What does an OHL contender look like?

[ScoresFromCentre]

[delete]

Click to read more...

 

[EvenSteven]

Great article. However, if a team is recognized as a contender before the trade deadline, then the appropriate deals can be made to improve their chances. Some of those teams that you have just outside the bubble, if they stood pat at the deadline, they may have been able to improve their chances with trades for veteran help.

I could make the argument that had that 2015–16 Rangers made the appropriate trades at the deadline that season they could've added 8 to 10 points to their point totals thus moving them into contender status. The great debate that year among Ranger fans as to whether or not we were contenders came at, and leading up to, deadline time when we stood Pat.

The same could be said for the Rangers 2011–12 season. Steve Spott stood pat where had he made a couple of trades, specifically a deal for Austin Watson who eventually went to London, we may have been right up there with London at the top of the standings.

Again, really good article, but there are some things that also have to be taken into consideration when deciding whether a team is a contender and when you decide that team was a contender at deadline time or at seasons end. I say this only because of the reason you created this article in the first place – your discussion with Ranger fans as to whether or not the 2015-16 season was a contending season or not.

 

[GoKnightsGo44]

The two other metrics that would be interesting to examine would be age of players on a contender, and draft status. Do you need a certain amount of NHL drafted 19 year old first rnds?

 

[ScoresFromCentre]

Great article. However, if a team is recognized as a contender before the trade deadline, then the appropriate deals can be made to improve their chances. Some of those teams that you have just outside the bubble, if they stood pat at the deadline, they may have been able to improve their chances with trades for veteran help.

I could make the argument that had that 2015–16 Rangers made the appropriate trades at the deadline that season they could've added 8 to 10 points to their point totals thus moving them into contender status. The great debate that year among Ranger fans as to whether or not we were contenders came at, and leading up to, deadline time when we stood Pat.

The same could be said for the Rangers 2011–12 season. Steve Spott stood pat where had he made a couple of trades, specifically a deal for Austin Watson who eventually went to London, we may have been right up there with London at the top of the standings.

Again, really good article, but there are some things that also have to be taken into consideration when deciding whether a team is a contender and when you decide that team was a contender at deadline time or at seasons end. I say this only because of the reason you created this article in the first place – your discussion with Ranger fans as to whether or not the 2015-16 season was a contending season or not.

Good points, ES. The right deadline deals absolutely could have (and probably would have) pushed the Rangers into contender status by the metrics I used. I think fan engagement reflected this, too. As you said, fans were pretty annoyed that the team didn't add more aggressively at the deadline, and by the end of the season seemed cautiously optimistic at best. Perhaps the real story of the article is that a team's fans are the best barometer of their chances! (Although I imagine Rangers fans are a bit more, uh, 'realistic' about their team's chances than some others.)

I wish the OHL website had a "on this date" standings function. Then we could compare pre-deadline performance of championship teams to get an idea of how good a team has to be to go all-in (considerations of competition aside, anyway). Really, this analysis only began to scratch the surface of what contention means and what kinds of things teams consider when they decide whether to go for it.

The two other metrics that would be interesting to examine would be age of players on a contender, and draft status. Do you need a certain amount of NHL drafted 19 year old first rnds?

Good idea! I'll add this to my list of topics to explore.

 

[EvenSteven]

The reason I brought up Kitchener's 2011–12 season was because up to the deadline, I believe the Rangers record versus London was 3-0-1 or something like that. That told me at that point we could compete with London if not be the better team. Had we acquired Austin Watson instead of London, the final standings may have been different based on us having him in our lineup versus him being in London's lineup and our playoff series against them may have gone a different way considering Watson was the best player on the ice between the two teams.

 

[ScoresFromCentre]

Oh, excellent point. I missed that when I read your post earlier. The teams were well within two Austin Watsons of each other; I'd agree with that. Knights fans might disagree, but those back-to-back OHL championship squads didn't blow me away at the time and don't really in hindsight, either. They'd struggle to push the more recent champs (Guelph, Oshawa, London, Erie) to six, I think.

