Goosefeathers

Play-off assignment rotation

2009-05-26T00:38:00.000-07:00

This is the rotation for the 2009 playoffs showing which officials were assigned to a giving game.

Round Two Assignments:

Game#	Visitors	Home	Referee 1	Referee 2	Game#	Visitors	Home	Referee 1	Referee 2
1	CAR	BOS	Devorski	LaRue	1	PIT	WSH	Jackson	Pollock
2	CAR	BOS	O'Halloran	Leggo	2	PIT	WSH	Joannette	Sutherland
3	BOS	CAR	Furlatt	McCreary	3	WSH	PIT	Leggo	O'Halloran
4	BOS	CAR	Jackson	Pollock	4	WSH	PIT	Watson	Peel
5	CAR	BOS	Watson	Peel	5	PIT	WSH	McCreary	Frulatt
6	BOS	CAR	Joannette	Sutherland	6	WSH	PIT	Devorski	LaRue
7	CAR	BOS	Jackson	Pollock	7	PIT	WSH	O'Halloran	McCreary

1	ANA	DET	Sutherland	Joannette	1	CHI	VAN	McCreary	Frulatt
2	ANA	DET	McCreary	Frulatt	2	CHI	VAN	Peel	Watson
3	DET	ANA	Peel	Watson	3	VAN	CHI	Jackson	Pollock
4	DET	ANA	Devorski	LaRue	4	VAN	CHI	Sutherland	Joannette
5	ANA	DET	Leggo	O'Halloran	5	CHI	VAN	Devorski	LaRue
6	DET	ANA	Jackson	Pollock	6	VAN	CHI	Leggo	O'Halloran
7	ANA	DET	Devorski	Joannette

Round One Assignments

Game#	Visitors	Home	Referee 1	Referee 2	Game#	Visitors	Home	Referee 1	Referee 2
1	MTL	BOS	Pollock	LaRue	1	NYR	WSH	Leggo	Peel
2	MTL	BOS	Leggo	Peel	2	NYR	WSH	Frulatt	McCauley
3	BOS	MTL	Devorski	Walsh	3	WSH	NYR	Jackson	Sutherland
4	BOS	MTL	Jackson	Sutherland	4	WSH	NYR	Devorski	Walsh
					5	NYR	WSH	Hasenfratz	VanMassenhoven
					6	WSH	NYR	McCreary	Meier
					7	NYR	WSH	O'Halloran	Watson

1	CAR	NJ	Joannette	O'Rourke	1	PIT	PHI	Hasenfratz	VanMassenhoven
2	CAR	NJ	Hasenfratz	VanMassenhoven	2	PIT	PHI	McCreary	Meier
3	NJ	CAR	LaRue	Pollock	3	PHI	PIT	O'Rourke	Joannette
4	NJ	CAR	Frulatt	McCauley	4	PHI	PIT	LaRue	Pollock
5	CAR	NJ	McCreary	Meier	5	PIT	PHI	Frulatt	McCauley
6	NJ	CAR	Peel	Leggo	6	PHI	PIT	Rooney	Watson
7	CAR	NJ	Devorski	Pollock

1	ANA	SJ	Jackson	Sutherland	1	CBJ	DET	Devorski	Walsh
2	ANA	SJ	Lee	O'Halloran	2	CBJ	DET	Jackson	Sutherland
3	SJ	ANA	Hasenfratz	VanMassenhoven	3	DET	CBJ	Meier	McCreary
4	SJ	ANA	Rooney	Watson	4	DET	CBJ	Lee	O'Halloran
5	ANA	SJ	LaRue	Pollock
6	SJ	ANA	Frulatt	McCauley

1	STL	VAN	Lee	O'Halloran	1	CGY	CHI	Frulatt	McCauley
2	STL	VAN	Rooney	Watson	2	CGY	CHI	Devorski	Walsh
3	VAN	STL	McCreary	Meier	3	CHI	CGY	Rooney	Watson
4	VAN	STL	O'Rourke	Joannette	4	CHI	CGY	Leggo	Peel
					5	CGY	CHI	Lee	O'Halloran
					6	CHI	CGY	Joannette	O'Rourke

NHL Promotions

2009-05-20T11:30:00.000-07:00

I do not understand it. Are the people who run the NHL PR machine really idiots?

Why is Sidney Crosby treated as a god? Good Lord, right now on the main NHL portal page, there are five categories to click on for current NHL lead stories that they consider the main presentations to represent the league. Those buttons are: “NHL LIVE”, obvious, “RED WINGS - HAWKS”, no brainer, “CHI – HAWKS MOMENTS”, Yep, on of two playoff series going, “’HAWKS POSTGAME”, seems like that one would be just post-game but whatever. It was a great OT game last night and that is what should obviously be covered. Oh, forgot, the LEAD category: “SID THE KID”. Not the Pittsburgh/Carolina series. Not the playoff in general or the Eastern Conference Finals. Sidney Crosby. And even listed before the Western Conference Finals categories for the game last night. The lead story, the first thing you see when you enter the portal, the item that NHL PR considers the most important promotional story of the day: “PICTURE PERFECT? Dan Bylsma says no one’s perfect, but Sidney Crosby is getting there”. That is a quote. I make plenty of grammar and spelling errors and do not tend to care, there are at least a few I know of in this posting which I am too lazy to fix, but don’t blame me for the quoted ones here, that is how the NHL is present itself to the world.

Give me an F’ing break! Understand, I do not blame Crosby. But, Sidney Crosby in not The NHL. Get over it. He is not even the best player in the league. You need look no further than New Jersey or Detroit to find better, more accomplished, team hockey players. You need look no further than Washington to find a better individual player of the same age group class. You need look no further than Chicago for players of the same/younger age group that are better team players, and have already accomplished more at their age that Crosby, Malkin, Ovechkin did at the same age. But Sidney Crosby is THE poster boy for the NHL. This year, they did sometimes start promoting AO more, because they almost had to. The last couple weeks Toews, Kane, Kieth, (not Versteeg, Sharp, Mason, Rinne…) have sometimes been mentioned as an afterthought in some of the promos as some of the up and coming young breed, but only because it is being shoved down their throats by performance.

Sid the Kid, the future of the NHL. No, he is not! He is a great player. Could be, probably should be, a hall of fame player, in 15 years. They have him there now though. Sell the game, not Sidney Crosby. Not Alexander Ovechkin for that matter. Not Kane, Sharp, Toews, Thornton, Zetterberg, Nash, Traveres before he is even drafted, whoever. Sell the game. Bettman, this is not the NBA where the players had to be marketed over a freaking boring game. This is HOCKEY. Market the game of hockey. Quit shoving one, or ten, or even a hundred players down our throats. Sell the game.

