Prediction Contest: Nylander Points Total: 2018-19

[LeafingTheWay]

Sens fan here in peace. Something to consider here. Last year he had a PDO of 104. That is a lot of luck on his side. This year he has a pdo of 95.3. Luck is not on his side(yet).

We had the same issue with duchene last year. He had a slump to start but he was actually playing very well. You wouldn't know that by the stat watchers who are the worlds biggest keyboard warriors. His PDO was awful in first 20 games as a sen. Since his pdo normalized he has been beasting hovering at a hair above PPG.

The point is, there is zero reason to panic on this guy. Nylander is a very good possession player and he will undoubtedly pile up points again sometime in the near. He is way to skilled and getting way to unlucky so far for this streak to be normal for him.

Relax boys, he is gonna be just fine. Maybe a hair over paid, but it really is more a to-may-to vs to-mat-to kind of perception there.

Thank you for bringing common sense into this board. As you can see, majority of Leaf fans are impatient and overreact for everything.

I have been preaching about PDO and on-ice sh% for the past 4 years. I have the same arguments every year explaining PDO and related stats, and it always, always works out in the end.

 

[LeafingTheWay]

Still spouting the CF numbers to defend William I see.

IMO here are the numbers that actually matter.

	GP	W	L	OT	PT
Pre-WN	28	20	8	0	40		0.714
Current	45	28	15	2	58		0.644
Post WN	17	8	7	2	18		0.529

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Probably just a coincidence, but a couple of posters keep citing stats about how well they are playing since WN returned.

Apparently they are not.

I don't know what or who you're referring to when you say "how well they are playing since WN returned". I have never said that. I have said Nylander has great possession and zone-entry stats since returning. I have said Nylander has been unlucky and in a slump. I have said Kadri has been unlucky and in a slump. I have said Matthews has been unlucky and in a slump. Heck, I've even said the Leafs team itself has been unlucky and in a slump.

Let me explain the Leafs season so far. They started with an insanely high PDO and sh%. It was literally unsustainable. I mean come'on, you didn't even need stats to realize this. Marner, Tavares and Rielly at a 150 point pace. Matthews at a 75 goal pace. Kapanen at a 30 goal 60 point pace. Etc. Heck the Leafs team was dominating in possession and dominating other teams. Did you honestly think they would keep up that play? As the season progressed, they have been regressing more and more to the mean. They STILL have the 2nd highest PDO at 103 and the 2nd highest sh% at 10.1%. Tampa's pretty high too, they'll regress a bit as well. So buckle up buddy, regression to the mean is NEVER fun with Leaf fans because of how they overreact.

And guess what? Boston has the 2nd lowest sh% in the league (Really high sv% though) They're going to climb to the mean/normal slowly by slowly. Statistically, Boston is going to surge in 2nd half of season. Do I hope the Leafs finish ahead? Of course, but we'll see.

 

[LeafingTheWay]

Since he's come back, there are moments where Nylander looks a little Nail Yakupov out there. Not suggesting he's a non NHL bust, but he just goes out there with this sneaky lazy game where he's moving his feet a million miles an hour, whipping his stick on flybys, looking busy, skating like he's being chased by bees but gets nothing done and bails on the puck and play the moment he sees someone's shadow.

I know what you're trying to say, but Yakupov was the opposite. He was super-fast and super hard-working. But he had low hockey IQ and terrible positioning.

 

[Stephen]

I know what you're trying to say, but Yakupov was the opposite. He was super-fast and super hard-working. But he had low hockey IQ and terrible positioning.

Yeah, not the same exactly, but just this high rep flailing where things look like they're getting done or should get done, but nada.

 

[MyBudJT]

I don't know what or who you're referring to when you say "how well they are playing since WN returned". I have never said that. I have said Nylander has great possession and zone-entry stats since returning. I have said Nylander has been unlucky and in a slump. I have said Kadri has been unlucky and in a slump. I have said Matthews has been unlucky and in a slump. Heck, I've even said the Leafs team itself has been unlucky and in a slump.

Let me explain the Leafs season so far. They started with an insanely high PDO and sh%. It was literally unsustainable. I mean come'on, you didn't even need stats to realize this. Marner, Tavares and Rielly at a 150 point pace. Matthews at a 75 goal pace. Kapanen at a 30 goal 60 point pace. Etc. Heck the Leafs team was dominating in possession and dominating other teams. Did you honestly think they would keep up that play? As the season progressed, they have been regressing more and more to the mean. They STILL have the 2nd highest PDO at 103 and the 2nd highest sh% at 10.1%. Tampa's pretty high too, they'll regress a bit as well. So buckle up buddy, regression to the mean is NEVER fun with Leaf fans because of how they overreact.

