BinCookin's Defensive Scoring

[BinCookin]

My approximations for total season points based on these values:


Mike Green (misses ~5 games for current injury)
77 games, 14 goals + 29 assists = 43 points

Niklas Kronwall
68 games, 5 goals + 20 assists = 25 points

Dan DeKeyser
82 games, 4 goals + 12 assists = 16 points

Xavier Ouellet
67 games, 4 goals + 10 assists = 14 points

Alexey Marchenko
61 games, 2 goals + 11 assists = 13 points

Jonathan Ericsson
78 games, 1 goals + 10 assists = 11 points

Ryan Sproul
30 games, 2 goals + 6 assists = 8 points

Brendan Smith
25 games, 2 goals + 3 assists = 5 points

This will be interesting to revisit near year's end!

 

[Henkka]

This will be interesting to revisit near year's end!

Nice to check them at season end, how far the estimations did went.... injuries are impossible to predict, but I did cut 5 games off from Green and 10 off from Marchenko, Some off also from Kronwall and Ericsson. Most of them went to Sproul. 5 games for Smith and then he is gone.


But let's go back to our own "advanced" statistics, far far away from these stupid real points.

 

[njx9]

Lashoff makes no good plays per game
Lashoff makes one mistake per game.
This seems to be inline with exactly what you think he would provide, "boring moderately safe play" (him performing no good plays is why people hate him)(yet few appreciate that he is moderately safe)

He's barely on the ice and plays in fairly sheltered situations, I don't think the "safe" bit is surprising or particularly meaningful. But it also ignores the larger reasons behind why people dislike him.

That said, it's interesting to see the data continuing to reflect that E isn't a bad player when he's played appropriately. I'm still not sold he's particularly good (I mean, in an NHL-wide way), but he's certainly far, far from the boat anchor he was on the first pair.

Also, surprised (though happy) to see that XO has gotten immensely better at least in Henkka's data. His speed killed him early, and really magnified his (at the time, Smith-esque) mistakes, so it's interesting to see that he's either figured out how to play around it, or he's improved it. I'd be really happy to have been wrong about him, and for him to be a quality lower-pairing guy.

 

[Frk It]

He's barely on the ice and plays in fairly sheltered situations, I don't think the "safe" bit is surprising or particularly meaningful. But it also ignores the larger reasons behind why people dislike him.

That said, it's interesting to see the data continuing to reflect that E isn't a bad player when he's played appropriately. I'm still not sold he's particularly good (I mean, in an NHL-wide way), but he's certainly far, far from the boat anchor he was on the first pair.

Also, surprised (though happy) to see that XO has gotten immensely better at least in Henkka's data. His speed killed him early, and really magnified his (at the time, Smith-esque) mistakes, so it's interesting to see that he's either figured out how to play around it, or he's improved it. I'd be really happy to have been wrong about him, and for him to be a quality lower-pairing guy.

TZE said the other day that Green and Ericsson have been our best defenseman this season, and I would agree with that statement. Even as someone who has hated Ericsson the last 2 seasons.

Ouellet has been sheltered, but I think he has done a good job in his limited role. I think he has earned himself a spot in the top 6 for now.

 

[BinCookin]

TZE said the other day that Green and Ericsson have been our best defenseman this season, and I would agree with that statement. Even as someone who has hated Ericsson the last 2 seasons.

Ouellet has been sheltered, but I think he has done a good job in his limited role. I think he has earned himself a spot in the top 6 for now.

obviously QoC will effect the scores.

But overall

Green has been great (obviously)
Ericsson has been solid (surprisingly)
Sproul and Ouellet have both been impressive (on the bottom pair)
Kronwall has been playing well (on bottom pairing) according to my data. And seems to be a little snake bitten, but playing well on Henkka's scale. Even tthough people yell "kronwall sucks every thread".

Now tht does not at all imply our defense is "good".

I am just saying that several of our players are doing well in their roles.

Would be much much nicer to force everyone down a spot. But hey, I can only score people we have.

 

[njx9]

TZE said the other day that Green and Ericsson have been our best defenseman this season, and I would agree with that statement. Even as someone who has hated Ericsson the last 2 seasons.

Ouellet has been sheltered, but I think he has done a good job in his limited role. I think he has earned himself a spot in the top 6 for now.

