Here's a starting point for something along the lines of "Individual Value":
First, as I said before, I don't know that this will work well at all for players that derive the vast majority of their value from ES defense (shutdown d-men and checking forwards).
Second, while I think something like this could work well for comparing at least certain types of players within a single season, there would need to be further adjustments to compare players from different seasons. For one, ES/PP/SH scoring levels vary from season to season, which allows more value to be apparently created in some seasons compared to others, so one would have to adjust for scoring levels. Also, parity varies from season to season, which should affect replacement level (since I'm basing it here on the worst team in the league in that particular category). A solution might be to use an average or median for a multi-year period, to smooth out variations due to randomness and/or differing environments (e.g., expansion or otherwise unusually bad teams). Finally, another issue may be scale, such that comparing skaters to goalies (using goals saved vs. league avg. or replacement level) may not be possible, since the scale of the metrics for each may be different.
Panther used '94 Gretzky as an example, so I'm comparing '94 Gretzky to '94 Fedorov.
Even Strength Value
One starting point would be Adjusted Plus-Minus:
Adjusted Even-Strength Plus-minus 1960-2017 | HFBoards - NHL Message Board and Forum for National Hockey League (mandatory.com)
Basically, we calculate ESGF & ESGA from TGF, PGF, TGA & PGA.
ESGF = TGF - (PGF + SGF) ... SGF is estimated from team SGF and the individual's ratio of PGA (individual PGA/team PGA). One difference is that if individual's SHP (SHG + SHA) were more than the estimate, I used SHP instead of the estimate (since it had to be at least that much).
ESGA = TGA - (PGA + SGA) ... SGA is estimated from team SGA and the individual's ratio of PGF (individual PGF/team PGF).
Once we have individual ESGF & ESGA, "OFF" (team's ESGF & ESGA) is easily derived from (Team - Individual) for each of ESGF & ESGA.
Overpass, the author of that study, regressed the expected plus-minus (using OFF) to average (1.0), but I am not bothering with that here (although I'm not necessarily against) for the sake of simplicity.
The regression he does favors players on above average ES teams and penalizes players on below average ES teams (again, I'm not saying that's necessarily unjustified).
Without regressing to average, the adjusted plus-minuses are:
Gretzky -12.8 & Fedorov +35.4
The raw (ESGF - ESGA) are:
Gretzky -25.2 & Fedorov +45.4 ... Overpass' adjusted plus-minus would be between the two numbers (i.e. Gretzky -12.8 to 25.2, Fedorov +35.4 to 45.4), so in this case not regressing to the average yields a smaller gap between the two players.
I also calculated ESV another way. I gave the player credit for ESGF based on his ES points (ESG + ESA), but penalized him for ESGA based on him being one of five skaters on the ice. Before I go through the details of the calculation, I should say that I think it would be fairest to first adjust ESGA for team SV% vs. league average, but I didn't do that here (this again favored Gretzky, since Kings were around league avg., while Wings were worse).
Gretzky had 20 ESG & 42 ESA, while he was on ice for an estimated 77.0 ESGF. So he had points on 62/77 ESGF or 80.5%. His team had 479 ESP on 183 ESGF or 2.62 points awarded per ESGF.
Dividing 80.5% by 2.62, we get 30.8% and will call this his ESGF Responsibility %. We divide Responsibility for ESGA equally among each of the five skaters (this is an assumption for simplicty, the actual number would be slightly lower), so 20% each. We do the same for Fedorov, who had points on 75.0% of ESGF.
This yields these numbers:
Gretzky: ESGF = 77.0 * .308 = 23.7 ; ESGA = 102.2 * .20 = 20.4... so
+3.3
Fedorov: ESGF = 108.0 * .287 = 31.0; ESGA = 62.6* .20 = 12.5... so
+18.5
Power Play Value
We're using the worst team in the league in that category as "Replacement Level." So the Kings converted 20.7% of their PPs, while the Ducks only converted 14.4% of their PPs. We multiply the difference by the Kings' PP opportunites to yield: 444 PPO * (.207 - .144) = 28.2 Goals Above Replacement Level. So how do we distribute part of those 28.2 GARL to Gretzky? He had 14 PPG & 47 PPA for 61 PP points on 78 PGF, so 61/78 = 78.2%. Dividing 78.2% by 2.89 points awarded per Kings PP goal, we get 27.0% for his PGF Responsiblity %. We multiply that by the 28.2 GARL for his team to get
18.7 GARL for PGF. We do the same for Fedorov to get
9.5 GARL for PGF.
We calculate how many SGA were saved by using the same methodology for SH goals given up (but equally divided among five or 20% each), which yields
Gretkzy 2.5 & Fedorov 0.9
PPV Totals: Gretzky = 18.7 +2.5 = 21.2; Fedorov = 9.5 + 0.9 = 10.4
Short Handed Value
Using the same methodology for SGF as for PGF, we get:
Gretzky 3.0 & Fedorov 4.9 for GARL while SH.
We calculate how many PGA were saved by using the same methodology as For SGA (excep tequally divided among four for 25% each) which yields:
Gretzky 8.3 & Fedorov 8.8
SHV Totals: Gretzky = 3.0 + 8.3 = 11.3; Fedorov = 4.9 + 8.8 = 13.8
Summary
ESV
---Simple (ESGF - ESGA): Gretzky -25.2, Fedorov +45.4
---"Raw" Adjusted Plus-Minus: Gretzky -12.8, Fedorov +35.4
---Responsibility %: Gretzky +3.3, Fedorov +18.5
PPV: Gretzky 21.2, Fedorov 10.4
SHV: Gretzky 11.3, Fedorov 13.8
TOTALS, Using
---Simple (ESGF - ESGA): Gretzky +7.4, Fedorov +69.5
---"Raw" Adjusted Plus-Minus: Gretzky +19.8, Fedorov +59.6
---Responsibility %: Gretzky +35.8, Fedorov 42.6
The first two are rather large gaps. Another thought is that perhaps, assuming the line of three forwards is driving ES advantage/disadvantage, is to divide those numbers (Simple ESGF-ESGA & Raw Adj. PM, since Resp.% already distributes the advantage/disadvantage) by three. If we did this and made the adjustment for SV% vs. league avg., the gaps between Gretzky & Fedorov would be about 17, 10 & 8 goals, respectively. That range seems reasonable to me, but I welcome any comments or suggestions.
