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Insanite posted:Is this a good thing or a bad thing?: Opinions are going to vary, but more fans are starting to think that this is a bad thing. Staged fights like this are a pointless sideshow that slow down the game and, as you said, kind of strike me as a pro-wrestling kind of thing. In this instance, the coaches intentionally put their tough guys out there in order to mix it up. We've learned a lot about head injuries and the kind of damage these guys do to themselves, and while hockey is a dangerous sport anyway "goons" put themselves at more risk, and some develop serious mental problems. Here's an article from the New York Times about the death of a former enforcer, Derek Boogaard, and how fighting ultimately contributed a lot to his death: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/06/sports/hockey/derek-boogaard-a-brain-going-bad.html?pagewanted=all In my opinion, a staged fight is not a good fight, but if a fight is something that happens organically and there is some kind of significance behind why the two players are fighting, then I do get into it even though I disagree with the concept of fighting as a whole. One recent example I can think of is from a few years ago between Bruins forward Milan Lucic and defenseman Mike Komisarek, who was playing for the Montreal Canadiens at the time. If you don't already know, Bruins-Canadiens is arguably the biggest rivalry in the NHL historically and in recent years. So in addition to this natural dislike of the other team, Lucic and Komisarek kind of developed a little personal rivalry where they would take runs at each other, talk trash, get under each other's skin, and shove each other around, but they never actually fought. It finally did all come to a head in 2008 when, after months of stopping just short of fighting, the two finally went at it. Lucic won the fight and you can see how animated he got about it, you see Komisarek trying to get up and keep going, and it's because the two of them just had this burning animosity towards the other. It was almost like the personification of the Bruins-Canadiens rivalry in two players. Even though I'm not a huge fan of fighting, I did enjoy this fight just because of the rivalry between the teams and the two individuals themselves, I'd say it was a "good" fight because of that. Lucic and Komisarek have fought a couple times since this and I thought they were dumb fights, simply because there wasn't any significance to it. I hope that makes sense. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjZbNtzsQFY If you don't like the Bruins I dunno what to tell you, it's hard to suggest who to cheer for if the reason you pick a team is based on an indescribable feeling. I follow a few teams (meaning I watch at least 20-30 games a season, if not more) so here's some brief opinions on those: Boston Bruins - Boston is the best team in the NHL, and that's not a biased opinion. They have the league's best record and one of the most well-rounded rosters. I've followed the Bruins my entire life and I've never seen them this good, including the year that they won the Stanley Cup. They are a highly entertaining, highly skilled, physical, and still relatively young team, which means they are going to be competitive for the foreseeable future. They are also not very popular around the league because people like to hate Boston sports, Boston sports fans, and teams that have been successful recently. Washington Capitals - The Capitals are really bad and have been coasting by on the back of Russian superstar Alex Ovechkin, who is the league's best goalscorer and a highly entertaining player to watch. This year he was the only player to hit 50 goals despite playing on a team that did not make the playoffs. They have another fantastic forward in Nicklas Backstrom, but outside of that the roster is not very good and they are struggling with poor coaching and a lack of consistency. Nowadays I mostly hate-watch the Capitals because it's remarkable how crappy they've become in just a few seasons (in 2009-2010 they had the best record in the NHL) but they are still fun to watch because of Ovechkin. Minnesota Wild - I think Wild are fun to watch, but I can't really describe why. I suppose that for me personally, they just have that je ne sais quoi you are looking for. Minnesota has assembled a talented group of players, and in my opinion they have one of the best top 6's (first and second line forwards) in the league. They also have Ryan Suter, a defenseman who routinely plays about half of each game, which is unheard of. They have a good group of prospects coming in, and I think we're at the beginning of an era where they will be a consistent playoff team.
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Apr 14, 2014 15:08
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Insanite posted:As a sports fan, all of the fighting seems a little ridiculous (and can you imagine the media reaction if the same were to happen in the NBA or NFL!). It also scratches some sort of weird pro-wrestling kind of itch. Do hardcore hockey folk think of it the same way, or is there more depth, imagined or not, to it? Varied opinions on fighting - I've never thought it was that great for the most part and the pro/semi-pro game in North America is the only place where it's really "allowed" to happen (by that I mean that the players don't get tossed from the game if it's a one on one fair fight and only get 5 min majors). In the amateur game even at the collegiate and international levels it's generally not a good strategic move cause you lose the guys for the rest of the game plus potentially additional games. Someone might be able to answer your second question better if you give an example of a sports team in a different major sport that you like.
