Catching Up: The increasing pace of team adoption of hockey analytics

[Bear of Bad News]

http://www.sbnation.com/nhl/2013/10/21/4857618/nhl-stats-advanced-analytics-teams

A bit dated at this point (it's from October), but a really interesting team-by-team look at what franchises are doing in this area (sad to not see my Avalanche on the list, but not entirely surprised).

Click to read more...

 

[Bear of Bad News]

Related article, a Washington Post blog (Neil Greenberg) from December 25:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...owly-making-its-way-to-nhl/?tid=pm_sports_pop

 

[Beef Invictus]

Philly's insistence on playing goons who do nothing but drag the team down indicates they might not be taking this stuff seriously.

Rinaldo's performance this year should have earned him a bench spot while the team brought up some AHL guys to see if anybody at all can be better. Yet he still plays.

 

[hatterson]

Related article, a Washington Post blog (Neil Greenberg) from December 25:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...owly-making-its-way-to-nhl/?tid=pm_sports_pop

Obviously I'm thrilled at advanced stats being adopted in a wider view (granted corsi isn't that advanced from a mathematical standpoint, it's just addition and subtraction), but the David Perron image from the article kinda irked me.

As I said, it's great to see something like corsirel on a telecast, but my issue is having it just thrown out there without context. Yes a +14.2 corsi rel is usually a good thing, but what was his competition like? Who were his teammates? How was he deployed? etc. All of those have a dramatic effect on a players corsi. Now, it turns out that Perron plays fairly average minutes for the Oilers in terms of competition and deployment, and when you watch him play you can see that he's actually playing great.

But let's take a couple examples on the opposite end of the spectrum. Dion Phaneuf and Torey Krug. Phaneuf currently (as of last update on behindthenet) has a corsirel of -5.9 and Krug had a corsirel of +11.0. If we used the same stat line on the image it would be.

Phaneuf, 41gp, 17pts, -5.9 corsi relative
Krug, 40gp, 23pts, +11 corsi relative

That's obviously absurdly misleading given that Krug gets incredibly sheltered minutes and Phaneuf plays the hardest (or right near the hardest) minutes in the entire league.

I suppose my ultimate point is that the prime lesson from advanced stats is to not look at things in a vacuum. The reason goals, assists, points, especially +/- and others are misleading is because people look at them in a vacuum. They say things like "Player x scored more points than player Y therefore they're better offensively" or "player A has a better +/- than player B so they must be a better two way player"

The exact same pitfalls exist with corsi, corsirel, and the whole host of "common" advanced stats so when they're just spit out on a statline I don't think it really does anything to advance the image of advanced stats in the common viewers mind.

 

[hatterson]

Tim Murray, Buffalo's new GM was doing the local radio tour this morning and I heard his piece on WGR550. The guys there are generally into analytics (perhaps not as much as us, but we can hardly judge ) and analytic came up at the end of the interview.

http://audio.wgr550.com/a/85962030/1-10-tim-murray-joins-wgr.htm

Relevant section is at around 22:30

Seems that he believes analytics have their use, but doesn't sound as high on them as others. Implies they're more useful for those who don't know as much about hockey. Will be interesting how he interacts with the Sabres current analytics personnel.

 

[Mathletic]

Tim Murray, Buffalo's new GM was doing the local radio tour this morning and I heard his piece on WGR550. The guys there are generally into analytics (perhaps not as much as us, but we can hardly judge ) and analytic came up at the end of the interview.

http://audio.wgr550.com/a/85962030/1-10-tim-murray-joins-wgr.htm

Relevant section is at around 22:30

Seems that he believes analytics have their use, but doesn't sound as high on them as others. Implies they're more useful for those who don't know as much about hockey. Will be interesting how he interacts with the Sabres current analytics personnel.

The part on HNIC vs. analytics guys made me laugh. Like you said, should be interesting what happens to their analytics guys. Not sure how much of a say they had before that anwyays.

 

[BraveCanadian]

http://www.sbnation.com/nhl/2013/10/21/4857618/nhl-stats-advanced-analytics-teams

A bit dated at this point (it's from October), but a really interesting team-by-team look at what franchises are doing in this area (sad to not see my Avalanche on the list, but not entirely surprised).

