalty is worth about one quarter of

a goal (in both goals allowed and lost offense). The 26 penalty difference therefore

roughs out to 6.5 goals or about 25 PC points. Tampa was a little more efficient at

translating goals into points and this stretches out the penalty impact a bit. Tampa‟s weak

goaltending also serves to amplify the difference and the two players end up a whopping

29 PC points apart.

So Stamkos undisciplined play meant that his PCD score comes in at just 3. And that

took him out of the running.

Meanwhile St. Louis turned in a gleaming PCD score of 33 to set the PC bar at 115 for

forwards.

Ovechkin had a leap for the bar with a PCDEH

score of 18. But his 18 minor penalties

were too much to baggage to carry. Kesler had a similar PCD score, helped by 210

minutes of penalty killing time. But his even handed defense was worse than that of

Ovechkin and his penalty profile was about the same.

In the end Toews cleared the bar by an inch with a PCD score of 30 based on a defensive

profile much like that of Kesler but with fewer penalties. The Gretzky Award winning

profile: outstanding two way player with special shootout skills.

Player Contribution considers a lot of factors. I am not confident that its deals so well

with quality of teammates or competition. So let‟s examine the colour on that matter:

Toews had a revolving door of solid teammates that included Patrick Kane (71

PC, 73 GP), Patrick Sharp (58, 74) and Marian Hossa (50, 65). Ovechkin

spent a great deal of time with Nicklas Backstom (68, 77). While even

2011 NHL Review


handed, St. Louis and Stamkos played together about 90% of the time. Corey

Perry had Ryan Getzlaf (47, 67) about 95% of the time. It was closer to 100%

of the time for the Sedin twins (Henrik was good for 66 PC in 82 games).

Kelser was less fortunate. Overall Perry and Kesler probably had the lowest

quality of teammates while St. Louis and Stamkos were most advantaged.

Kelser had tougher assignments than did Sedin, but neither faced very stiff

competition due to Vancouver‟s light divisional schedule. Stamkos and St.

Louis (again) had nearly matching competition profiles. Ovechkin played in

the same division. The three of them had middling competition. But Toews

and Perry seemed to have the toughest assignments of those players on the

leaderboard.

The colour suggests that Toews widens the gap over St. Louis. Hart Trophy voters had

him ranked fourth amongst forwards.

Hart voters completely missed the performance of Loui Erikson. PC has liked him for

years and, in 2011, ranked him with Corey Perry. He impressed PC with his defense

(more on that below) which, of course, hockey journalists have no way to assess (but now

you do). His name was not on a single Hart ballot and was ranked 7th

in all-star voting at

left wing.

Thomas Vanek was also completely ignored but, as I pointed out above, was about as

impactful offensively as any player not named Corey Perry. He was ranked 7th

in all-star

voting at left wing and was also not on a single Hart ballot. His secret weapon was the

shootout, which voters fail to value.

Alex Tanguay had the same secret weapon (more on his exceptional PCOSO

below).

Let me close by remarking on the performance of Sidney Crosby who ranked 17th

amongst forwards in PC. The fact that he missed exactly half the season, with

concussion problems, makes it easy for us to extrapolate his PC line to a full season.

Below I have compared his PC line to that of Ovechkin‟s 2008 season, which will be

remembered as one of the finest in history.

PCO PCD

Player Season PC EH PP SH TR SO PCO EH PP SH TR PCD

Sidney Crosby Full 2011 160 94 27 3 16 1 142 11 1 3 4 19

Alexander Ovechkin Actual 2008 162 95 36 8 0 -1 138 13 1 1 9 24

Defensive Forwards

The Frank Selke trophy goes to the best defensive forward in the NHL. Having no

metric for defense on which to rely, the voters rarely get this right. Reputations tend

to rule. The three finalists for this trophy were the leaders from recent votes, Pavel

Datsyuk (the imcumbent) and Ryan Kesler, and Jonathon Toews. Kesler won his first

Selke Trophy in a landslide, being the top name on 105 of 124 ballots.

2011 NHL Review


My Bob Gainey Award winner, for the top

defensive contribution by a forward, was

Travis Zajac of the Devils, who was named

on just two ballots and finished 25th

in the

Selke voting. I had him ranked 5th

in 2010.

Of the finalists PC had Toews ranked the

best. Datsyuk and Kesler were deep and

both were ranked third best on their teams.

Voters might be adding what I call PCOTR

to defense (I doubt it because they can‟t

evaluate it), in which case Kesler‟s stature

rises considerably. But I would still have

him ranked behind teammate Malholtra.

Below are the details for the PCD calculation for the top defensive forwards in 2011.

This list may surprise many people, so I should start with a quick review of the

component parts. PCDEH

is even handed defensive contribution. While even handed,

forwards have a lesser defensive role. So this part of the game may not be as valuable as

short handed defense (PCDSH

), where forwards are much more thoroughly engaged in

goal prevention even

though much less playing

time is involved. If you are

not asked to kill penalties,

you can‟t contribute. If you

do kill a lot of penalties and

do it well, that is a valuable

contribution. PCDPP

(power play) is really only

included for completeness –

the number is never large.

In simple terms, all of these

PC scores involve a credit

for ice time and a debit for

goals against such that a

marginal player gets a zero

score.

PCDTR

is about the effect

of game transitions that I

allocate to defense, mainly

penalty avoidance.

Penalties are obviously

very significant „tilts‟ in the

game and the taking of

Bob Gainey Award Top Defensive Forward

Player Team PCD

Travis Zajac NJD 47


Adam Hall TBL 39

Dana Tyrell TBL 38

Samuel Pahlsson CBJ 38

Nate Thompson TBL 37

2011 Player Contribution PCD for Forwards

Defense (PCD)

Player Team POS EH PP SH TR PCD

Travis Zajac NJD C 16 0 12 19 47

Loui Eriksson DAL L 18 0 8 16 43

Adam Hall TBL R 15 0 15 8 39

Dana Tyrell TBL C 16 0 15 7 38

Samuel Pahlsson CBJ C 16 0 16 5 38

Nate Thompson TBL C 16 0 13 7 37

Anze Kopitar LAK C 17 1 8 10 35

Martin St. Louis TBL R 17 -3 2 17 33

Michal Handzus LAK C 12 1 11 8 32

Patrik Elias NJD L 12 -1 10 11 31

Jonathan Toews CHI C 12 0 7 11 30

John Madden MIN C 10 0 10 10 30

Teddy Purcell TBL R 17 0 0 12 29

Nicklas Backstrom WSH C 18 1 6 4 29

Mike Grier BUF R 11 0 10 7 28

Brooks Laich WSH C 17 1 12 -2 28

Ilya Kovalchuk NJD L 13 0 2 13 28

Daniel Winnik COL C 18 0 7 3 28

Rod Pelley NJD C 14 0 6 6 27

Tyler Bozak TOR C 6 0 6 15 27

2011 NHL Review


penalties is a bad thing. Certain players do their jobs without taking penalties, and that is

a valuable thing.

Exhibit A for penalty avoidance is usually Martin. St. Louis. He took just 6 minor

penalties all year, a repeat of his 2010 performance. One must factor that into a view of

defense or you are missing something (see my commentary above on St. Louis versus

Stamkos).

Before spending more time on St. Louis and the plethora of Lightning players near the

top of this list, we should start at the top with Travis Zajac. Below is a comparison of the

2010 and 2011 lines on his defense.

Travis Zajac MOI Defense (PCD)

Season EH SH EH PP SH TR PCD

2010 1274 148 16 0 12 19 47

2011 1240 172 16 0 6 8 30

PC says that, while even handed, he was about the same player in 2011. As a raw

indication of his performance, however, his even handed goal against average

deteriorated from 1.79 in 2010 to 2.47 in 2011. So why the same PC score? Martin

Brodeur. New Jersey goaltending was off materially in 2011, inflating goals against

averages everywhere. PC tries to neutralize for that effect and comes to the conclusion

that it was the same old Zajac.

Zajac‟s team-leading PCDEH

score of 16 was strong but not amongst the league leaders:

Logan Couture led the way with 19 PCDEH

while Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom, Loui

Eriksson and Daniel Winnik each had 18.

Toews came in at 12 PCDEH

. He played 1,257 even handed minutes and posted a 2.24

GAAEH

in front of league-average goaltending. Kesler, playing in front of elite

goaltending, recorded a 1.89 GAAEH

in 1,173 minutes. While even handed, Datsyuk had

less ice time (867 minutes) and an inferior goals against average 2.63 GAAEH

(in front of

better goaltending) and came in at 8 PCDEH

.

There were many players with lots of playing time (>800 minutes) and much better

looking goals against averages. The leaders were Torrey Mitchell (SJS, 800 MOIEH

, 1.50

GAAEH

, 14 PCDEH

), Logan Couture (SJS, 1149, 1.57, 19) and Brooks Laich (WAS,

1076, 1.62, 18). These results reflect individual, team, competition and goaltending

dynamics, but none of these performances was in front of exceptional goaltending.

Marginal even handed defense is illustrated by Kevin Porter (COL, 880, 3.68, 1). But a

couple of higher profile players, Jason Spezza (OTT, 915, 3.61, 2) and Eric Staal (CAR,

1302, 3.50, 2), were just about as bad. Compare Spezza to teammate Chris Neil (2.69

GAAEH

) and Staal to rookie teammate Jeff Skinner (2.87). Seven players posted league

worst PCDEH

scores of -2, including Jamie Langenbruner (4.31 GAAEH

) during his days

with the Devils. In New Jersey that kind of performance is just not allowed.

2011 NHL Review


Zajac‟s penalty killing contribution was improved in 2011. He got about 20% more

playing time but doubled his PCDSH

. Again, this was a solid performance, but hardly a

league leading result. He got top pairing minutes (172) and delivered a solid 5.25 goals

against average (in front of weak goaltending).

The league leading PCDSH

score of 16 came from Samuel Pahlsson. He was last season‟s

Gainey Trophy winner and it appears to have been no fluke:

Samuel Pahlsson MOI Defense (PCD)

Season EH SH EH PP SH TR PCD

2010 1045 227 15 0 17 2 33

2011 1018 233 16 0 16 5 38

In 2010 Pauhlsson‟s penalty killing play was bettered by only two players. This season,

says PC, nobody contributed more while short handed. His 6.43 GAASH

may not impress

you, but Columbus had essentially no goaltending. His 227 minutes were bettered by

only 7 players.

One player that came close in playing time and PCDSH

was Adam Hall who, as you can

see, looks a lot like Pahlsson overall:

MOI Defense (PCD)

Player EH SH EH PP SH TR PCD

Adam Hall 973 231 15 0 15 8 39

Samuel Pahlsson 1018 233 16 0 16 5 38

Both played in front of terrible goaltending. Hall had a slightly better GAASH

(5.98) but

a slightly higher GAAEH

(2.41 versus 2.36 for Pahlsson). Hall took four fewer penalties.

There were many players with lots of playing time (>150 minutes) and much better

looking short handed goals against averages. The leaders were Jannick Hansen (VAN,

198 MOISH

, 2.73 GAASH

, 11 PCDSH

) and Alex Burrows (VAN, 163, 3.69, 8). Both, of

course, played in front of exceptional goaltending. Other leaders were Matt Cooke (PIT,

184, 3.91, 12) and Matt Cullen (MIN, 157, 4.21, 13).

Marginal penalty killing is illustrated by Tim Brent (TOR, 156, 10.03, 0), Patrick

Marleau (SJS, 163, 10.30, 0) and R.J Umburger (CBJ, 161, 10.78, 0). Umburger can be

compared directly to Pahlsson. Marleau and Brent both led their teams in short handed

ice time when everyone else had lower goals against averages. I guess both coaches were

afraid of the rest of their benches. Both PKs were quite bad in 2011.

Jordan Eberle (EDM, 21, 20.56, -5), Rick Nash (CNJ, 47, 22.48, -4) and Fredrick Modin

(ATL, 36, 21.51, -4) each butchered the PK in very limited ice time and delivered league

worst PCDSH

scores. This is the kind of performance that, I supposed, frightened the

coaching staffs in Toronto and San Jose.

The Selke Trophy finalists did not stand out here either. Toews had 7 PCDSH

(157

minutes, 6.13 GAASH

) while Kesler had 6 (210 minutes , 6.13 GAASH

in front of Luongo

2011 NHL Review


and Schneider). Pet peeve: Datsyuk is not asked to kill penalties (just 37 minutes in

2011). You can‟t contribute if you don‟t play. For this reason alone Datsuk should not

have been a serious candidate for the Selke Trophy.

Where Zajac wins the Gainey prize is with his defensive transition game where he led

NHL with 19 PCDTR

. This is mainly from penalty avoidance (just 7 minors). But he was

+26 on turnovers and +120 on faceoffs, both of which tilt the ice away from your net.

Other transition leaders were St. Louis (17), Loui Eriksson (16), Tyler Bozak (15) and

Ilya Kovalchuk (13).

Toews (11 PCDTR

) and Datsyuk (10) had solid defensive transition scores. Kesler (1)

was about league average.

Eriksson‟s defensive transition performance vaulted him to 2nd

overall in PCD (43). Just

in arrears were Adam Hall (39), Dana Tyrell (38) and Nate Thompson (37). All three

play for Tampa. The trio was the second most regular line combination for the Lightning

(about 10% of all even handed shifts) behind Stamkos-St. Louis-Downie. Hall and

Thompson were the lead penalty killers.

PC can‟t really distinguish the defense of players while they share the ice (no statistical

method can). So it is not so surprising that the three end up in the same general zone.

My approach to transitions is based on observable individual events. Yet the three still

end up in the same zone.

Here is the profile of these players. I have thrown in St. Louis, Teddy Purcell and

Domenic Moore so that we can have a look at the Tampa Bay phenomenon all at once:

MOI Defense (PCD)

Player EH SH EH PP SH TR PCD

Adam Hall 973 231 15 0 15 8 39

Dana Tyrell 801 132 16 0 15 7 38

Nate Thompson 961 215 16 0 13 7 37

Martin St. Louis 1312 38 17 -3 2 17 33

Teddy Purcell 918 2 17 0 0 12 29

Domenic Moore 968 163 8 1 9 -8 9

Steve Stamkos 1256 27 17 -3 2 -14 3

We have already seen how Stamkos and St. Louis are indistinguishable except for their

transition game. If you track down the details you see that Hall and Thompson were

likewise joined at the hip. These two end up with nearly matching PDCEH

scores. Their

time apart on the PK distinguished Hall as the more (slightly) impactful player.

After a promising start to his career in Nashville, having jumped directly to the Predators

from US college hockey, Hall started to look like a marginal player with the Rangers,

Wild and Penguins in 2007 and 2008. In 2009 he joined the Lightning for more of the

same and 2010 saw him in the minors at the age of 28. In 2011 he was installed firmly in

the third line role and clearly earned the respect of the coaching staff. As I said before,

he looks a lot like Pahlsson, which is praise coming from PC.

2011 NHL Review


Nate Thompson was a part-timer with the Islanders and Lightning until 2011 when he

emerged as the prototypical third line centre. As a centre, Thompson may look more like

Pahlsson than does Hall.

