Confirmed with Link: Faulk & 5th to STL for Edmundson, Bokk, 2021 7th

[Blueston]

Jay-Bo's age allows us to structure a very, very cap friendly contract though.

We can give him a contract that pays him league minimum in guaranteed money with a sizeable bonus for hitting the 10 game mark. The league minimum portion would count against the cap, but then if we are right up to the cap next year and he hits his 10 games played bonus, we can apply that bonus to the next season's salary cap (which should be easier to manage with the expiration of Steen, Allen, Bozak, Gunnar and Sanford's contracts). If we are looking to pinch pennies on D in order to fit in a Petro extension, Jay-Bo should be retained if he is still able to provide adequate play.

At league minimum that seems fine, but he is also over-played. Are we confident that team will reduce his role commensurate with his declining play?

 

[Blueston]

Great write up and presentation of stats.

Bouw-Parayko have been drastically outproducing their expected GF% going back well into last season. At this point, we probably have a 100+ game sample size of their actual GF% being double digits better than their expected GF%. At a certain point, I have to believe that their play style isn't properly analyzed by expected GF%. The eye test tells me that they are a great shutdown pairing and we have 100+ games of our goaltenders having a noticeably higher SV% with them on the ice. They are both such big bodies and clog passing lanes so well. My theory is that they do a wonderful job of preventing cross ice passes and clearing rebounds, so a big percentage of the high danger chances against are "less" dangerous than they usually are because they aren't being taken immediately after a pass or broken play. A goalie square to a shot from 10 feet out has a much higher chance of stopping it than a goalie who is sliding over for the same shot. But the current state of analytics counts those as the same value chance. Bouw-Parayko limiting the amount of times our goalies have to move pre-shot could very well explain how they consistently outperform their expected numbers by such a large margin. The sample size is just too big for me to believe it is luck when my eyes tell me they do a fantastic job defensively.

I think we sometimes confuse how effective JayBo-Parayko pair is with how effective Parayko is. If JayBo were still a league average defender that would be a better pair.

 

[MissouriMook]

I think we sometimes confuse how effective JayBo-Parayko pair is with how effective Parayko is. If JayBo were still a league average defender that would be a better pair.

This is just my opinion based on the eye test - I have no data to back this up - but I haven't really had an issue with JBo defensively this season. I believe he is still above average in that regard. But the SCF Game 7 first goal notwithstanding, JBo has been a black hole offensively for some time and it seems to be getting worse.

/hyperbole

His play from the point can only be described as a dump-in at this point even when we have established possession in the O-zone. About 95% of the shots he attempts to get on net are blocked and the ones where he attempts a "shot pass" off the end boards generally result in 50-50 pucks. I don't see why he even bothers to skate across the center red line anymore.

/end

 

[Brian39]

I think we sometimes confuse how effective JayBo-Parayko pair is with how effective Parayko is. If JayBo were still a league average defender that would be a better pair.

Colt has gotten better results paired with Bouw than he did with Petro. Every stat that paints Bouw in a poor light paints Parayko in an equally poor light. This idea that "Parayko is so amazing that he can carry anyone" idea is not really backed up by any data. He has consistently has played his best with JayBo and rushing Mikkola into a 22 minute a night role over fears of "overplaying" Jay-Bo is a recipe for a disasterous rookie season. Outside of Mikkola, you certainly aren't getting anything close to a league average defender for $1M against the cap.

I will vehemently disagree about Jay-Bo being a below league average defender. His gap closure and stick work to cover passing lanes are still excellent. He still at least average at clearing rebounds and he is a fine shot blocker. He is still very much an above average defender by NHL standards.

 

[TK 421]

When I iso on Bouw in games I'm always impressed with how many plays he breaks up and how good his coverage skills are. We are going to seriously miss this guy when he's done imo.

 

[Celtic Note]

Great write up and presentation of stats.

