Roman Josi quietly having another Norris caliber season

[Rowlet]

I do wonder why Josi is considered runner up and it’s not more neck and neck with Hughes/Makar. Because of points? It’s interesting that a year he lost to Makar he had more points but worse defensive metrics. In a year he’ll likely lose again he has fewer points but better defensive metrics than Hughes.

To me this should actually be Josi/Makar fighting for 1 with Hughes 3. And the rationale behind that is Josi and Makar both drive offense similar to Hughes but seem to be vastly superior defensively. Josi has almost double the hits and triple the blocked shots vs Hughes. Makar is similar. Josi also plays on an objectively worse team than Hughes if you look at it across the entire season.

But this isn’t really new with awards, it’s all just opinion based and opinions will vary. This was likely already decided at the break anyway, even if Josi or Makar somehow catch Hughes in total points.

Hey man, based on some of your other replies you seem pretty genuine in wanting to learn about other methods of measuring possession and player skill so I'm going to do a brief breakdown for you on the three players.

As a bit of a Legend for the chart, Corsi means shots for/against, Fenwick means unblocked shots for/against. xGF is expected goals for and xGA is goals against, HDCF means high danger chances for/against. The star indicates Makar away from MacKinnon. I do not know why there is a #1 there, it should not be and I can't delete it. Hughes basically laps all other defenseman, and almost all forwards, in CorsiRel.

It's worth noting that other stats you mentioned like blocked shots etc aren't great because they rely on your team not having the puck. Good puck holders like Hughes will naturally have a really low shots blocked and hits stat because they lead the league in time spent carrying the puck. When it comes to offensive zone puck carrying time, Hughes is much, much further ahead than any other defenseman.

It's also worth noting that I isolated Makar away from MacKinnon for some of the stats because he's been notably really bad compared to his usual self, like a detriment to his team levels of terrible.

Ultimately both Hughes and Josi are much, much better than Makar this year while Hughes is slightly better than Josi in most statistical categories, while being much better in CorsiRel.

1. Player	Hughes	Makar*	Josi
   CF%	61.9	46.47*	59.7
   FF%	59.6	46.95*	59.6
   CorsiRel	18.7	3.8	13.8
   FenwickRel	15.5	4.1	13.8
   xGF%	54.82	48.10*	54.08
   HDCF%	54.46	47.79*	53.27
   xGA	59.6	46.7	58.8

 

[19 for president]

If I had a one year window to win a cup, he's the guy I'm taking. I've always been a big fan of his since he was coming up under Weber and Suter. I feel like outside of his massive points year, he has always been a very underrated dman.

He's never had the team support that a lot of the other top dman currently in the league have had.

Longterm guys like Hughes, Makar, Fox, etc would be better picks, but again if I needed a guy for one run; I'm taking Josi.

 

[HockeyWooot]

He definitely is having a great year.

Coming into the season I had him as an easy top 5 dman regardless of this upcoming seasons progress: Makar, Fox, Josi, Heiskanen, Hedman

 

[Soundgarden]

Never forget that Josi was Norris runner up to Makar in 2022 despite having *more* 1st place votes. Voting panel kind of lost all credibility after that in my mind

He wasn't even in the top 5 for one voter, he picked Devon Toews over him, had he chose Josi he would have won the Norris I believe.

 

[KrisLetAngry]

73 points and 19 goals in 72 games and is carrying a surging Nashville squad to the playoffs. Not that he's gonna win it, but there's so little buzz around this guy compared to other high scoring defencemen in the game such as Makar, Hughes, Karlsson.

Defencemen points per game

Last 3 seasons

Makar 1.13
Josi 1.04
Hughes 1.00
Fox 0.94
Hedman 0.9
Karlsson 0.9

Last 5 seasons

Makar 1.06
Josi 0.97
Hughes 0.91
Hedman 0.88
Fox .86

Seems like his name comes up in these way less frequently than his production suggests it should. Thoughts on Josi and the season he's having? Surely he's a future HoFer in the maing.

I mentioned Josi in another thread about defensemen in the Norris. I have him in that 3 to 7 range.

I think a part of why Josi isn't getting much noise is because generally Norris winners are on top teams. Until recently Nashville was kind of not that good this year or good enough to he considered.

Karlsson got the pass for having a historical season.

 

[SeanMoneyHands]

He's pretty much the Sergei zubov of this generation. Elite two-way defenseman who just won't win the Norris as long as Makar and Hedman are in the NHL. One of the most underrated defensemen of this era.

If he played in the Canadian market he would get huge exposure. Just imagine the numbers he would put up if he was playing on Toronto.

 

[Buck Naked]

He's pretty much the Sergei zubov of this generation. Elite two-way defenseman who just won't win the Norris as long as Makar and Hedman are in the NHL. One of the most underrated defensemen of this era.

If he played in the Canadian market he would get huge exposure. Just imagine the numbers he would put up if he was playing on Toronto.

*Checks notes*
Won the Norris in 19/20 with both Makar and Hedman in the league.

