Name That Defenseman

[MissouriMook]

I wanted to try a little Sociology Experiment within our Blues Board to see how well those of you who want to play along can do in identifying the Blues Defenseman based on some of their analytics from last regular season. All of the data below is from naturalstatrick.com and represents purely 5-on-5 data. Can you guess who each player is.

Defenseman	A	B	C	D	E
ATOI	19.19	18.31	18.05	17.57	14.32
CF%	49.41	45.21	53.13	50.19	55.21
FF%	50.28	45.88	52.96	50.28	54.07
GF%	55.17	50.75	55.46	45.74	61.45
xGF%	48.04	43.69	52.42	50.83	53.10
GF%-xGF%	7.13	7.06	3.04	-5.09	8.35
HDCF%	45.71	40.95	50.58	49.23	53.85
PDO	101.05	101.34	100.76	98.44	102.30
OnIceShoot%	7.96	8.19	9.65	6.91	9.27
OnIceSV%	93.09	93.15	91.11	91.53	93.03

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Click to read more...

 

[MissouriMook]

For those that might need a key with some of these stats:

ATOI - Average Time On Ice (again this is all 5-on-5)

CF% - Corsi For percentage (Corsi events for the Blues divided by all Corsi events)

FF% - Fenwick For percentage (Fenwick events for the Blues divided by all Fenwick events)

GF% - Goals For percentage (Goals scored by Blues while on ice divided by all goals scored while on ice)

xGF% - Expected Goals For percentage (xGoals for Blues while on ice divided by all xGoals while on ice)

GF%-xGF% - The difference between GF% and xGF%, a function of how lucky or unlucky you are (+ is lucky, - is unlucky)

HDCF% - High Danger Chances For percentage (High danger chances for Blues while on ice divided by all high danger chances while on ice)

PDO - On Ice Shooting Percentage plus On Ice Save Percentage, another factor of how lucky or unlucky you are (100 is average, >100 is lucky, <100 is unlucky)

 

[Alklha]

These stats are always interesting.

I am certain of A, C & E. I'm assuming I know who B & D are based solely on the ice-time & pairings.

E having such good underlying numbers, albeit in a sheltered role, makes me wonder about his trade value. Particularly considering his agent.

 

[Davimir Tarablad]

A and B are Parayko/JBo, the massive GF%-xGF% give it way with their heavily defensive deployment.

D is Faulk, I'm guessing due to the poor PDO and negative GF%-xGF%.

E is Dunn, mostly based on TOI

Which leaves Petro as C

 

[joe galiba]

I would guess E is Dunn, lower ice time with more scoring as he had a high % of offensive zone starts
I would guess D as Faulk only because of the negative GF% vs xGF%, and the negative PDO as to my eyeballs he seemed very unlucky
C - Petro ? probably not Parayko as the shooting % is too good
not sure on A or B

 

[BlueKnight]

A and B is Colt/Bouwmeester
C Petro
D Faulk
E Dunn

 

[Majorityof1]

Here is my thought process to help with your psychology. TOI makes this easier. Parayko gets most 5v5 time since he doesn't get much PP time. Faulk gets least of top 4. Dunn gets least total. So that ID's everyone but Pie and Bo. IIRC, Pie got the easier deployment last year, so his stats should be on average better. So he is the better of the middle ice time pair, or C.

A- Parayko, B - Jbo, C - Pie, D - Faulk, and E - Dunn.

 

[TruBlu]

Is this like Nioh 2 where you have to take into account the defense's diminishing returns following the hard cap on the physical damage stat? physical ki damage, skill ki damage, attack, etc?

 

[MissouriMook]

Is this like Nioh 2 where you have to take into account the defense's diminishing returns following the hard cap on the physical damage stat? physical ki damage, skill ki damage, attack, etc?

 

[Blueston]

As many have guessed already, I would think in order Parayko, JayBo, Petro, Faulk, and Dunn. And that is with Faulk having perhaps worst year of his career.

 

[MissouriMook]

First, let me say that you guys are good. Pretty much everyone was close, but @Majorityof1 nailed it first.

I wanted to put this exercise together because I believe that Faulk has room for improvement over his play in the regular season (which he openly admitted) but that he was not nearly as bad as many are making him out to be. Some may claim that the eye test disputes the analytics, but I think both are necessary to truly evaluate the player, and some of the data I was able to mine even gave me pause as to how he measured up against his teammates.