I'd generally agree with that. I still wish E would play 'bigger', but I feel like that's such a minor complaint given his improvement this year (and it's based on fairly limited viewing, so maybe I've just missed the times he's thrown his weight around more).

Green has really been great, even beyond the offense. It does make me wonder what the real difference is for him, this season... Is it just that he's had a different role (and 20 second of increased PP time)?

obviously QoC will effect the scores.

But overall

Green has been great (obviously)
Ericsson has been solid (surprisingly)
Sproul and Ouellet have both been impressive (on the bottom pair)
Kronwall has been playing well (on bottom pairing) according to my data. And seems to be a little snake bitten, but playing well on Henkka's scale. Even tthough people yell "kronwall sucks every thread".

Now tht does not at all imply our defense is "good".

I am just saying that several of our players are doing well in their roles.

Would be much much nicer to force everyone down a spot. But hey, I can only score people we have.

Yeah, absolutely. And "players doing well in their roles" is still a massive step up from last year. Even the skate passing and horrific breakout, while not good seem to be better.

Either way, and even when I disagree with the findings (i.e. Lashoff), it's still great to have a way to go back and look at the previous games and the scoring. I wish there were a few more late games, but having been able to calibrate my 'scoring' against both of yours at least early on makes this a lot easier to look at now, and have an understanding of what's going on.

 

[InGusWeTrust]

baby steps.....amirite?

 

[SpookyTsuki]

TZE said the other day that Green and Ericsson have been our best defenseman this season, and I would agree with that statement. Even as someone who has hated Ericsson the last 2 seasons.

Ouellet has been sheltered, but I think he has done a good job in his limited role. I think he has earned himself a spot in the top 6 for now.

At this point Ericsson is trending downward. He was fine early in the year. But now he needs to pick up the pace or he's gonna go back into I shouldn't be here

Now it's just green and the "sheltered dmen" whichever one for the best dmen on this team

 

[Henkka]

At this point Ericsson is trending downward. He was fine early in the year. But now he needs to pick up the pace or he's gonna go back into I shouldn't be here

Now it's just green and the "sheltered dmen" whichever one for the best dmen on this team

Ericsson is that 3rd pair guy who is a bit sheltered now. And looks like a shiny new toy, surprise! That's what easier qualcomp does for every defencemen in hockey.

Ouellet started from 3rd pair, as sheltered too, but has been promoted to 2nd pair and doing better all the time.

That's. Real. Development.

 

[Henkka]

Updated forward ranks after the Anaheim game. Haven't watched TBL game yet.

Now players in Total Points/game order

Player, Goals+Assists, AllAttempts(Quality)+AssistedAttempts(Quality), Screens+OtherOffPlay+OtherDefPlay = Total

1. LW Tomas Vanek (10.0 Total points/Game), 21 games, 5+12, 56(30)+49(22), 21+6+3 = 210
Vanek has been an offensive beast. Keeps going with high rate of quality scoring chances, has total of 30+28=58 of them and has second highest per game rate. His chances also have transferred to points a little bit better rate than they should. But those always very dangerous and smart plays. Doesn't have much of intangibles (especially defensive), he concentrates only on offence.

2. C/LW Zetterberg (9.34 Total points/Game), 32 games, 6+15, 72(28)+93(39), 13+22+11 = 299
Henrik Zetterberg has cooled a bit down, at same time it has happened to Mantha. Has now 6 goals and 15 assists. He has also had 72 total Scoring attempts including goals and Quality chances. 28 of them have been Quality chances including goals. He has had 93 total Assisted scoring attempts, including assists and assists for Quality chances. 39 of his assists have been for Quality Chances, including "real" assists. He has also 13 screen plays and 22 Other Offensive plays, which have been are 6 Forecheking plays, 9 Key Faceoff wins and 7 drawn penalties. He has also had 11 good defensive plays, with 8 key takeaways (preventing opposite scoring chance) and has blocked 3 shots. 299 points total on my scale.

3. C/LW Dylan Larkin (8.97 Total points/game), 32 games, 10+3, 103(39)+73(22), 5+24+8 = 287
Larkin has had 39 Quality Chances and 22 Assisted Quality Chances. He has been a lucky with his scoring, has scored more goals than he should, but he has a lot less assists than he should. These will even out on long run. Of his 5+24+8 intangibles, 5 were screens, 10 were Forecheking plays, 4 Key Faceoffs, 10 Drawn penalties, 5 Good defensive plays and 3 blocked attempts.

