Statistical look at various defensemen (EDM/FA/trade targets)

[Riptide]

This started off as something I was going to post to the rumor thread... but as I started to write it up, realized it's something that would A get lost pretty quickly there, and B with the numerous pics be very large. So it now gets it's own thread.

So I spent the morning looking at the "Own the Puck"/HERO charts for most of the D we've discussed for the last while. Started off just looking at the FA D, then the Oilers D, then those that I thought might be available. Then a whole bunch of others. Fortunately my boss can't see how 'productive' I was today. Most that I looked at didn't make any of the lists (usually due to there being almost no chance they'd be available).

But honestly, I was quite surprised at some of the charts. Going to start this off as a 3 post thing. Starting with the Oilers D, then FA D then those who I think might be trade options (semi realistic ones - aka not Doughty, Weber or Hamilton, etc).

This is the site I was using.
http://ownthepuck.blogspot.ca/searc...d-max=2016-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&max-results=2

Now I'm not going to lay any claim to understanding these entirely or being an advanced stat wiz. But as far as I'm concerned if a D is generating shots and unblocked shots and is suppressing shots and unblocked shots while having a reasonable ES TOI, then that's more of what I'm looking for. I mean ideally you get someone who does it all... but considering the names I looked at, I'd be happy with someone who's more efficient even if they're less productive.

I also looked at a couple of stars just to get a comparison... Let me tell you... some of these were rather shocking. And some of these are guys I'd love to have on my team (no cap, no cost to acquire, yada yada yada) and have been staples for the last few Olympic teams.

Click to read more...

 

[Riptide]

Part 1 - Edmonton's 2014/15 Blueliners

All I'll say is that a couple of these surprised me. Specifically Nikitin and Marincin. And to a lesser extent Klefbom. Nikitin and Marincin due to how bad they've been knocked on on here. Klefbom, because while I expected the numbers to be decent, I didn't expect them to be that good. Fayne, Ference, Schultz and Petry were more or less what I was expecting to see after spending some time looking at a bunch of different players. Like I said... (depending on how you look at it) it was a very productive morning.

Mark Fayne

Andrew Ference

Oscar Klefbom

Martin Marincin

Nikita Nikitin

Jeff Petry

Justin Schultz

 

[Riptide]

Part 2 - Looking at some of the (current) 2015 Free Agent D

I'm going to be honest. Some of these rather surprised me. Especially Franson's and Green's. Ehrhoff was rather impressive as well. Paul Martin was more or less as expected.

Some other thoughts. I knew Oduya's possession numbers were bad. But it was surprising to see how much better his suppressing shots/unblocked shots was compared to Seabrook and Keith (very significant). This implies that with the right partner, Oduya could log significant minutes as a shutdown D.

A couple of cheap guys who might be effective (thinking more bottom 3) is Diaz and Leopold. But without moving some bodies out I'm not sure how that would work. Might just be better to gut it out with Nikitin for the season and see where things are at after next season.

Raphael Diaz

Christian Ehrhoff

Cody Franson

Mike Green

Barret Jackman

Jordan Leopold

Paul Martin

Adam McQuaid

Zbynek Michalek

Johnny Oduya

Andrej Sekera

Marek Zidlicky

 

[Riptide]

Part 3 - Looking at some of the D we've discussed or who might be trade options

So here's were I looked at many of the D we've talked about acquiring. I also looked at some of the lesser named guys (not the Webers, Letangs, Doughty's etc) who might be available via trade. I'm not saying they are or that the team would dump them... just that they might be worth discussing. I have also included some of the stars here (Weber, Seabrook, etc) as I found some of their charts interesting.

Overall, there were some surprising names that made this group. Specifically Brendan Smith, Wiercioch and Wisniewski. All of whom might be available to various degree's.

Seabrook and Keiths charts (very similar) was surprising when you compare it to Oduya's. So was Phaneufs and Webers. Suter's was similar to Webers.



Justin Braun

Brent Burns

Dustin Byfuglien

Matt Carle

Carl Gunnarsson

John-Michael Liles

Dion Phaneuf

Brent Seabrook

Dennis Seidenberg

Brendan Smith

Shea Weber

Patrick Wiercioch

James Wisniewski

Thomas Hickey

 

[Riptide]

reserved #3

 

[Riptide]

reserved #4

 

[McDeathbyCheerios*]

What I like about this is statistically what a lot of us thought about our own guys is right.