And guess what? Boston has the 2nd lowest sh% in the league (Really high sv% though) They're going to climb to the mean/normal slowly by slowly. Statistically, Boston is going to surge in 2nd half of season. Do I hope the Leafs finish ahead? Of course, but we'll see.

I'm sooooooo tired hearing about 'Zone Entry' Stats and how 'Elite' Nylander is at it....

Nobody except for people trying to claim that Nylander is an elite player uses this statistic... Name me one other player where people will use this statistic to explain how good that player is... Nobody cares, and it doesn't seem to necessarily have a strong correlation with offensive production.

 

[LeafingTheWay]

I'm sooooooo tired hearing about 'Zone Entry' Stats and how 'Elite' Nylander is at it....

Nobody except for people trying to claim that Nylander is an elite player uses this statistic... Name me one other player where people will use this statistic to explain how good that player is... Nobody cares, and it doesn't seem to necessarily have a strong correlation with offensive production.

You'll see the entire hockey stats community using and loving zone entries and zone exits. Just because you don't care about how it, doesn't make it useless. If you choose to be ignorant about those type of stats, then go ahead.

Controlled zone entries and zone exits are one of the few stats out there that actually have a strong correlation to how good a player is.

 

[HamiltonNHL]

Nylander ... here is your goalie next year.

 

[PromisedLand]

Why is this poll asking about his point totals? that is stupid.

just please make it about corsi and zone-entires

 

[MyBudJT]

You'll see the entire hockey stats community using and loving zone entries and zone exits. Just because you don't care about how it, doesn't make it useless. If you choose to be ignorant about those type of stats, then go ahead.

Controlled zone entries and zone exits are one of the few stats out there that actually have a strong correlation to how good a player is.

Or perhaps you can spend time to explain why it matters... Why don't we see other fanbases raving about their players who are strong at zone entries?

How does it explain that 1G and 3P in 17 games isn't something to be concerned about?

 

[Throw More Waffles]

Why is this poll asking about his point totals? that is stupid.

just please make it about corsi and zone-entires

No kidding.

I would like some new polls.

In nhl history, who is everyone's favourite zone entry player? Please list names below. Mine? William Nylander. Why? Because he's the only player I know where I've ever even heard it f***ing talked about.

 

[Ignatius Reilly]

Zero chance. Leafs will match any OS that comes but I doubt any come. Willie will be tradeable even if he sh1ts the bed for the rest of the year. The Canes love this guy and think he is part of the solution to their scoring problems.

Not so sure about that.

3 months ago I know I loved this guy and thought he was part of the solution to us moving forward in the playoffs.

Much more of this sort of production and the Canes and everyone else will be thinking differently.

We threw $7 ish at him because we all thought he would continue to get better. Instead, he's kinda dropped off a cliff so far. We complain about $6 for Marleau, but so far this year he's been giving us 2.5 times as many P/GP.

We're at 17 games now. Is this still a small sample size?

 

[LeafingTheWay]

Or perhaps you can spend time to explain why it matters... Why don't we see other fanbases raving about their players who are strong at zone entries?

How does it explain that 1G and 3P in 17 games isn't something to be concerned about?

There is a lot in hockey analytics out there that the common hockey fan doesn't know about. And that's fine because analytics in hockey hasn't been as popular for fans as it is in soccer, basketball, football, baseball, etc. Hockey fans are still in the mentality 'Stats can' t be used in hockey, it's too complex!' That's why you'll see more of fans of those other sports having more knowledge of underlying numbers, as opposed to fans of hockey. In hockey, people seem to only care about what they remember seeing and point totals only. Doesn't matter how you get the points, only that you got them. Isn't that odd?

The main reason analytics is crucial is to let people know the context and what's really going on, instead of simply guessing. If it were up to Leaf fans, Marner wouled've been traded last year, Kadri a long time ago, Rielly 2 years ago and Nylander at the start of the season.

What's Nylander's context to explain his situation?
Players with high controlled entries have a much stronger correlation to higher danger scoring chances and double the amount of unblocked shots. Possession stats such as expected goals (xGF%) and normal CF% are also indicators of future sucess among players. Very low on-ice sh% which is unsustainably low. His linemates are in their biggest slumps of the season, combined with his slump. So unless we think Matthews, Kadri, Marleau all suck at goal-scoding, we are in the midst of an unlucky dry-spell as shown by the oish%.

PM me if you want and I can explain further if wanted. I'm on my phone currently, but here are some links for your reference to check out:

Measuring the Importance of Individual Player Zone Entry Creation

Why Zone Entries and Exits Matter

 

[Maplebeasts]

You'll see the entire hockey stats community using and loving zone entries and zone exits. Just because you don't care about how it, doesn't make it useless. If you choose to be ignorant about those type of stats, then go ahead.