While even handed Tyrell was less well connected to Hall and Thompson, but the three

still shared a great deal of even handed ice time. Tyrell was number four on the PK depth

chart, playing most commonly with Domenic Moore. But you can see that he might have

been some kind of secret sauce as he sported a 3.19 GAASH

and a 2.02 GAAEH

. His PCD

scores reflect superior performance in playing time that was likely limited by his rookie

status. Although he matches the PCD lines of Hall and Thompson very well, his ice time

was lower, his PK work was largely independent and he is individually assessed on

transitions.

The Moore/Tyrell comparison on the penalty kill reinforces this. Tyrell was much better

than Moore when they played apart. Moore‟s most common PK partner was Tyrell, but

number two was Sean Bergenheim. Both had better records than did Moore.

Tyrell, Pahlsson and Rod Pelley (NJD) are the co-winners of my Defense First Award for

forwards. Tyrell and Pahlsson, last year‟s champion, each had 38 PC points, all of which

came from defense. Pelley had 27 PCD and -11 PCO (based on just 3 goals and 7

assists).

The analysis says that Tampa Bay‟s goaltending was the worst in the NHL with a .903

save percentage and marginal neutral save percentage. Tampa‟s shot counts look about

normal so all of this neutralization comes from shot quality. According to my analysis,

Lighting skaters did the best job in the league of keeping the puck out of harm‟s way.

This analysis is based on road games and is therefore unaffected by Tampa Bay scorer

bias.

The conclusion that Tampa‟s goaltending is marginal means that PC allocates all

observed goal prevention to the skaters. This puts Tampa‟s defensive numbers on

steroids and makes them a bit suspect.

St. Louis took his PCDEH

score from 8 in 2010 to 17 in 2011. I think that all of this is

improvement is quite measurable and reconcilable as his GAAEH

went from 3.26 to 2.65

while (raw) save percentages deteriorated slightly. So I think that it is clear that St. Louis

was much better defensively in 2011. The story was similar for Stamkos. This also

suggests that the 2011 Tampa Bay defensive story was real. That becomes important in a

minute.

Defensemen

Finalists for the Norris Trophy in 2011: Zdeno Chara, Nicklas Lidstrom, and Shea

Weber with Lidstrom winning the trophy for the 7th

time. None were „finalists‟ in 2010,

although Lidstrom did finish fourth in the voting.

2011 NHL Review


The voting was actually quite tight. Weber

was third ranked at the top of the ballot (32

first place selections versus 33 for Chara

and 35 for Lidstrom) but was the most

popular second choice (41 votes) by far.

While it is common for PC to diss certain

highly regarded defenders, for the first

time in memory PC has turned up a list of

top defensemen that looks very little like

popular opinion. Below I show the top six

PC performances in 2011 by defensemen.

You can see that PC nominates three players, Alex Pietrangelo, John Carlson and Brett

Clark, ahead of Lidstrom for my Bobby Orr Award for the top contribution by a

defenseman.

To paraphrase Ricky Ricardo – “PC,

you‟ve got some „splaining to do!”. To do

that out one needs to examine the details

and, on the next page, I have provided the

PC breakdown for the top contributions by

defensemen in 2011. As you can, there are

many ways for a defender to add value.

PC provides a way for you to add up the

component parts. That makes sorting these

top defensemen a much more objective

exercise. But PC has its limitations and I

will declare, up front, that PC may not

have these players in the right order.

It is very tough for a defender to be a top contributor without doing something on

offense. Most observers are not effective at identifying defense so, in fact, Norris voters

tend to be biased towards offensive contribution.

Which is why, at the all-star break, many were touting Dustin Byfuglien as the NHL‟s

top blueliner. PC says that he was, in fact, the most valuable offensive performer

amongst defenders. His 20 goals were tops amongst defensemen. Add 33 assists and

adjust for context and PC gets him to 55 PCO.

Big Buff started strongly, but Lubomir Visnovsky reeled him in over the last half of the

season finishing with 18 goals and 50 assists to lead all defensemen in scoring points. PC

assessed his offensive contribution at 54 PCO, just a hair behind Byfuglien. His 36

PCOEH

was just ahead of Buff‟s (35) based on 13 (versus 12) goals and 24 (versus 17)

assists. This additional offense was partially due to more ice time (1,597 vs 1,553

minutes). Byfuglien‟s PCOEH

is improved slightly by noting his 3 single assists

(Visnovsky had none), which are more valuable than garden-variety assists.

Norris Trophy Voting

Player Team PC

Nicklas Lidstrom DET 736

Shea Weber NSH 727

Zdeno Chara BOS 688

Lubomir Visnovsky ANA 573

Keith Yandle PHX 312

Chris Letang PIT 144

Bobby Orr Award Top Defenseman

Player Team PC

Alex Pietrangelo STL 90

John Carlson WSH 90

Brett Clark TBL 90

Nicklas Lidstrom DET 88

Dan Boyle SJS 82

Keith Yandle PHX 81

2011 NHL Review


2011 Player Contribution – Defensemen (items may not total due to rounding)

PCO PCD


Alex Pietrangelo STL D 90 24 7 1 0 0 32 26 8 10 14 58

John Carlson WSH D 90 25 4 0 0 0 30 41 1 14 5 60

Brett Clark TBL D 90 8 14 0 -2 0 19 45 -7 19 13 70

Nicklas Lidstrom DET D 88 22 27 0 -6 0 43 19 4 9 12 44

Dan Boyle SJS D 82 16 21 0 -2 10 46 27 3 8 -2 36

Keith Yandle PHX D 81 26 14 0 1 0 41 31 5 1 3 40

Niklas Kronwall DET D 80 18 12 0 -1 0 28 32 2 16 3 52

Lubomir Visnovsky ANA D 79 36 20 0 -1 -1 54 16 2 1 6 25

Christian Ehrhoff VAN D 77 18 23 1 -2 0 40 24 4 12 -3 37

Brent Burns MIN D 75 29 12 0 -2 2 41 23 3 15 -7 34

Shea Weber NSH D 75 24 10 3 0 0 36 25 6 8 0 39

John-Michael Liles COL D 74 19 12 0 3 0 33 21 0 10 9 41

Fedor Tyutin CBJ D 74 13 3 0 -2 2 16 33 -1 17 9 58

Trevor Daley DAL D 73 14 4 0 -1 0 17 44 -1 5 7 56

Andy Greene NJD D 73 8 2 -1 -2 0 7 35 1 16 14 65

Dustin Byfuglien ATL D 72 35 21 0 1 -2 55 20 -2 1 -3 17

Kris Letang PIT D 71 16 11 2 4 1 33 28 3 8 -1 38

Alex Goligoski PIT/DAL D 70 19 14 1 -1 -1 32 30 1 5 2 38

Mark Giordano CGY D 69 8 17 0 2 0 26 30 2 12 -2 42

Erik Karlsson OTT D 68 22 14 0 -1 4 38 15 4 13 -2 30

Duncan Keith CHI D 68 11 15 2 -6 0 22 22 6 9 10 47

Visnovsky (5 goals, 26 assists) also outscored Buff (8, 16) on the power play in similar

ice time. PC sorted that out (including 12 versus 9 first assists) and gave 21 PCOPP

to

Byfuglien (20 to Visnovsky).

As the Norris Trophy winner and the defensive benchmark of our times Nick Lidstrom

will be the reference point for all others in this discussion. He came in with the NHL‟s

second best official offensive tally – 16 goals and 46 assists for 62 scoring points. He did

this mainly on the power play (7 goals, 32 assists), leading all defensemen with 27

PCOPP

. His even handed offense was strong (22 PCOEH

) but trailed that of Visnovsky

(36), Byfuglien (35), Brent Burns (29), Keith Yandle (26), John Carlson (25), Alex

Pietrangelo (24) and Shea Weber (24).

Lidstrom‟s overall PCO score was hurt by his transition game and a PCOTR

score of -6.

In 2011 he failed to draw a single penalty, was neutral on turnovers and nearly neutral in

his even handed zone start profile. Nevertheless the future hall of famer was ranked 4th

in

PCO (43) amongst defensemen behind Byfuglien (55), Visnovsky (54) and Dan Boyle

(46), who accumulated 10 PC points by going 3 for 3 in the shootout.

2011 NHL Review


Shea Weber (16 goals, 32 assists) was back at 36 PCO and Zdeno Chara (14, 30) was at

31 PCO. Carlson (7 goals, 30 assists, 30 PCO) and Pietrangelo (11, 32, 32) looked

roughly like Weber while even handed and like Chara overall. Carlson‟s numbers seem

smaller but he did most of his work while even handed, where it is tougher to put up the

numbers, and got less power play time. PC adjusts for things like this. Only four

defensemen came in with a higher PCOEH

score.

Turning to defense …

Neither of Byfuglien or Visnovsky were strong enough defensively to stay in the race.

Neither was asked to kill penalties (8 and 35 minutes of PK ice time respectively).

Neither was strong while even handed (20 and 16 PCDEH

respectively). Visnovsky,

however, still finished fourth in Norris voting.

Our benchmark is, of course, Lidstrom. Here is a comparison of his PC scores since the

lockout:

PCO PCD

Nicklas Lidstrom Team POS PC EH PP SH TR SO PCO EH PP SH TR PCD

2006 DET D 143 25 35 -1 -1 0 58 32 7 29 17 85

2007 DET D 130 16 24 0 2 0 42 50 5 21 12 88

2008 DET D 121 25 23 -5 0 0 43 48 3 17 10 78

2009 DET D 117 23 27 -4 1 0 47 37 7 12 14 70

2010 DET D 100 18 16 2 -4 0 33 31 7 17 12 67

2011 DET D 88 22 27 0 -6 0 43 19 4 9 12 44

While there is some noise in here, one can see the aging of this player – his overall and

defensive contributions have declined between 5% and 10% per year (until 2011). This

is a much slower than normal deterioration and is slower than most elite players. His

offensive production fell in 2010 (and he slipped to fourth in the Norris balloting) but

returned to form in 2011.

On defense last season he showed a break from this trend. Lidstrom aged a lot. His

transition game (mainly penalty taking) was unchanged, but all other aspects of his

defense eroded. His even handed GAA jumped from 2.20 to 2.93 and his minutes were

down (1,524 to 1,373). Short handed playing time was up slightly (332 minutes versus

320) but the results were a fair bit worse (GAA of 7.40 versus 4.23). Yes – the

goaltending behind him went from above average (.917 NSV) to below average (.910),

but PC adjusts for this.

In 2011, on defense, we did not see the „same old Lidstrom‟, we saw „old Lidstrom‟.

And that opened the doors for others to shine.

Shea Weber was more valuable while even handed (25 PCOEH

versus 19). His GAAEH

was 2.36 (in front of pretty good goaltending). PC says that was worth about half of the

difference with the other half coming from a lot more minutes (1,604). Weber‟s PK

contribution was about the same as that of Lidstrom. In 299 minutes he got to 8 PCDSH

.

2011 NHL Review


However he was off Lidstrom‟s overall PCD pace because of his penalty taking (28

minor penalties versus 10 for Lidstrom).

While Zdeno Chara was in between Lidstrom and Weber while even handed (23 PCDEH

),

his penalty killing work was brutal. He turned in a GAASH

of 7.37 in front of lights-out

goaltending. The Bruins PK was slightly better than average, but did I mention the

lights-out goaltending? Chara‟s GAASH

was the worst result of any of the Boston

regulars (I know – he faced tougher competition …). Overall his PCD score was 29.

So neither of these guys was better than Lidstrom.

Last year I said:

“If there is a more over-hyped defenseman in the NHL [than Zdeno Chara] it is Jay

Bouwmeester”.

I relent.

Chara remains the most over-hyped defenseman in the NHL – second in the Norris

balloting but PC ranked him #34 with 60 PC. In 2011 Bouwmeester came in at 56 PC

(versus 60 in 2010). This is a very solid season for a defender, but his high cost

($6,680,000 cap hit) means that he had the highest cost per PC point on the leaderboard

($119,696).

So now it is time to explain why Brett Clark, John Carslon and Alex Pietrangelo each

ranked (ever so slightly) ahead of Lidstrom. The latter two delivered PCO more than 10

points off Lidstrom‟s pace so they have a hill to climb on defense. Clark had one of the

weakest offensive profiles on the leaderboard. So he has a mountain to climb.

This analysis says that, while even handed, Pietrangelo (26 PCDEH

) was the defensive

equivalent of Shea Weber. His GAAEH

was worse (2.59 versus 2.36) and he played

fewer minutes (1,344 versus 1,604). But PC says that Pietrangelo was materially

disadvantaged by goaltending (.902 NSV versus .923) and calls the result roughly a draw.

In fact, PC says that Pietrangelo (76 PC before defensive transitions) was Shea Weber

(75 PC), without all those messy penalties (just 7 minors – a performance worth 14

PCDTR

).

He was clearly the top defenseman on what was a pretty good defensive team. While his

zone starts were favourable for him (PC adjusts for that) his quality of competition was

second only to Barret Jackman. I have the Blues ranked as the 6th

best defensive team in

2011 based largely on the 2nd

lowest shots allowed. Not bad for a 20 year old who had

played just 17 games in the NHL prior to last season?

Pietrangelo overtook Lidstrom by being stronger across the entire defensive spectrum.

He played a bit less while even-handed (1,344 minutes) but had a lower GAAEH

(2.59) in

front of inferior goaltending and PC awarded him 26 PCDEH

(versus 19 for Lidstrom).

He picked up another 4 points with power play defense (0.00 GAAPP

), 1 point on the

penalty kill (a 6.51 GAASH

) and 2 points in defensive transitions.

2011 NHL Review


He was not named on a single Norris ballot. He was also ineligible for the Calder Trophy

in what you would have to think of as his rookie season.

John Carlson looked a lot like Pietrangelo on offense, giving up 3 PC points on the power

play and ending with 2 fewer PCO. His defensive profile was quite different but added

up to 2 more PCD to end up tied with the Blues blueliner. Versus Pietrangelo, Carlson

gave up 9 PCDTR

(mainly from 10 extra minor penalties) and 7 PCDPP

but clawed 4

points back while short handed and then surged back with 41 PCDEH

, the 4th

best total in

2011. In 1,485 minutes of even handed play he had a sizzling GAAEH

of 1.90 (in front of

average goaltending). While short handed (191 minutes) he delivered a GAASH

of 4.72.

He was clearly the top defenseman on what I have ranked as the 4th

best defensive team

in 2011 (Mike Green might complain about that evaluation but he missed 33 games),

generally facing the toughest competition. Not bad for a 20 year old who had played just

22 games in the NHL prior to last season? He was also not named on a single Norris

ballot.

Carlson and Pietrangelo were unheralded youngsters who snuck up out of nowhere. But

Brett Clark‟s story could not be further away. For the longest time he looked like he

would never make it to the NHL. After a couple of tries with the Canadiens in 1998 and

1999 he looked to be settling in to a minor league career. Finally, for the 2006 season, he

made the grade to commence a 5 year stint with the Avalanche.

The Lightning signed him as a free agent for the 2011 season and the Hockey News had a

not so flattering commentary:

ASSETS: Moves the puck efficiently and is a good shot-blocker. Uses his

mobility to make up for mistakes in the defensive zone, either by himself or his

partner. Is conscious of the transition game.

FLAWS: Struggles with big forwards in front of his own net. Tends to make the

occasional blunder from behind the blueline. Isn't a physical player at all.