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Apr 14, 2014 15:30
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canuckanese posted:In my opinion, a staged fight is not a good fight, but if a fight is something that happens organically and there is some kind of significance behind why the two players are fighting, then I do get into it even though I disagree with the concept of fighting as a whole. It's important to note that a lot of what fans consider "staged fights" aren't actually staged. Maybe not in this particular case, but there's an entire etiquette around when to fight the other guy, like it's considered Not Cool to fight a guy at the end of his shift if you're at the start, because that's not a fair matchup, and plenty of guys have expressed the opinion that when they absolutely know they're going to have to fight that game anyway, they prefer to get it over with as early as possible. There can also be multi-game chains of causation for fights that get started early, stemming from an incident(s) even as far back as the previous season. A lot more of the fights are "organic", or at least have a narrative of significance constructed around them by the fighters, than many anti-fighting fans seem to want to credit. There have been so many changes to the rules around fighting, mostly at the behest of the league/owners, that the "spontaneous street justice for dirty play" fights can be a lot more dangerous in hockey terms (penalties, etc) for the guy who starts them and that's entirely subject to ref discretion, so in a lot of ways the timeframe for those incidents has gotten stretched out, specifically so the refs can't get as involved. Now, that's not to say that the whole idea of player enforcement and fighting as deterrents is or is not entirely bogus itself, but the issue is a lot more complicated than this whole idea of "staged fights".
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Apr 14, 2014 16:06
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Insanite posted:Is this a good thing or a bad thing?: What I don't get is why one of the guys who isn't fighting doesn't go get the puck and try to score. What does he have to lose?
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Apr 14, 2014 16:11
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the posted:What I don't get is why one of the guys who isn't fighting doesn't go get the puck and try to score. What does he have to lose? Play stops when there's a fight. HELLO LADIES posted:It's important to note that a lot of what fans consider "staged fights" aren't actually staged. Maybe not in this particular case, but there's an entire etiquette around when to fight the other guy, like it's considered Not Cool to fight a guy at the end of his shift if you're at the start, because that's not a fair matchup, and plenty of guys have expressed the opinion that when they absolutely know they're going to have to fight that game anyway, they prefer to get it over with as early as possible. There can also be multi-game chains of causation for fights that get started early, stemming from an incident(s) even as far back as the previous season. A lot more of the fights are "organic", or at least have a narrative of significance constructed around them by the fighters, than many anti-fighting fans seem to want to credit. There have been so many changes to the rules around fighting, mostly at the behest of the league/owners, that the "spontaneous street justice for dirty play" fights can be a lot more dangerous in hockey terms (penalties, etc) for the guy who starts them and that's entirely subject to ref discretion, so in a lot of ways the timeframe for those incidents has gotten stretched out, specifically so the refs can't get as involved. I guess what I really mean is that I personally don't buy into the whole "team's need to have an enforcer, respect The Code" kind of thing. I suppose that teams having goons or enforcers is what I actually have a problem with. Whenever those useless players are hitting the ice it's because they're supposed to be looking for a fight. That's all they're good for, that's why coach puts them in the game. To me, that makes it staged, because no one thinks they're going out there to score goals. Everyone knows they're going out there to hurt people and start a fight, everyone knows they're paid to sit in the penalty box for more minutes than they'll get ice time, and it's garbage. I have less of a problem when your average player happens to get in a fight, I still think it's dumb, but it's their choice to do so. These guys take regular shifts, contribute to the team's success, etc. They're paid to play the game, not solely to punch other people. Jamwad Hilder fucked around with this message at 17:02 on Apr 14, 2014 |
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Apr 14, 2014 16:16
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HELLO LADIES posted:It's important to note that a lot of what fans consider "staged fights" aren't actually staged. Maybe not in this particular case, but there's an entire etiquette around when to fight the other guy, like it's considered Not Cool to fight a guy at the end of his shift if you're at the start, because that's not a fair matchup, and plenty of guys have expressed the opinion that when they absolutely know they're going to have to fight that game anyway, they prefer to get it over with as early as possible. There can also be multi-game chains of causation for fights that get started early, stemming from an incident(s) even as far back as the previous season. A lot more of the fights are "organic", or at least have a narrative of significance constructed around them by the fighters, than many anti-fighting fans seem to want to credit. There have been so many changes to the rules around fighting, mostly at the behest of the league/owners, that the "spontaneous street justice for dirty play" fights can be a lot more dangerous in hockey terms (penalties, etc) for the guy who starts them and that's entirely subject to ref discretion, so in a lot of ways the timeframe for those incidents has gotten stretched out, specifically so the refs can't get as involved. Everything you just said describes exactly why they're called staged.