Bouw-Parayko have been drastically outproducing their expected GF% going back well into last season. At this point, we probably have a 100+ game sample size of their actual GF% being double digits better than their expected GF%. At a certain point, I have to believe that their play style isn't properly analyzed by expected GF%. The eye test tells me that they are a great shutdown pairing and we have 100+ games of our goaltenders having a noticeably higher SV% with them on the ice. They are both such big bodies and clog passing lanes so well. My theory is that they do a wonderful job of preventing cross ice passes and clearing rebounds, so a big percentage of the high danger chances against are "less" dangerous than they usually are because they aren't being taken immediately after a pass or broken play. A goalie square to a shot from 10 feet out has a much higher chance of stopping it than a goalie who is sliding over for the same shot. But the current state of analytics counts those as the same value chance. Bouw-Parayko limiting the amount of times our goalies have to move pre-shot could very well explain how they consistently outperform their expected numbers by such a large margin. The sample size is just too big for me to believe it is luck when my eyes tell me they do a fantastic job defensively.

We need a royal road stat to measure against, specifically in cross ice and change in direction plays

 

[shpongle falls]

Man I dunno Faulk is pretty solild I'd take him over Eddy all day even if he's a right handed shot. Contract is kind of iffy but we'll see how it plays out.

 

[Reality Czech]

When I iso on Bouw in games I'm always impressed with how many plays he breaks up and how good his coverage skills are. We are going to seriously miss this guy when he's done imo.

Absolutely. I don't get the criticism of Bouw from Blues fans. The reason he seems to get caught more often than other D is probably because he is on the ice in most key defensive situations. Look to see if he's on the ice the next time the Blues are down by 1 with less than a minute to go. We should be thankful that Bouwmeester is still so effective at his age, not trying to pay him close to league minimum next year. He deserves more than that for what he contributes.

 

[Brian39]

Absolutely. I don't get the criticism of Bouw from Blues fans. The reason he seems to get caught more often than other D is probably because he is on the ice in most key defensive situations. Look to see if he's on the ice the next time the Blues are down by 1 with less than a minute to go. We should be thankful that Bouwmeester is still so effective at his age, not trying to pay him close to league minimum next year. He deserves more than that for what he contributes.

My point is not that we should give him a contract that has an actual value at or near league minimum. My point is that we should take advantage of the rules in the CBA that allow the team to offer him easily obtainable bonuses and allow for bonus payments to be rolled into the following season's cap total if they would otherwise put the team over the cap in the year they are attained. So structure the contract as follows:

$1M salary
$2.5M bonus for 10 games played.

That is $3.5M in JayBo's pocket barring catastrophic injury with a $1M cap hit in 20/21. When he hits his bonus, every dollar of that $2.5M that would make us exceed the 20/21 salary cap will "rollover" and be applied as a cap hit for 21/22 (a year we have much more cap flexibility with Allen, Steen, Bozak, Sanford and Gunnar all coming off the books and replaced with a cheaper player or extended at a much cheaper rate).

You give him the total dollars he is worth structured in a way that allows you to have his cap hit minimized in a year we most need the cap space. If you are concerned about the league investigating for cap circumvention, remember that the league approved a 35+ contract to Iginla where he had a $1.8M base salary with $4.2M in easily obtainable bonuses in 2013/14. Those bonuses included a $3.7M bonus for reaching 10 games played. It was clearly and unambiguously designed to roll a cap hit into the following season and the NHL approved it.

 

[AjaxManifesto]

Man I dunno Faulk is pretty solild I'd take him over Eddy all day even if he's a right handed shot. Contract is kind of iffy but we'll see how it plays out.

Good take

 

[stl76]

The Faulk-JBo pairing has the 36% GF%, the Faulk-Petro pairing has an even 50% GF%

To me, the underlying numbers show that Faulk plays fairly solid for most of his TOI, it's just his mistakes are big ones that have generally ended up in the back of the net, and that ends up sticking on our minds more than a mistake that doesn't result in a goal against. If even a few of those big mistakes don't end up in our net, he'd probably have a much better perception on here in my opinion. He seems like he's caught in between not being an ideal fit and having a bit of bad luck in terms of bounces both for and against.