By the way, along with resentment that their player does not receive the same promotion; along with it being an embarrassment to the league and the game; in your efforts to institute the star system in the NHL as was done in the NBA you are throwing the entire credibility of the league into question. Fans of every other team already think that certain star players, including specifically Ovechkin and Crosby, and their teams, receive special treatment one the ice, not just in promotion. They are being given ammunition for those arguments in two ways: through the belief that the NHL cannot afford to have their promotional machine lose, and through the evidence of actually watching on the ice. Yes, it is becoming more and more obvious, to observers who try to stay unbiased, that they DO get different treatment on the ice. That the same rules do not apply to certain players on the ice as apply to everyone else. The perception is that this is worse than reality, but the reality is growing. By progression, if a player is getting preferential treatment, so is their team. That means that there is a growing perception, and starting to be actual evidence, that the league is manipulating games. Knock it off. This is not “Sports Entertainment”, a euphemism used by “Professional Wrestling” meaning staged acting. This is a team sport and you are ripping off and angering other players and more importantly, the fans who pay the bills.

Think I am wrong with any of this? Tell me. Convince me. I'm open minded. Opinionated, but open minded. I also think I am right and you will have trouble convincing me otherwise. Think I am right? Tell me. I want people to know what the fans really think and how many are on each side of what I think is an important issue.

Officiating Standards

2009-05-17T20:12:00.000-07:00

What should the coding standards be, and what are they really?

First, the coding standard should be whatever the competition committee says it is. I actually do not who all is currently on the competition committee, but it should be fair representation by the NHLPA, teams (either GMs or coaches, probably GMs), league officials, and referee reps. Whatever they decide though, the standard should be what they say the standard is, and the games should be officiated to that standard from day one of the season until the cup is awarded. Hey, if they really want what they have this year, 2/3 of the season officiated to one standard, that standard progressively relaxed over the last 1/3, and then thrown out the window for the playoffs, then say that is what you are going to do. It is stupid, but at least state that is what you are going to do.

Changing the way the game is called for the playoffs is complete BS. You might as well play something like no touch hockey for 82 games to determine who is going to play full contact stick and grap for the championship. Hey, lets go back to days that once a team is eliminated, other teams can pick up their players too. Ovie could be playing for Carolina, Pronger and Nieds for Chicago, Thornton for... Oh, sorry, he would still be playing golf.

The officials are supposed to be professionals. If they are too big of cowards to call the rules in the playoffs, how are they compitent enough to call the regular season. I happen to be a big fan of the officials. Yes, they really do have fans. I happen to think that they are the best set of officials in sports. Their job is far more difficult than, Basketball, Football, and certainly Baseball. Crap, I could call Baseball and Basketball, I have. There is not a chance in the world I could have every skated at the level hockey officials do. The intricacies of the calls that hockey officials have to make on the fly is far more complex, and the physical level they must handle is not even in the same ballpark. Yes, football rules are at least as complex, and they have what, about seven officials on the field and each are only responcible for a fraction of that rule-book. Baseball is a piece of cake, and they are so worried about it that they go to six freaking officials for the playoffs. As professionals though, why are theysuddenly afraid to call they game in the playoffs? Call the game.

As for what level of infraction constitutes a penalty, well, I can live with any real level as long as it is consistent. Players adapt very quickly to whatever the standard is. People claim that there are too many soft penalties called. I ran the numbers earlier in the year, and it is non-sense. There is virtually no difference in total calls before and after the tighter standards were put in place, and the number of obstruction type calls has actually gone down, not up. I got those numbers by parsing play-by-play data for the games, not from some database. The claims are simply wrong.

What style of calling is better for the league? Well, that is hard to say other than consistancy, the rest is opinion and preference. My preference is the tighter standard. It is not that I like power-plays and cheap calls, it is that I like the game it produced.

I like the faster and open game it produces. That allows the skilled players to be skilled players. Looser standards does not in my opinion. I did not like clutch and grab. Well, it is still hockey, so I like it, just not as much.

Understand, I do not like no-contact hockey. I like power, high speed, high impact, hitting, fighting, competitive hockey. A lot of people think that the tight standards only promote high speed. I think a lot of people are wrong. Power forwards are back, because guys are not allowed to drape all over them. Speed guys are not dragged down every time they want to make a move. Hits are up and so are fights. Why? Because the game took a step back towards what it was in the 80's and early 90's. Higher speed means harder hits. Clutch and grab means very little hitting. How do you hit someone if they can't move? What does harder hitting produce? More fights. The reason is they same reason as the 80's, no clutch and grab means the skill players are more vulnerable. You take a run at a skill player, especially a smaller skill player, and they have to be protected. Given time, I believe it will also bring back the skill player who fights for themselves. Real fights, not the stage BS for the fans. Hockey fights.

I know that many disagree with my assertions, and they are just opinions. The numbers though I think back me up.

Headshots

2009-05-02T22:54:00.000-07:00

I really do not understand what the NHL discipline gurus are doing. I try not to be arbitrarily critical but their actions in the playoffs just does not make sense to me. They say the want to crack down on it, and say it, and say it. Then in the course of a week or so they have their chance to show their cajones.

First, Brashear takes out Betts in the Washington/Rangers series. There was no excuse. It was a brutal and unacceptable hit. Betts got rid of a pass, was well behind the play, and turned to head off the ice after his shift. Brashear went from almost stationary, to taking three full strides and just devistated him with a trageted head shot. He broke his orbital bone. Bill McCreary was looking right at the play and acted like nothing happened. The trail referee, Brad Meier was in trial, so even though I can say he should have seen the play I do not know where his attention really was, following the puck watching some other behind the play action. There is also two linesmen on the ice, one of which should have been following the puck into the zone, but the other should have been watching the bench action and therefore been drawn immediately to Brashear heading from the bench area to center ice for an open ice hit on a player who did not have the puck. Now, in the officials defence, they did call a penalty on Brashear, roughing. The same call they gave Betts' team mate who came over to push and shove. So, according to the on ice officials, attempting to cave in the side of a players face is the same as pushing and shoving after than hit. Truthfully, my actual assumption is that Brashear got his roughing for the pushing and shoving, not the hit. Two referees, of either of the linesmen could have correctly made a call of at least a double major or more correctly a major and game or match penalty. At least the league stepped to the plate and gave Brashear five games for the hit, not that this really help the Rangers who lost a valuable player, that game and the next to be eliminated from the playoffs whil the Caps replaced their goon with an actual player.

I have no problem with the leagues reaction on this, five games in the playoffs is appropriate. Betts being lost to the Rangers is unfortunate, but it happens. I do have a problem with the fact that a creatin like Brashear is even still in the league. I have a bigger problem with the on ice officials who simply did not officiate the play.

A few nights later, it is Eager with a blueline hit. Now on this one, on first view I thought this was a no big deal interference hit, or as the official called it, roughing. I cannot fault the officials because it was fast and in play. Replay though clearly showed it to be a head-shot, and pretty clearly a targeted one. Easy for on-ice to miss the exact nature of the hit, but not on replay. Precident had been set with Brashear and earlier incidents, clearly Chicago was going to lose the services of Eager for one to two games. It was clear to everyone except Chicago home fans. Well, I guess it was not obvious to those in Toronto. No additional punishment and a clear head-shot. OK, judgement, but a pretty clear 1-2 games to me.