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Apr 14, 2014 16:59
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Aphrodite posted:Everything you just said describes exactly why they're called staged. Not really, when most of the people who throw that term around inevitably follow it up with how they hate those fights because they're "not about anything" and "not the same as guys defending their teammates/sticking up for themselves", plus they also seem to think "staged" fights are always just cynical sideshows with nothing to do with player self-policing. Some are, but most aren't. If people don't believe deterrence and self-policing is real or actually works, cool, more power to 'em, but the idea that semi-planned fights AREN'T deterrence but spontaneous ones TOTALLY ARE is bullshit. It's a false dichotomy.
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Apr 14, 2014 17:14
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If someone asks who they should cheer for the answer is always the Detroit Red Wings. Fighting is usually dumb but sometimes it just comes to a head. Check a guy enough times, maybe one is a bit dirty, sometimes you just have to drop the gloves.
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Apr 14, 2014 17:22
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Detroit's star player is a homophobe douche. Also they call themselves Hockeytown despite not even being in the top 3 of US markets (and well behind when we count Canada.) That is a significant misnomer! If you're a fan of douchiness though, by all means... Aphrodite fucked around with this message at 17:34 on Apr 14, 2014 |
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Apr 14, 2014 17:31
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spwrozek posted:If someone asks who they should cheer for the answer is always the Detroit Red Wings. Especially if you live in Boston right now. You can be That Annoying Loudmouth Fucker at the pub, like me for the next two weeks. Even better if you don't actually know anything about hockey, you'll fit right in with many Red Wings fans!
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Apr 14, 2014 17:32
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HELLO LADIES posted:Not really, when most of the people who throw that term around inevitably follow it up with how they hate those fights because they're "not about anything" and "not the same as guys defending their teammates/sticking up for themselves", plus they also seem to think "staged" fights are always just cynical sideshows with nothing to do with player self-policing. Some are, but most aren't. If people don't believe deterrence and self-policing is real or actually works, cool, more power to 'em, but the idea that semi-planned fights AREN'T deterrence but spontaneous ones TOTALLY ARE is bullshit. It's a false dichotomy. My point is that having goons on your roster is a relic and it doesn't have a place in today's NHL. It's a waste of a roster space, and sending them on the ice to fight absolutely is a sideshow. When you send out the guy who's paid to fight, it's a staged fight, even if people want to claim he's "sending a message" or "keeping the other team in line".
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Apr 14, 2014 17:41
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goldrush posted:Marchand is a douchebag but he's an effective player. He's what known as a "pest" or an "agitator". He gets under the skin of opponents because of his borderline-legal playstyle - questionable hits, trashtalking, taunting, embellishment, and general antics of the sort. However he's also skilled at putting up points and perhaps throwing opposing players off their game. That's what people mean when they say they hate him but he's the kind of guy you want on your side. Thank you for the thorough explanation! (Nose Face Killah, awful) I'm sure I'll notice this more during the playoffs - glad to have a sport that doesn't hide player personalities a ton! I've been stockholm syndrome'd since moving to the Boston area - my best excuse.