4. RW Gustav Nyquist (8.50 Total Points / Game), 32 games, 4+13, 73(38)+79(37), 8+9+11 = 272
Nyquist has rised up on latest games on the team standings from 7th best to 4th best forward in my Scoring Chance points /Game rating. He has 37 assisted Quality scoring chances, which is second most after Zetterberg's 39. He has 75 combined Quality Chances + Assists.

5. W Anthony Mantha (8.44 Total points /Game), 18 games, 4+5, 47(25)+29(13), 16+9+4 = 152
Mantha has cooled a bit down in latest games. Was the team leader in per /game average very long, but maybe the NHL game wear is also hitting him, like it has been already hit on others. His advantage is now gone and we see the real level of effort from him. Still pretty good numbers. And lots of quality, 3rd most of his plays are quality, only Vanek and Nyquist do better.

6. W Tomas Tatar (8.22 Total points/Game), 32 games, 7+7, 91(50)+52(15), 12+19+10 = 263
Tatar has had 50 Quality chances, which is highest total amount in our team. 15 Assisted Quality chances. Despite the hattrick, his puck luck still has been kind of unsustainable, he should have had 2-3 extra goals to match normal averages. Has most post shots by 4. Tatar also has had 13 forecheking plays, which is team-high of our forwards and also 10 good defensive plays. He has been solid and that fan critisism is just more correlated to Red Wings fans Hockey IQ than Tatar's season effort.

7. C Frans Nielsen (8.16 Total points/Game), 32 games, 7+10, 65(32)+66(26), 7+22+26 = 261
Nielsen has been on huge rise on my point scale after last check-out. That adjustment period after World Cup looks like it's far behind and he is thriving especially in defensive statistics. It could also be signal of our team going worse and Frans has to break more plays than he usually did. But other players stats aren't in high rise as his are.

8. C Darren Helm (6.94 Total points/Game), 17 games, 4+3, 35(19)+15(6), 5+18+13 = 118
Helm has same stats as in last check. Still injured.

9. W Justin Abdelkader (6.45 Total points/game), 22 games, 4+4, 32(19)+31(6), 27+11+8 = 142
Same with Abdelkader. Injured

10. F Andreas Athanasiou (5.89 Total points/game), 18 games, 5+1, 38(17)+22(10), 3+8+2 = 106
Athanasiou thriwes on offensive statistics, but is lacking those other intagibles on his play. His defence isn't good and other offensive intangibles are missing. Those can be learnt, his offensive skills never will disappear anywhere. Will be full-time TOP6 forward pretty soon. Athanasiou's Quality/60 is 4th highest in the team, behind Vanek, Nyquist and Mantha.

11. C/RW Glendening (5.72 Total points/game), 32 games, 1+8, 50(15)+27(11), 15+18+38 = 183
Glendening has been doing even better than on last check. He really does those dirty things and is best defensive player to prevent opposite scoring chances. He also has had some creativity at this season, and when he was promoted to TOP3 lines it didn't look at all so stupid move on my statistics. He did create those Quality scoring chances for Ott and Miller and had them more than guys like Helm and Sheahan had at TOP3 lines. It was deserved. He has 71 intangibles (15 screens, 11 forecheking plays, 4 key faceoff which lead to scoring chance, 3 drawn penalties, 11 good defensive plays, 16 key blocked attempts, 11 good PK-plays) is the team-high and 38 good defensive plays is the clear TOP figure as the best defensive forward in our team.

12. F Riley Sheahan (5.66 Total points/game), 32 games, 0+5, 63(25)+22(7), 27+14+18 = 181
Sheahan -case of the weirdest ones I've witnesses for a while. He is working hard there. He has been better on his last 10 games, than he was on the first 24 games. He has scoring chances and attempts just like others, but nothing goes in. Absolutely nothing. From 25 chances he should have had 4-5 goals. Tatar snake-bit is nothing compared to this situation. And he wroks hard, goes net-front, retrievs pucks, defends, blocks, makes key penalty kill plays. He is currently another Luke glendening, whi just can't finihs. But there's more finishing ability in him. We have seen that. Shot is good, just confidence is gone. But guy is doing some work down there. Is not a lazy-ass.