Then we have Brown on Hudler. Hudler dumps the puck down ice. Yes he was watching the puck but there was no reason not to. The puck was gone, the play was over for him. There was no one around, at least not anyone he needed to worry about. There was Brown, well behind the play. Brown saw it differently though. He felt that it was fair game to skate past and paste him with an elbow to the face. Sutherlands hand immediately went up, and as soon as he consulted with the other three officials and got the bleeding Hudler off the ice they correctly called a 5+Game on Brown. The call was interference, but roughing, elbow, intent to injure, they all work.

The league, in its infinite wisdom, stepped in to back its officials and hit Brown with a well deserved 4 game suspension. Err, they him with a light two games. Err, actually, they obsolved him of wrong-doing and cleared him to play in game two. I guess the lesson here is very clear. break a bone, and you get a vacation as long as you are a player of no real importance to your team. Only bust a guys up and you are OK. Way to go Mr. Murphey and Mr. Campbell. Heads are indeed still fair game in the MMA on ice.

First round Op Eds, and thoughts

2009-04-30T22:08:00.000-07:00

First round officiating was inconsistent at best. One of the reasons was the some of the wrong officials were put in the first round. I was openly apposed to Lee, Meier and LaRue making it at all. McCreaty, McCauley and Leggo I felt should be included only because someone had to be, and one and done should be all they see. Walsh did not have and especially impressive season, in fact many did not think they should be in. There are six other also reviewing games, and all of us gave a fair chance regardless of or thoughts going in.

My personal first round reviews were:
Flyers-Pens with VanMassenhoven and Hassenfratz. It was brutal, and I was not easy on them. They had no control, no consistency and lost it to the point that Carcillo was suspended for a game. GPA style scores for them was 1.00 for VanM and 0.75 for Fratz, and they had to work hard to score that low.
Blues/Nucks with Rooney and Watson. The teams complained that their first game was too tightly called, so they got what they wanted. They game was called fairly and even, not anything goes, but no soft calls, just beat on each other. I hit them for safety, but nothing else. 3.2 average score for both.
Bruins/Habs with Devorski and Walsh. An odd pairing because both are poor skaters. Devo though is very good at bringing the level of others up and working as a team. He did exactly that here. Walsh had a very poor skating game which lowers his score. 2.1, a touch above average. Devorski had superior positioning, which turns his poor skating effectively into well above average. 3.4, a B+.
Devils/Canes with Furlatt and McCauley. I was pleasantly surprised by McCauley, he in fact scored even with Furlatt, though in different areas. This is though probably the easiest game to officiate. This however was the controversial game with the winning goal with 0:00.2. I called the final goal clean, no interference, but did ding the officials for interference on an earlier goal. Scores averaged 2.9 each.
Flyers/Pens with Furlatt and McCauley. This time the duo did not draw and easy game. Again they really surprised me. The handled the game well, kept it in control. The only real demerits I game them was they skated poorly and were repeatedly in the way. Furlatt pulled a 2.8, and McCauly 2.5.
Wings/Jackets with Lee and O'Halloran. A pretty easy series, but a potential elimination game. They handled it horribly. It started off anything goes and became complete whistle lock. The suddenly a too many men was called with just over a minute left and Detroit scored to wing the game. The officials do not get dinged for that call, but they do for the rest of the game. 0.5 for each of them.
Flames/Hawks with Lee and O'Halloran, giving them another chance. The league had a full throttle on the game, and then when Chicago put the game early, it was just a dead game. Then the officials did not even call the game particularly even and inconsistent to try to keep it under control. If Calgary was going to show any signs of getting back in, it was made sure they did not. They still get better scores than they really deserve because the game did not test them. 2.8 for O'Halloran, Lee a 2.6.
Caps/Rangers with McCreay and Meier. A poor pairing, in what should be a fair game. In the end, I gave them higher scores than they deserved. Brashear hit bates with a brutal hit, a pure cheap shot that ended up resulting in a six game suspension. With officials had a good view, and gave him a matching minor, while Betts earned a broken orbital. The rest of the game was fairly clean except for skating, but they probably deserved a fail for that. McCreary a 1.7 and Meier 1.5.

Devorski and Walsh combined for 8 of the 12 highest scores in the round. Sutherland, Rooney,
Joannette and McCauley not only had the next highest scores and a separation from the pack. There was no question they earned the right to move on. McCauley of that group would not be my choice, but performance says he should move on. O'Rourke, Furrlatte, Watson, Jackson and Peel are in the next group. Pollock was well back of that group, but would be an almost must be moved on for his ability to police games and some of the teams that advanced. McCreary scored just behind Pollock, and a big gap back to 14. I would put him at a standby. VanMassenhoven, I would put as my other standby even with his rating of 19 out of 20 for his ability to police. No other really even earned consideration.

Those were my opinions. I have no idea what criteria the league used in place of merit as they said they were going to. McCreary was taken, and though I really do not like his officiating, he was boarderline at #13 in our ratings, and is a very veteran referee, so I could live with it without liking it. The keeping of LaRue, Leggo and O'Halloran and calling it on merit though is just out of line. McCauley would have been my first choice if I was to take someone out of line, and he was dropped, but he really deserved another round. Dropping O'Rourke and Rooney was a really poor choice, especially replacing them with the likes of LaRue and Leggo who simply are not good enough to be in the second round and they showed that in the first round. And dropping Walsh after the way he worked with Devorski is just inexcusable.

Scoring explanation.

2009-04-30T19:04:00.000-07:00

The ratings table is the work of a group of seven people who dedicated quite a bit of time to review how officials did in the first round of the playoffs. I did only minimal interpretation of the scores, going as much as possible directly by how the reviewers scored the game.

The first two tables are for common infraction and safety infractions. Both are scored the same way. Common infractions are the non-physical fouls, interference, trips, and so on. Safety infractions are the more physical in nature infractions that if allow to escalate lead to potential injury and loss of control of the game. Too many men, pucks over the glass, fights and misconducts are not included. Ratings for call types are control calls, which would typically be a weak call but the reviewer thought it was made to keep the game under control, typical infractions, and no calls which are calls that are in the standards for calling in that game, but the officials let it go and noted why they thought it was a good call. Each of these were assigned a value of 100 when the reviewer noted them. A noted call is one that the reviewer gave specially notation about and would include things like a dive which takes special paperwork if it is called. Noted calls were set at 150, and a major was set at a value of 200. Any instance of those categories would add the noted amount to used as the standard for the game and the amount credited to the official.

There is them the negatives. A weak call is given the value of 50, and a miss 100. Make-up calls were called out by Mike Murphy of league offices in TOR as something that was not going to be tolerated, so that was given a value of 150, along with whiffs, which I defined as a miss that was made with a rated level of 20 or more points below standard for the game. A phantom call was given a value of 200, and had to be expressly called out by the reviewer as a call that simply was not an infraction. A bad miss was also given the value of 200, and I put as needing to be a level 90 or over infraction that was not called or specifically called out by the reviewer. A reviewer would call these out on things like a clear penalty that was not called and lead directly to a goal. All negative call add to the standards, but the official gets no credit.