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Apr 15, 2014 00:25
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Zelamir posted:glad to have a sport that doesn't hide player personalities a ton! Unfortunately this is completely not true. Hockey players are the absolute worst interviews in all of sports. And on the rare occasion somebody does do something interesting or cool or fun, the establishment comes down on him hard. Quick example off the top of my head: the old-school fools were INCENSED after this beautiful goal https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-a-XPZqYIw
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Apr 15, 2014 00:57
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ElwoodCuse posted:Unfortunately this is completely not true. Hockey players are the absolute worst interviews in all of sports. And on the rare occasion somebody does do something interesting or cool or fun, the establishment comes down on him hard. Some more context, this is San Jose Sharks uber-rookie Tomas Hertl, who is Czech. The kid is a dynamo. His smile and love for the game is infectious. This beautiful goal was his 4th of the night. Hat tricks are rare, 4 is simply astounding. The even more amazing part? It was his 3rd NHL game. He scored 2 goals the night before. The NHL should have this kid's face plastered on every t-shirt in their store but hockey is run by old-school fools who preach about playing hockey "the right way by good Canadian boys." Luckily, several highly regarded Canadian players like Hertl's teammate Joe Thornton had some pretty legendary responses the next night to a journalist who asked if Hertl was "showing off". Thornton said if he had scored 4 goals he would have "whipped his cock out". By old-school fools, we of course mean Don Cherry - who is somehow regarded as a folk hero in Canada. So much so that he has a dedicated 1st intermission segment called "Coaches Corner" on the weekly national broadcast of "Hockey Night In Canada", which is the NHL's equivalent of NBC's Sunday Night Football. I've never thought less of this xenophobic, kill-joy old coot. Guys of his generation use terms like "enigmatic", "mysterious" and "selfish" to describe players of Scandinavian, eastern European and Russian descent simply because the person playing "their" sport doesn't speak good English. This was his response to Hertl's amazing night: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFEZq5TdXQ0 Now, the goalie who faced Hertl (Marty Biron) retired soon after this game. It was a long time coming and the Rangers had several competent goaltenders in the minor leagues. For an old man to basically shame a young exciting player by implying that he cause Marty Biron to be sent down to the minor leagues (and therefore compel him to retire due to his age) is just shameful. And let me be clear: I DO NOT LIKE TOMAS HERTL, but I'll be damned if I didn't see Twitter explode after Hertl's 3rd goal that night and tune in. My wife and I were cheering and clapping after he scored his 4th, because if you love hockey, who wouldn't?! It was an incredible moment, moreso because his Mom traveled from the Czech Republic to see her son play. I am a Kings fan, and I know that Hertl is going to be an extremely effective (perhaps generational) player who will bother the club I love for the next two decades - but I am absolutely aghast at this old-school mentality in the NHL that somehow believes individual accomplishment shouldn't be celebrated. MaoistBanker fucked around with this message at 05:37 on Apr 15, 2014 |
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Apr 15, 2014 05:29
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I live in Alberta and I don't give a gently caress about Don Cherry. Kinda feels like he's worn out his welcome though. He's not a legend and a mediocre analyst at best. That being said I hope the Hawks can get their poo poo together and beat the gently caress out of St. Louis. I was looking at their numbers earlier and man, they have the highest Goals For in the league (by one, take that Anaheim). Then you look at their Goals Against and it's like they're slapping poo poo at the net without caring about defense. Just pile on goals people, that'll win it! (it might) Anyway, I do have a question and I'm kind of embarrassed not to know it being a hockey fan. Why do some guys get kicked out of the face off? Does the ref fake drop the puck and think "I don't like your vibe" and kick someone out?
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Apr 15, 2014 13:18
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If you move before the puck is dropped, you get removed, also if you're mouthing off to the other player you can get kicked too, I believe.
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Apr 15, 2014 13:21
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Sometimes the center can get tossed if one of his wingers moves early, too. If the second guy in to take the faceoff gets thrown out too (on the same faceoff) then it's a penalty. It happens maybe once/twice a season.
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Apr 15, 2014 13:33
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They are apparently changing the rule next season to forcing the center to take the face off from further back rather than being kicked out.
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Apr 15, 2014 13:35
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I'm a leafs fan. Mock me. I do have a couple questions though for those of you that eat, breathe and sleep hockey. What effect will the Brendan Shanahan hiring have on the leafs organization. I get that the guy has 3 rings and has leadership qualities and has worked as the league disciplinarian but how does that translate into being a good choice for Leafs president? I just asked one of my co-workers what he brings to the leafs and he sad, "hopefully a stick and a pair of skates". Secondly, if Randy Carlyle gets tossed out as is being speculated who's available that the leafs would be better off with? I keep hearing the name Barry Trotts or something that was fired from Nashville. What makes him a good candidate? There's a bunch of other questions I could ask you guys but I don't want to poo poo up the thread too much more than I already have.