Klefbom is close to a top pairing guy with a few rookie mistakes to iron out.

Fayne is a top pairing shutdown D.

Ference sucks.

A Green, Fayne pairing could be very very good. Fayne covers for Greens D, Green puts up the points. Probably a very solid second pair.

 

[doulos]

It almost looks like the Oilers have a pretty decent defense group outside of Schultz (EDIT: And Ference...ouch) if I am reading it correctly. The truth is they are a disaster. So I'm either reading it incorrectly, or those stats don't really tell much of a story?

Maybe this is a case of misuse of defenseman when Schultz and Ference are getting SO much ice time relative to how putrid they are defensively?

 

[oXo Cube]

Ference

Lots of these do seem to support my version of the eye-test

Big LOL at Phaneuf

 

[McDeathbyCheerios*]

It almost looks like the Oilers have a pretty decent defense group outside of Schultz if I am reading it correctly. The truth is they are a disaster. So I'm either reading it incorrectly, or those stats don't really tell much of a story?

Bad systems and bad pairings. Klefbom should be been with Fayne on the top pairing, Schultz should of been third with Ference

 

[doulos]

Wait ... so basically Shea Weber sucks defensively according to these charts?

 

[Riptide]

It almost looks like the Oilers have a pretty decent defense group outside of Schultz (EDIT: And Ference...ouch) if I am reading it correctly. The truth is they are a disaster. So I'm either reading it incorrectly, or those stats don't really tell much of a story?

Maybe this is a case of misuse of defenseman when Schultz and Ference are getting SO much ice time relative to how putrid they are defensively?

It's stats. I wouldn't use them solely to acquire someone, and then gut it out with them even if things are not working 20 games into the season. But what I did find interesting is that despite all the **** and abuse Nikitin and Marincin get, that they were not quite as bad as most make them out to be. And were better than Ference and Schultz.

I think in general to a poor system and issues with the forwards coming back, that TOI allocation and pairings were more of an issue then the 6 individual players. Doesn't mean I think all 6 should be back... but Ference and Schultz getting 19 and 22:30 minutes a night while both being awful defensively was an issue. Add in neither goalie playing all that well... and it's a receipt for disaster - which is what happened.

 

[RattsSSV]

Appreciate the effort and thanks for sharing the information & your site.

 

[oXo Cube]

Wait ... so basically Shea Weber sucks defensively according to these charts?

No, it says that the Predators gave up a lot of shots against when Weber was on the ice. Read whatever you want into that statement.

Most notably outside of TOI these charts don't do a great job of tracking the quality of your competition, as I understand them.

 

[doulos]

No, it says that the Predators gave up a lot of shots against when Weber was on the ice. Read whatever you want into that statement.

Most notably outside of TOI these charts don't do a great job of tracking the quality of your competition, as I understand them.

You've demonstrated exactly my issue with this. The implication in the charts was that all those shots against while a defenseman was on the ice was a bad thing (look at Schultz and Ference) but then you look at a guy like Weber who has horrific stats in that same area and it really makes you wonder what value these have?

I enjoy stats but this particular set has me scratching my head on how to interpret it.

 

[RattsSSV]

You've demonstrated exactly my issue with this. The implication in the charts was that all those shots against while a defenseman was on the ice was a bad thing (look at Schultz and Ference) but then you look at a guy like Weber who has horrific stats in that same area and it really makes you wonder what value these have?

I enjoy stats but this particular set has me scratching my head on how to interpret it.

It's lacking a quality of competition set however that metric would be questionable because their is such diversity in quality across the league in skill at each position and line.

 

[Soundwave]

You've demonstrated exactly my issue with this. The implication in the charts was that all those shots against while a defenseman was on the ice was a bad thing (look at Schultz and Ference) but then you look at a guy like Weber who has horrific stats in that same area and it really makes you wonder what value these have?

I enjoy stats but this particular set has me scratching my head on how to interpret it.

Wouldn't it kinda stand to reason that there would be more shots against a d-man like Weber? He probably plays the tough minutes against better forwards, better forwards tend to generate more shots. Not all shots are equal too obviously.

 

[McOilbleeder]

Sekera-Wizniewski pairing combined with Klefbom-Fayne pairing gives us a top-4 that can get into the playoffs. I have to imagine that is the best bet for us to fix this pitiful D.

 

[Riptide]

Wait ... so basically Shea Weber sucks defensively according to these charts?