13. W Tomas Jurco (4.56 Total points/game), 9 games, 0+0, 15(9)+9(1), 2+1+4 = 41
Jurco is like poor man's Athanasiou, speed and flash, but can't find the net anyhow. That missed breakaway empty-net was probably his career turning point. Like, he has had 9 Quality chances and that's great number on small sample size, but you have to score if there's no intangibles on your play. He is just a borderline 13th guy in many different stat factors (also plays/60), so I think he does not have anything to give for this organization on long run. Trade bait on the dealine, if someone interested. When any other other of our TOP12 is on the ice, things happen more per ice-time.

14. F Steve Ott (3.50 Total points/game), 28 games, 2+1, 20(8)+23(8), 6+9+21 = 98
15. W Drew Miller (2.81 Total points/game), 21 games, 2+0, 19(7)+10(5), 3+4+9 = 59
16. LW Tyler Bertuzzi (2.14 Total points/game), 7 games, 0+0, 5(1)+5(0), 0+3+1 = 15

 

[Winger98]

Sproul and Ouellet have both been impressive (on the bottom pair)
Kronwall has been playing well (on bottom pairing) according to my data. And seems to be a little snake bitten, but playing well on Henkka's scale. Even tthough people yell "kronwall sucks every thread".

XO has looked really good for stretches this year. The guy has really surprised me as I thought his weak skating was going to be a death knell for him. As it is, both he and Sproul look more like NHLers than I ever thought Kindl looked. Low bar, maybe, but it's something.

And I wonder how much Kronwall's past is held against him. All of us remember that smooth skating bone cruncher back there. At times it's just hard seeing what he is now, regardless of how effective he still is.

 

[BinCookin]

Figured I should Update my post, as it has been a few months:

View attachment 94375

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1q4VrVqT940wR2V_qhhCxR5h9HDQqcTmnwINkfIRtUcw/edit#gid=0

The rating for most good plays per game Is led by:

Green (who has a wide lead) over
Sproul
Smith
Ericsson
Kronwall
Jensen

Ranking by Safety (Leastt mistakes per game)
Ouellet
Jensen
Kronwall
Russo
Ericsson
DDK
Green

Sproul
Marchenko
Smith

Most mistakes by Marchenko//Smith


On a Net Basis This is how I rate our D men:

1) Green
(wide Gap)
2) Kronwall
3) Ericsson
4) Jensen
(decent Gap)
5) Xav. Ouellet
6) Sproul
(decent Gap)
7) DDK (There should be an * here that he is on the top pairing, and thus is artificially lower as he clearly should not be on tthe top pairing)
(decent Gap)
8)Russo
9) Marchenko
10) Smith
11) Lashoff

The Organization has choosen to cut Smith and Marchenko... And I must say my stats agree with that choice!
Jensen has been a nice surprise.

 

[Henkka]

Thanks a lot for the update. Matches pretty well with my eye-test too.

 

[Frk It]

Artificially lower... lol.

 

[Mijatovic]

I am surprised Jensen so low on the offensive end. I feel he jumps in the play quite regularly compared to the other blokes.

 

[BinCookin]

I am surprised Jensen so low on the offensive end. I feel he jumps in the play quite regularly compared to the other blokes.

I think Jensen is "really" noticeable. Like when he joins the play, he forechecks himself. And joins the rush a lot.
The bulk of his marked +'s from me are for these plays. He usually plays pretty standard in his own end, or uses the boards a lot so doesn't earn a lot of +'s from break out passes.

Ericsson and Kronwall, as much as people REALLY seem to remember whenever they make mistakes, are quite good with stretch passes, or solid first passes out of the zone. Kronwall additionally jumps into the play for closer than normal point shots every now and then to gain +'s.

Jensen provides a different style. And it is nice and refreshing. I think being 4th in my list is not so much an insult to Jensen, but rather that Kronwall is being savagely underrated by our board currently.

Yes hes slow, but hes throwing 1-2 really solid passes per game (like Z) that are high difficulty or directly lead to scoring chances, and im forced to mark him down as making plays. For what ever reason, no one seems to mention these plays ever, and just worry that Kronwall looks slow in his own end. I should note Kronwall is not actually making many mistakes in his own end, he just seems slow if vs a really fast skater.

 

[njx9]

Yeah, I think Kronwall's the only real surprise in your list, but I wonder if that's a symptom of him having had a couple of really, really bad plays when he first came back in that have sort of set the tone for his performance the rest of the way? It's also really easy to overlook the break out passes if you're not explicitly looking for them, while it's really hard to miss a guy skating around a slow defenseman (it took me a while and some focused watching to not be so sour on XO, after he was essentially a pylon to start the season).