As much as possible, reviews attempted to assign who was responsible for a noted call/non-call. This is not always possible due to camera angles, and sometime either official should see the play. These were considered shared calls. For an official, if the responsible official would accumulate the assigned value time three, for shared incidents times two, and for partner's calls with no multiple. It accounts for the fact the officials are a team, but they are also responsible for their own calls. Thus pairs did not have the same scores, but do track each other.

For the composite over-all rating, the scores from the three categories are added, with safety multiplied by 1.5. I even know of a bit fairer way of doing this, but the change in scores is small enough that I don't have time to do those calculations. If I weak or miss was close to the standard to the game, I gave the official a 1/2 rather than a full ding.

First Round Official ratings

2009-04-30T03:31:00.000-07:00

Common Infractions

Referee	Number	Standard	Credit	Score
Devorski	10	6800	6700	98.5%
Walsh	29	6000	5700	95.0%
Sutherland	11	4950	4300	86.9%
Rooney	5	2800	2400	85.7%
Joannette	25	3800	3100	81.6%
Jackson	8	5650	4500	79.6%
Peel	20	4850	3600	74.2%
Furlatt	27	6650	4800	72.2%
O'Rourke	42	5400	3700	68.5%
LaRue	14	7050	4800	68.1%
Leggo	3	5350	3600	67.3%
McCauley	4	8350	5600	67.1%
Pollock	33	6150	4000	65.0%
Watson	23	5700	3500	61.4%
O'Halloran	13	8700	5300	60.9%
Lee	28	8000	4400	55.0%
VanMassehoven	21	9000	4000	44.4%
McCreary	7	9275	3850	41.5%
Hsenfratz	30	7000	2800	40.0%
Meier	34	8625	3150	36.5%

Safety Infractions

Referee	Number	Standard	Credit	Score
Walsh	29	2050	1950	95.1%
Devorski	10	2550	2250	88.2%
Sutherland	11	5650	4800	85.0%
Rooney	5	5900	4800	81.4%
McCauley	4	6950	5550	79.9%
McCreary	7	9775	7600	77.7%
O'Rourke	42	2350	1800	76.6%
Watson	23	6700	5100	76.1%
Hsenfratz	30	7300	5500	75.3%
Meier	34	6925	5200	75.1%
Joannette	25	2650	1800	67.9%
Jackson	8	4350	2800	64.4%
Furlatt	27	6050	3850	63.6%
Peel	20	6000	3800	63.3%
VanMassehoven	21	7500	4500	60.0%
Pollock	33	4750	2800	58.9%
O'Halloran	13	6850	3550	51.8%
Leggo	3	6200	3200	51.6%
Lee	28	7150	3550	49.7%
LaRue	14	4650	2000	43.0%

Reviewer Ratings

Referee	Number	Standard	Credit	Score
Devorski	10	4000	3545	88.6%
Sutherland	11	3000	2500	83.3%
Walsh	29	4000	3207	80.2%
Joannette	25	3000	2172	72.4%
O'Rourke	42	3000	2082	69.4%
McCauley	4	5000	3382	67.7%
Rooney	5	3000	1970	65.7%
Jackson	8	3000	1950	65.0%
Furlatt	27	5000	3220	64.4%
Peel	20	4000	2532	63.3%
Watson	23	4000	2512	62.8%
Pollock	33	4000	2502	62.6%
Leggo	3	4000	2255	56.4%
LaRue	14	4000	2205	55.1%
Meier	34	5000	2505	50.1%
McCreary	7	5000	2480	49.6%
Hsenfratz	30	4000	1858	46.4%
VanMassehoven	21	4000	1712	42.8%
Lee	28	4000	1618	40.4%
O'Halloran	13	5000	1912	38.3%

Combined Score

Referee	Number	Standard	Credit	Score
Devorski	10	4000	3545	88.6%
Sutherland	11	3000	2500	83.3%
Walsh	29	4000	3208	80.2%
Joannette	25	3000	2173	72.4%
O'Rourke	42	3000	2082	69.4%
McCauley	4	5000	3382	67.7%
Rooney	5	3000	1970	65.7%
Jackson	8	3000	1950	65.0%
Furlatt	27	5000	3220	64.4%
Peel	<0	4000	2532	63.3%
Watson	23	4000	2512	62.8%
Pollock	33	4000	2502	62.6%
Leggo	3	4000	2255	56.4%
LaRue	14	4000	2205	55.1%
Meier	34	5000	2505	50.1%
McCreary	7	5000	2480	49.6%
Hsenfratz	30	4000	1858	46.4%
VanMassehoven	21	4000	1712	42.8%
Lee	28	4000	1618	40.4%
O'Halloran	13	5000	1912	38.3%

Why all the ref data?

2009-04-14T16:06:00.000-07:00

Mike ask a question that led me to answer a little more on what is going on with this data. Those of us who are reviewing games and the reason why I gathered and am presenting this data is because we are hockey fans. Easy and I (with others) started doing this a couple years ago when we as a group reviewed a large number of games systematically to look at the officiating. Some of that effort was initiated by rumors of favoritism and bias in officiating. Some was because I at least was tired of the yearly calls that “this year the rules would be enforced, and we really mean it this time”. We decided to monitor it. We wanted to create a forum under which officiating could be discussed without the constant bashing and whining that this or that referee hates our team, and the refs are all out to get us. Frankly, we also wanted to help educate people, including ourselves, exactly what referees in the NHL do, and how well they do it.

The project was well received. It was a lot of work for all involved, and Easy did a great job organizing it. I think all of us that were in the project found the effort worth it. We also had a huge increase in our respect for NHL officials and just how good of a job they really do. We found that some of the official we thought were not very good, actually were. Some of the officials that are/were the targets of the most criticism by the fans are actually amongst the ones we rated absolutely the best. We also watched some of the officials improve before our eyes. We watched as Steven Walkom, the Grand Poobough of officials actually implemented the system he said he was going to. We also found that our little project was noticed, to the point that the league knew they were being watched. As for bias, I will not say who, but we found evidence of only two officials that any of us felt showed signs of bias. On one of those, others found the same thing, including articles in the press accusing him of it, and he resigned before the next season.

Easy has revived the review process in a slightly different form, and we, the group that is, hit many of the late season games, and hope to get all the playoff games. One of our rules has always been no doing “our” team. Easy and I are both in SJ, so Sharks games are off-limits for us. Both of us are completely capable of reviewing a San Jose game without bias, but it simply looks better if we do not. Besides, then I get to yell at the officials for those games too. I am, and always have been, a hockey fan first though, and then a Sharks fan. I bleed hockey red, not teal.