You should offer your services.

 

[The Mighty Duck Man]

Tim Murray, Buffalo's new GM was doing the local radio tour this morning and I heard his piece on WGR550. The guys there are generally into analytics (perhaps not as much as us, but we can hardly judge ) and analytic came up at the end of the interview.

http://audio.wgr550.com/a/85962030/1-10-tim-murray-joins-wgr.htm

Relevant section is at around 22:30

Seems that he believes analytics have their use, but doesn't sound as high on them as others. Implies they're more useful for those who don't know as much about hockey. Will be interesting how he interacts with the Sabres current analytics personnel.

Or don't have the resources that a NHL team does. Given that Jay Feaster is apparently big into them and his track record, I wonder if that isn't pretty damn accurate. As flawed as these stats are, they are nice for fans, but corsi and fenwick are pretty flawed to judge individual players, and given the sheer amount of film, pro scouting and other things teams track, they probably don't do a whole lot for a hockey club. From a managerial standpoint, at least.

 

[Mathmew Purrrr Oh]

Or don't have the resources that a NHL team does. Given that Jay Feaster is apparently big into them and his track record, I wonder if that isn't pretty damn accurate. As flawed as these stats are, they are nice for fans, but corsi and fenwick are pretty flawed to judge individual players, and given the sheer amount of film, pro scouting and other things teams track, they probably don't do a whole lot for a hockey club. From a managerial standpoint, at least.

or a team could use CF% in their proper context, compile WOWYs and see which players are hurting there team far more than their boxcars would let on

I would say being able to identify anchors might be kinda useful....from a managerial standpoint, at least

 

[wgknestrick]

Or don't have the resources that a NHL team does. Given that Jay Feaster is apparently big into them and his track record, I wonder if that isn't pretty damn accurate. As flawed as these stats are, they are nice for fans, but corsi and fenwick are pretty flawed to judge individual players, and given the sheer amount of film, pro scouting and other things teams track, they probably don't do a whole lot for a hockey club. From a managerial standpoint, at least.

Almost every stat has value, but the problem is assigning too much value to a particular stat or failing to see that it is part of a "big picture".

I always think most NHL teams look at everything on a micro level instead of a "results" level IMO. This is why they don't seem to properly identify the dead weight (esp at the forward position). The dead weight is able to avoid detection during a micro level, film review, but are usually clearly identified by advanced stats at a macro level. They don't seem to do anything blatantly wrong, but also don't seem to do anything right either.

My team, PIT, keeps employing Craig Adams (5 years) and also went out and identified Tanner Glass as someone who they thought they needed a year ago. If anyone can shed light into how any rational person could make these decisions, please share.

 

[Sinochick]

I'm new to hockey analytics and this forum so this forum will be a fun read for me. I heard this on MvW podcast a few days ago that the NJ Devils have a job posting for a hockey analytics position and they do have a posting on their site:

Hockey Operations: Player Personnel/Scout
Director of Hockey Analytics - New Jersey Devils (Newark, NJ)
The New Jersey Devils are looking for someone with the passion, intelligence and experience to lead its hockey analytics group. The position reports directly to the President and General Manager, Lou Lamoriello. Interested applicants should have a deep understanding of both hockey and advanced data-centric techniques to analyze games, players, and rosters. Experience on/around the ice is a plus while a deep passion for NHL hockey is required. Experience in statistics, data science, econometrics, computer science, or other data-driven fields is a must. The position will office in the Prudential Center in Newark.
http://hockeyjobs.nhl.com/teamwork/jobs/jobskey.cfm?s=new+jersey#63219

 

[Bear of Bad News]

Interesting find with the job posting - I'm super-happy with my current role, otherwise it's something that I would probably apply for.

As far as the Avalanche are concerned, to answer the question above - I had some brief conversations (through an intermediary) several years back. At the time at least, they weren't interested (probably in me specifically).

 

[Bear of Bad News]

Edmonton Journal article on what the Oilers are doing (or not doing) in this realm:

http://blogs.edmontonjournal.com/2014/01/21/the-edmonton-oilers-are-not-doing-enough-with-analytics/