CAREER POTENTIAL: Puck-moving and shot-blocking defenseman.

Here is what he did in 2011:

His even-handed offense hardly inspired. In 1,197 minutes he delivered an Andy Greene

like 3 goals and 11 assists for a PCOEH

of 8. His 14 PCOPP

in 235 minutes was a better

effort, ranking behind only 9 defensemen and coming in at the same kind of level as

Sergei Gonchar and P.K. Subban. Clark‟s career has hinted at this kind of profile

(however his PCOPP

was just 1 in 162 minutes in 2010), but his numbers likely benefited

from being designated as the premier power play point man in support of the likes of St.

Louis and Stamkos.

PCO of 19 was hardly an auspicious start. But his defensive story really smoked.

2011 NHL Review


While even handed he posted a very strong GAAEH

of 2.05. Many defensemen did

better, but goaltending is a huge consideration here. A useful comparison is Andrej

Meszaros, who matched Clark‟s GAAEH

. The Lightning had terrible goaltending (.903

save percentage) whereas the Flyers were better than average (.915). PC awards

Meszaros 29 PCDEH

for this result but Clark gets 45 PCDEH

. If you scale back the ice

time of Meszaros (he played 151 extra minutes) you scale back his PCDEH

to 23. Clark

was on-ice for 478 shots whereas a scaled back Meszaros would have allowed 596. If

you exposed those shots to Tampa‟s inferior goaltending he would have been on-ice for

11 goals more than Clark. The two players share the same GAAEH

, but when you adjust

for goaltending context Meszaros is a long way back of Clark‟s performance.

Clark had a better record of shot prevention in front of markedly inferior goaltending.

This accounts for about 14 of the 22 point difference. The remainder is due to shot

quality differentials between the two teams, which PC allocates over the whole team.

When you compare Clark to his teammates you see second-pairing even handed minutes

(1,197) behind Victor Hedman (1,369 minutes, 2.67 GAAEH

) and Pavel Kubina (1,255,

2.29). But when you study quality of competition you conclude that Tampa‟s coaching

did not materially differentiate. Mattias Ohlund (1,133, 2.86) and Mike Lundin (1,196,

2.71) got the toughest assignments. All of this suggests that Clark‟s defensive numbers

may have been enhanced a bit by coaching.

No NHL defender had a higher PCDSH

score than did Clark (19). His 1.56 GAASH

in just

116 minutes was lights out. But he undoubtedly got the light duty assignments as his ice

time ranked him #5 on Tampa‟s PK depth chart. Nevertheless, results are results and PC

sets out to find them.

Tampa Bay (and Clark) had poor power play defense. PC blames that mostly on

blueliners. Sub-marginal goaltending amplifies the results and PC takes away 7 points

here.

Clark‟s teammate Mike Lundin (with just 6 minor penalties,) tied for the NHL lead

(14 PCDTR

) in defensive transitions with Pietrangelo and Andy Greene, but Clark was

number four (13 PCDTR

, 7 minors). I have harped on this before – penalties have a cost.

Again, marginal goaltending amplifies this (a penalty puts weak goaltending more at

risk).

In summary, Clark‟s raw defensive numbers are very good and when you adjust for

goaltending they become excellent.

PC tries to measure the important circumstances of performance so as to refine our view

of a player. By far the largest circumstantial factor concerning our assessment of defense

is goaltending. Washington‟s goaltending was the best amongst the four teams

represented in this list. Tampa‟s was the worst. PC deals with this directly but another

way to take goaltending out of the equation it to study shots allowed, where Lidstrom

sticks out like a sore thumb:

2011 NHL Review


Shots / 60

Player EH SH

Alex Pietrangelo 22.6 36.8

John Carlson 24.7 33.0

Brett Clark 24.0 36.8

Nicklas Lidstrom 29.7 50.1

This, of course, leads you to consider quality of competition13

before you reach any

conclusions14

. While Pietrangelo and Carlson were generally deployed as „top pair‟ guys,

Clark was not. His quality of competition was the weakest of PC‟s top four defensemen.

In absolute terms, quality of competition would rank the top four something like:

Lidstrom, Carlson, Pietrangelo and Clark. To reconcile Lidstrom‟s shot and QoC

information – it looks like he faced tougher opposition but, in a best against best contest,

he may have come out the loser.

Another factor is teammates. Carlson had a pretty steady date with Karl Azner to their

mutual benefit. Pietrangelo‟s partners shuffled around. Clark and Lidstrom were in

between (most commonly with Victor Hedman and Brad Stuart respectively). Overall

Carlson played with the strongest teammates, followed by Clark, Lidstrom and then

Pietrangelo.

When discussing team results I pointed out that PC allocates team points to individuals,

regardless of whether they were a consequence of performance or luck. In other words,

PC makes no attempt to identify the element of randomness that shows up in

performance. The only „unlucky‟ team (a low ratio of points in the standings to marginal

goals) represented in this top six discussion is St. Louis. The other teams were all on the

lucky side of average. If one adjusts the PC scores for team luck, Pietrangelo

„surges‟ into the top position (by 12 PC points over Carlson and 15 points over Brett

and Lidstrom).

I thought last season was a difficult one but in 2011 PC called this (just about) a four way

tie and left it up to me to decide. Note the dramatically reduced PC scores for top

defensemen in 2011 which imply that the race was wide open. Lidstrom‟s performance

was clearly off in 2011, but the voters hardly got it wrong (although it seems to me that

they lucked into the selection as neither Weber nor Chara were deserving).

Of PC‟s four „finalists‟ Brett Clark seems the easiest to disqualify based on his pedigree

and context. However, his defensive story is only dismissed if you believe he had low

quality of competition. Lidstrom is, of course, easiest to choose, especially if you believe

13 See www.BehindTheNet.ca.

14 Quality of competition is difficult to assess. First of all it relies on some holistic measure of “quality”.

Plus/minus is the first approximation of “quality”. Corsi is a much better approximation. But it is still a deficient measurement for a number of reasons. The best measure of quality that I know is Player Contribution. But to use quality of competition in PC creates a problem of “circularity” (the measurement cannot be made until the measurement is made). The correct approach involves the simultaneous solution of about 1,000 equations in 1,000 variables or an iterative approach.

http://www.behindthenet.ca/

2011 NHL Review


in high quality of competition. But I am going to going to stick with PC‟s choice of Alex

Pietrangelo as the Bobby Orr Award winner in 2011. The mathematical margin was 0.3

PC points (over Carlson), but I think he had the weakest profile of teammates and played

for one of unluckiest teams in the NHL (a significant factor in connecting individual and

performances).

Defensive Defensemen

The list of top defensemen is usually highly influenced by offensive play. The NHL

needs a defenseman‟s version of the Selke Trophy. Mine is the Rod Langway Award, for

the top defensive contribution to team success by a defenseman.

Who were the best defensive defensemen

in the NHL in 2011? The list is to the

right. And the PCD details are provided

below for the top 20 defensive defenders.

If you were paying attention above you

would have realized that the winner of my

Rod Langway Award is the unlikely Brett

Clark.

To summarize his performance: league

leading PCDEH

(45) and PCDSH

(19), a

killer combination. While even handed he

posted a GAAEH

of 2.05 in 1,197 minutes.

His 1.56 GAASH

in just 116 minutes of PK play was lights out. He also took just 7 minor

penalties to drive a 13 PCDTR

score. The qualitative assessment is above.

Rounding out the leaderboard was Andy Greene, Carlson, Paul Martin, Henrik Tallinder,

Fedor Tyutin and Pietrangelo. The profiles, of course, varied.

After a breakout year in 2010 in which he ranked fifth in PCD, Greene moved to second

in 2011. Of course, this starts with solid even handed play (35 PCDEH

). His 2.57 GAAEH

was actually the highest of the regular defensemen but he got a lot of ice time (1,538

minutes) and you should note that PC is essentially 'performance' x 'opportunity'. His

story continues with a strong penalty killing work (16 PCDSH

, 5.36 GAASH

, 190 minutes)

and an unsurpassed 14 PCDTR

(just 10 minor penalties). Note that goaltending collapsed

behind him but PC sees right through this:

PCD

Andy Greene Team POS EH PP SH TR PCD

2010 NJD D 42 4 7 14 67

2011 NJD D 35 1 16 14 65

Greene‟s teammate Tallinder had even stronger even handed defense (41 PCDEH

), where

he had a 2.42 GAAEH

in even more ice time. His 1,609 even handed minutes ranked third

Rod Langway Award Top Defensive Defenseman

Player Team PCD

Brett Clark TBL 70

Andy Greene NJD 65

John Carlson WSH 60

Paul Martin PIT 60

Henrik Tallinder NJD 59

Fedor Tyutin CBJ 58

Alex Pietrangelo STL 58

2011 NHL Review


in the league behind only Duncan Keith (1,744) and Jay Bouwmeester (1,628). Tallinder

and Greene did NOT spend so much even handed time together, so you should not

conclude that there is cause and effect with these two players. His overall PCD was held

back by uncompetitive PCDTR

and PCDSH

scores.

2011 Player Contribution Defense – Defensemen (items may not total due to rounding)

PCD

Player Team POS EH PP SH TR PCD

Brett Clark TBL D 45 -7 19 13 70

Andy Greene NJD D 35 1 16 14 65

John Carlson WSH D 41 1 14 5 60

Paul Martin PIT D 30 3 16 11 60

Henrik Tallinder NJD D 41 3 11 4 59

Fedor Tyutin CBJ D 33 -1 17 9 58

Alex Pietrangelo STL D 26 8 10 14 58

Karl Alzner WSH D 41 0 10 7 57

Rob Scuderi LAK D 36 0 10 10 56

Trevor Daley DAL D 44 -1 5 7 56

Jan Hejda CBJ D 29 0 19 7 56

Mike Lundin TBL D 30 -1 11 14 53

Brian Campbell CHI D 34 4 5 10 53

Niklas Kronwall DET D 32 2 16 3 52

Greg Zanon MIN D 39 0 13 0 51

Jeff Schultz WSH D 28 0 13 8 50

Jay Bouwmeester CGY D 38 2 4 5 49

Jason Demers SJS D 36 4 6 3 49

Andrej Sekera BUF D 28 2 10 8 49

Marc-Edouard Vlasic SJS D 33 2 2 9 47

Duncan Keith CHI D 22 6 9 10 47

Paul Martin is a refugee from the Devils‟ defenseman factory and his pedigree shows.

Note that, like Carlson, his goaltending support was good. This shows up in his goals

against averages - 2.17 in 1,354 even handed minutes and 3.97 in 211 short handed

minutes. As is the case with most of the PCD leaders, his PCDTR

score was solid.

Fedor Tyutin, like Clark, Greene, Tallinder and Pietrangelo, played in front of weak

goaltending. He posted a 2.68 GAAEH

in 1,364 even handed minutes and 6.62 GAASH

in

218 short handed minutes. His ice time profile is very similar to that of Martin. PC says

they had about the same impact, so you can see the goaltending effects in the goals

against averages.

The top defensive performances while even handed came from Clark (45), Trevor Daley

(44), Tallinder (41), Pavel Kubina (41) and the Washington duo of Carlson (41) and

Azner (41). These two were a regular pairing (together about 27% of all defensive time)

2011 NHL Review


and PC cannot reasonably separate the defense of two players under such circumstances.

Together, however, they had a superlative record with GAAEH

of 1.90 and 1.84

respectively (in front of better than average goaltending). Daley‟s GAAEH

was 2.11 in

1,533 minutes in front of below average goaltending. Kubina is part of the Tampa story

(2.29 GAAEH

, 1,255 minutes).

Tying Clark for the league lead in penalty killing impact (each with 19 PCDSH

) were Jan

Hejda (CLB), Zbynek Michalek (PIT), Willy Mitchell (LAK) and Chris Phillips (OTT).

Repeating on the leaderboard from 2010 were Greene, Greg Zanon, Tyutin and

Bouwmeester.

Washington, by my reckoning the NHL‟s fourth best defensive team, placed three

defenders on the list – Carlson, Alzner and Schultz. The perennially strong Devils, the

league‟s top defensive team, placed two (Greene and Tallinder) as did the fifth best

Tampa Bay (Clark and Lundin), 10th

place Columbus (Tyutin and Hejda) and 7th

best San

Jose (Demers and Vlasic).

I have been following Marc-Edouard Vlasic since he was in diapers. In my assessment of

defensive contribution Vlasic was third in 2007, first in 2008 and second in 2009. At that

stage of his development I called him “Nick Lidstrom without the offense”. Here is the

before and after for Vlasic:

PCD

Marc-Edouard Vlasic Team POS EH PP SH TR PCD

2007 SJS D 30 5 16 18 69

2008 SJS D 47 3 14 16 80

2009 SJS D 37 3 13 12 65

2010 SJS D 28 0 11 7 46

2011 SJS D 33 2 2 9 47

Last season Vlasic missed 18 games, but he had no such excuse in 2011. This season his

penalty killing was brutal. His 9.54 GAASH

was the worst on the leaderboard. While his

182 short handed minutes led the Sharks, his results did not appear to be due to quality of

competition. Rather, this would appear to be another case of under-coaching. Vlasic was

treated a top-pair defender when his short handed work was out of whack. With a more

historic short handed effort and more historic discipline he would have been near the top

of the list.

In 2008 Vlasic was my choice for the Stay-At-Home-Defenseman of the year (highest

differential between PCD and PCO). In 2009 it was Sean O‟Donnell (PCD of 55, PCO of

-4). In 2010 the winner was Greg Zanon (68, 4). The winner in 2011 is Andy Greene

(65, 7), with Karl Alzner (57, 1) in hot pursuit.

As I consider penalty avoidance to be an element of defense, it is not surprising that most

of these players were above average in penalty avoidance. Greene, Pietrangelo and

Lundin led the way with 14 PCDTR

points followed by Clark (13) and Lidstrom (12).

2011 NHL Review


Goaltenders

The Vezina Trophy goes to the goalkeeper adjudged to be “the best at this position as

voted by the general managers of all NHL clubs”. I always struggle with this definition.

If a goalie has great stats and plays 70 games, should he lose this award to another with

„better‟ numbers but in only 45 games? I don‟t think so. I prefer a “most valuable”

definition (PC is an impact measure) for my Patrick Roy Award. Voters tend to have the

same view, however their value measurement system and mine seem to be somewhat

different.

This season the issue becomes crystal clear. Finalists for the 2011 Vezina Trophy were

Roberto Luongo, Pekka Rinne and Tim Thomas. The Bruins‟ backstop won the trophy

rather handily with 17 of 30 votes. Rinne out-balloted Thomas for the Hart Trophy but

placed behind him in All-Star voting (same voters).

PC sees this though the „contribution‟ lens and says that Cam Ward was the most

valuable goalkeeper in 2011. He was not named on a single Hart ballot and finished 7th

in the Vezina balloting (only named on 2 of 30 ballots as one of the NHL‟s three best

goaltenders).

The salient details are shown to

the right. PCGRO

and PCGSO

are PC scores from goaltending

in regulation/overtime and the

shootout respectively. The PC

total includes some spare

change from offense and

defense (penalties).