Controlled zone entries and zone exits are one of the few stats out there that actually have a strong correlation to how good a player is.

Preach! The people harping on Nylander have demonstrated little to no patience on the matter and their understanding of the game and player quality comes purely from how many points they have. They either don't care how the player contributes in other areas of the game or are willfully being ignorant to push their own personal biases on to others. Nylander has been a great possession player his whole career and is one of the team's best in the neutral zone. He has a history of good to great production and fans here forget that. Nylander not having many points yet is a combination of coming back mid season combined with unsustainably low OISH. Everyone in the stats community knows that it is eventually going to turn around, as it always does. I hope it does turn around soon so we don't need to bear with these ignoramuses and have all of our threads polluted with their repetitive, uninformed crap.

 

[mclaren55]

Preach! The people harping on Nylander have demonstrated little to no patience on the matter and their understanding of the game and player quality comes purely from how many points they have. They either don't care how the player contributes in other areas of the game or are willfully being ignorant to push their own personal biases on to others. Nylander has been a great possession player his whole career and is one of the team's best in the neutral zone. He has a history of good to great production and fans here forget that. Nylander not having many points yet is a combination of coming back mid season combined with unsustainably low OISH. Everyone in the stats community knows that it is eventually going to turn around, as it always does. I hope it does turn around soon so we don't need to bear with these ignoramuses and have all of our threads polluted with their repetitive, uninformed crap.

I don’t think people are being impatient. I think people are frustrated that a player wasted half a season over a contract he was rumoured to have been offered in August, and reported to the team completely out of shape.

That being said, he has showed dramatic improvement. He is feeling the puck more and his speed and timing are starting to come back. I’ve basically written this season off for him, but look forward to what we see next year. Having seen him play live multiple times both in the AHL and NHL, he is special. It’s rare you get a player that has his poise.

 

[Confucius]

Still spouting the CF numbers to defend William I see.

IMO here are the numbers that actually matter.

	GP	W	L	OT	PT
Pre-WN	28	20	8	0	40		0.714
Current	45	28	15	2	58		0.644
Post WN	17	8	7	2	18		0.529

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Probably just a coincidence, but a couple of posters keep citing stats about how well they are playing since WN returned.

Apparently they are not.

oh come on just imagine how bad our record would be if William didn't finally sign.

 

[dmac87]

My biggest gripe about advanced stats is when people place a higher value on them than real production. On twitter I will see a lot of "Nylanders CF% and xGF% were better than marners so therefore he played better." Meanwhile marners over there like uhh yeah I just got 3 assists.

Also the "unlucky" aspect with a low PDO and low sh% can tell you he should be getting better breaks. It can also tell you well maybe he just f***ing sucks at finishing and scoring on NHL goaltenders right now. Last time I checked, it is kind of important to be good at getting the puck past a goalie.

 

[Pookie]

I'm sooooooo tired hearing about 'Zone Entry' Stats and how 'Elite' Nylander is at it....

Nobody except for people trying to claim that Nylander is an elite player uses this statistic... Name me one other player where people will use this statistic to explain how good that player is... Nobody cares, and it doesn't seem to necessarily have a strong correlation with offensive production.

Ironic post.

The team hires an analytics wizard. Promotes him. Lose Hunter in the process.

This wizard presumably uses stats to determine he’s worth about $7M a season (or at least 6). What else would an Analytics guru do?

Somewhere in there they concluded he’s elite.

Why fight it?

 

[HamiltonNHL]

This wizard presumably uses stats to determine he’s worth about $7M a season

That's not what happened. No stat shows will is worth 7. Period. More importantly, he's not worth 7 to us as we have lots of capable right wingers.

Dubas said he's worth 6 (max 6.5) AAV x 7 based on his 20 goals. Nylander wouldn't sign and held out. Dubas tried to trade him or at least show Willy what other people would pay (nowhere near 7). To save face for the season and Willy's own sake, Dubas made a significant overpay deal. Structured such that he's going to trade Willy after July 1.

Players dont get away with that nonsense. Willy held the team hostage for 0.5-1 AAV more. Classless.

As it stands today, Willy's on ice performance is so bad, it is hard to trade him for a reasonable value.

Trade Bait on a Trade Bait contract. Cap floor teams will love the discount.

 

[MyBudJT]

There is a lot in hockey analytics out there that the common hockey fan doesn't know about. And that's fine because analytics in hockey hasn't been as popular for fans as it is in soccer, basketball, football, baseball, etc. Hockey fans are still in the mentality 'Stats can' t be used in hockey, it's too complex!' That's why you'll see more of fans of those other sports having more knowledge of underlying numbers, as opposed to fans of hockey. In hockey, people seem to only care about what they remember seeing and point totals only. Doesn't matter how you get the points, only that you got them. Isn't that odd?