When we did the reviews before, our grading was strictly on calls, good, bad and missed, with some verbal comments thrown in. We gave both officials full credit/blame on each issue, but we tried to lean to identify who the responsible party really was. We went by the theory that officials word as a team. This worked, but it was not 100% true. We quickly learned that senior officials often dominated junior officials for instance. We also learned that this was one of the systems that Walkom was trying to eliminate, and most of the time it is now greatly reduced. The Sr. official still usually runs the show, but most of the Jr. officials are no longer afraid to make a call. The reviews that are being done this year do not use that all a team effort. We try to identify who is actually responsible. If an infraction occurs directly in front of an official, but the official 90 feet away has to call it, we not that. We also are not grading just on pure counts, we are judging, in our opinion, the quality of the calls. We rate an infraction. If that infraction would have been called 20% of the time, then it should be let go, and we will call it a weak call if the whistle blows. If an official lets something go that is called 80% of the time: that is a blown call. We are rating each official in the game on situations that we think are their responsibility. Included are skating and position (do the players beat them down the ice, are they constantly getting hit by pucks…), fairness of the calls (do that call something we rate a 40, but let 70’s go. No calling things on one team or player and letting it go the other way), quality (no missed calls, no phantom calls, no make-ups (calling something that didn’t happen because you made a weak call last period and the team scored on the PP), safety calls (no letting things like high stick, crosschecks, charges, etc. go). The only real exceptions we give on having different call standards are there can be different standards for safety and obstruction, as long as the standard for obstruction is not lower than safety, and there is a lot more contact allowed in front of the crease (though more than I would like).

Now, on the numbers I have presented here: These are not gathered by the described review method. These come from the official play-by-play for the games. That means no way to assign who actually made a given call. If a call is made, it is assigned to both officials. That tends to flatten what should be the real spread amongst officials, and the real meaning of the numbers are that a game in which referee A is assigned has on averages these call probabilities, not that he actually made those calls. After an official has worked 70 games though, it is mostly fair to say if he has the highest call rate in the league, that it is his doing, and that his partner is actually holding it back from being even higher, or at the other extreme. There is of course no way to know how many of those calls were good calls, or how many are missed. That is where these raw numbers can be combined with our subjective reviews to come up with a real picture of what you should expect from an official. If for instance you have a high infraction team hosting a low infraction team, and have and official that is noted as seeming to call a lot more on visiting teams, that is not a good sign for the low infraction team. Our observations though might say that the tendencies of that official is to call a fair game, he has just been getting a lot of games with the visitors committing a lot of penalties. Or not. In the past, predicting call patterns for a game from these processes has been quite accurate.

Information on offciating over the season.

2009-04-14T04:02:00.000-07:00

These are links on information about officials from the regular season. I will be adding additional information from the regular season and as the playoffs go on. I will keep this particular post at the top of the blog so that links to the other posts are readily and visible available in one place as other posts may be added. Comments are welcome. I hope you may find some of this information useful.

For call history by team. Calls by category, information by home and road, and "home ice advantage". Teams

Most penalty numbers by referee. This includes total calls, calls by category, and percentage of calls by period. Referees.

Calls by period, broken down by total calls and each category, looking mostly for drops of increases of calls. By Period.

Referee assignments. This shows total assignments by conference and division. There is then "drill down" sheets for each division. On the drill downs it will show both home many games the official work for a team both at home and on the road. Assignments

Playoff assignments is information on playoff assignments for last season. This set of sheets was made for questions of who worked specific games last year, and to see who is likely to work deep into the playoffs this year. It can be assumed that an official that worked deep into the playoffs last year would be expected to this year unless they have diminished performance since last season or if they do not perform to standards in the early rounds this season. Playoff Assignments.

Comments on the officials that have been selected for the playoffs this season. These comments are opinions, from my observations. Comments

It would be best not to comment on this post, all the others are fine. That is only because I will probably delete and re-publish this post through the playoffs to keep it on top.

Comments on playoff officials

2009-04-14T03:55:00.000-07:00

These are entirely opinion from my observations, though I may revise according to the thoughts of other members of the group that have been reviewing officials and will be doing so for the playoffs.

When I make the comment heavy talkers, this is a good thing. Talkers are guys you can see visibly talking to players after the play, can hear on the feed calling out to get sticks down and to break up holds and jousting, especially early in the game to control rather than calling early penalties. Most of them will not make the first call until they have given a warning, then to the box you go. I am not talking arguing, strictly letting the player know what will be tolerated and what will not. They are also usually very good at going to the bench to explain their calls to the bench.

All playoff games are required to have a stanby referee and lineman assigned. In the first round these are referees other than the twenty listed as playoff referees. After the first round, referees working the series rotate out, or are taken out of the working rotation as the series progress or end. By the finals the officals are paired and usually alternate games until game seven for which the rotation sometimes is broken. Only one game last year failed to have a standby when travel issues prevented the back-up linesman from making the game.

Paul Devorski #10: 16 last year, through the SCF. Primarily an Eastern official in the regular season. Not an especially good skater but tends to make up for that in anticipation. Slightly over average in call rate. Has called 3% more on visitors than home teams. Calls level between periods even when broken down by category except misconducts. He calls misconducts in the second and third at any sign of a game getting out of hand. Consistently one of the best communicators in the game. Controls a game without bullying other officials and out of respect from the players.

Brad Watson #23: 16 games through the SCF. Above average skater who anticipates well and talks to players throughout the game. Call rate is high. Home/away differential well under average. Level all game in obstruction calls, but safety calls and fight related go up sharply in the 2nd, back down in the third indicating he cuts off the extra stuff before it gets out of hand. He is a heavy talker to the players, can be heard calling for sticks down and talking to players after whistles to keep control. Heavy Western official, matches Leggo with highest Pacific game count in the league.

Marc Joannette #25: 15 games through SCF. Average skater with good positioning. Level calls through the game, with obstruction calls dropping in the 3rd but safety calls going up. No real trends to losing control of games. Average call rate, with very few misconduct called. Well above average leaning towards home team. Regular season workload is almost even East/West, but seldom works the Pacific. Also know for very good positioning on calls.

Dan O'Halloran #13: 13 games through the SCF. Even split between East/West, almost even between all six divisions so equally familiar with all teams. Substantial drop in all call types in the third would indicate a trend to swallow the whistle late in a game. Call rate just above average with close to even calls between home and road however would indicate if may be more of getting a game under control early. Has issues with skating and position, and is sometimes completely silent in his calls, leaving everything to his partner.

Bill McCreary #7: 11 games through the conference finals. Even assignments between all divisions, and the senior official in the league. Substantial drop in obstruction calls while level in safety calls would back up his reputation for swallowing the whistle as the game progresses. His call rate is medium low however he had one of, if not the highest call rate in last year’s playoffs. A bit above average with home advantage in call rate.

Kevin Pollock #33: 11 games through the conference finals. Known as the Sherriff amongst referees. If trouble is expected, Pollock will not be far behind. This season he had a very heavy assign rate to the NE and Central divisions. Well below average in leaning to home team in calls, slightly below average in call rate. Is known for getting a game under control by making early calls, therefore is an official with the first period being the highest call period (for most of the league the second is), but a relatively flat call rate through the game. Talking much more to players this year after establishing a rep for taking no BS.