From this, it is easy to jump to

the shootout as the

differentiating aspect of Ward‟s

performance. The Carolina

twine-minder stopped 19 of 25 shootout attempts (.760 save percentage) versus just 10 of

19 (.526) for Thomas. When you watch Thomas you get the sense that his strengths are

his mobility and reflexes. These skills are not emphasized in the shootout and he has

never been an impressive goaltender in this contest. Ward‟s performance was a bit better

than league average but Carolina was a lucky shootout team and that puts his better than

average performance on steroids, delivering 44 PCGSO

. The performance of Thomas was

nearly marginal.

The most impactful shootout performances came from Henrik Lundqvist (64 PCGSO

),

Jonathon Quick (62) and Marc-Andre Fleury (57). A good part of this was opportunity -

they ranked first, second and fourth in shootout attempts (46, 44 and 38 respectively).

But these three also delivered the performance - save percentages of .848, .818 and .842

respectively.

Patrick Roy Trophy Top Goaltender

Player Team PCGRO PCGSO PC

Cam Ward CAR 271 44 319

Tim Thomas BOS 269 7 278

Pekka Rinne NSH 212 49 255

Carey Price MTL 223 22 243

Roberto Luongo VAN 224 9 234

Jonas Hiller ANA 196 36 232

2011 NHL Review


The rest of the Ward versus Thomas analysis is relatively simple. Thomas played better

(.938 save percentage versus .923). Ward played more (a league leading 4,316 minutes

versus 3,364). In terms of points in the standings, PC saw this as roughly a draw.

Thomas got the press and he deserved it, setting a modern era save percentage record.

His neutral save percentage was .939, indicating that his save percentage was not

materially affected by his circumstances.

There is no doubt in my mind that Thomas was the „best‟ NHL goaltender in 2011.

Ward‟s NSV of .927 tells you that there were some adverse circumstances in Carolina

(mainly inferior shot quality). Note that, during skating time, Carolina was a luckier

team than the Bruins. But, if you de-luck the PCG scores, Ward remains 12 PC points

ahead.

I am comfortable with the conclusion that Ward made the most valuable contribution in

the blue paint in 2011.

The General Managers who vote for the Vezina typically ignore the shootout. They

placed Rinne clearly ahead of Luongo in the voting yet PC had them in a different order

before the shootout. The Vancouver netminder had a .928 save percentage and 38 wins.

Rinne posted 33 wins and a .930 save percentage. These voters normally like wins but I

think that Luongo‟s results were discounted because he played for the NHL‟s top regular

season team. PC care‟s not about wins (a team metric). So it is important to note that

Luongo‟s NSV was .932 (in 3,590 minutes) and Rinne‟s was .927 (in 3,789 minutes).

Like Thomas, Luongo had a weak shootout record (.538 save percentage). And this is

what let Carey Price sneak into fourth place. He posted a .923 save percentage (.924

NSV) in 4,206 minutes (second only to Ward) and then posted a .750 save percentage in

the shootout.

Transitions

The best example of a transition is the taking of a minor penalty. Such an act (typically)

puts a team a man down for (up to) two minutes. It clearly tilts the ice against the

defending team and results in a higher expectation of goals allowed and a lower

expectation of goals scored. As a rule of thumb, a minor penalty costs about 25% of a

goal. Penalty drawing is the mirror image of this, tilting the ice in favour of the drawing

team.

These penalty transitions have an important goaltending effect – taken penalties will

increase both shots allowed and their quality (danger) while drawn penalties reduce shots

allowed (without a material impact on shot quality). Once you think about increasing (6

players in the game) or reducing (only 5 players in the game) reliance on goaltending you

can conclude that the effects are not completely symmetrical. Also, the effects of penalty

taking relate to team goaltending. This is easy to see if you imagine the case of a team

with a „perfect‟ goaltender (penalties taken only cost two minutes of lost offense) versus

the case of a team with „no‟ goaltending (penalties taken are virtually a conceded goal

2011 NHL Review


but, because of that, there is little lost offense). Penalty drawing effects therefore are

better seen against league average goaltending.

Face-offs tilt the ice from its neutral position in favour of the winning team. A defensive

zone starts indicate that an adverse tilt in the ice already exists. An offensive zone finish

suggests a positive tilt has been achieved. Giveaways and takeaways tell us about shifts

in puck possession and tilts in the game.

I have been incorporating these other transitions into PC, but they don‟t add up to much

relative to the impact of minor penalties (or I am still looking at it the wrong way). So

when I talk about transitions, think „penalties‟.

Clean and Impactful Play

The Lady Byng Memorial Trophy goes to the player “adjudged to have exhibited the best

type of sportsmanship and gentlemanly conduct combined with a high standard of

playing ability”. Voters tend to go down the list of top scorers until they find someone

with low penalty minute totals. In 2011, Martin St. Louis and Loui Eriksson were two of

only three players with fewer than 20 penalty minutes among the top 40 point scorers.

And they were two of the Lady Byng Trophy „finalists‟. In an unusual development, a

defenseman (Nicklas Lidstrom) was the third finalist.

In honour of Frank Boucher, a seven time Lady Byng Trophy winner (in fact they gave

him the original trophy and now award a second generation version), let me present the

Frank Boucher Award to the player who best combines both clean and impactful play.

This is close to the Lady Byng definition. The word “combines” is an “AND” condition.

With “AND” conditions you multiply (with “OR” conditions you add). You need both

factors to be strong to get a good “AND” rating.

My “Frank” points are therefore:

Player Contribution (my measure of impact) x (50 – PIM) (my measure of clean play).

Fifty minutes is a pretty arbitrary part of this formula. In fact the formula is pretty

arbitrary.

The voters chose Martin St. Louis as the

Lady Byng man (115 PC points, 12 PIM)

for the second year in a row.

This is a very arbitrary award and my

formulaic approach is meant to simulate

voter behaviour. But voters completely

ignored Brett Clark (90, 14) and Brian

Campbell (65, 6). With no way to measure

defense, the Lady Byng voters typically

downplay defensemen in their voting, with

the exception of larger-than-life Lidstrom

Frank Boucher Award Clean and Impactful Play

Player Team Franks



Brett Clark TBL 3231

Michael Grabner NYI 3123

Pavel Datsyuk DET 2945

Brian Campbell CHI 2855

2011 NHL Review


(88, 20). He placed 10th

in the Frank rankings but 2nd

in Lady Byng voting.

Voters ranked Loui Eriksson in third, but my formula had him in second (99 PC, 8 PIM).

The formula ranked Michael Grabner (78, 10) much higher than did the voters (21st).

Patrick Marleau was the only other top 40 scorer with fewer than 20 minutes of penalties.

Not surprisingly he ended up 4th

in the balloting. With 74 PC and 16 PIM he placed 11th

in the Franks.

Defensive Transitions

Below is a list of the seven highest defensive transition contributions in the NHL in 2011.

The formula to determine PCDTR

is dominated by the piece tracking penalty avoidance,

and that part is basically ice time x (average minor penalties – actual minor penalties).

So this is a list of players with considerable ice time who did whatever they did, on

offense or defense, without cheating (much). Each contributed around 1.5 points in the

standings with their discipline.

I have already remarked on

many of these players

before so I won‟t spend

more on them.

Also shown are the worst

defensive transition

players. Each of these guys

played a great deal, took a

lot of minor penalties and

hurt their team around 2

points in the standings.

Most of these are „tough

guys‟. All, except for

Cooke, had more than 170

minutes of penalties. Only

Cooke and Downie had

fewer than 10 fights. Only

Cooke and Downie had

more goals than fights.

McLeod‟s -24 PCDTR

score

overwhelmed is other,

limited contributions (he had 0 PCO) and he ended up with a league worst skater PC

score of -12. Chris Neil also had a negative PC score (-2) but the others were in positive

territory (Staubitz was barely there with 3 PC).

Downie can contribute in other ways (he had 30 PCO and 17 PC). He also is one of the

NHL‟s top pests, as is evidenced by his PCOTR

score of 9. Matt Cooke is also a rounded

player with 26 PC (after the negative PCDTR

score).

Defensive Transitions – Best

Player Team POS Minors PCDTR

Travis Zajac NJD C 7 19

Martin St. Louis TBL R 6 17

Loui Eriksson DAL L 4 16

Tyler Bozak TOR C 7 15

Andy Greene NJD D 10 14

Alex Pietrangelo STL D 7 14

Mike Lundin TBL D 6 14

Defensive Transitions – Worst


Cody McLeod COL L 36 -24

Steve Downie TBL R 33 -24

Brad Staubitz MIN D 29 -19

Derek Dorsett CBJ R 32 -18

Theo Peckham EDM D 38 -16

Chris Neil OTT R 35 -15

Matt Cooke PIT L 37 -15

2011 NHL Review


The 10th

worst PCDTR score came from Steve Stamkos. I discussed that earlier,

comparing him to Martin St. Louis.

The top 10 PCDTR

players averaged 76 PC points while the bottom 10 (including

Stamkos) averaged 23 PC points. So penalty avoidance is well correlated with overall

value.

Offensive Transitions

I think penalty drawing is an indication of an ability to play an up-tempo game. It is

probably the best statistical indication of aggressive play. And penalty drawing is the

dominating part of offensive transitions (PCOTR

).

The list of the top PCOTR

scores is shown to the right.

While penalty taking drives

the PCDTR

scores, penalty

drawing is a less dominant

part of PCOTR

. Manny

Malholtra demonstrates

that, standing out with very

few penalties drawn. In

fact, he had a PCOTR

score

of -1 from penalty drawing

alone.

Malholtra, Kesler, Toews

and Gaustand each had

more than 10 PCOTR

from

sources other than penalty

drawing.

Carolina rookie Jeff

Skinner led the NHL with

53 minor penalties drawn

and all of his 12 PCOTR

was attributable to that. He was followed by Dustin Brown (50), the captain of the Kings

and last year‟s leader.

Note that all of the top seven PCOTR

players are (listed listed by the NHL as) centres.

With the exception of Skinner these guys took a lot of faceoffs and did it well. As a

group the top six won 4,403 and lost 3,241 and averaged nearly 200 net faceoff wins over

the course of the season.

As a group they collected credit for 354 takeaways and were debited with just 187

giveaways.

Offensive Transitions – Best

Player Team POS Minors PCOTR

Ryan Kesler VAN C 37 14

Manny Malhotra VAN C 16 14

Jonathan Toews CHI C 32 13

Paul Gaustad BUF C 25 13

Steve Ott DAL C 33 12

Darren Helm DET C 38 12

Jeff Skinner CAR C 53 12

Offensive Transitions – Worst


Andrew Cogliano EDM C 14 -10

Ryan Getzlaf ANA C 13 -9

Daniel Sedin VAN L 14 -9

Derek Stepan NYR C 15 -8

Brad Richards DAL C 9 -7

Patrik Elias NJD L 14 -7

Derick Brassard CBJ C 14 -7

2011 NHL Review


At the other end of the spectrum, seven forwards had PCOTR

scores of -7 or worse.

Others were penalized less but this group averaged 1,440 minutes of playing time and, on

average, drew a minor penalty once every 6 games. Five were centres, although Elias

took a fir number of faceoffs. As a group (excluding Sedin) they won 2,411 and lost

2,975. As a group the takeaway/giveaway numbers were 260/351.

The top 10 PCOTR

players averaged 59 PC points while the bottom 10 averaged 42 PC

points. So PCOTR

scores provide some colour but may not be that highly correlated with

value generation.

Net Transitions

Looking at net transitions allows us to sum up the effects of penalty taking, penalty

drawing and other ice tilting effects:

PCTR

= PCOTR

+ PCDTR

.

While there is a notable correlation between taking and drawing penalties, for the most

part, those taking a lot of penalties do not make up for it by drawing penalties. And the

impact of penalty avoidance is generally not watered down by the failure to draw

penalties. In other words: avoiding penalties is good, drawing penalties is good, doing

both is both better and possible.

Net Transitions – Best

PCTR

Player Team POS Penalty Taking

Penalty Drawing Other Total

Jonathan Toews CHI C 5 3 16 24

Manny Malhotra VAN C 2 -1 20 21

Travis Zajac NJD C 14 -6 12 20

Tyler Bozak TOR C 11 -1 9 19

Darren Helm DET L 5 9 5 19

Martin St. Louis TBL R 18 3 -4 17

Pavel Datsyuk DET C 7 1 9 17

Net Transitions – Worst

PCTR

Player Team POS Penalty Taking

Penalty Drawing Other PCTR

Cody McLeod COL L -24 2 0 -22

Derick Brassard CBJ C -8 -3 -7 -18

Ryan O'Byrne COL D -15 -1 1 -15

Jonathan Ericsson DET D -11 -2 -2 -15

Steve Downie TBL R -24 9 0 -15

Mattias Ohlund TBL D -13 -2 0 -15

2011 NHL Review


You can see that the worst transition players generally spend a considerable amount of

unpaired time in the penalty box. Cody McLeod took 36 minors but did little to redeem

himself. His overall PC score came in at -12, the lowest amongst skaters. Downie took

33 minors but drew 33 as well. Note how PC does not see this as a wash in this case –

Tampa‟s goaltending was awful and symmetry would only hold in front of average

goaltending.

The best transition players tended to get to the top of the class either through penalty

avoidance or doing the „other‟ things well. Choir boy St. Louis has been discussed

already. His penalty avoidance was extra-valuable in front of Tampa‟s crummy

netminding. Malhotra was an unsung hero with the Canucks and his heavy lifting was

worth 2 points in the standings. Toews was not quite as valuable in this regard but his 16

„other‟ PCTR turned him into the Wayne Gretzky Award winner.

The top 10 PCTR

players averaged 73 PC points while the bottom 10 averaged 24 PC

points. Good transition players are generally very good players and poor transition

players are generally weak players.

Rookies

A lot of famous names have won the Calder Trophy as the NHL‟s top rookie. But a very

large number of very good hockey players never got their name on this trophy. Of the

NHL‟s top ten all time leading scorers only one, Mario Lemieux, was awarded the Calder

(the others – Wayne Gretzky, Mark Messier, Gordie Howe, Ron Francis, Marcel Dionne,

Steve Yzerman, Joe Sakic, Jaromir Jagr and Phil Esposito). With this kind of history, I

am thinking that Sidney Crosby is happy that he lost out to Alexander Ovechkin in the

2006 voting.

The „finalists‟ for the Calder Trophy were Logan Couture, Michael Grabner and Jeff

Skinner, who grabbed most of the interest from voters and won. Skinner was at the top

of 71 ballots, but Couture was topped 41 ballots and received strong “secondary support”

in the balloting, which lets voters name and rank five players, such that the overall point

count was close (Skinner 1,055 – Couture 908).

This was a really big rookie year.

In 2010 just two rookie goaltenders, Jimmy Howard and Tuuka Rask, stood out. This

season no new goaltender shone as brightly as those two, but several made their mark and

six of the top seven rookie contributions came from the blue paint.

Last season‟s top rookie contribution, from a skater, was posted by defenseman Tyler

Myers (88 PC). The top skater score in 2011 came from defenseman John Carlson (90).

While the next five skaters were clustered around 50 PC points last season, in 2011 the

next five averaged 69 PC.

The top thirteen (six skaters plus the top goaltenders) PC scores in 2011 from rookies are

shown below.