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Apr 15, 2014 17:15
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Thaxxas posted:I'm a leafs fan. Mock me. I do have a couple questions though for those of you that eat, breathe and sleep hockey. Honestly, no one knows. I don't think Shanny has ever held a position like this before, so his reign could involve pretty much anything. Leiweke has made it pretty clear that it's not going to be be a figurehead position, so he will be making hockey decisions. Nonis and all the business guys are going to report to him. Anything else is pretty much speculation, but it's seemingly not something they're doing just to sell tickets. quote:Secondly, if Randy Carlyle gets tossed out as is being speculated who's available that the leafs would be better off with? I keep hearing the name Barry Trotts or something that was fired from Nashville. What makes him a good candidate? Barry Trotz was the only coach the Predators had in their history. For a budget team in a non-traditional market, they managed to do extremely well for themselves and Trotz was a very big part of that. He's the #1 coach on the market right now, and probably shouldn't even have been the one fired in Nashville. If Toronto hires him, he might also come with a very, very good goalie coach in Mitch Korn, who is the guy who developed Pekka Rinne. Trotz system in Nashville was extremely defensively-oriented, but unlike a lot of similar coaches, he knows how to fairly effectively run offense through his defensemen in addition to just teaching excellent defense, which was a necessity in Nashville because of how their team was built, but would actually be a pretty good fit with the current Toronto roster. Most hockey people are of the opinion that Nashville's low scoring and comparitive lack of offense over the years was more due to the roster Trotz had to work with rather than any tendency of his to utterly squelch the living poo poo out of his players offensive instincts, unlike John Tortorella. quote:There's a bunch of other questions I could ask you guys but I don't want to poo poo up the thread too much more than I already have. That's what it's here for! Also our N/V thread is mostly various fanbases pissing and moaning doom and gloom, so it's not very fun at the moment.
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Apr 15, 2014 17:41
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What do you think about Byron's hit on Sedin in Sunday night's game? The people in the GDT seemed to be of the opinion that it was the Worst Thing Ever, but it looked to me like a fairly weak (although still not legal) hit that just ended very badly. It was definitely a penalty, possibly even a justifiable game misconduct, but the people calling for supplementary discipline seemed a little crazy to me. What was I missing?
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Apr 15, 2014 17:54
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Thanks for the response HL. It's nice getting a consice answer on the questions I have as opposed to having to sift through the bullshit that can be sports media around here.
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Apr 15, 2014 18:46
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HELLO LADIES posted:
lies, it's full of lies! to clarify this means they are not all Pens fans. ChairmanMeow fucked around with this message at 21:09 on Apr 15, 2014 |
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Apr 15, 2014 19:04
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Thaxxas posted:I'm a leafs fan. Mock me. I do have a couple questions though for those of you that eat, breathe and sleep hockey. Who knows? All I know is that you are no longer talking about the Leafs' epic collapse, and that's exactly the way the Leafs want it. Narrative changed. I wonder if Shanny is really going to go all-in, but I don't see it. Being a President of a team means shoring up sponsorship deals and schmoozing with corporate guys so that they spend every inch of available space advertising their product on TV, Internet and inside the arena. I don't really see Shanahan doing that, do you? Robitaille does it for LA and he does it well, but it largely means Robitaille doesn't get involved with hockey decisions. The only way this really works is if final decisions by Nonis & Co basically get the stamp of approval from Shanahan. It could be a Colorado situation where Sherman is still technically the GM, but it's a position in name only. This is a big pay jump for Shanahan, he's literally never had a job with these kinds of responsibilities before.
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Apr 15, 2014 20:04
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MaoistBanker posted:The only way this really works is if final decisions by Nonis & Co basically get the stamp of approval from Shanahan. It could be a Colorado situation where Sherman is still technically the GM, but it's a position in name only. Leiweke said in the presser that he does have final approval. Both the Nonis/hockey staff and the business staff will report to, and need approval from, Shanahan. Maybe it's all bullshitting, but here's what Nonis had to say about it: Dave Nonis posted:On the day that he was officially stripped of the final say on hockey matters, Toronto Maple Leafs general manager Dave Nonis tried to put a positive spin on the news that he was no longer in charge — as though he was happy to hand over the keys. “Listen, I have a boss and it’s Brendan,” Nonis said. “At the end of the day, the boss has the final say in anything. In any organization that I’ve been a part of that’s had any success, you’ve had consensus. You work together and you find a way to answer any questions or concerns that one side might have.” To me that sounds like Shanahan's authority is real and Nonis is passive-aggressively butthurt about it.
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Apr 15, 2014 20:19
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MaoistBanker posted:Who knows? All I know is that you are no longer talking about the Leafs' epic collapse, and that's exactly the way the Leafs want it. Narrative changed. I wonder if Shanny is really going to go all-in, but I don't see it. Being a President of a team means shoring up sponsorship deals and schmoozing with corporate guys so that they spend every inch of available space advertising their product on TV, Internet and inside the arena. I don't really see Shanahan doing that, do you? Robitaille does it for LA and he does it well, but it largely means Robitaille doesn't get involved with hockey decisions. The only way this really works is if final decisions by Nonis & Co basically get the stamp of approval from Shanahan. It could be a Colorado situation where Sherman is still technically the GM, but it's a position in name only. Speaking for myself here but I half assed expected the collapse. Two years ago they "drove the 18 wheeler off the cliff", last years collapse in the last ten minutes of game 7 vs Boston was an epic collapse. This year in my humble uneducated opinion finished the same way it started. Horrible play in their own end thus allowing too damned many shots against. Bernier and Reimer did what they could but 40 to 50 something shots against per game is not a winning game plan and I'm surprised it took so long for them to fall out of playoff contention. Regarding Shanahan, I know he wasn't brought in to shore up sponsorship deals and hobknob with the corporate types. They don't need him for that and that's why I asked what it is he brings to the organization.