Kelly Sutherland #11: 10 games through the conference finals. Very heavy assignments to the NW, with low counts for the Central and NE. One of the best skaters and positional referees in the game. Somewhat low call rate with almost no difference between home and road. Definite drop in calls in the third, with a noticeable drop in obstruction calls and a large drop in fighting type calls. Very heavy talker to players, calling for sticks down and to drop the holding early in the game.

Mike Hasenfratz #30: 10 games through the conference finals. Even assignments across all six divisions. Much lower than league average on home team tendencies with slightly about average call rate. Not only no tendency to swallow, his call rate goes up in the third, with the increase being in safety calls indicating he does not put up with the team behind gooning. Is an official who has steadily improved over the last three years.

Don Van Massenhoven #21: 9 games through the second round. Low game count in the SE though he has a lean in assignments to the East. Call rate rises through the game but his obstruction calls drop substantially in the third while safety calls go up. Throws misconducts in the third indicating a tendency to have trouble keeping control late and is another choice for games that expect rough stuff. A favorite tactic it to throw an extra roughing call in a fight so he does not have to call the instigator and the misconduct that goes with it.

Mike Leggo #3: 9 games through the second round. Very heavy Pacific assignments. Poor skater has been known to need to be carried especially at the payoff level. Has trouble with speed teams. Has the lowest call rate in the league and high drop off in the third which is no surprise as he is considered by many to be a whistle swallower in the third. Slightly above average leanings towards home team, but average is too high to begin with. Out of position way too often.

Tim Peel #20: 8 games through the second round. Even assignments between conferences, the very heavy in the SE and Central. Call rate slightly above average and is the only official except Devorski who has called more penalties on the home team than the visitors. Does have a noticeable drop in calls in the third with it being substantial in obstruction calls giving the impression of swallowing the whistle late. Usually very good positional and a good skater which has helped him rise in respect steadily.

Wes McCauley #4: 5 games through the second round. Mostly Eastern assignments with very heavy in the SE, and what assignments he has in the west being dominantly in the Central. Not good positionally. Very low call rate and high drop off in all calls in the third for a known whistle swallower. He is not known to be consistent in calls, making phantom calls and chasing calls. A little above the high league average in home advantage.

Eric Furlatt #27: 4 last year, through the second round. Primarily an Eastern official with 20 assignments in the NE. Above average home leanings and slightly above average call rate. Definite drop in calls in the third with a heavy drop in all calls would label him a whistle swallower who attempts to control the game early.

Dave Jackson #8: 4 games in the first round. Even assignments across the board except the NW. Above average call rate and below average home leanings. Very level call rates across all categories except a drop in fighting in the third showing no tendency to back off or lose control of the game.

Dennis LaRue #14: 4 games in the first round. Assigned almost exclusively to the Pacific and NW. Has the third lowest call rate in the league. Slightly below average home leanings. Substantial drop in calls in the third and in obstruction calls, but also has the lowest rate of roughing/fighting calls in the league. Some would say it is because he allows too many roughs to go unpunished. As Easy points out, LaRue was once one of the highest call rates in the league, but also got a rep for phantom calls and backed off. IMO, he also lost confidence and over compensated. He also has skating and position issues.

Chris Rooney #5: 3 games in the first round. Mostly even assignments across the board except exchanging Central assignments for NW. Average call rate and a bit below average home advantage. Level calls across periods with the bulk of his misconducts coming late. The fact that he is below average home advantage even though working the NW when he would have likely spent time paired with some of the highest such numbers in the league means a lot. Has been noted for skating.

Chris Lee #28: Standby last season. Heavy NW assignments, with a little above average call rate, and a high home ice advantage. Increase in call rate in the third with a very high misconduct rate and high safety call rate in the third, and one of the highest fight/rough rate in the league. Part of that could be blamed on the NW assignments, but he is known for losing control of games. Poor positional official who has been known as a puck magnet, and a magnet to controversy. Should not be out of the standby pool.

Brad Meier #34: Standby only. Very heavy NW assignment rate. Low call rate when officiating heavily in a very high infraction division. Incredible high home advantage in call rate which suddenly came down late in the season from over a 33% advantage, down to 26%. Level total calls across periods, but a substantial drop in obstruction calls and rise in safety calls in the third. Also seems to be a puck magnet. Do not think he was ready to leave the standby pool.

Dan O'Rourke #42: Standby only. Mostly even assignments across division except a bit high in the SE. Highest call rate of any playoff ref with a bit below average home advantage. Level calls across periods with a slight increase in the third. Up and comer with good skating and instincts for position, but has been accused of phantom calls. I have seen more often that he still needs to call heavy to control the game, something that tends to change as a referee becomes more senior an the player learn not to test them.

Ian Walsh #29: standby only. Leans a bit to the East with assignments with the Atlantic being his highest assignment division. Medium below average in calls, and below average in home advantage. No drop in calls in the third period. Is not good positionally as he does not seem to be able to read the play if by instinct or experience, often getting caught in corner fights and hit by pucks. Do not agree he is ready to leave the standby pool.

Koharski (2), Kimmerly (1), Marouelli (1), Fraser (1)

NOTE: Many of the referees that have higher call drops in the third as amongst the officials that did not make the playoffs.

Referee Assignments by Division

2009-04-13T23:47:00.000-07:00

This is a table of assignments by referee. I put in three pages, Home assignments, Away assignments, and total by division. I include East/West totals in each sheet. There is then Sheets for each division that will show assignments by team.

Calls by period, for call types

2009-04-13T19:38:00.000-07:00

This set of tables is a bit more straight forward. It breaks out each call type, I show the total number of calls of that type the referee made, and then show what percentage of those calls were made each period. When you combine this, it gives a bit of an idea of if the referee tends to quit calling late in the game and it they tend to lose control of the game late. Remember though, these are only numbers, not fact. Observations need to be combined with these numbers though. Similar numbers for different officials do not necessarily mean the same thing. On the surface though, before I include my own observations, this is how I start out looking at these numbers, you may interpret them completely differently:

When the total number of calls drop of radically between the second and third, that is a sign to be of an official swallowing the whistle. In general, I but this line at about 9% difference. Next, look at where the drop off occurs.

As an example, if an official has a drop-off in total calls of 9%, but you look at the types and that drop-off is in safety calls and roughing/fighting, but obstruction stays relatively flat, then this is likely not from swallowing the whistle, this is an official simply getting control of the game. A big drop in obstructions, but an increase in fighting/roughs and safety calls, would to me be a sign that the official tends to quit calling and loses control of the game.

Penalty Numbers by Team

2009-04-11T22:35:00.000-07:00

This is a one that people will want to look at if they think that their team is taking a disadvantage from the officials, as every fan does. This includes some of the numbers that demonstrate the idea that home teams are receiving advantageous officiating. I raised these numbers before, and others have as well. These are updated numbers for the bulk of the season. I did adjust the numbers a little as I could not get data for a few games, and all teams had 2-3 games left when I ran the numbers. I normalized the numbers because of this. By this I mean if a team had played 38 home games, I extrapolated it to 41. I show counts in whole numbers only. If you compare across tables, you will sometimes see numbers that are supposed to be equal (such as total number of penalties against home teams) that are sums of rounded number and do not come out the same. This does not effect calculations.