2011 NHL Review


Corey Crawford topped the list by

becoming Chicago‟s go-to goalie, playing

in 57 games. His headline stats (33 wins

and 2.30 goals against average were

impressive and placed him fourth in the

Calder Trophy voting. The things that PC

focuses on (3,337 minutes and .919 NSV,

based on a .917 raw save percentage) also

impressed. The Blackhawks may have

hoped for this level of performance, but

had Marty Turco in mind for more playing

time. To put Crawford‟s performance in

perspective, his numbers were much like

those of Ondrej Pavelec (3,225 minutes,

.919 NSV, 162 PC), Tomas Vokoun

(3,224, .921, 177) and predecessor Anti

Niemi (3,524, .917, 156).

Crwaford‟s numbers were also somewhat

like those of Sergei Bobrovsky (3,017, .919, 126) who won the tussle for ice time in

Philadelphia and then was demoted in the off-season. He was seventh in Calder voting.

James Reimer started the season fourth on the Maple Leafs‟ depth chart, getting his

chance to play only around mid-season. He had a hot hand from the beginning and the

goaltending starved Toronto team played every card in that hand. In 35 starts and 2 relief

appearances (2,080 minutes) he posted a .922 NSV (.921 raw save percentage) and was

credited with 20 wins. Other Toronto goalies posted just 17 wins in 42 starts. Reimer

was just 15th

in Calder voting based on less playing time.

Cory Schneider is the Tuuka Rask of the West. He is ready to go (.932 NSV) but stuck

behind an elite and clear number one goaltender so that the playing time is just not

available (1,372). The Canucks may play him more in 2012, especially if Luongo gets

off to one of his infamous slow starts.

Devan Dubnyk‟s story was somewhat like that of Reimer (33 starts, 2,061 minutes, .918

NSV). Michal Neuvirth was less impressive (.909 NSV) in more playing time (2,689

minutes).

Let‟s move on to the skaters. PC says this one was a no-brainer, but the voters did not

see John Carlson as the next Tyler Myers. As I have already discussed, Carlson produced

at all star levels yet he was fifth in the Calder voting, just slightly ahead of the more

flamboyant PK Subban.

The voters, instead, chose Jeff Skinner out of what PC identified as a pack of credible

rookie performances by forwards.

Below is the PC detail for the top six rookie skaters:

Mark Messier Award Top Rookie

Player Team PC

Corey Crawford CHI 156

James Reimer TOR 130

Sergei Bobrovsky PHI 126

Cory Schneider VAN 102

John Carlson WSH 90

Devan Dubnyk EDM 85

Michal Neuvirth WSH 84

Michael Grabner NYI 78

Logan Couture SJS 76

Al Montoya NYI 76

Jeff Skinner CAR 75

P.K. Subban MTL 60

Tyler Ennis BUF 58

2011 NHL Review


PCO PCD


John Carlson WSH D 90 25 4 0 0 0 30 41 1 14 5 60

Michael Grabner NYI R 78 41 3 15 2 0 61 6 0 6 6 17

Logan Couture SJS C 76 36 12 -1 2 1 51 19 1 4 2 25

Jeff Skinner CAR C 75 41 7 0 12 12 72 5 0 0 -2 3

P.K. Subban MTL D 60 15 14 0 8 -1 35 19 3 13 -11 24

Tyler Ennis BUF C 58 27 9 0 0 9 45 10 0 0 3 14

To me this is a really interesting analysis with each player setting benchmarks for the

others. Skinner won the prize so let‟s start with him.

The Calder trophy winner‟s even handed offense (25 goals, 20 assists) set the bar for

forwards. But PC says that Grabner was just as valuable notwithstanding lower output

(26, 15). Why? Grabner had 2 unassisted goals and 67% of his assists were primary

versus just 45% for Skinner. Also, it took him just 960 minutes of play for these totals

(versus 1,109 for Skinner).

Skinner also put up a wow performance in offensive transitions. His PCOTR

score of 12

was driven by a league leading 53 minor penalty draws. On the power play he had 260

minutes ice time, so PC was not that impressed by his 9 goals and 12 assists. Skinner

went 4 for 10 in the shootout for 12 PC points. But he looks to be all offense as he

generated just 3 PCD. The voters would have missed the nuances of his defense, power

play, shootout story and transition game and focused on his rookie leading 63 scoring

points.

Grabner never had a shootout chance, so his PCOSO

score is zero. And he did not draw

penalties like Skinner (just 20 minors). But his wow stat is his short handed offense (15

PCOSH

) based on 6 goals (3 unassisted) and 1 assist. His penalty killing was actually

very good too but he had just 116 minutes of playing time and so his PCDSH

got to just 6.

Grabner gets to a slightly higher PC score than Skinner (78 versus 75).

Couture came in at the same level (76 PC) with even handed offense that was a bit off the

Skinner/Grabner pace (22 goals, 20 assists, 1,149 minutes, 36 PC) but better power play

work (10, 4, 174, 12). Where he rocked was on defense where his 19 PCDEH

was the

foundation of a 25 PCD score.

PC calls these three forwards about the same. When you remove team luck from this,

Grabner moves up and Skinner moves down. When you remove individual luck from

this you might let a bit of air out of Grabner‟s goal-scoring numbers. He also had the

best quality of teammates. As is common with a young sniper, Skinner played against

slightly weaker competition. Voters may have also considered age. Skinner was the only

member of the 2010 draft class under consideration and projects to a better career given

his entry age.

Tyler Ennis is off the pace across the board, but his shootout contribution (3 goals on 4

attempts) was noteworthy. He finished 11th

in the voting.

2011 NHL Review


PK Subban is a hard guy not to notice and finished 7th

in the voting. He plays a very

forward in-your-face game that makes him look great at times and awful at other

moments. His penalty killing was strong. His power play work was good. He drew a lot

of penalties but he needs to work on his discipline (-11 PCDTR

).

Shootout

There were 149 points contested in the shootout in 2011, down 35 from 2010. About the

same number of games (148) were resolved in overtime, up 31 from 2010. PC responds

to this by attributing less value to efforts in the fifth period in favour of those in the fourth

period.

The sixth annual Wyatt Earp Award, as the

most valuable shootout gunslinger, goes

this season to Alex Tanguay. He was

successful in a league leading 10 out of a

league leading 16 attempts. His 32 PCOSO

points represented about 30% of his total

(93 PC points). Most people would have

picked Tanguay for this award and, in this

case, PC confirms it for you.

Jarret Stoll was nearly as impactful, potting

9 goals in 10 tries for the Kings, driving

the teams to a 10-2 shootout record.

Radim Vrbata repeated from the 2010

leaderboard with goals in 7 of 11 tries (in

2010 he went 8 for 18). The limited

history of the shootout suggests that the

match is more of a lottery than players

would like to admit, but Jonathon Toews

also repeated from the 2010 leaderboard

with 5 goals in 11 attempts.

Mike Ribiero had 6 goals (10 tries) and a

number of players had 5 in the shootout.

Of those Thomas Vanek had the fewest

tries (6). Frans Neilsen took 8 attempts for

the same result.

Rookie Tyler Seguin scored 4 times in 8 attempts. Boston went 2-6 in the shootout for

two points in the standings. When you work through the performance of the goaltenders

and other shooters you come to the conclusion that Seguin‟s 4 goals were worth about 2

points (20 PC) and the others netted to nothing. For instance, other shooters scored just 2

goals in 16 attempts.

Shootout Awards

Wyatt Earp Award Top Shooter

Player Team PC

Alex Tanguay CGY 32

Jarret Stoll LAK 29

Radim Vrbata PHX 21

Tyler Seguin BOS 20

Mike Ribeiro DAL 17

Frans Nielsen NYI 16

Thomas Vanek BUF 16


Cork Award Top Stopper

Player Team PC

Henrik Lundqvist NYR 64

Jonathan Quick LAK 62

Marc-Andre Fleury PIT 57

Craig Anderson OTT 52

Pekka Rinne NSH 49

Miikka Kiprusoff CGY 45

Cam Ward CAR 44

2011 NHL Review


The worst shootout record belonged to Steve Stamkos (0 goals, 7 attempts) His PCOSO

score of -6 was matched by Matt Duchene (0 for 6) and Daniel Alfredsson (0 for 3).

Ottawa was a really lucky shootout team, generating just 1 marginal goal yet winning 2

of 7 shootouts. This situation amplifies individual success or failure and this is why

Alfredsson‟s record scales his PCOSO

score to that of Stamkos.

For goaltenders I present the Cork Award for the best stopper in the shootout. As with all

of PC, this can be thought of as “performance” x “workload” and most of the leaders had

a high exposure to the shootout.

The exception was Craig Anderson who faced just 12 shots. But his 11 saves in the

context of Ottawa‟s terrible shootout performance added up to 52 PC points. How does a

team with just 2 points from the shootout end up in this situation? It means that the rest

of the team was -32 in the fifth period. In fact Brian Elliott had, by far, the NHL‟s worst

shootout performance, stopping just 2 of 8 attempts. In the PC calculation his

performance is effectively amplified by Ottawa‟s good luck in the shootout and he ended

up with a PCGSO

score of -19.

The busiest goalie in the shootout was Henrik Lundqvist. He faced 46 attempts and

allowed just 7 goals and PC gave him 64 points for those 39 saves. The Rangers went 9-

3 in the shootout. Jonathan Quick had a similar record – 8 goals allowed in 44 attempts.

The Kings won 10 of 12 shootout contests. The next highest workload (41 attempts, 29

saves) belonged to Miikka Kiprusoff, but he was out-played by Marc-Andre Fleury (38,

32) and Pekka Rinne (34, 27).

2011 NHL Review


All-Star Contributions

NHL

NHL First Team Second Team

Position Name Team PC Name Team PC

LW Alex Ovechkin WSH 103 Loui Eriksson DAL 99

C Jonathan Toews CHI 116 Ryan Kesler VAN 103

RW Martin St. Louis TBL 115 Corey Perry ANA 99

D Alex Pietrangelo STL 90 Brett Clark TBL 90

D John Carlson WSH 90 Nicklas Lidstrom DET 88

G Cam Ward CAR 319 Tim Thomas BOS 278

The NHL All-Star Team is selected by the hockey writers.

In goal they had Tim Thomas and Pekka Rinne. As discussed above, although Thomas

played better than Ward, he played less and had a poor shootout record. Ward was 9th

in

the voting and I think that was a terrible oversight.

On defense the voters‟ All-Star team was comprised of Lidstrom, Weber, Chara and

Visnovsky. I spent a lot of time on PC‟s assessment before. The ranking here is per the

calculations and the ties are broken in the decimal places I don‟t show. What I will add

here is that PC had Visnovsky ranked 8th

, Weber 11th

and Chara 33rd

. Pietrangelo,

Carlson and Clark received no all-star votes.

PC put Toews and Kesler on the all-star team. The voters had them ranked 3rd

and 4th

,

electing Henrik Sedin as the first team centre. This is a big miss on the part of the voters:

Centre Team PC


Ryan Kesler VAN 103

Anze Kopitar LAK 90

Steven Stamkos TBL 86

Pavel Datsyuk DET 84

Brad Richards DAL 82

Sidney Crosby PIT 80

Jarret Stoll LAK 80

Jeff Carter PHI 78

Logan Couture SJS 76

Joe Thornton SJS 76

Mike Ribeiro DAL 76

Jeff Skinner CAR 75

Joe Pavelski SJS 74

Danny Briere PHI 74

Jason Spezza OTT 70

Travis Zajac NJD 68

Nicklas Backstrom WSH 68

Alex Steen STL 67

Henrik Sedin VAN 66

2011 NHL Review


You can see that the voters‟ choice for the second term centre (Stamkos) is a better

choice. But, as I pointed out before, there is at least one big hole in his game.

On right wing the voters agreed with PC but flipped the order. Given that he won the

Hart, it is no surprise that Corey Perry was the voters‟ first team right winger over Martin

St. Louis.

On left wing the voters committed the Sedin sin again by electing Daniel over Alex

Ovechkin and Loui Eriksson, the choices of the PC system. But Daniel was not as far off

the pace as his brother. PC had him in fourth behind the unusual profile of Alex

Tanguay. Eriksson was ranked 7th

in the voting, another big miss.

Repeating from my 2010 All-PC team were Ovechkin and St. Louis.

West

West First Team Second Team


LW Loui Eriksson DAL 99 Alex Tanguay CGY 93

C Jonathan Toews CHI 116 Ryan Kesler VAN 103

RW Corey Perry ANA 99 Jarome Iginla CGY 89

D Alex Pietrangelo STL 90 Dan Boyle SJS 82

D Nicklas Lidstrom DET 88 Keith Yandle PHX 81

G Pekka Rinne NSH 255 Roberto Luongo VAN 234

About half of the All-PC team comes from the West.

New faces here include the two goaltenders. Rinne and Luongo were the most obvious

candidates, but Jonas Hiller was just 2 points off Luongo‟s pace.

Iginla and Tanguay are the new faces on the wings. On defense the new faces are

Yandle, an honourable mention from last year, and Boyle, a repeat from 2010. Lidstom

was the only other repeat from last season, although Toews got an “honourable mention”.

This is a pretty balanced team with only Vancouver and Calgary having multiple

representatives.

Honourable mention goes to two members of last year‟s team, Anze Kopitar (90) and

Pavel Datsyuk (84), as well as Daniel Sedin (86), Brad Richards (82), Bobby Ryan (81),

Jarret Stoll (80) and defenseman Niklas Kronwall (80).

2011 NHL Review


East

East First Team Second Team


LW Alex Ovechkin WSH 103 Nikolai Kulemin TOR 65

C Steven Stamkos TBL 86 Sidney Crosby PIT 80

RW Martin St. Louis TBL 115 Thomas Vanek BUF 95

D John Carlson WSH 90 Andy Greene NJD 73

D Brett Clark TBL 90 Dustin Byfuglien ATL 72

G Cam Ward CAR 319 Tim Thomas BOS 278

According to PC, half of the 12 NHL all-stars were from the East. But the lack of depth

in the Eastern Conference shows up in this all-star team.

The new faces (versus the NHL all-star team) are Greene and Byfuglien on defense,

Stamkos and Crosby at centre and Vanek and Kulemin on the wings.

Crosby? Yes – King Crosby did in half a season what ordinary superstars do in a full

season. The list of top centres (above) shows a lack of depth in the East.

Kulemin? Below is the list of the top left wingers15

in 2011. After Ovechkin, they‟re all

from the West:

Left Wing Team PC

Alex Ovechkin WSH 103


Alex Tanguay CGY 93

Daniel Sedin VAN 86

Rick Nash CBJ 79

Patrick Marleau SJS 74

Henrik Zetterberg DET 70

Ryane Clowe SJS 69

Jamie Benn DAL 67

Nikolai Kulemin TOR 65

Vanek? A very good performance from a player that the Sabres had to pay dearly to keep

several years ago (his 95 PC cost $7.1 million in cap hit in 2011).

Ovechkin, Stamkos, Crosby and St. Louis all repeat from last year. Andy Greene repeats

from 2010 as well. He is joined on defense by Big Buff.

Tampa Bay placed three on the team and the Capitals placed two.

Carey Price deserves honourable mention with 243 PC points but no all-star berth. The

only other player from the East that deserves a special note was Claude Giroux (92).

