Why Plus/Minus is the Worst Statistic in Hockey

[Ceccles]

In a thread over the value of Byfuglien I posted this. I believe using similar teams in the same situation and GA/G and TOI, all together make +\- accurate towards defenseman.

Ps. Sorry the columns didn't allign, used my phone.


Dustin Byfuglien 78 20 36 56 -20 86 17.01

Rank Player Team GP G A P +/- PIM TOI
214 P.K Subban MTL 82 10 43 53 -4 81 18.41
257 Kevin Bieksa VAN 76 4 20 24 -8 104 17.83
258 Kris Letang PIT 37 11 11 22 -8 16 17.69
284 Erik Karlsson OTT 82 20 54 74 -15 36 20.2
296 Keith Yandle PHX 82 8 45 53 -23 63 18.58

WPG 82 37 35 10 84 227 237 -10 973 2.82

Team GP W L OT P GF GA DIFF PIM GA/G
MTL 82 46 28 8 100 215 204 +11 1063 2.45
VAN 82 36 35 11 83 196 223 -27 1115 2.63
PIT 82 51 24 7 109 249 207 +42 832 2.49
OTT 82 37 31 14 88 236 265 -29 1094 3.15
PHX 82 37 30 15 89 216 231 -15 810 2.73


I think comparing defenseman to other defenseman are one thing, but you should compare a defenseman to another defenseman to a similar team with stats. For instance maybe, Detroit, Nashville or Calgary and Ottawa who all had goalie issues last season and similar GA ratio.

Lets just point out that OTT got scored against 265 to WPG 237 and Karlsson +/- is still better and has more TOI than Byfuglien. Ottawa's GA/G is 3.15 to Winnipeg's 2.82.

Team GP W L OT P GF GA DIFF PIM GA/G
WPG 82 37 35 10 84 227 237 -10 973 2.82
DET 82 39 28 15 93 222 230 -8 725 2.70
NSH 82 38 32 12 88 216 242 -26 808 2.84
CGY 82 35 40 7 77 209 241 -32 858 2.90
PHI 82 42 30 10 94 236 235 +1 1180 2.70


Player Team GP G A P +/- PIM TOI
Dustin Byfuglien WPG 78 20 36 56 -20 86 17.01
Tobias Enstrom WPG 82 10 20 30 -9 56 17.53
Niklas Kronwall DET 79 8 41 49 0 44 16.95
Danny Dekeyser DET 65 4 19 23 10 30 16.88
Roman Josi NSH 72 13 27 40 -2 18 20.05
Shea Weber NSH 79 23 33 52 -2 52 20.44
Mark Giordano. CGY 64 14 33 47 12 63 18.32
T.J. Brodie CGY 81 4 27 31 0 20 19.39
Mark Streit PHI 82 10 34 44 3 44 16.71
Braydon Coburn PHI 82 5 12 17 -6 63 17.42

So all of these top defenseman played in a similar situation as the Winnipeg Jets and outperformed Dustin Byfuglien...

I still stand by my own opinion, that I don't think Byfuglien is a top defender. Winnipeg has the second highest PIM next to Philadelphia and Byfuglien has the highest PIM. GA/G between all 5 teams are close and Byfuglien has the highest +/- ratio compared to all the top defenders that i have listed.

 

[JayP812]

I agree that +/- is a bad stat for assessing players, but what I don't get is how the article and many others brush off having poor save and shooting percentages as pure bad luck. Are we absolving all fault from a player who is a pure chest sniper and screens his own goalie?

 

[Micklebot]

I agree that +/- is a bad stat for assessing players, but what I don't get is how the article and many others brush off having poor save and shooting percentages as pure bad luck. Are we absolving all fault from a player who is a pure chest sniper and screens his own goalie?

I'd say those factors would be fairly minor at best (4 other guys can shoot too). A bigger impact would be playing infront of Dubnick, or some other poor goalie.

Here's a look at an individual players ability to impact on ice sh% The quick recap is only a handful of elite players can have a significant impact.

As for on ice Sv%, once again, it is very hard to pin on one player as shown here, because he can only have a marginal impact on the even that happen (he's only one skater out of 10 on the ice at any given time).