 

[BonMorrison]

Sad that he's never going to get his second Norris. What he's doing at his age right now is crazy. Not to diminish Hughes and Makar but these guys got like the next 10 years to win a bunch, old dog Jos should've got one more especially the year Makar (also deserving) won.

 

[mattihp]

Not very quietly

 

[LCPreds]

Hey man, based on some of your other replies you seem pretty genuine in wanting to learn about other methods of measuring possession and player skill so I'm going to do a brief breakdown for you on the three players.

Thanks for sharing all of that info. Do you have any more info on the "rel" versions of Corsi/Fenwick? I found this from another site but it doesn't really get into the specifics on how the relativity is derived.

Just a quick refresher, Corsi Relative (usually just written as Corsi Rel) basically measures the effect an individual player has on his team's overall Corsi performance. It can be used in +/- form or as a percentage (I'm gonna use the latter). Instead of just looking at a players Corsi For% (CF%), we can use CF% Rel to see how he is performing relative to his teammates.

I mean it's written very clearly but doesn't really explain how they're able to extrapolate individual performance vs. others on this specific stat. Is it simply taking the Corsi of all players on the team and comparing the individual value vs. the median of all other players on the team (maybe fancier than that)? So for example, if Hughes has a CFrel of 18.7 does it mean he is about 18.7% better than the average Canuck? 18.7 ppts better?

The other thing I did pick out of the chart above is that clearly Makar has not performed as well as those two across several categories. Hughes and Josi are pretty dang close to one another.

Thanks again.

 

[Rowlet]

Thanks for sharing all of that info. Do you have any more info on the "rel" versions of Corsi/Fenwick? I found this from another site but it doesn't really get into the specifics on how the relativity is derived.

Just a quick refresher, Corsi Relative (usually just written as Corsi Rel) basically measures the effect an individual player has on his team's overall Corsi performance. It can be used in +/- form or as a percentage (I'm gonna use the latter). Instead of just looking at a players Corsi For% (CF%), we can use CF% Rel to see how he is performing relative to his teammates.

I mean it's written very clearly but doesn't really explain how they're able to extrapolate individual performance vs. others on this specific stat. Is it simply taking the Corsi of all players on the team and comparing the individual value vs. the median of all other players on the team (maybe fancier than that)? So for example, if Hughes has a CFrel of 18.7 does it mean he is about 18.7% better than the average Canuck? 18.7 ppts better?

The other thing I did pick out of the chart above is that clearly Makar has not performed as well as those two across several categories. Hughes and Josi are pretty dang close to one another.

Thanks again.

Yeah, no problem!

CorsiRel as a stat is calculated by taking a player's OICF% (on ice corsi for/on ice corsi against) and dividing it by the player's CFOff% (the player's team's corsi when that player is off ice).

So, it means that when Hughes is on the ice, the team takes 19~ more SF than SA compared to when he's off the ice of every 100 shots made total. This shows that Hughes drives play towards the other end of the net at an elite level, at a rate that is among, if not the single best in the league.

Additionally, CorsiRel typically favours forwards, and for reference McDavid, MacKinnon, and Kucherov are all 16.7. I believe Hughes is the highest in the league.

 

[HolyHagelin]

Yeah, no problem!

CorsiRel as a stat is calculated by taking a player's OICF% (on ice corsi for/on ice corsi against) and dividing it by the player's CFOff% (the player's team's corsi when that player is off ice).

So, it means that when Hughes is on the ice, the team takes 19~ more SF than SA compared to when he's off the ice of every 100 shots made total. This shows that Hughes drives play towards the other end of the net at an elite level, at a rate that is among, if not the single best in the league.

Additionally, CorsiRel typically favours forwards, and for reference McDavid, MacKinnon, and Kucherov are all 16.7. I believe Hughes is the highest in the league.

To add on, there are a variety of reasons for this, including but not limited to defensemen playing more minutes, playing with more different guys on the team, and others.

 

[Sky04]

Too bad his passport prevents him from winning a Norris.

Are you ok?

 

[Ghetty Green]

Are you ok?

Little tired. Just took a nap tho. Feeling better. HBU?

 

[DudeWhereIsMakar]

Can't stand Nashville, but Roman Josi is one of my favourite defenseman in the league.

Other than that, I think it's Quinn Hughes's to win.

 

[Coffey]

Only a +19 with a 6 game win streak?
Only 1 point more than EVAN BOUCHARD?

Can't spell Norris for Josi without a NO.

 

[Maple Leaf]

Too bad his passport prevents him from winning a Norris.

Norris is irrelevant when players who cannot defend have won the trophy

 

[Sky04]

Little tired. Just took a nap tho. Feeling better. HBU?

Explains your post.

 

[Rowlet]

To add on, there are a variety of reasons for this, including but not limited to defensemen playing more minutes, playing with more different guys on the team, and others.

Do you have any stats for league leaders in CFrel and FFrel? I can't think of any players who push play at a higher level than Hughes, I can't even think of where to find them that wouldn't be paywalled.

Also shoutout to Bouchard for his insane CFrel, any idea how that happened?

 

[Ghetty Green]

Explains your post.

You mad ?