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Apr 15, 2014 21:35
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Thaxxas posted:Secondly, if Randy Carlyle gets tossed out as is being speculated who's available that the leafs would be better off with? Anyone. Anyone at all. In fact, hiring nobody would probably be a step up at this point. Also I suspect that Shanahan is also in as a bit of a blame barrier for Leiweke, so that Nonis can be shuffled off either Sherman or Feaster style while eliding the fact that like 8 months ago Leiweke said "this is the guy and he has as much time as he needs" while handing out a 5-year extension.
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Apr 15, 2014 22:21
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How the hell did Minnesota lose a hockey team to Texas?
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Apr 16, 2014 05:44
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Yeet posted:I live in Alberta and I don't give a gently caress about Don Cherry. Kinda feels like he's worn out his welcome though. He's not a legend and a mediocre analyst at best. Teaching point/opportunity to boast about my favorite team, and perhaps assuage some of your fears of the Blues. The Blackhawks have the second highest Fenwick for percentage in the league. Fenwick is a statistic that counts the number of shots on goal and shots that miss the net (excluding blocked shots) for each team; a team's Fenwick for percentage is generally represented by the percentage of the total "Fenwick events," aka shots on goal plus missed shots, that a team has at even strength play compared to their opponents. So, if team A had 40 Fenwick events for in a game during 5-on-5 play, and their opponent had 60, their Fenwick for percentage in that game would be 40%. Why we care is sort of intuitive, and sort of not. So, shooting the puck more than your opponent must be a good thing; that's the intuitive part. The unintuitive part is this: we use Fenwick as a proxy for possession. You can only shoot the puck when you have possession, and, perhaps more importantly, your opponents can't shoot the puck when you have it. So we approximate how much a team has the puck compared to their opponents by measuring what their share of the shot attempts are compared to their opponents. Fenwick has been shown to be a very reliable predictor of success in the NHL, unlike goals. This is because goals are a relatively rare event, while shots happen all the time, and the law of averages says that the larger your sample, the more representative of actual team quality the mean is. In other words: goals are more likely to be outliers than are possession statistics, simply because the sample size is larger. What does this have to do with the Blackhawks/Blues series? Well, you can look at the season series, and see that the Blues won most of the games. Seems like they're the better team, right? Well, maybe not. Two of those wins came in the shootout, which, again, uses relatively few events to determine the outcome of the game, and doesn't really say much about their ability to actually beat the Blackhawks at hockey. Over the season series, the Blackhawks significantly out-possessed the Blues. Like I mentioned earlier, this is a much better predictor of success than the goal counts in an extremely small sample of the regular season series. I wrote a fairly long blog post about why I don't think the blues stand much of a chance of winning this series if anyone's interested. I can post the link upon request. Again, somewhat counter-intuitively, wins aren't even a good predictor of future performance. For example, though the Avalanche had more points than anybody else in their division, they were significantly out-possessed by their opponents over the course of the season. This doesn't bode well for them in the playoffs, and, in my opinion, is going to be the major reason they don't make any serious noise this year. Okay, I'm phone posting, it's late, and I have to work in the morning, but I'd be happy to explain more about so-called "fancy stats" if there's interest. Other things I like to talk about : Corsi: another possession metric that also counts blocked shots, in addition to what Fenwick counts. PDO: sort of a measurement of luck, though I've become kind of skeptical about its actual value when compared to its components, which are... Shooting percentage and save percentage: why volatility in these two percentages can either make teams look better or worse than they actually are over a given sample. Zone starts: measures how often a player is sent out by his coach for an offensive or defensive zone faceoff. Can often explain why some players look better or worse than their possession metrics might indicate. And my favorite things ever: usage charts. Can't really summarize these, but they're fun to look at to get a more holistic view of individual player performance.
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Apr 16, 2014 05:49
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Goodpancakes posted:How the hell did Minnesota lose a hockey team to Texas?