The main reason analytics is crucial is to let people know the context and what's really going on, instead of simply guessing. If it were up to Leaf fans, Marner wouled've been traded last year, Kadri a long time ago, Rielly 2 years ago and Nylander at the start of the season.

What's Nylander's context to explain his situation?
Players with high controlled entries have a much stronger correlation to higher danger scoring chances and double the amount of unblocked shots. Possession stats such as expected goals (xGF%) and normal CF% are also indicators of future sucess among players. Very low on-ice sh% which is unsustainably low. His linemates are in their biggest slumps of the season, combined with his slump. So unless we think Matthews, Kadri, Marleau all suck at goal-scoding, we are in the midst of an unlucky dry-spell as shown by the oish%.

PM me if you want and I can explain further if wanted. I'm on my phone currently, but here are some links for your reference to check out:

Measuring the Importance of Individual Player Zone Entry Creation

Why Zone Entries and Exits Matter

I appreciate the work you put into this, but I don't think you understood where I was getting at...

Stats can only be so useful if they are used in the right context. I'm not one of those people that thinks that analytics is useless... heck, I use stats all the time in my field of work... but I do think that many here don't know what they're talking about when it comes it.

Points/Goals are whats most important in hockey. If you outscore your oponent, you win the game. This is why many here care more about actual output than underlying statistics. There are other facets of the game that help you win games... Blocking shots for instance... if you block a shot, you possibly prevent a goal being scored which is a good thing.... still, you can block 10 shots in a game, but it doesn't matter if the opponent still outscores you. Zone entry stats is another one... A player can be the best player in the world at entering the opponents zone... This isn't a bad thing, because it means that you likely have the puck in the opponents zone more than your own, and it SHOULD translate to offense... but elite zone entry doesn't matter if it doesn't ultimately doesn't translate to goals scored.

Saying someone is elite at zone entry to defend how good they are is kind of like saying how elite someone is at blocking shots to defend how good they are...

 

[MyBudJT]

Ironic post.

The team hires an analytics wizard. Promotes him. Lose Hunter in the process.

This wizard presumably uses stats to determine he’s worth about $7M a season (or at least 6). What else would an Analytics guru do?

Somewhere in there they concluded he’s elite.

Why fight it?

Analytics is nothing more than predictors... they can still be wrong...

 

[DavePoulin4PM]

You'll see the entire hockey stats community using and loving zone entries and zone exits. Just because you don't care about how it, doesn't make it useless. If you choose to be ignorant about those type of stats, then go ahead.

Controlled zone entries and zone exits are one of the few stats out there that actually have a strong correlation to how good a player is.

Why don’t you just watch games..? These stats are irrelevant if you actually understand what you are watching.

 

[Pookie]

That's not what happened. No stat shows will is worth 7. Period. More importantly, he's not worth 7 to us as we have lots of capable right wingers.

Dubas said he's worth 6 (max 6.5) AAV x 7 based on his 20 goals. Nylander wouldn't sign and held out. Dubas tried to trade him or at least show Willy what other people would pay (nowhere near 7). To save face for the season and Willy's own sake, Dubas made a significant overpay deal. Structured such that he's going to trade Willy after July 1.

Players dont get away with that nonsense. Willy held the team hostage for 0.5-1 AAV more. Classless.

As it stands today, Willy's on ice performance is so bad, it is hard to trade him for a reasonable value.

Trade Bait on a Trade Bait contract. Cap floor teams will love the discount.

You edited out my “or at least 6m”

Dubas judges his value based on stats. Using stats to argue against his value be it 6 or 7 is silly.

If he had 1 g and 2 a at 6m, this thread would still exist.

 

[HamiltonNHL]

The top 4 Cap floor teams are Carolina, NJ, Columbus, Arizona.

Arizona is always looking for value.

 

[Pookie]

Analytics is nothing more than predictors... they can still be wrong...

Sure. But stats were used to be establish a value. 6 or 7, who cares. It’s not like the value established was 1.5m. He was getting a good pay day.

In arguing against his stats you are arguing against Dubas and the team.

 

[egd27]

I'm sooooooo tired hearing about 'Zone Entry' Stats and how 'Elite' Nylander is at it....

Nobody except for people trying to claim that Nylander is an elite player uses this statistic... Name me one other player where people will use this statistic to explain how good that player is... Nobody cares, and it doesn't seem to necessarily have a strong correlation with offensive production.

I've also noticed that once he makes an elite zone entry, he often curls at the boards and, if challenged, dumps the puck into the corner. So an elite entry amounts to nothing unless his centre or wing partner wins the corner board battle.

Well maybe not nothing, I suppose it pumps up the zone entry stats.