It could, of course, also just be another symptom of the chronic, forced mis-usage of all of the team's D pairings.

 

[vladdy16]

Awesome to have a substantive take around here.

I think you have to weight and consider surrendering the defensive zone and in the d-zone more heavily. Players like Jensen not only lose board battles, but often surrender their coverage and collapse towards the net, not to mention conservative gaps leading to easy zone entries.

How many passes does the opposition complete after entering the zone on a specific d-man's side? How much zone time as a result? Scoring chances as the result of lost/blown/passive coverage, not just turnovers. I also think a wider gradiation for the point system might help. A dman misfiring a pass on a regroup in the neutral zone is pretty inconsequential, whereas a lazy clear that bounces in front of your own net is like a -5 or something.

Sincerely no disrespect to the work you've put in, it's a great way of looking at things and I think you've definitely got your finger on the pulse of what our coach specifically, and the modern NHL as a whole is looking for from some of it's d-men.

I just think your system as it stands is weighted to favor offensive minded puck movers. The league has been skating circles around the Wings this year, and no amount of stretch passes or jumps into the rush are going to stop that. The primary priorities of a defensemen are to minimize scoring chances against and gain possession of the puck. If the opposition hems you in for a whole shift, and you finally jump on a loose puck and make a breakout pass while they go for a change, that shouldn't net you a +shift.

Props though, just brainstorming a bit, because that Kronwall-Jensen pairing for example, I have a much different impression of than your numbers would indicate.

 

[BinCookin]

Awesome to have a substantive take around here.

I think you have to weight and consider surrendering the defensive zone and in the d-zone more heavily. Players like Jensen not only lose board battles, but often surrender their coverage and collapse towards the net, not to mention conservative gaps leading to easy zone entries.

How many passes does the opposition complete after entering the zone on a specific d-man's side? How much zone time as a result? Scoring chances as the result of lost/blown/passive coverage, not just turnovers. I also think a wider gradiation for the point system might help. A dman misfiring a pass on a regroup in the neutral zone is pretty inconsequential, whereas a lazy clear that bounces in front of your own net is like a -5 or something.

Sincerely no disrespect to the work you've put in, it's a great way of looking at things and I think you've definitely got your finger on the pulse of what our coach specifically, and the modern NHL as a whole is looking for from some of it's d-men.

I just think your system as it stands is weighted to favor offensive minded puck movers. The league has been skating circles around the Wings this year, and no amount of stretch passes or jumps into the rush are going to stop that. The primary priorities of a defensemen are to minimize scoring chances against and gain possession of the puck. If the opposition hems you in for a whole shift, and you finally jump on a loose puck and make a breakout pass while they go for a change, that shouldn't net you a +shift.

Props though, just brainstorming a bit, because that Kronwall-Jensen pairing for example, I have a much different impression of than your numbers would indicate.

I understand what you're saying.
I am sure there are many ways to do some really nice counting of statistics related to our D men. I would be willing to do a really exhaustive analysis if i were on the payroll

I can tell you my subjective feelings about each D men from my rudimentary analysis though.

For Offensive abilities I would have to give a "good score" to

Green, who is by far the most offensive D man we have.
After that most of our D men provide very little in the offensive zone.

Jensen has jumped into a few plays recently
Sproul had some flashes early, but not much consistency
Kronwall is slow, but makes solid passes

Overall offensively we are really lacking.


Defensively most of our D men are below average as well.

IMHO Ericsson has played well this year (before injury)
And by played well i mean "ok" for a 2nd pairing D man.

Dekeyser has played generally poorly on the top pair (I think he would do much better on a 2nd pairing, or would play very well on a third pairing).

Green i think has played Ok on the top pairing defensively. And this is really much better than anyone in WSH would have expected.


IMHO Green is a legit #2 (top pairing D man)

I do think XO and Jensen have played well for 3rd pairing D men. This is good as they are very cheap replacements for Marchenko and Smith.
Who i rated as very mistake prone.

I should note that if i gave "many minuses" for horrible mistakes. Smith would have been even worse than his current near last rating. And I think his offensive abilities were not that great.

My overall position is we made a good choice moving on from Smith and Marchenko. And I think Signing Jensen was a solid move.