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Apr 16, 2014 06:00
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PT6A posted:What do you think about Byron's hit on Sedin in Sunday night's game? The people in the GDT seemed to be of the opinion that it was the Worst Thing Ever, but it looked to me like a fairly weak (although still not legal) hit that just ended very badly. It was definitely a penalty, possibly even a justifiable game misconduct, but the people calling for supplementary discipline seemed a little crazy to me. What was I missing? It was definitely a dangerous hit, and Byron was lucky that he didn't break Sedin's neck. That aside, I presume that the response stems from the league's inconsistent and mostly lenient rulings for dangerous hits like this. With the rise of knowledge of things like post concussion syndrome, the league has only paid lip service to reducing dangerous contact to the head. Stiff suspensions have been dealt before, but you have to have a mile long record before they'll think of suspending you for more than 5 games. On the other hand, the NHL hasn't done anything as egregious as the NFL.
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Apr 16, 2014 08:59
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Lawnie posted:Corsi: another possession metric that also counts blocked shots, in addition to what Fenwick counts. I'd love to hear more about all the "fancy" stats. Also, what do you mean by blocked shots? Shots that another non-goalie player blocks, or does it include saves? It seems to me (I know nothing about hockey) that if you're looking for a proxy for possession you'd want to include all shot attempts, regardless of outcome (miss, goal, save, block).
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Apr 16, 2014 13:15
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junidog posted:I'd love to hear more about all the "fancy" stats. Yeah, a blocked shot is a shot that would be on net, but is blocked by another player, either on purpose or unintentionally. It's a pretty common strategy. A blocked shot by the goalie isn't counted by that however, and is just called a save, regardless of them catching it, or it bouncing off of their pad or what have you.
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Apr 16, 2014 13:17
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junidog posted:I'd love to hear more about all the "fancy" stats. Downgoesbrown's stats primer is generally considered the best simple introduction. You're right that corsi - which includes shots blocked - gives a better view of who had the puck more. In fact, from the times someone has watched a game with a stopwatch to test, it syncs up almost perfectly with who actually had the puck more. The reason fenwick - which excludes shots blocked - is considered superior is that both blocking opponents' shots and having one's own shots unblocked appears to be a repeatable skill. The New York Rangers under John Tortorella are one example of a team that was exceptionally good at blocking a high percentage of opponents' shots on goal (last year they managed 52.7% of the corsi events, but 54.1% of the fenwick events), while this year's Ottawa Senators were downright dreadful at blocking shots (52.2% of the corsi events - close to last year's Rangers - but only 50.8% of the fenwick events).
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Apr 16, 2014 13:30
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junidog posted:I'd love to hear more about all the "fancy" stats. Shots are saves+goals already in the NHL. If it misses the net, it's not a shot. The simple description is that if it would have gone in had the goalie not been there, it's a shot*. So Corsi takes that existing stat and adds misses and blocks to it. Fenwick just adds misses. *: This sometimes leads to situations where something that is not a shot on goal becomes a shot on goal because physics put it in the net. For example a shot that goes over the net is not a shot on goal. But if it ricochets and ends up in the net off the goalie's back or something, it magically becomes one even though the goalie not being there actually would have prevented it from being a goal.
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Apr 16, 2014 13:30
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Aphrodite posted:Shots are saves+goals already in the NHL. If it misses the net, it's not a shot. The simple description is that if it would have gone in had the goalie not been there, it's a shot*. Also, just to confuse matters further, in IIHF-sanctioned tournaments and leagues they use separate stats for "shots" and "shots on goal" where the former also includes missed shots and the latter is the same as "shots" in the NHL.
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Apr 16, 2014 13:38
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junidog posted:I'd love to hear more about all the "fancy" stats. I'm glad hand knit posted that stats primer; it's extremely useful. In addition to shot blocking being a repeatable skill, Fenwick correlates better with expected performance (ie wins) than Corsi, and wins are the almighty stat.