Good catch, thank you!

I think you are dead on with the bolded.

Excellent post! Thanks for all the work you put in. An old geezer like me who is new to advanced stats really appreciates
the comprehensive breakdown. This really helps!

Haha happy to help Simon. "Advanced" stats may seem unapproachable at first, but it just takes a little time to understand exactly that the stat actually measures.

For example, a player's CF% (corsi for percentage) is pretty simple: it compares the amount of shots on the opponent's net vs the amount of shots on his own net while a said player is on the ice. If a player's CF% is high (above 50%), it means that when he is on the ice more shots are hitting the opponents goalie/net than his own. A player's GF% (goals for percetage) just compares how many goals his team scores vs how goals are scored against his team while he is on the ice. Pretty straight forward so far.

Now let's compare a shot from the point vs a tap in goal from back door pass - obviously the back door tap in shot is more dangerous/likely to score but corsi considers them both just a shot on net. If the shot from the point is an apple and back door pass/tap in is an orange, then corsi often compares apples to oranges.

Stats like HDCF% (high danger corsi for percentage) and xGF% (expected goal for percentage) essentially try to improve on corsi by taking into account how dangerous a shot is and allow us to compare apples to apples. HDCF% works the same way as corsi (comparing number of shots on opponents net vs own net when a player/pairing is on the ice), but only counts shots taken from within a certain area around the net. This means that instead of comparing the back door tap in with the shot from the point, the tap in is compared to other shots that come from within a couple feet of the net. xGF% also takes into account how far away from the net the a shot comes from, but is a bit more complicated in that it tries to take into account additional factors (ex. is the shot off the rush, is the shot off a rebound, ect).

None of these stats are perfect, but once we understand what the letters and numbers actually mean, then we can compare them different stats and use them as a tool to better evaluate what we are seeing. For instance, we would generally expect a pairing that has a high HDCF% (more shots on opponents goal vs shots on their goal from within a couple feet) to also have a high GF% (more goals scored than given up). Looking back at the Faulk - Pietrangelo pairing however, they have a high HDCF% at 57.29 but their GF% is fairly low at exactly 50%...this is why I think they may have had some back luck! The eyetest still matters, but we can try to use these stats to help find blind spots.

If you have an Athletic subscription, this article is a very good read and does a great job breaking down what a lot of "advanced" stats actually measure - An advanced stat primer: Understanding basic hockey metrics

Great write up and presentation of stats.

Bouw-Parayko have been drastically outproducing their expected GF% going back well into last season. At this point, we probably have a 100+ game sample size of their actual GF% being double digits better than their expected GF%. At a certain point, I have to believe that their play style isn't properly analyzed by expected GF%. The eye test tells me that they are a great shutdown pairing and we have 100+ games of our goaltenders having a noticeably higher SV% with them on the ice. They are both such big bodies and clog passing lanes so well. My theory is that they do a wonderful job of preventing cross ice passes and clearing rebounds, so a big percentage of the high danger chances against are "less" dangerous than they usually are because they aren't being taken immediately after a pass or broken play. A goalie square to a shot from 10 feet out has a much higher chance of stopping it than a goalie who is sliding over for the same shot. But the current state of analytics counts those as the same value chance. Bouw-Parayko limiting the amount of times our goalies have to move pre-shot could very well explain how they consistently outperform their expected numbers by such a large margin. The sample size is just too big for me to believe it is luck when my eyes tell me they do a fantastic job defensively.

Yeah, Bouw - Parayko's xGF% is always going to be skewed due to their usage. It's just not really possible to have a high xGF% when you start so many shifts in your own zone against other team's top lines. It goes back to what I was saying to Simon, none of these stats are perfect.