What I didn't add to the data in the exercise is the zone starts, because I thought that would give it away. O-Zone starts last season broke down as follows:

Dunn (62.54%), Petro (52.38%), Faulk (51.64%), JBo (41.69%) and Parayko (40.20%)

Here is how they compare in some of the metrics, best to worst:

Corsi For%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo
HDCF%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo
xGF%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo

Are you sensing a pattern here? What struck me most odd is that Faulk was the only one of our top five minutes eating defensemen to have a worse outcome on actual GF% than their expected GF%, and by a lot. I'm not sure what that means, but I would be interested in some theories. I'm pretty sure that like PDO, this is simply a matter of "luck", but I'm open to other theories.

Ultimately, the most meaningful optic presented here showed that the performance pretty much followed the players usage, and that none of them bucked a trend in terms of how O-Zone starts affected their outcomes as measured in these ways. My conclusion in all of this is that there is really no data to support a position that Faulk was (or will be in the future) significantly worse(nor better) than any of the other defensemen we rely on regularly. If we increase his O-Zone starts, we will probably get better results - just like everyone else. And if we reduce his O-Zone starts, we will probably get worse results - just like everyone else. There may be some inherent bias in these findings, because it always feels that way when you go looking for data and what you find proves your point, but I think the same can also be said about the eye test. He became a whipping boy pretty quickly, despite the fact that he was clearly not put in a position to succeed based on his usage, so every gaffe became magnified and most good plays got overlooked because you are now looking for data that proves your point.

 

[Blueston]

First, let me say that you guys are good. Pretty much everyone was close, but @Majorityof1 nailed it first.

I wanted to put this exercise together because I believe that Faulk has room for improvement over his play in the regular season (which he openly admitted) but that he was not nearly as bad as many are making him out to be. Some may claim that the eye test disputes the analytics, but I think both are necessary to truly evaluate the player, and some of the data I was able to mine even gave me pause as to how he measured up against his teammates.

What I didn't add to the data in the exercise is the zone starts, because I thought that would give it away. O-Zone starts last season broke down as follows:

Dunn (62.54%), Petro (52.38%), Faulk (51.64%), JBo (41.69%) and Parayko (40.20%)

Here is how they compare in some of the metrics, best to worst:

Corsi For%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo
HDCF%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo
xGF%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo

Are you sensing a pattern here? What struck me most odd is that Faulk was the only one of our top five minutes eating defensemen to have a worse outcome on actual GF% than their expected GF%, and by a lot. I'm not sure what that means, but I would be interested in some theories. I'm pretty sure that like PDO, this is simply a matter of "luck", but I'm open to other theories.

Ultimately, the most meaningful optic presented here showed that the performance pretty much followed the players usage, and that none of them bucked a trend in terms of how O-Zone starts affected their outcomes as measured in these ways. My conclusion in all of this is that there is really no data to support a position that Faulk was (or will be in the future) significantly worse(nor better) than any of the other defensemen we rely on regularly. If we increase his O-Zone starts, we will probably get better results - just like everyone else. And if we reduce his O-Zone starts, we will probably get worse results - just like everyone else. There may be some inherent bias in these findings, because it always feels that way when you go looking for data and what you find proves your point, but I think the same can also be said about the eye test. He became a whipping boy pretty quickly, despite the fact that he was clearly not put in a position to succeed based on his usage, so every gaffe became magnified and most good plays got overlooked because you are now looking for data that proves your point.

I think your luck explanation on Faulk is right.

And I would point out that Dunn played sheltered minutes while Parayko and JayBo typically matched up against opponents best.

 

[LGB]

First, let me say that you guys are good. Pretty much everyone was close, but @Majorityof1 nailed it first.

I wanted to put this exercise together because I believe that Faulk has room for improvement over his play in the regular season (which he openly admitted) but that he was not nearly as bad as many are making him out to be. Some may claim that the eye test disputes the analytics, but I think both are necessary to truly evaluate the player, and some of the data I was able to mine even gave me pause as to how he measured up against his teammates.

What I didn't add to the data in the exercise is the zone starts, because I thought that would give it away. O-Zone starts last season broke down as follows:

Dunn (62.54%), Petro (52.38%), Faulk (51.64%), JBo (41.69%) and Parayko (40.20%)

Here is how they compare in some of the metrics, best to worst:

Corsi For%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo
HDCF%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo
xGF%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo

Are you sensing a pattern here? What struck me most odd is that Faulk was the only one of our top five minutes eating defensemen to have a worse outcome on actual GF% than their expected GF%, and by a lot. I'm not sure what that means, but I would be interested in some theories. I'm pretty sure that like PDO, this is simply a matter of "luck", but I'm open to other theories.