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Apr 16, 2014 14:21
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I live in South Florida, so my exposure to hockey has been effectively nil. I watch it every now and than when its on tv, but I lack a strategic and tactical understanding of the game and what the teams are trying to do to each other. I used to not enjoy soccer for the same reason, but after reading on formations and how they try to score/advance the ball within their structure, and understanding tactically x player makes pass to y player for z reason, it sort of fell together for me. Could someone take like two of the most common hockey formations and explain the positions within, their responsibilities/ what they try to do, and than perhaps explain a simple play or two? For example, Sidney Crosby is like an attacking mid who passes to people around him and facilitates a shot by penetrating the defense? (im guessing) I guess with football, it would be the equivalent of explaining a passing concept vs a coverage and the qbs read on said concept. I.e. vs cover two, you run 3 deep routes to stress the two safetys horizontally or verticall,read one of them (depending upon your routes and the wr formation) and throw to whoever comes free because fundamentally you have a 3v2 advantage
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Apr 16, 2014 15:17
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Waroduce posted:I live in South Florida, so my exposure to hockey has been effectively nil. I watch it every now and than when its on tv, but I lack a strategic and tactical understanding of the game and what the teams are trying to do to each other. I used to not enjoy soccer for the same reason, but after reading on formations and how they try to score/advance the ball within their structure, and understanding tactically x player makes pass to y player for z reason, it sort of fell together for me. An NHL goaltender should stop all of the shots he sees, so one common basic attack plan is to take the offensive zone, hit the goalie with the first shot, then send a wall of meat and swinging lumber towards the net in the hopes that the now-out-of-position goalie won't be able to stop the puck in the chaos. This is called "crashing the net", and it's usually pretty effective as long as the defense is negligent enough to let it happen. And when you wanna talk about negligent defense, you come to a Senators fan. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfGcy0h32o8 First goal:  The Canadiens (red) have the puck on a three-on-two attack, and their right-winger (with his stick in the air, #21 Brian Gionta) is getting ready to move it. The centre (#81, Lars Eller) is moving towards the net, and because he's holding his stick left-handed, he's a legitimate threat to drive straight to the net, receive a pass or pick up the loose puck and put it around the goalie on the side where the puck currently isn't. If he were right-handed the curve on his stick would be convex towards the right side, making it a bit harder for him to pick up a pass from his right and making it more likely that the shot he takes up close is on the side where the goalie currently is; to attack the left side of the net he'd have to either use his backhand (which most players suck at, relatively speaking) or take a moment to angle his body more to the left, which would give the goalie more time to react. The Ottawa defenseman facing Gionta (#3 Marc Methot) is doing his best to keep his man "to the outside", that is, along the boards and far from his goalie. This offers the dual advantage of forcing the shooter to take the shot the goalie is ready for, and making him less-able to pass to a teammate in scoring position because the puck would have to go through him. If you slow it down you can even see him crouch a bit and hold his stick parallel to the ice in anticipation of the pass, then stand up again when it becomes clear that the attacking player is about to shoot. Montreal's left winger (#27, Alex Galchenyuk) is staying as far as he can from the other two players to put extra stress on Ottawa's right defenseman (the one not in the circle, #65 Erik Karlsson). If Galchenyuk gets the puck right now he'll probably score because the goaltender won't be able to move from where he is now to where he needs to be to stop the shot properly, so the defensemen have to prevent that. Methot has the puck-carrier, and Karlsson is forced to deal with the other two guys: he has to be ready to block Galchenyuk's shot, stop Eller from passing to Gally, and knock Eller on his rear end if he happens to end up with the puck (which he can't do because he's three inches shorter and 30 pounds lighter). Gionta sees all of this because he is good at hockey, and he knows exactly what to do: he slaps a low-percentage shot up high on the goalie where it's not likely to make a big rebound, Eller skates through Karlsson, Karlsson is forced to wave his stick ineffectually at the puck because he's not big enough to body Eller out of the way and he can't dedicate all of his attention to one player, Eller gets to the puck first, and the Habs close the lead to two goals. This play would be completely neutralized if the Ottawa forward (the one standing opposite the Bell sign, #15 Zack Smith) would take a few steps forward and put the Montreal winger into the boards, freeing up his defensemen to handle the other two forwards one-on-one. Instead, he stands still and waves his stick at the problem hoping that magic will shoot out the end of it and make everything okay. The other two Ottawa forwards are in their correct positions, more or less (which is something to be happy about in the case of #14 Colin Greening). If the puck comes their way they can attack the other team's net, and once the Montreal defensemen show up, the forwards can put some pressure on these "point" positions. If the two Ottawa forwards were instead Montreal defensemen, they would be playing the point. From back there the point-man can see the whole play, skate laterally along the blue line to make the other players move to compensante and create holes, make wise passes to players in scoring position or take huge slapshots themselves. flakeloaf fucked around with this message at 18:10 on Apr 16, 2014 |
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Apr 16, 2014 18:03
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Thats awesome thank you
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Apr 16, 2014 20:11
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