 

[Purple Phart]

Oh, excellent point. I missed that when I read your post earlier. The teams were well within two Austin Watsons of each other; I'd agree with that. Knights fans might disagree, but those back-to-back OHL championship squads didn't blow me away at the time and don't really in hindsight, either. They'd struggle to push the more recent champs (Guelph, Oshawa, London, Erie) to six, I think.

This is why the goalposts do move from season to season. What might be a very viable ( average) metric overall will not remain a constant. Last season saw no less than 5 teams from the Western Conference who were bona-fide contenders, so I'd rate that as a rather exceptional season. Some seasons, there will be but a couple of legitimate contenders, who have clearly distanced themselves from the pack, points-wise. In the playoffs, it would take a significant upset to beat such a team, and it's been done the odd time. Even as a Knights fan, I'd agree that those back-to-back championships were a bit of an anomoly.

It strongly relates to the overall quality of the opposition. Some seasons it's present in abundance. In other seasons, not so much.

 

[ScoresFromCentre]

Good points, and this is why I was comfortable with, say, labeling the Spitfires a "fringe contender" last season even though they won the Memorial Cup and would probably have been around the 100-point mark in a typical year (they played, what, twenty games against London-Erie-OS-SSM?). The nice thing about a points-based metric is that in a stronger year, you have to be a stronger team to contend, since other great teams are hoovering up the points too.

I've been racking my brain for a way to mathematical means of comparing talent year-over-year, but I haven't been able to come up with anything. If anyone has any ideas, drop me a line.

 

[rangersblues]

Very interesting article and metrics. The difficulty that I see is that with the unbalanced East/West schedule, and the East Conference being inferior for the most part , it somewhat could skew the differentials. Possibly a strength of schedule metric needs to also be included.

 

[bobber]

Great posts here. It's a given you have to have a team that has a high GF to do any damage but also how about the effect great goal tending has as witnessed by DiPietro in the Mem Cup last season? In the end both high scoring and extra solid goal tending are a huge factor in winning a Mem Cup or League Championship. Most teams are only as good as their goalies. Rebuilding teams like the Spits this season can surprise a lot of teams because their goal tender holds the fort even in low scoring games. There are so many factors that go into making a champion team not sure you can measure it all. Interesting article Scores From Centre.

 

[ScoresFromCentre]

Very interesting article and metrics. The difficulty that I see is that with the unbalanced East/West schedule, and the East Conference being inferior for the most part , it somewhat could skew the differentials. Possibly a strength of schedule metric needs to also be included.

Good thinking, RB. There were 37 West contenders and 17 East contenders by my metric since 2004-05, so I figured the metric mostly controlled for the conference imbalance. But you're right that it's a piece that's currently missing from the puzzle. I'll see what I can do to get strength of schedule data beyond last season (which took far too long to calculate by hand). Maybe I can write a program for it.

Great posts here. It's a given you have to have a team that has a high GF to do any damage but also how about the effect great goal tending has as witnessed by DiPietro in the Mem Cup last season? In the end both high scoring and extra solid goal tending are a huge factor in winning a Mem Cup or League Championship. Most teams are only as good as their goalies. Rebuilding teams like the Spits this season can surprise a lot of teams because their goal tender holds the fort even in low scoring games. There are so many factors that go into making a champion team not sure you can measure it all. Interesting article Scores From Centre.

Thanks, bobber, glad you found the article interesting. You're absolutely right about great goaltending. One stat that caught my eye in doing research for this article was the shot differential of some of last season's contenders:

Owen Sound +782
Erie +748
Sault Ste. Marie +347
Windsor + 126
London +60

Huge discrepancy between the top two teams and Windsor and London, which shows just how important DiPietro and Parsons were to those teams' success in the regular season. (We saw what both guys could do in the playoffs/Cup, of course.)