The bolded definitely matches my personal eye test. How many times did we see Parayko out muscle a guy and clear a rebound trickling towards the goal line last playoffs alone? Bouw and Parayko do a great job clearing the crease, tying up sticks, knocking away rebounds and blocking shots. They generally seem to play a highly structured game which limits the "surprises" for the goalie and makes their life a lot easier.

Still, the difference between Parayko and Bouw's GF +/- vs xGF +/- is really remarkable. Faulk's is as well, tho in the opposite direction. Here are their individual 5v5 stats from Corsica:

	GF	GA	GF +/-	xGF	xGA	xGF +/-
Parayko	33	29	4	30.39	35.31	-4.92
Bouw	33	32	1	30.25	37.22	-6.97
AP	51	44	7	39.15	35.52	3.63
Faulk	35	42	-1	34.82	32.38	2.44

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

On a semi related note, this discussion lead to me finding out that Corsica is finally back up! FWIW Parayko and Bouw face toughest 5v5TOI%QoC on the Blues (Pietrangelo close 3rd).

 

[simon IC]

All the advanced stats (which I am grateful for being explained!) are not going to change my opinion on Justin Faulk. I just don't like the kind of defenseman he is. This may ruffle some feathers, so be it. he is a rushing defenseman. He wants to rush the puck up the ice in the offensive zone, and in the defensive zone he like to rush the puck carrier. He wants to do it all himself. This is just based on my eye test, which may be flawed, but generally has served me well for almost five decades. I have seen this type of defenseman before, and while they do have their upside, (and often make themselves popular with new fans), unless they are Bobby Orr or Paul Coffee, I think they are more of a liability than an asset. Just my two cents.

 

[Em etah Eh]

Bourayko?

How about Ray Jay?

 

[Brian39]

For example, a player's CF% (corsi for percentage) is pretty simple: it compares the amount of shots on the opponent's net vs the amount of shots on his own net while a said player is on the ice. If a player's CF% is high (above 50%), it means that when he is on the ice more shots are hitting the opponents goalie/net than his own. A player's GF% (goals for percetage) just compares how many goals his team scores vs how goals are scored against his team while he is on the ice. Pretty straight forward so far.

Just to nitpick a bit, Corsi is a measure of all shot attempts, not shots on the opponents net. "Corsi for" is the total of all blocked shots, shots high/wide and shots on goal taken while a player's team takes while he is on the ice. "Corsi against" is the total of all blocked shots, shots high/wide and shots on goal taken by the opponent while a player is on the ice. CF% is simply a player's corsi for divided by his corsi against (CF/CA).

One thing that often gets overlooked is that corsi was originally created as a quick way to calculate time of possession. Measuring possession time with a stop watch is a very time consuming process and is prone to error/bias since there are tons of plays every game where reasonable minds can disagree about whether a team has possession or there is a contested puck. However, people eventually compared a large sample of possession time against CF% and found that in the vast majority of games, a team's CF% was nearly identical to their share of possession time. Originally, Corsi wasn't intended to measure quality of possession or expected scoring. It was simply designed as a way to determine which team controlled possession without having to have a person sit and manually record possession with a stopwatch.

Since it was created and spread, it became clear that at the NHL level, time of possession was a huge predictor of future success and CF% exploded in popularity. But it was never designed to measure the quality of shot attempts. It is simply a shorthand measure of how much a player's team possesses the puck in a game.

 

[Blueston]

Just to nitpick a bit, Corsi is a measure of all shot attempts, not shots on the opponents net. "Corsi for" is the total of all blocked shots, shots high/wide and shots on goal taken while a player's team takes while he is on the ice. "Corsi against" is the total of all blocked shots, shots high/wide and shots on goal taken by the opponent while a player is on the ice. CF% is simply a player's corsi for divided by his corsi against (CF/CA).