15 Forwards can shuffle their positions a great deal so any list by position may have some noise in it.

2011 NHL Review


Rookie

Rookie First Team Second Team


F Michael Grabner NYI 78 Tyler Ennis BUF 58

F Logan Couture SJS 76 Taylor Hall EDM 47

F Jeff Skinner CAR 75 Brad Marchand BOS 46

D John Carlson WSH 90 Mark Fayne NJD 49

D P.K. Subban MTL 60 Cam Fowler ANA 47

G Corey Crawford CHI 156 James Reimer TOR 130

Because younger players move positions around so much I have simply identified the top

six forwards (most of whom are listed as centres in your program).

I have already talked about most of these guys. Subban could be an elite defender one

day if he channels himself properly. Fayne and Fowler look like very solid defenders.

During last season‟s Stanley Cup run I had to keep reminding myself that Marchand was

a rookie.

Sergei Bobrovsky, at 126 PC, was just a hair behind Reimer. Honourable mention also

goes to Edmonton‟s Jordan Eberle (44). His performance was not far off that of Tay;or

Hall, the number one draft pick

How did the Class of 2010 do?

Class of 2010 Name 2010 2011

1st Team

LW John Tavares 52 43

C Matt Duchene 56 56

RW T.J. Galiardi 43 13

D Tyler Myers 86 64

D Erik Karlsson 51 68

G Jimmy Howard 244 118

2nd Team

LW Jamie Benn 45 67

C Rob Schremp 36 26

RW Niclas Bergfors 38 28

D Victor Hedman 46 52

D Cody Franson 44 47

G Tuukka Rask 186 70

Howard and Rask were about half the men they were in 2010. In the case of Rask this

was just the musical chairs of playing time. Howard, on the other hand, had no such

excuse. However it is not such an uncommon phenomenon to have a hot young

goaltender regress.

Of the others Benn and Karlsson had the biggest jumps. As an unknown, inexpensive,

offensively minded defenseman Karlsson should be in your 2012 hockey pool. Tavares,

2011 NHL Review


Myers, Galiardi, Schremp and Bergfors had material declines. I know that Tavares‟ 28

goals and 38 assists sounds really impressive, but he took a lot of ice time to get there

(1,231 and 277 minutes while even handed and on the power play respectively) and his

defense is awful.

The Class of 2009:

Class of 2009 Name 2009 2010 2011

1st Team

LW Chris Versteeg 57 52 48

C Patrik Berglund 57 20 41

RW Bobby Ryan 58 66 81

D Drew Doughty 48 104 67

D Matt Hunwick 37 28 16

G Pekka Rinne 187 142 255

2nd Team

LW James Neal 50 54 53

C T.J. Oshie 49 63 55

RW Blake Wheeler 50 29 41

D Brian Lee 37 13 20

D Zach Bogosian 35 38 29

G Steve Mason 169 23 29

Rinne is the biggest story from the 2009 class, jumping to elite status in his third season.

The only other nice jump up came from Bobby Ryan. Drew Doughty had that super

sophomore year that he could not come close to in 2011. The others have been drifting

sideways, or worse.

Green (23 and under)

Green First Team Second Team


LW Jamie Benn DAL 67 Milan Lucic BOS 43

C Jonathan Toews CHI 116 Anze Kopitar LAK 90

RW Claude Giroux PHI 92 Bobby Ryan ANA 81

D Alex Pietrangelo STL 90 Kris Letang PIT 71

D John Carlson WSH 90 Erik Karlsson OTT 68

G Carey Price MTL 243 Ondrej Pavelec ATL 162

I lowered the age limit for this team in 2011. It actually did not change the picture very

much.

Forwards tend to peak at an early age, but the only 23-and-under member of the NHL

All-PC team was PC‟s MVP, Jonathan Toews (22). Giroux (22) made such an impact in

Philadelphia that Mike Richards and Jeff Carter became expendable. Kopitar (23) was an

honourable mention last season. As noted above, Bobby Ryan (23) has shown a lot of

growth (something that is not automatic in a young player).

2011 NHL Review


This team is a bit thin on the left wing. Other forwards deserving honourable mention are

Sidney Crosby (age 23, 80 PC), Steven Stamkos (20, 86) and Patrick Kane (22, 71), who

were members of last year‟s team, and the trio of rookies discussed above: Grabner (23,

78), Couture (21, 76) and Skinner (18, 75). Ovechkin and Eriksson graduated from the

2010 team and now are cornerstones of the All-PC team.

Defenders generally take longer to hone their craft, but Pietrangelo (20) and Carlson (20)

are on PC‟s All-NHL team. Letang (23) is now recognized as one of the NHL‟s best

defensemen. And Karlsson (20) has shown a lot of growth. Honourable mention goes to

Drew Doughty (21, 67) and Tyler Myers (20, 64), members of this team in 2010. Mike

Green and Keith Yandle graduated from the 2010 team (Yandle was the only victim of a

lowered age limit).

Goalies generally require the most seasoning. But Carey Price (23) has achieved an elite

level of play and looks like Canada‟s future international goaltender. Montreal made the

right call investing in Price and dispatching Halak to St. Louis. Pavelec (23) looks like a

solid netminding foundation for the Jets‟ building process.

Note that, for both of the Green and Grey teams, I used the player‟s age as of January 1,

2011 (mid season) to determine eligibility.

Grey (33 and over)

Grey First Team Second Team


LW Patrik Elias NJD 62 Ray Whitney PHX 47

C Danny Briere PHI 74 Andy McDonald STL 61

RW Martin St. Louis TBL 115 Jarome Iginla CGY 89

D Nicklas Lidstrom DET 88 Dan Boyle SJS 82

D Brett Clark TBL 90 Lubomir Visnovsky ANA 79

G Tim Thomas BOS 278 Tomas Vokoun FLA 177

Carry-overs from the All-NHL team are St. Louis (35) and Lidstrom (40), who were the

only repeats from 2010, and Clark (34) and Thomas (37), who was a 2009 Grey Team

member. Clark was the “rookie of the year” amongst skaters. St. Louis was the team‟s

MVP.

Boyle (34) was a Western All-Star and Visnovsky (34) was close. Kimmo Timonen (age

35, 65 PC) was a member of last year‟s team and put in another solid season. Other older

defensemen with fine seasons were Stephane Robidas (33, 64), Zdeno Chara (33, 60) and

Joe Corvo (33, 59).

Ray Whitney (38) has now made this team four years running. Iginla, Briere and

McDonald are all 33 years old and now eligible for the Grey team. Elias (34) makes his

first appearance in his first year of eligibility as well. Honourable mention goes to the

ageless Teemu Selanne (40, 62).

2011 NHL Review


Martin St. Louis (34) was the Grey Team (skating) rookie of the year, with 90 PC points

and a growing trophy collection. Alfredsson (37) and Whitney (37) three-peated from

2008 and 2010. The other forwards were Andrew Brunette (36)¸ Saku Koivu (35) and

Vinny Prospal (34). Honourable mention goes to Jamie Langenbrunner (age 34, 57 PC),

Teemu Selanne (39, 56), Mike Knuble (37, 55) and Alex Kovalev (36, 52).

Graduating to the Grey Team in goal was Tomas Vokoun (34) after a long career atop the

PC goaltender rankings.

But here is the story with age:

Grey Team 2010 Name 2010 2011

1st Team

LW Andrew Brunette 64 44

C Saku Koivu 56 33

RW Martin St. Louis 91 115

D Chris Pronger 102 32

D Nicklas Lidstrom 100 88

G Evgeni Nabokov 244 DNP

2nd Team

LW Ray Whitney 51 47

C Vinny Prospal 51 17

RW Daniel Alfredsson 77 19

D Brian Rafalski 83 53

D Kimmo Timonen 73 65

G Martin Brodeur 161 7

The members of last year‟s Grey team had very substantial declines in performance.

Only Martin St. Louis managed to up his game. A more normal pattern is a decline of

about 20% in PC. Examples are Lidstrom and Timonen. Both were off about 12%.

Whitney is aging gracefully (-8%). But most of last year‟s team fell off a cliff (Prospal

and, to a lesser extent, Pronger were held back by injuries).

Offense

Offense First Team Second Team

Position Name Team PCO* Name Team PCO*

LW Daniel Sedin VAN 74 Alex Ovechkin WSH 73

C Steven Stamkos TBL 89 Ryan Kesler VAN 82

RW Corey Perry ANA 98 Martin St. Louis TBL 82

D Dustin Byfuglien ATL 57 Nicklas Lidstrom DET 43

D Lubomir Visnovsky ANA 55 Keith Yandle PHX 41

* PCO excluding shootouts.

Shootout performance has proven to be somewhat non-repeatable. So my evaluation of

offense, for this purpose, is PCO before the shootout. Here is how PCO* compares to

2011 NHL Review


scoring points for the „scoring‟ leaders in the NHL (I carry lots of decimal places in the

calculations so watch out for rounding):

PCO

Player Team POS G A Pts EH PP SH TR PCO*

Corey Perry ANA R 50 48 98 58 26 10 4 98

Steven Stamkos TBL C 45 46 91 57 29 0 3 89

Martin St. Louis TBL R 31 68 99 55 27 -1 1 82

Ryan Kesler VAN C 41 32 73 35 28 5 14 82

Daniel Sedin VAN L 41 63 104 50 33 0 -9 74

Alex Ovechkin WSH L 32 53 85 58 11 0 4 73

Claude Giroux PHI R 25 51 76 41 12 11 7 71

Jonathan Toews CHI C 32 44 76 39 17 1 13 71

Sidney Crosby PIT C 32 34 66 47 13 2 8 70

Jarome Iginla CGY R 43 43 86 50 18 0 1 69

Bobby Ryan ANA R 34 37 71 57 6 1 4 68

Danny Briere PHI C 34 34 68 53 9 0 4 66

Thomas Vanek BUF R 32 41 73 43 21 0 2 66

Eric Staal CAR C 33 43 76 38 19 6 -1 61

Michael Grabner NYI R 34 18 52 41 3 15 2 61

Henrik Zetterberg DET L 24 56 80 33 24 1 2 61

Jeff Carter PHI C 36 30 66 52 10 -1 -1 60

Jeff Skinner CAR C 31 32 63 41 7 0 12 60

Pavel Datsyuk DET C 23 36 59 39 13 1 6 59

Teemu Selanne ANA R 31 49 80 34 28 0 -4 58

The PC calculation essentially adjusts scoring points in the following fashion:

Goals are given more weight than assists. There is actually much more to this re-

balancing but my position is that a scoring point is a very crude and inaccurate

assessment of offense. This is why players with high (relative) assist levels, such

as St. Louis and Zetterberg, slide down in the rankings and Perry and Stamkos

rise.

There is some credit for “plusses” that don‟t show up in the scoring totals at all.

This is especially true on the power play where team play is amped. Toews and

Staal were both on-ice for 24 even handed goals where they were credited with no

scoring points. But Crosby had just 4 (in half a season of work) and Grabner and

Selanne each had just 7. On the power play, Kesler had 26 no-point plusses and

Stamkos had 21.

Ice time is „taxed‟ to get to value added above that of a marginal player. This is

explains why Crosby (41 games) and Datsyuk (56) move up the list. These two

had just 899 and 1,082 minutes of play respectively. But of those players who got

2011 NHL Review


in close to a full season of play ice time ranged from 1,830 minutes (Perry) down

to 1,146 (Grabner). So Grabner goes up and Perry goes down.

The rate of tax is situational. Much more offense is created on the power play and

much less while short handed. This means that marginal performance is higher on

the power play and lower while short handed. The offense generated on the

penalty kill by Grabner (6 goals, 1 assist), Giroux (3, 4) and Perry (4, 1) is „taxed‟

lightly and stands out. On the power play, Ovechkin recorded 7 goals and 17

assists in 354 minutes for 11 PCOPP

. Jeff Carter delivered less (8 goals, 9 assists)

but occupied just 235 minutes of ice time. PC gave Carter roughly the same score

(10 PCOPP

) as he left 119 minutes of ice time for someone else to use. In other

words, Ovechkin‟s work in 119 extra minutes was nearly marginal. PC lets some

air out of the power play records of Stamkos (373), St. Louis (370), Staal (361)

and Ovechkin (354) as the leaders in power play ice time. Selanne (16 goals, 18

assists, 253 minutes, 28 PCOPP

) and Zetterberg (10, 20, 260, 24) end up with

PCOPP

scores like those Stamkos (17, 19, 373, 29) and St. Louis (4, 37, 370, 27).

They produced less but consumed less ice time.

The tax rate varies by position. Less offense is generated by defensemen (the

marginal level of performance is lower), especially while even handed. Dustin

Byfuglien‟s record of 20 goals and 33 assists looks a lot like that of Jussi Jokinen

(19 goals, 33 assists), but Big Buff gets 57 PCO and Jokinen settles for 35.

Penalty drawing does not show up in the „points‟ column. But drawing penalties

generates observable offense (see Skinner). Other transitions also tilt the ice in

favour of (see Toews and Kesler) or against (see Sedin) teammates.

PC is denominated in points in the standings. Individual performance is scaled by

a team‟s ability to translate its offense and defense into points, whether by good

fortune or through skill (an ability to win close games). In 2011 Tampa Bay was

very efficient in translating goals into wins, improving the PC scores of Stamkos

and St. Louis by about 8%. Chicago was inefficient and Toews takes part of the

blame and a haircut of about 6% in his scores.

Defense

Defense First Team Second Team

Position Name Team PCD Name Team PCD

LW Loui Eriksson DAL 43 Patrik Elias NJD 31

C Travis Zajac NJD 47 Dana Tyrell TBL 38

RW Adam Hall TBL 39 Martin St. Louis TBL 33

D Brett Clark TBL 70 John Carlson WSH 60

D Andy Greene NJD 65 Paul Martin PIT 60

Andy Greene and Martin St. Louis repeat from last season. Zajac received an honourable

nod in 2010.

2011 NHL Review


As discussed above, the defense of Martin St. Louis is largely comprised of penalty

avoidance (something he does very well). Three other Lighting players are on this roster

and I discussed this at length earlier. Tampa Bay was a good defensive team. 1-3-1

anyone? New Jersey has historically been a strong defensive team. Three Devils are on

the team and Paul Martin is one that got away. For the record, in assessing defense, it is

challenging to take the team out the player.

Centres have a generally higher defensive responsibility. Honourable mention should go

to centres Samuel Pahlsson (38), Nate Thompson (37) and Anze Kopitar (35).

Even Handed

Even Handed First Team Second Team

Position Name Team PCEH Name Team PCEH

LW Alex Ovechkin WSH 82 Loui Eriksson DAL 69

C Jonathan Toews CHI 75 Anze Kopitar LAK 70

RW Martin St. Louis TBL 89 Jerome Iginla CGY 71

D John Carlson WSH 72 Alex Pietrangelo STL 64

D Trevor Daley DAL 65 Brett Clark TBL 64

PCEH = PCOEH + PCDEH + PCOTR + PCDTR

The NHL‟s so-called more open game really is not. The reality is that there is more

scoring mainly because there is less even handed time. But about two-thirds of the game

is played even handed. And you don‟t need a degree in math to figure out that this still

matters more than power play time.

My definition of PCEH

includes ALL of the „transition‟ factors, mainly penalty drawing

and penalty taking. Note that this is a simplification as penalties are drawn/taken when

not even-handed. While the NHL does give enough information to split it out it is a

considerable amount of work. I have better things to do.

