Murray's GSAx is his "actual numbers", and the most accurate measure of goaltending performance. You seem to have no trouble utilizing the stat when it suits you, but then you turn around and try to discredit the stat when it doesn't - using it incorrectly and making incorrect statements about it.
"Expected" its right in the title "Goals Saved above
Expected" is NOT actual numbers like Shots, Saves, Goals Against, are actual verifiable #'s. Who decides expected goals from actual goals?
The Leafs are
"Expected" to win the Stanley Cup, they
"Actually" lose in round #1 however.. See how
expected is only pretend and not reality?
That is because where shots are taken on the ice
Do NOT show up of the Score Clock, only actual real goals against count, not pretend expected ones the goalie should have saved.
The NHL records shots on net as either Goals if they go in, and Saves if the goalie stops then his sv% is calculated based those 2 official accurate figures, and where that shot came from totally irrelevant to the outcome of the game.
GSAx is not a stand alone stat its a derivative of actual Goals and Saves.
This is just the basics of understanding on how scoring works in the NHL. For 100 years the NHL never even heard of "expected stats" and to this day go with tracking only actual verifiable numbers for a goalie. You can argue until your blue in the face that the goalie "should" have stopped that one, as he was "expected" to stop that one because he let in a soft/bad goal, but in reality all actual goals count.
Analytics was created to drill down on actual numbers looking for patterns and trends to help understand what might comprise those core numbers, but they only try and help explain the actual numbers. They might only be actual in terms of tracking if the shot came from the point, or the face-off dot or centre ice in that respect, You can see shot location maps all the time tracking were they came from and which ones went in.. The
subjective part is the expected part as someone arbitrarily determines IF the goalie should have stopped it. Shoulda, Woulda Coulda doesn't matter expected or not, that's an opinion not a fact, puck either goes in, or the goalie saves it, that is the actual true fact.
A high positive GSAx means your goalie is making a lot of tough saves because they were expected to let in from that shot HDSC location etc on the ice, and vice versa a high negative GSAx means your goalie is letting in a lot of easy goals he likely should be expected to stop but doesn't. When you get to the playoffs you want to count on goalies that make the easy and tough saves and the higher the GSAx the more game saving saves he is making and likely wins your team is recording.