One thing that often gets overlooked is that corsi was originally created as a quick way to calculate time of possession. Measuring possession time with a stop watch is a very time consuming process and is prone to error/bias since there are tons of plays every game where reasonable minds can disagree about whether a team has possession or there is a contested puck. However, people eventually compared a large sample of possession time against CF% and found that in the vast majority of games, a team's CF% was nearly identical to their share of possession time. Originally, Corsi wasn't intended to measure quality of possession or expected scoring. It was simply designed as a way to determine which team controlled possession without having to have a person sit and manually record possession with a stopwatch.

Since it was created and spread, it became clear that at the NHL level, time of possession was a huge predictor of future success and CF% exploded in popularity. But it was never designed to measure the quality of shot attempts. It is simply a shorthand measure of how much a player's team possesses the puck in a game.

Yes, Corsi is a crude proxy for possession. It generally feels most helpful to me in providing context for a player who doesn't put up a lot of points.

 

[Dbrownss]

My issue with advanced stats is that is seems like there's always a stat that counters another stat.

 

[Stealth JD]

My issue with advanced stats is that is seems like there's always a state that counters another stat.

Disbelief? Confusion? Drunkenness?

 

[Brian39]

My issue with advanced stats is that is seems like there's always a stat that counters another stat.

Hockey is a complex, fluid sport where teams very often switch back and forth between offense and defense 5+ times per minute. Every player in NHL history has flaws and holes in his game. There are too many variables that go into being an effective NHL player for everything to boil down nicely to a couple gold standard stats.

 

[Dbrownss]

Hockey is a complex, fluid sport where teams very often switch back and forth between offense and defense 5+ times per minute. Every player in NHL history has flaws and holes in his game. There are too many variables that go into being an effective NHL player for everything to boil down nicely to a couple gold standard stats.

That I know but my point was that is seems like when someone is using advanced stats to make an argument, I see someone come in, dismiss those stats and present another stat. I'm not against using them at all but it feels like if you "take a week off", you're left out of the loop of the newest metric

 

[Majorityof1]

That I know but my point was that is seems like when someone is using advanced stats to make an argument, I see someone come in, dismiss those stats and present another stat. I'm not against using them at all but it feels like if you "take a week off", you're left out of the loop of the newest metric

Its not about another new stats countering an old stat. Its about trying to paint a complete picture. Let's say you were the best artist in the world. I asked you to look at something, draw or paint it, but I only gave you one color. You can give the person a rough idea of the thing. The outline of it, but you miss many of the crucial details. The more colors I give you, the more you are able to fill in the nuances of the thing. Only with the full spectrum of colors at your disposal can you paint a true picture, and only one as good as your ability with those colors.

Stats are the same. CF% can give you an outline of something, but not what it is often used for. It merely says the the number of shot attempts for this players team
was this percentage of all shot attempts while that player was on the ice. It says that fairly incontrovertibly (aside from counting errors or quibbles with whether something was a shot attempt or pass, etc). People use it to outline a players performance. They use it as a proxy for possession, and that players effect on possession. It does not, and never purported to do that. It can be a basis or rough outline of that though. If you use more stats, you can start to fill in that outline more. How big is the sample size, how tough is the competition, how good are his linemates, does he drive possession or is he a passenger? As you get more stats the picture becomes more complete. Unfortunately, knowing which stats to use and what they mean, ie the skill of the artist, can drastically change the picture. So there is no replacing looking at the thing yourself (the eye-test), and using the best picture available (combination of stats) to reinforce your memory of that thing.

 

[Stealth JD]

moved from GDT so as not to derail that thread:

I'm not saying he won't be better and I'm not comparing him to JE either, but it's what we had with Shattenkirk without being one of the best PP QB's in the league. There was always an awkwardness of finding the right role for Shattenkirk. He wanted more, and once Parayko got here, Shatty was clearly 3rd pairing. Faulk is in an even more awkward spot because he won't be on the top PP unit.