St. Louis was the NHL‟s top even handed player (89 PCEH

) and one of only two players

to repeat from last season‟s team. Ovechkin was the other, ranking second overall in

even handed play. Crosby would have repeated if not for a large headache.

Toews is your number one even-handed centre. Kopitar was similar in his scoring

profile. His even handed defense was better, but Toews had top transition numbers.

Eriksson and Ovechkin‟s were the two top defensive forwards on this team. Eriksson

bettered Ovechkin‟s transition game (which has been improving) but could not compete

on offense.

Iginla made the team with his defense. His even handed offense (50 PCOEH

) was

bettered by Ovechkin (58), Perry (58), Stamkos (57), Ryan (57), St. Louis (55), Briere

(53), Carter (52) and Nash (51), but he was out-defensed by only St. Louis.

2011 NHL Review


On defense the new name is Trevor Daley who trailed only Brett Clark in even-handed

defense. Keith Yandle nearly repeated with 62 PCEH

.

Power Play

Player Contribution reduces to “performance” x “ice time”. Here is where playing time

really matters. This is not a list of the “best” power play performers, it is a list of the

biggest contributions on the power play. Frequently this list is dominated by the brute

force of ice time, but this season the finesse shone through.

Power Play First Team Second Team

Position Name Team PCPP Name Team PCPP

LW Daniel Sedin VAN 34 Dany Heatley SJS 27

C Ryan Kesler VAN 29 Joe Thornton SJS 26

RW Teemu Selanne ANA 28 Corey Perry ANA 26

D Nicklas Lidstrom DET 31 Dan Boyle SJS 24

D Christian Ehrhoff VAN 27 Lubomir Visnovsky ANA 22

PCPP = PCOPP + PCDPP

As you can see, success was a team effort.

Daniel Sedin (18 goals, 24 assists, 296 minutes) was the NHL‟s top power play performer

by some distance. Kesler (15, 15, 297) was a very regular compatriot. The Canucks had

the NHL‟s top power play and placed three players on the first PP team, including

Christian Ehrhoff (6, 22, 281). Henrik Sedin (8, 27, 295) came in just of the all-star pace

at 24 PCPP

.

San Jose ranked second overall and placed three players on the second team. The number

one unit was Heatley (11 goals, 19 assists, 258 minutes, 27 PCPP

), Thornton (9, 24, 271,

26), Joe Pavelski (11, 17, 249, 25), Patrick Marleau (11, 15, 274, 22) and Dan Boyle (7,

10, 326, 24).

The ageless Selanne (16 goals, 18 assists, 253 minutes) was frequently accompanied by

Perry (14, 17, 288). The Ducks‟ PP ranked third overall and they placed three players on

this team including point man Visnovsky (5, 26, 336).

Heatley and Selanne are the only repeats from 2010.

Lidstrom (7, 32, 332) was the only player to break the west coast power play cartel and

was the NHL‟s second most valuable PP contributor.

The duo of Stamkos (17 goals, 19 assists, 373 minutes, 26 PCPP

) and St. Louis (4, 37,370,

24) used up too much ice time to make the team.

The worst performance on the power play was probably that of Jacub Voracek of

Columbus. He spent 237 minutes with a man advantage and delivered just 2 goals and 6

assists. PC assessed that at -1 PCPP

.

2011 NHL Review


Short Handed

Short Handed First Team Second Team

Position Name Team PCSH Name Team PCSH

F Frans Nielsen NYI 24 Michael Grabner NYI 21

F Jamie Benn DAL 22 Matt Cooke PIT 20

D Willie Mitchell LAK 21 Zbynek Michalek PIT 19

D Jan Hejda CBJ 20 Brett Clark TBL 19

PCSH = PCOSH + PCDSH

For forwards it is common to get to the head of this class with offense. The short handed

offense generated on the penalty kill by Frans Neilsen (7 goals, 1 assist), Michael

Grabner (6, 1), Jamie Benn (4, 2) and Matt Cooke (3, 3) were the reasons for their first

team positions at forward. His scoring (with some defense) makes Nielsen the short

handed player of the year.

Brad Marchand actually had the NHL‟s best short handed scoring record of 5 goals and 1

assist in just 121 minutes for a league leading 13 PCOSH

. But his penalty killing record

was not so strong (3 PCDSH

).

Of the four forwards Matt Cooke had the greatest impact in the defensive zone. But none

of these four were elit penalty killers. If you ignore the offense and just look at penalty

killing you get the following results (which do not look very different for defenders).

Penalty Killing First Team Second Team

Position Name Team PCDSH Name Team PCDSH

F Samuel Pahlsson CBJ 16 Dana Tyrell TBL 15

F Adam Hall TBL 15 Max Talbot PIT 14

D Jan Hejda CBJ 19 Brett Clark TBL 19

D Willie Mitchell LAK 19 Chris Phillips OTT 19

With a league leading MGDSH

of 37, Tampa Bay placed three players on the All-PK

team. With awful goaltending, the Lightning still managed to rank 7th

in the conventional

metric of penalty killing percentage. As noted before, Hall and Tyrell were not a regular

PK pairing and Clark was way down the depth chart on defense.

Chris Philips is now a three-peater on the top PK list. His 290 minutes of ice time was

just off the league lead (Anaheim‟s Toni Lydman led with 291) and he had a solid 5.78

GAASH

for 19 PCDSH

. Clark had a stunning 1.56 GAASH

in just 116 minutes of PK play

in front of poor goaltending. Hejda spent 219 minutes short handed with a 6.09 GAASH

(again, poor goaltending). Mitchell, playing in front of better goaltending, had a 3.09

GAASH

in 194 minutes.

These performances would seem to be hard to compare, but PC does that for you leveling

out the effects of ice time and goaltending.

2011 NHL Review


As you can see, each of the defenders had the same PCDSH

score of 19. Michalek also

posted 19 PCDSH

but he sorted out of the top four based on the decimal places.

Pittsburgh led the NHL in the conventional metric of penalty killing percentage (86.1%).

After factoring in the strong goaltending, the Penguins slip to second in MGDSH

with 33.

You can see that Talbot and Cooke had something to do with that.

Sammy Pahlsson (6.43 GAASH

, 233 minutes) was the only player to repeat as a forward.

Teammate Derek Doresett (3.56 GAASH

, 118 minutes) missed the team by a few decimal

places.

Most Valuable Performances

In a sense value is a relative thing. When two players produce the same outputs, a team

would prefer the player with the smaller paycheck. And, in today‟s salary cap era, certain

contracts are seen as liabilities because no plausible performance can justify the cost.

In this spirit I present the All-Value teams for 2011:

All Value First Team Second Team

Position Name Team $ PC Cost Name Team

$ PC Cost

LW Jamie Benn DAL 12,245 Lauri Korpikoski PHX 12,903

C Frans Nielsen NYI 8,717 Nate Thompson TBL 13,112

RW Claude Giroux PHI 8,942 Michael Grabner NYI 10,801

D Jason Demers SJS 8,837 Andy Greene NJD 10,145

D John Carlson WSH 9,391 Mark Fayne NJD 11,057

G James Reimer TOR 4,579 Corey Crawford CHI 5,131

PC Cost is the Cap Cost per PC point. I used the annual cap cost (in US dollars) per

annum, rather than the per diem approach used in the NHL‟s CBA, to screen out players

with limited playing time but high per game PC scores.

Obviously a lower PC Cost is better and the table above shows the value leaders. To put

these costs into perspective, a salary cap of about $56.7 million suggests that an average

player on a playoff bound team should cost around $56,700 per annum per PC point16

.

Greene and Nielsen are repeaters from 2010. In fact Nielsen records a three-peat.

Repeats are uncommon as it tends to be the nature of the group that they either have a

very unusual year or they are coming off an old contract.

Nielsen remains on his contract through the coming season. Benn, Carlson and Fayne

also have unexpired contracts.

16 A team with playoff aspirations needs to target a 100 point season. This translates into 1000 PC

points and gives you my average cost per PC point. A Stanley Cup team is likely to be better than this and needs to have a lower average cost per PC point.

2011 NHL Review


James Reimer was the value leader in 2011 with 130 PC for $597,000 of cap hit.

Crawford cost $800,000 for 156 PC. Jimmy Howard was the obvious value leader in the

NHL in 2010 and was the third ranked goalie in 2011 (still at a cap cost of $717,000).

Among skaters the value leader was again Frans Nielsen, who delivered 60 total PC

points based on 13 goals, 31 assists, 1,261 minutes, 8 shootout goals and much more. His

salary cap hit was at the minimum - $525,000.

The most valuable performance by a player in a defending role belonged to Jason Demers

– 61 PC points at a cap cost of $543,000. The best PC outputs on the team came from

Giroux (92 PC at a cap cost of $822,000) and Carlson (90, $846,000).

All Cap Roster

If all NHL players had been free agents at the beginning of the 2011 season and could

have been signed for their then current cap cost, who would you want on your team?

Herein I present my All Cap roster. This is a list of 23 players you might want to have on

your team if you were prepared to max out your cap costs while attempting to max out

performance.

This was a pretty subjective exercise. I am sure there is a mathematical solution to this

optimization problem. But I know that any solution would involve a lot of variables and

constraints and would tax my computer (never mind my programming skills). So I did

this by eye.

The rules I used to put this together and evaluate the output are:

Cap Cost < $56,700,000

14 forwards, 7 defensemen, 2 goaltenders.

Players play in position and are seeded into a depth chart for each situation.

Players are attributed ice time (MOITOT

) based on their position in the depth chart:

o The prima goalie gets 3,700 minutes (about 61 games). The second fiddle

gets 1,300 minutes (about 21 games).

o Even handed, first line forwards are assumed to play 1,100 minutes,

second line 1,000 minutes, third line 800 minutes and the fourth line 500

minutes. The top power play unit gets 300 minutes, the second unit 250

minutes, the third unit 100 minutes and the fourth unit 50 minutes. The

top penalty killing pair gets 250 minutes, the second pair 175 minutes, the

third pair 100 minutes and a fourth pair 50 minutes.

o Even handed, first defensive pair is assumed to play 1,400 minutes, second

pair 1,200 minutes and the third pair 900 minutes. The top power play

unit gets 300 minutes, the second unit 150 minutes and the third unit 50

2011 NHL Review


minutes. The top penalty killing pair gets 300 minutes, the second pair

200 minutes and the third pair 100 minutes.

o The two press box forwards are each assumed to play 450 even handed

minutes and the press box defenseman is assumed to play 600 minutes (of

which 25 is power play and 25 is short handed) during the injuries, slumps

and trips to the coach‟s doghouse of main roster players.

Below is my All Cap Roster. If you can find a more optimal one, share it with me.

All Cap Roster – 2011

Actual Projected

Position Name Team CapCost MOI PC MOIEH MOISH MOIPP MOITOT PC

LW1 Loui Eriksson DAL 4,266,667 1,625 99 1,100 0 250 1,350 78

C1 Sidney Crosby PIT 8,700,000 899 80 1,100 0 250 1,350 121

RW1 Martin St. Louis TBL 5,250,000 1,720 115 1,100 0 250 1,350 91

LW2 Daniel Sedin VAN 6,100,000 1,521 86 1,000 100 300 1,400 83

C2 Jonathan Toews CHI 6,300,000 1,661 116 1,000 50 300 1,350 96

RW2 Corey Perry ANA 5,325,000 1,830 99 1,000 100 300 1,400 80

LW3 Jamie Benn DAL 821,667 1,243 67 800 175 50 1,025 69

C3 Logan Couture SJS 1,241,667 1,408 76 800 0 100 900 48

RW3 Claude Giroux PHI 821,666 1,591 92 800 175 100 1,075 65

LW4 Alex Tanguay CGY 1,700,000 1,561 93 500 0 100 600 47

C4 Frans Nielsen NYI 525,000 1,261 60 500 250 50 800 53

RW4 Michael Grabner NYI 843,333 1,146 78 500 250 0 750 73

F5 Darren Helm DET 912,500 1,091 64 450 50 0 500 30

F5 Teddy Purcell TBL 750,000 1,142 60 450 0 50 500 27

F 44,207,500 19,700 1,185 11,100 1,150 2,100 14,350 964

D1 John Carlson WSH 845,833 1,857 90 1,400 300 50 1,750 90

D1 Alex Pietrangelo STL 3,166,666 1,738 90 1,400 100 150 1,650 84

D2 Brett Clark TBL 1,500,000 1,548 90 1,200 200 150 1,550 101

D2 Keith Yandle PHX 1,200,000 1,999 81 1,200 100 300 1,600 64

D3 Andy Greene NJD 737,500 1,834 73 900 300 50 1,250 57

D3 Mark Giordano CGY 891,667 1,898 69 900 200 300 1,400 57

D4 Jason Demers SJS 543,333 1,462 61 550 25 25 600 26

D 8,884,999 12,336 554 7,550 1,225 1,025 9,800 479

G1 Carey Price MTL 2,750,000 4,206 246 3,700 224

G2 James Reimer TOR 596,667 2,080 130 1,300 86

G 6,286 376 5,000 310

TEAM 55,789,166 2,116 1,753

Goal

Carey Price is my starting goalie at $2,750,000 (all „salary‟ data is the cap cost – the

average annual paycheque over the contract). His projected PC goes down a little mainly

on the basis of less ice time. James Reimer was hard not to choose for the backup

2011 NHL Review


position. He started the season deep in the Maple Leafs goaltending depth chart but got

his chance midseason. His performance was at about the same level of Price but he got

less ice time. Last season‟s starter for this team, Jimmy Howard, would remain a good

choice with a $717,000 cap hit. Other strong candidates included Corey Crawford

($800,000 for 156 PC in 3,337 minutes) and Cory Schneider ($900,000 for 102 PC in just

1,372 minutes).

Defense

This is the cheapest defensive corps I have ever put together. The good news starts with

the performances of Carlson and Clark. But it continues through returnees Yandle and

Greene.

Based on ice time profiles I paired Carlson and Pietrangelo as the first even handed duo.

Clark actually had the best even handed numbers but had the lowest ice time of this group

of blueliners. With Yandle, I gave him second-pairing minutes.

I gave Greene third pairing even handed ice time but matched him with Carlson as the top

penalty killing pair. Giordano got third pairing even handed ice time but second pairing

(with Clark) PK time. Clark projects out as the best penalty killer based on his 2011

results, but his ice time profile suggests a second tier assignment.

Each of these players is comfortable on the power play. Giordano and Yandle produced

best on the power play. So my algorithm gives them each 300 minutes of time with the

man advantage. Next best were Clark and Pietrangelo.

The seventh defender is youthful Jason Demers, a well rounded defenseman (who, of

course, works cheap). PC ranked him as the number two defenseman in San Jose.

At $3,167,000 Pietrangelo is the most expensive defender but his cost, $35,024 per PC

point, is still below budget.

As the shopping was better this year, this team‟s defense cost less ($8.9 million versus

$12.3 million in 2010 and $17.9 million in 2009) but is also projected to produce less

(479 versus 513 PC points).

Forwards

All of this modeling assumes modest down time for injuries and Crosby missed half a

season. Top line ice time on this team over a „full‟ season projects him to 1,100 even

handed minutes. His relative strength is even handed play. So have the Crosby line

seeded as the second power play unit. My model does not give any penalty killing time.