These are the sheets that are included:
By Category: shows the number of penalties called against each team by four categories and the category as a percentage of the total calls against that team. The "Obstruction" category are the typical penalties, holds, hooks, delay of game, etc. "Safety" calls are the more dangerous penalties, all stick and physical penalties, x-check, slash, boarding, charging, and such. The "Rough" category are roughing and fight related penalties. "Misconduct" are any 10 minute call.

Home-Road Differential: This does not necessarily show an advantage to a team at home. It shows how many calls are mate against a team when playing at home, and when on the road. It says nothing about how many penalties are called on their opponents. In some cases it is more of an indication than their games are called very differently when at home than on the road, which can be just as much of an advantage. I stated before that for a team like Detroit, with many more calls against on the road than at home is like almost a different rule book is used for their home games than road. Detroit home games tend to be low call games for both teams, while road games tend to be high call games. STL on the other hand has their home games as high call while road games tend to be lower. In their case, that plays into their hands at home since the Blues have one of the best power plays in the league. These numbers may tend to support assertions that officiating might tend to the style that the home team prefers.

Home calls, Road calls: Shows the number of calls for and against at home and on the road. It shows the differentials in calls for and against, and expresses the differential as a percentage of calls against.

Home Advantage: This final table is the one that shows any actual advantage that a team gets by playing at home, or disadvantage on the road if it were. The table shows the home and road differentials, and total differentials, and finally these numbers expressed as a "home advantage". In this sense, the home advantage is expressed as the difference in call differential between home and road games. To use an example for explanation, I will use Nashville. At home, they have a differential of 14 fewer calls on them than their oppenents, a 7.00% call advantage. On the road though they are -38 or -17.14%, and overall -24 or -5.37%. The "Home advantage then the be +52 or 24.14% advantage playing at home over than on the road.

Penalty Numbers

2009-04-07T09:21:00.000-07:00

These are nearly complete numbers for the season, through 1183 of 1230 games for the season. The following sheets are by official. I included substitute referees in the total numbers, but as these numbers are more for seeing before the playoffs, I did not keep them on the sheets as they will not work the playoffs. Due to the nature of fewer games worked, and always being junior to the other official, their numbers tend to be skewed.

In the referee numbers are the following sheets:
By Game (All Calls) excludes no calls for each official. Values are number of games worked, Calls against the home and away teams, and total, calls per game, home, team and total, and variance from league average as a percentage. The league average is 11.15 calls per game. Highest call officials are Auger at +12.56%, St. Pierre at +12.38% and O'Rourke at +12.20%. Low end is McCauley at -13.63% and Leggo at -13.78%.
Referee Differential (All Calls) are the same calls showing the spread between home and away calls. Raw difference is Visitor Calls - Home Calls. Differential % is Raw Difference/Home Calls. League average is down to 8.97% in the home teams favor. League highs are Meier at 25.98%, St. Pierre at 20.55% and Schick at 18.52%. The low end is Sutherland at 1.09% and Peel and Devorski, the only two that call more on the visiting teams by 0.99% and 2.96% respectively.
Manpower The next two pages are the same numbers excluding calls that do not lead to a manpower advantage (fights, misconducts). With these, the league average is 9.70 calls per game.
Majors Shows the distribution of the 34 non-fighting majors called.
Instigators Shows who has been in on instigator calls. 45 Instigators have been called against 710 fights, so one instigator for every 15.8 fights.
Misconducts Include all 10 minute penalties, and also includes some interesting trends. Two that jump out are Fraser with 4 Misc against home teams and 16 against the visitors, while Schick called only 4 on each home and away.
By Period Shows what percentage of a given officials calls are made in each period, plus a column for how many calls they made in OT. I use an arbitrary line as a 9% drop between the 2nd and 3rd period to be an official swallowing the whistle. This is not always true as for some officials get control of the game. The problem is, 13 of the 33 officials meet this definition, with several others close. This is even more of a possible issue as these are calculated on all call, when misconducts often tend to increase in the 3rd as games get out of hand.

Leaf Slap

2009-04-01T22:50:00.000-07:00

Link

The NHL proved that it is serious about enforcing the terms of the CBA, kind of. In a dispute over a $755,000 signing bonus between the league and the team, the league ruled that Toronto violated the CBA with the bonus to Jonus Frogen. It is commonly believed that the reason Toronto handed the large bonus to Frogen was so that he could buy his way out of his contract in the SEL, but the bonus violates the ELS clauses of the CBA. The league is stripping the team of a fourth round pick and $500,000. Frogen's contract was left in tact, only the team was sited.

That level of penalty is really more of a slap to TOR than a real penalty. I 4th round pick is not that damaging for an NHL roster player, a 4th rounder has roughly 25% chance of making the NHL at all, and only a 6% chance of being a impact player (top 10). (I am working on draft evaluation, not pulling the numbers out of air). In exchange for a roster player, fair trade. The money would have more impact on most other teams, but truthfully, that is change for Toronto. I suppose for another team, that would be a relatively fair hit, so Toronto should get about the same penalty (I think a third would be fair). The fact that he was originally a 8th round pick, and is 28 probably lowered the penalty. In Toronto's defense, they likely thought that the age would help get them off the hook on the deal, but league said no, it is still an ELS. The fact that they hit TOR at all says that they are series. The biggest issue with the penalty is that it should count against the cap. It may, but I have seen such an indicate.

The main then is, they sent the indication to not screw with the system.

More Indepth on Home/Away Call differential

2009-03-26T21:12:00.000-07:00

OK, I will now give some people, especially those in Detroit, the opportunity to point their fingers back at Calgary and San Jose fans as say "Wait just a minute there Jr." This will also show why some should not just too quickly to conclusions. I have added a third sheet to the data for home vrs. Road call patterns. I have a concern that there is too much of a pattern of calls going in favor of the home teams, but I as not pointing a finger as certain venues as controlling the officials. I am simply concerned that 11-12% advantage in calls for the home teams is too high. As I stated before, the Calgary/Detroit game helped cause be to visit this closer than I did a couple months ago. I put some numbers up earlier this week that showed that there is some very hefty differentials on how some teams are called at home and on the road, and specifically said that it looked almost like a complete different rulebook is used for some teams at home and on the road, and specifically did not say that those teams were getting advantageous treatment.

Someone should have called me on something, and that is that I only sited calls against, [i]not calls for.[/i] Those who jumped to assumptions of collusion from those numbers are incorrect. The third sheet I added includes calls for each team at home and on the road. With that, for many teams, you get a very different picture of things. STL for instance, who had a positive differential in that more penalties are called on them at home than on the road, well, the same is true of their opponents. At home they have an additional 25 calls against them, but their opponents have an additional 39 calls against. They simply have more calls at home than on the road. Detroit, with a large difference between the number of calls against them at home and on the road, also have many more calls on the opponents on the road. Their games literally seem to be called to a different standard on the road than they are at home.