That's one of the ones I found interesting. Weber, Seabrook, Keith and Suter all had a very low shot suppression. While other players on their team(s) showed very favorably there. A good part of that is going to be how they're used and the quality of players they go up against. But it was interesting to see how those 4 were not all that effective (in that category) while other players like Eklhom, Scandella, Oduya, etc were all vastly superior there.

Like I said... it's stats and you take it with a grain of salt. Sample size, TOI, quality of competition, etc all play into it.

The reason why I took the time to find this and post it is I do think it could be useful to perhaps look at a couple other players that might be effective, but less recognized. We all read the article about Green and why he'd be a bad fit here. This suggests that he might not be quite as bad as they say. Pair him with someone like Oduya, Ehrhoff or Martin and you could have a very effect pairing. Martin is recognized as a top pairing guy... but I don't think many would suggest the other 2 are.

 

[Soundwave]

That's one of the ones I found interesting. Weber, Seabrook, Keith and Suter all had a very low shot suppression. While other players on their team(s) showed very favorably there. A good part of that is going to be how they're used and the quality of players they go up against. But it was interesting to see how those 4 were not all that effective (in that category) while other players like Eklhom, Scandella, Oduya, etc were all vastly superior there.

Like I said... it's stats and you take it with a grain of salt. Sample size, TOI, quality of competition, etc all play into it.

The reason why I took the time to find this and post it is I do think it could be useful to perhaps look at a couple other players that might be effective, but less recognized. We all read the article about Green and why he'd be a bad fit here. This suggests that he might not be quite as bad as they say. Pair him with someone like Oduya, Ehrhoff or Martin and you could have a very effect pairing. Martin is recognized as a top pairing guy... but I don't think many would suggest the other 2 are.

Wouldn't it kinda make sense though that top pairing d-men allow more shots against? They're the ones playing the Kanes, Toews, Crosbys, Ovechkins, etc. of the world, it makes sense there would be more shots against.

 

[doulos]

Wouldn't it kinda stand to reason that there would be more shots against a d-man like Weber? He probably plays the tough minutes against better forwards, better forwards tend to generate more shots. Not all shots are equal too obviously.

That's the missing piece here. Without knowing quality of competition (mentioned earlier) the incomplete charts are actually less than helpful. They can tell any story you want to them to tell.

Love this stuff. Don't stop posting it, but building on top of it is where it becomes useful. Right now it actually could cause really bad decisions to be made instead of good ones. Or great one. Or horrific ones. Who knows since this is like a book with 2/3 of the pages ripped out randomly.

 

[Riptide]

Wouldn't it kinda make sense though that top pairing d-men allow more shots against? They're the ones playing the Kanes, Toews, Crosbys, Ovechkins, etc. of the world, it makes sense there would be more shots against.

Yet according to this Oduya played a lot of minutes. NHL.com has him 3rd in ES TOI (behind Keith and Hjalmarsson). This says he was more effective then Seabrook and Keith, while logging more ES minutes than Seabrook.

From what little I remember reading about CHI, Oduya and Hjalmarsson were their shutdown pairing. One would have to dig deeper into the stats or talk to some CHI guys to confirm that.

 

[McDeathbyCheerios*]

That's the missing piece here. Without knowing quality of competition (mentioned earlier) the incomplete charts are actually less than helpful. They can tell any story you want to them to tell.

Love this stuff. Don't stop posting it, but building on top of it is where it becomes useful. Right now it actually could cause really bad decisions to be made instead of good ones. Or great one. Or horrific ones. Who knows since this is like a book with 2/3 of the pages ripped out randomly.

The stats don't tell everything. However if a player has high ice time but garbage stats like Schultz and Ference you can tell they are overplayed as they don't suppress shots or really take shots.

Also aren't Seabrook and Weber more offensively dmen anyways?

 

[McDeathbyCheerios*]

Ehrhoff - Klefbom
Green - Fayne
Nurse - Wiercioch

Could be a very obtainable and solid D core

 

[doulos]

The stats don't tell everything. However if a player has high ice time but garbage stats like Schultz and Ference you can tell they are overplayed as they don't suppress shots or really take shots.

Also aren't Seabrook and Weber more offensively dmen anyways?

So is Schultz.

All three of those guys have very similar charts but one of those does not seem to match up. Watching them gives insight, but then it leaves you wondering about the value of the charts.