His shootout success was much more limited than in the past and the model ranks him

fourth on the shootout depth chart. Nevertheless he still projects out to be this team‟s

most valuable skater at 121 PC. At $8,700,000 he is not cheap, but he is Crosby and

plays up to his contract.

2011 NHL Review


His wingers would be Eriksson and St. Louis. They are also top even handed players but

tier two power play performers on this team. The entire first line is comprised of repeats

from 2010. In fact, Eriksson has now been named to this team three years running,

notwithstanding a near tripling of his cap hit in 2011.

The second best even handed players, Toews, Perry and Daniel Sedin, would also be the

top power play unit. Sedin was the most productive power player in the league in 2011.

While even handed, Toews would likely protect the team from the weak defense of his

wingers and he projects out as the team‟s second most valuable skater (and second most

expensive). Perry gets the biggest haircut in ice time (all players on this team are used to

much more playing time than they would receive on such a team) so he won‟t score 50

goals for this team.

Overall the “top six” forwards are paid top six dollars. The third line is comprised of

three very good, young, inexpensive players – Benn, Couture and Giroux. The two

wingers would form the second penalty killing unit.

Frans Nielsen also repeats from 2010. His performance and cap hit make him very hard

to exclude form such a team. He would be one of the team‟s top tie penalty killers and an

potent weapon in the shootout. I picked Alex Tanguay for the fourth line for his solid

overall performance and stellar shootout record (all for the low, low price of $1,700,000).

Rookie Michael Grabner fit in too well not to be selected. He would join teammate

Nielsen on the PK.

The press box forwards, Helm and Purcell, are both very solid, inexpensive players

would provide PK and PP depth respectively.

All of these forwards can score. Nearly all could play the power play. Some of them

may have to learn to play some defense for this team.

With these players the shootout depth chart would probably be topped by Tanguay,

Toews and Nielsen. Crosby has historically been very effective in the shootout but was

not in 2011.

The forwards cost $43.6 million in 2011, up a bit from last season ($42.5 million) but are

projected to perform at much higher level (964 versus 860 PC points).

Overall

This team comes in about $900,000 under budget. The defensive spend is down from

2010 and that permitted the spend on the Carey Price contract. I considered Tim Thomas

for the team, and it may have turned out to be a better team with him, but the inexpensive

goaltending that I chose enables performance potential elsewhere. Looking backwards it

is not hard to find inexpensive goaltenders (not so easy to do looking forward).

There are five contracts north of $5 million (of annual cap cost) – Crosby, St. Louis,

Sedin, Toews and Perry. But these guys earned that kind of paycheck in 2011. Except

for goaltenders, it is only extreme performance that can justify a contract north of $5

2011 NHL Review


million. In retrospect it is easy to find value in large contracts ... but it is not so easy to

do looking forward.

These players combined for 2,116 PC points, down from 2,287 PC in 2010. But the

playing time of almost all of these players needs to be scaled back and this team projects

out to 1,753 PC points (or 175 points in the standings). That would not happen for two

big reasons:

There are only 164 points (1640 PC points) up for grabs.

Although winning is a linear (additive) function of individual performance over

the normal range of team play, this team ain‟t normal. A really good team, such

as this, faces an increased headwind in its winning percentage. But this team

could be a 140 point team … and a Stanley Cup shoo-in.

2011 NHL Review


Hall of Fame Watch

Over the past few seasons I have had some fun forecasting the careers of Sidney Crosby

and Alexander Ovechkin. I invited Evgeni Malkin into the process once but I have

concluded that he is not in the same league as King Crosby and Alex the Great.

Unfortunately for

everyone (and I mean

everyone), Sid may no

longer be “in the same

league” either. Two

hits, by David Steckel

and Victor Hedman,

halved his season and

may have permanently

altered his career

trajectory. The

projection of his future

performance is now a

much riskier proposition. Time will tell.

Ovechkin and Crosby entered the NHL in the same year (2006) and the Russian won

round one, capturing the Calder Trophy as the NHL‟s top rookie. Crosby won the Art

Ross and Hart Trophies in 2007 to claim round two. But Ovechkin trumped that in 2008

with an unprecedented sweep of the Ross, Richard, Hart and Pearson Trophies and

stretched his lead in 2009 with repeat Richard, Hart and Pearson Trophies. In 2010

Crosby got his name on the Richard Trophy (he shared it with Stamkos) to continue the

see-saw battle. In 2011 both players suffered a hardware outage. While Ovechkin

looked less special, Crosby was on-plan for his own quadruple (Ross, Richard, Hart and

Lindsay) until his concussion(s).

These players are such great talents and still so young. So the question just dangles –

how good could they be over time?

The answer to this question is in career projections. This exercise is much like trying to

forecast the weather over the long term – accuracy is very challenging. But the exercise

is awfully interesting. The best approach to this is to find a group of similar players and

study their performance over time. Below are the 18 players I selected for inclusion in

the comparison group and their career summary scoring statistics.

To properly conduct that analysis it is necessary to pay attention to three large factors –

age of entry into the NHL, experience and playing time. In the case of a teenage phenom

this analysis is made easier as raw skill development, experience and playing time all

tend to blossom in concert.

But the analysis is made more challenging by a very limited number of comparisons. The

comparison group I formed is comprised of players who, like Crosby, were well

2011 NHL Review


established at an elite level of

competition prior to the age

of 20. Over the history of the

NHL, this is an awfully small

group of players.

Ovechkin was 20 years old

when he entered the NHL,

losing a year to the lockout. I

think it is fair to conclude that

he could have played in the

league as a teenager and can

be compared to this peer

group.

To be a useful part of the

analysis it is also necessary

for a player to have a

complete or nearly-so career

(all of these players have now

retired). Furthermore the

game changes over time and

it is desirable to keep the comparison group recent. To that end most of the comparable

players were born in the 1960s.

It is clear from this list that Crosby and Ovechkin are in very good company. This group

has averaged 1,244 games played, 568 goals, 851 assists and 1,419 points over their

careers.

To use this historical data one needs to adjust for changes in rates of scoring over time.

To the right is a graph of the per-game scoring rates, by age, for this comparison group

after adjusting scoring to the context of the 2011 season. This graph shows the

significant growth of goal

scoring and playmaking

skills through the age of

23. Thereafter goal scoring

tends to go into gradual

decline. Playmaking tends

to grow at about the same

pace as goal scoring

through the age of 23 but

the growth continues on,

peaking several years later.

As point totals are

dominated by assists, they

tend to peak around the age

of 27. Offensive skills are

Peer Group

Player GP G A Pts

Wayne Gretzky 1,487 894 1,963 2,857

Mark Messier 1,602 658 1,146 1,804

Ron Francis 1,731 549 1,249 1,798

Steve Yzerman 1,514 692 1,063 1,755

Mario Lemieux 915 690 1,033 1,723

Joe Sakic 1,363 623 1,006 1,629

Jaromir Jagr 1,273 646 953 1,599

Dale Hawerchuk 1,188 518 891 1,409

Mike Gartner 1,510 735 652 1,387

Brendan Shanahan 1,490 650 690 1,340

Denis Savard 1,196 473 865 1,338

Pierre Turgeon 1,294 515 812 1,327

Mats Sundin 1,305 555 766 1,321

Dave Andrechuk 1,597 634 686 1,320

Pat Lafontaine 865 468 545 1,013

Eric Lindros 760 372 493 865

Jimmy Carson 626 275 286 561

Sylvain Turgeon 669 269 225 494

2011 NHL Review


clearly in retreat over the age of 30, eroding quickly beyond the age of 37. Note that this

analysis is of per game scoring rates. The forces of injury and retirement also reduce the

average number of games played by attained age.

Adjusting scoring to the context of the current season is more complex work than you

might think and moves the peer group expectations around from year to year. In 2011

scoring and playmaking were down a bit with the effect that the normalized career

projections for Crosby and Ovechkin creep up a tad.

How do Crosby and Ovechkin compare to this group?

The table below shows that King Crosby has trumped the competition. Over his career

(per game played, normalized to today‟s scoring environment) he has out-performed the

peer group – 35% more goals, 55% more assists and 47% more points.

Age 18 19 20 21 22 23 Career

Crosby

Games Played 81 79 53 77 81 41 412

Goals 39 36 24 33 51 32 215

Assists 63 84 48 70 58 34 357

Points 102 120 72 103 109 66 572

Adjusted Peer Group *

Games Played 70 72 75 72 72 72 433

Goals 21 24 30 30 31 35 171

Assists 30 36 43 44 45 49 247

Points 51 60 73 74 76 84 418

Ratio to Peers per GP

Goals 159% 137% 114% 102% 146% 160% 135%

Assists 180% 213% 159% 148% 115% 121% 155%

Points 172% 183% 140% 130% 128% 137% 147%

* adjusted to today’s scoring context

Breaking through 50 goals for the first time in 2010 (and on pace to do so again in 2011),

Crosby certainly increased his goal scoring lead over the peer group (two years ago he

was 25% ahead of the pack). But recently has Crosby traded goals for assists and his

playmaking has regressed towards that of the peer group.

Earlier in his career Crosby looked more like a Wayne Gretzky than a Mario Lemieux.

But, at this stage of his career, it is hard to know what Crosby wants to be. It feels like he

has tried to put the Penguins on his back and carry them, like Mario.

Alexander the Great is clearly more of a sniper than is Crosby. The table below shows

that Ovechkin‟s career performance, relative to the peer group, is different – 47% more

goals, 6% more assists and 23% more points.

When you adjust for changes in scoring levels over time, Ovechkin‟s goal production in

2008 (age 22) was one of the ten best in NHL history. In 2010 he was very close to his

career average goal pace but 2011 was a goal-scoring disappointment. Ovechkin seems

2011 NHL Review


to be trending in the general direction of the peer group, which became better playmakers

over time.

Age 20 21 22 23 24 25 Career

Ovechkin

Games Played 81 82 82 79 72 79 475

Goals 52 46 65 56 50 32 301

Assists 54 46 47 54 59 53 313

Points 106 92 112 110 109 85 614

Adjusted Peer Group *

Games Played 75 72 72 72 75 63 429

Goals 30 30 31 35 33 28 188

Assists 43 44 45 49 49 41 274

Points 73 74 76 84 82 69 462

Ratio to Peers per GP

Goals 161% 134% 184% 145% 158% 91% 147%

Assists 117% 91% 92% 100% 125% 103% 106%

Points 135% 109% 129% 119% 138% 98% 123%

* adjusted to today’s scoring context

I think it is important to note that Crosby is cursed by terrible teammates whereas

Ovechkin in blessed. This situation is likely to average out over time and should affect

their career trajectories.

Ovechkin is two years older than Crosby, a significant matter in career projections. He is

now past the magic age of 23, when the performance of snipers tends to peak. While

Ovie scored 50 goals four times in a five year career, the peer group analysis says that

feat is becoming more challenging.

Although still very early in their careers it is evident that both of these youngsters are

something quite special. Using their career-to-date performance and the lifetime

trajectories of the peer group I have (boldly) forecast their careers (career to date statistics

are highlighted) in the table below.

The first thing to observe is that the career of Ovechkin is disadvantaged by later entry

into the NHL. Not only did he lose two seasons to Crosby but his older age of entry

implies less upside. The projections say that Ovechkin has peaked.

Crosby

His career goal projection (659) is actually up from last year notwithstanding his

concussion. The career assist forecast is down 47 this season, mainly due to injury but

also due to his apparent strategy shift towards scoring that occurred in the past two

seasons. Crosby‟s forecast for career points (1845) is down by 38 from last year (1883).

This is mainly about the loss of a half season. The forecast would have been up

otherwise.

2011 NHL Review


Note that Sid was 23 years old last season. This is the magic peak year for offensive

forwards.

Crosby Ovechkin

Age G A Pts G A Pts

18 39 63 102 0 0 0

19 36 84 120 0 0 0

20 24 48 72 52 54 106

21 33 70 103 46 46 92

22 51 58 109 65 47 112

23 32 34 66 56 54 110

24 41 71 112 50 59 109

25 42 71 113 32 53 85

26 40 74 114 43 50 93

27 39 74 113 42 49 91

28 36 67 103 39 45 84

29 31 61 92 33 41 74

30 37 63 100 39 42 81

31 33 60 93 35 40 75

32 25 54 79 27 36 63

33 26 49 75 28 33 61

34 24 48 72 25 32 57

35 23 43 66 24 29 53

36 19 37 56 21 25 46

37 16 35 51 17 24 41

38 12 22 34 12 15 27

39 0 0 0 0 0 0

40 0 0 0 0 0 0

Totals 659 1186 1845 686 774 1460

How is he doing on games played? The peer group averaged 432 games played through

the age of 23. Crosby has played 412, about 5% fewer. The model I use can only

average out injuries. So far he is roughly on target.

The forecast, however, is now fraught with uncertainty. If Crosby can avoid the Eric

Lindros career trajectory, the model‟s GP forecasts might be fine (it forecasts 72 GP next

season). Before his concussion I would have said that he looked pretty durable. But his

career is, today, looking like it has higher than average risk. In fact, it looks like he will

miss a substantial part of the coming season.

Ignoring that very important consideration, with six years of data, the model is now

stabilizing somewhat. The algorithm is forecasting 110 – 115 points for the next several

years. I wouldn‟t be surprised to see him come in higher than that. There was a strong

uptick in his offense in 2011 that gets only half credit because he missed so much playing

time. And the model doesn‟t really know about Sid‟s lack of playmates and there may be

some upside from this, some day. As it stands, his projected career assist total is behind

that of only Wayne Gretzky (1,963), Ron Francis (1,249) and Mark Messier (1,193).

2011 NHL Review


And his projected career points total is behind that of Gretzky (2,857), Messier (1,887)

and Gordie Howe (1,850) – very good company indeed.

Ovechkin

This year he now projects out a bit under 700 career goals, down 46 from last year. His

projection was hurt by netting a career worst 32 goals (17 short of the forecast of 49) and

dialing back his future a bit. Ovechkin‟s playmaking performance in 2011 tracked

expectations such that his career forecast (774) is up by just three over the 2010 model.

The goal-scoring stumble in 2011 is a setback. Last year he projected into the top five

snipers of all time. Now he projects to 10th

(remember, however, that he is playing in a

low scoring environment) amongst all-time goal scorers. And 15th

in all-time points. I

think there is some upside in this projection as well. The forecast for goals for next

season is 43.

Pay attention to these guys! Should these careers come to pass we would worship Crosby

and Ovechkin as two of the finest players to ever lace on skates. But this would

understate their relative achievements. They are disadvantaged by playing during one of

the lowest scoring eras ever.

When you deflate the career performances of others to the current scoring context you

come to the conclusion that

Ovechkin projects to the second greatest goal scorer of all time. With 705

„normalized‟ goals (historical totals adjusted to the current scoring environment)

only Gretzky has a higher total, and

Crosby projects to the second greatest playmaker and point scorer of all time.

With 1,658 normalized assists and 2,362 normalized points only Gretzky has

higher totals.

Or, to put it another way, just imagine what these numbers might have resembled during

the free scoring 1980s (note that my assumption is that scoring levels remain at today‟s

low levels). These projections are highly dependent on the size of goals and goaltenders

going forward. The NHL‟s desire for more offense suggests that future scoring inflation

could pump up these careers.

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