Having 4 dmen competing for 2 or 3 PP spots, and 3 of them being RH, just makes things a bit awkward. I don't think we'd be that much worse off if Bortozzo was in for Faulk. I still don't mind what we gave up for Faulk, I just never liked the extension.

If Petro walks, it was a great proactive move by Army. If Petro stays, there's no reason to have a 3rd pairing guy paid $6.5M/year...especially with what he's bringing. There's zero chance of Faulk exiting until the Pietrangelo situation is resolved...but if/when that happens, there's no justification for paying $5M/year more on Faulk than Bortz to be your 3rd pairing RHD. Maybe he'll settle into a top-4 role on the left side after a full camp...but it's hardly stretch to suggest that for the role required of them today, lining up behind 27 & 55, Bortz is a better choice than Faulk. Chief isn't cutting Faulk's ice-time for no reason.

 

[bleedblue1223]

The Faulk extension only makes sense to me if Petro had no intention of coming back, like Tavares with the Islanders. If that's the case, then Parayko takes over the old Petro role, and Faulk takes over the old Shattenkirk role. If Petro is open to coming back, then the Faulk deal just makes it harder to get a deal done since it takes away so much of the cap for a potential 3rd pair guy.

 

[Stealth JD]

Might as well keep all of the Faulk-discussions in one place: From Dom at the Athletic:

14. Before the season started, the Blues made a puzzling sign-and-trade, acquiring Justin Faulk, a right-handed defenseman and immediately signing him to a seven-year deal paying him $6.5-million per season. It was a confusing move considering team captain Alex Pietrangelo’s deal would be up at season’s end, and the acquisition doesn’t look much better in hindsight. For the season the Blues have earned 51 percent of the expected goals with Faulk on the ice, but that’s in sheltered third-pairing minutes where he’s also been out-scored 49-38. Usually, that would be just plain old bad luck, but in Faulk’s case, it’s been the same story in every year of his career except last season.
None of that is ideal and he’s not bringing much offensive punch either, scoring 14 points in 60 games and just 0.46 points-per-60 at 5-on-5. That ranks 191st among defenders who’ve played over 300 minutes. It was an iffy move at the time and only looks worse now.

 

[MissouriMook]

Might as well keep all of the Faulk-discussions in one place: From Dom at the Athletic:

I'm not sure it changes anything else in those two paragraphs, but he has obviously not been watching this situation very closely if he thinks Faulk's deployment has been "sheltered third-pairing minutes." I think he's looked just fine, and more importantly like an upgrade over Eddy, when he has been played on the right side with a left shot partner. I will maintain that 90% or more of the issue with the failure of this experiment has been the off-side deployment of either Faulk or his partner. The extension looks bad at the moment, but was likely a necessary evil given the circumstances under which we acquired him.

 

[Alklha]

I'm not sure it changes anything else in those two paragraphs, but he has obviously not been watching this situation very closely if he thinks Faulk's deployment has been "sheltered third-pairing minutes." I think he's looked just fine, and more importantly like an upgrade over Eddy, when he has been played on the right side with a left shot partner. I will maintain that 90% or more of the issue with the failure of this experiment has been the off-side deployment of either Faulk or his partner. The extension looks bad at the moment, but was likely a necessary evil given the circumstances under which we acquired him.

Yeah, I don't think anyone should be overly concerned about Faulk until midway through next season.

Going into next season he'll have had a year to settle, had a full camp with no distractions and could well find himself with usage that he is more comfortable with. Even if he is just getting back to the ~35 point production range, Seattle will probably see value in that.

We need to remember that the cap is going to be closer to $90m than $80m for their first season in the League, and they won't have players at $9m+. $6.5m isn't a problematic salary, particularly for a RHD that could QB the PP for them.

Not saying that we should be hoping for Seattle to take him off our hands either, just that in that scenario that he would likely be the player Seattle want if we don't protect him.