Ultimately, the most meaningful optic presented here showed that the performance pretty much followed the players usage, and that none of them bucked a trend in terms of how O-Zone starts affected their outcomes as measured in these ways. My conclusion in all of this is that there is really no data to support a position that Faulk was (or will be in the future) significantly worse(nor better) than any of the other defensemen we rely on regularly. If we increase his O-Zone starts, we will probably get better results - just like everyone else. And if we reduce his O-Zone starts, we will probably get worse results - just like everyone else. There may be some inherent bias in these findings, because it always feels that way when you go looking for data and what you find proves your point, but I think the same can also be said about the eye test. He became a whipping boy pretty quickly, despite the fact that he was clearly not put in a position to succeed based on his usage, so every gaffe became magnified and most good plays got overlooked because you are now looking for data that proves your point.

Zone starts can be very misleading IMO. The stat you are referencing only compares OZ and DZ starts which leaves out the vast majority of the data as most of the time players start on the fly and another large percentage of the time they start in the neutral zone. Naturalstattrick.com has all of the zone start data but unfortunately only gives the percentages you referenced.

As an example here is a breakdown of Dunn's zone starts if you include on the fly and neutral zone starts:
OZs%: 14%
DZs%: 8.4%
NZs%: 15.4%
On the Fly: 62%

I agree with you that Faulk should have a better year next year though just based more on luck than deployment. To be honest though really just wanted to talk about Dunn because I think people discount him too much for his usage. To me all indications point towards Pietrangelo leaving and I think Dunn will need to have a much larger role moving forward.

 

[simon IC]

First, let me say that you guys are good. Pretty much everyone was close, but @Majorityof1 nailed it first.

I wanted to put this exercise together because I believe that Faulk has room for improvement over his play in the regular season (which he openly admitted) but that he was not nearly as bad as many are making him out to be. Some may claim that the eye test disputes the analytics, but I think both are necessary to truly evaluate the player, and some of the data I was able to mine even gave me pause as to how he measured up against his teammates.

What I didn't add to the data in the exercise is the zone starts, because I thought that would give it away. O-Zone starts last season broke down as follows:

Dunn (62.54%), Petro (52.38%), Faulk (51.64%), JBo (41.69%) and Parayko (40.20%)

Here is how they compare in some of the metrics, best to worst:

Corsi For%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo
HDCF%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo
xGF%: Dunn, Petro, Faulk, Parayko, JBo

Are you sensing a pattern here? What struck me most odd is that Faulk was the only one of our top five minutes eating defensemen to have a worse outcome on actual GF% than their expected GF%, and by a lot. I'm not sure what that means, but I would be interested in some theories. I'm pretty sure that like PDO, this is simply a matter of "luck", but I'm open to other theories.

Ultimately, the most meaningful optic presented here showed that the performance pretty much followed the players usage, and that none of them bucked a trend in terms of how O-Zone starts affected their outcomes as measured in these ways. My conclusion in all of this is that there is really no data to support a position that Faulk was (or will be in the future) significantly worse(nor better) than any of the other defensemen we rely on regularly. If we increase his O-Zone starts, we will probably get better results - just like everyone else. And if we reduce his O-Zone starts, we will probably get worse results - just like everyone else. There may be some inherent bias in these findings, because it always feels that way when you go looking for data and what you find proves your point, but I think the same can also be said about the eye test. He became a whipping boy pretty quickly, despite the fact that he was clearly not put in a position to succeed based on his usage, so every gaffe became magnified and most good plays got overlooked because you are now looking for data that proves your point.

I thought this was where you were heading as soon as I saw the thread title. I agree that Faulk will likely be better next season. (If there is one). I doubt that he will have a "breakthrough" season as some have predicted, largely because of his age. I think Faulks most productive years in terms, of offense, ae behind him. He can still contribute offensively, however, especially if paired with a solid partner and lots of PP time. What you will never convince me of, however, is that he is good defensively. My biggest concern with Faulk is that the style of play he employs does not age well, and his best offensive tallies are behind him. I also doubt that he has the hockey IQ to transform his game into that of a solid defensive player, something other defensemen have done in the later stages of their careers when they can no longer rely on their diminishing offensive skills. In short, I think Faulk's already declining offense will not be enough to justify his defensive liability, and that contract is not going to age well.

 

[CaliforniaBlues310]

I personally think Scandella(if Petro leaves) or Mikkola(if Petro stays) should be Faulk’s partner next year. He needs to be able to have someone cover him so he can play comfortably offensively. Dunn and Petro aren’t that guy.

While I don’t think his goal totals will go back to his past performance levels, he can still rack up assists based off who he’s feeding the puck to. Him having over 40 points next year if Petro leaves isn’t an obnoxious request, I don’t think. He’ll be on the second pair, and will have plenty more time on the PP.