If someone wants to point towards any possible bias, it would be seen in column I have labeled "Home Advantage", which is the call differential at home, minus the call differential at home. Detroit for instance is a +30 at home, -1 on the road, so this comes out to +31. Understandable for a team with a very good home record, and good road record. Let's look at SJ though (and this should end anyone claiming I am just throwing out numbers to support the Sharks): The have exactly the same number of calls against at home and on the road. Wait though, what about their opponents? Their road differential is -14 calls, while at home they are +53. That is a home advantage of +67. Careful where you are pointing fingers Shark Fan. On those three Western Canada teams, you suddenly see something different. Vancouver goes from a top 5-6 differential on calls against them, to a "Home advantage" or +48. Still fairly high, but 10 teams are higher than them. Edmonton on the other hand, drops all the way out of the top group to a +22, which is higher than only 8 teams. Their games are simply called differently in their barn than in others, but not necessarily to anyone's advantage as far as calls in numbers, only in style.

Calgary on the other hand, the Flames are still right up there at the top of the league with a +64. The Flames have a +28 at home, and a -36 on the road. Montreal is the third team over +60 with another seven teams over +50. Especially notable would be NJ, BOS, FLA, MIN and WSH amongst playoff teams and teams fighting for slots that do not have much of a call advantage at home in the least, even with good home winning records.

I am including the chart again for the benefit of those using a direct link to the page rather than entering through the home page:

Enjoy.

Call Differential H/V by team

2009-03-25T00:29:00.000-07:00

I added a second sheet, which is an update on one of the sheets I did earlier on calls, home vrs. visitor, by official. I put in numbers for each official for games 1-817 (which is what I did before), and then gave the numbers for games 818-1095, and totals for all of those games. The league average for that period moved from 12% to 11.2%, so I was curious if it would be specific officials that moved, of the league as a whole. What I found was that some officials I suspected may have been in touch with the league did indeed move, but others jumped even more in the other way, especially surprising me.

I am going to try to look at a couple of other things and then I am going to put up a few of my thoughts on some ideas of by the numbers seem as skewed as they are. I know that quite a few Wings and Flames fans are stopping by. Don't hesitate to comment. I am not going to blow off comments unless they are completely out of line. This is not a Sharks site.

Per request, this is the fairest way I could come up with for determining call "advantage" per venue. I took each team, and found the calls for and against for that team when they are at home, and on the road. Excluded are fighting, too many men, and puck over the glass, "automatic" calls and those made by the linesmen. Since that is the criteria that I used originally, I stuck with that criteria.

There was an article out of Edmonton soon after I made those tallies. They used a different criteria than I did, and came up with slight different numbers as a result. The looked, I believe, and actual power plays. This would have included two of the three calls I eliminated, but eliminated misconducts and offsetting penalties, while I was looking at just differential of discretionary calls. Both are completely valid numbers, and are also in the same range. The numbers from the 800 +/- game mark show an advantage to the home team league wide was 12.1%. The Journal came up with numbers around 11% without looking up the exact number. I will not take credit for getting the league's attention, that was obviously EJ, I will only take credit for doing the numbers first.

This is a re-run of the numbers after 1095 games. The league average is now down to 11.2%, a considerable movement in less than 300 games. Something makes be think a few officials were talked to. The request that resulted in a re-run of the numbers was to see which venues might have the greatest advantage, so I did this by team rather than by referee as I did before. Venue is not really valid, so I did it by team, calls that were made against a team when they were at home vrs. what that team was on the road, there are some every enlightening numbers. There are some teams, five actually, that have more calls made on them at home than on the road, when the league average is an 11.2% advantage to the home team. Stl is actually at a 12.8% advantage on the road, 24% off the league average. Some team fans, such as San Jose fans, feel their team get a raw deal at home. Well, in some ways you look at it, they are. They are one of two teams that are dead even on calls home and road.

The game that drew attention to looking at it this ways was the Calgary/Detroit game. I can understand why such a game will draw people's attention. Detroit is has the biggest differential in the league at 33.6% between their home and road call rate, while Calgary is at number 5, with a 24.8% differential. For each of them, it is like there is a complete different rule book when they are playing at home and on the road. Negative numbers represent more calls made on the visitors, positive on the home team.

2007-2008 Playoff Referee assignments

2009-03-17T21:47:00.000-07:00

Just a summary of games worked, by game and totals for officials for last season's playoffs. Looking at the pattern, you can get a good idea who has a headstart depending on this years league evaluations on working deep into the playoffs this season. They by game portion are for those that recall especially good or poor work in a specific game. I may not have been completely accurate in games counts but it should be close.

Tickets

2009-03-12T21:53:00.000-07:00

On Easy's comment, I decided to do a quick search on what I could see on prices for next season as I had heard of several teams that were dropping prices, and the only team I had heard raising was Toronto. Would be glad to hear anyone who knows on other teams as I did not dig that deep, but these are the ones I could quickly track down:

A number of teams are freezing prices: Chicago, Minnesota, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Phoenix, and Columbus I spotted.

Popular seems to be early renewal will lock in this years prices:
STL, this year, Nashville lock for two years, Carolina for three years.

Colorado froze except they will allow season ticket holders to add some seats at a discount with the renewal of existing.

Dallas froze all lover bowl, reduced 4,000 upper bowl seats.

Tampa Bay, 90% of their ticket prices will be dropped for 09-10, average 10% drop on season tickets. $239 for a season ticket? I could not get an IHL season ticket for that 15 years ago.

Boston, all prices frozen for renewals except glass (+$10 per ticket). For new STH's, prices go up $1-$7 per seat ($20 on glass).

Buffalo is not using the exponential playoff price model. They will be increasing 5% per round. The will have a 5% across the board price increase for next year, with renewal for next year earning 20% off playoff prices this year.

Calgary, reportedly 5-7% increases per seat.

Detroit, I could not find the numbers, but last season they dropped many upper bowls, and the reports were that most seats would be dropped this year to to the very badly hurting economy in Detroit.

No numbers for the big guns of Toronto, Rangers, Habs, teams with waiting lists for season tickets. San Jose would time to take a run and then jack prices, but the fact that almost no one else is increasing, and especially not Chicago that is selling all the tickets they can print, there might be pressure on the Sharks to not over bump their prices.

Atlanta BTW is on major damage control. They did a mid season gimmick that people could buy package seats under half price, actually paying more but part of the price going towards season tickets nest year. Seats adjacent to STH's that paid full pup. There are upset ticket holds, and a PR group swearing they will never screw up that way again. There have been major accusations that this was because the Thrashers were desperate for operating cash.

Visiting Revenues II

2009-03-12T17:15:00.001-07:00

Someone tipped me off to this one that I had missed: http://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/article/61684

It explains a few things that people do not understand when some of us call NHL contracts to be made of funny money.

Every time a player signs a new contract, especially a big UFA contract, they are effectively taking money away from every other player in the league. How the cap was designed was that each year the league and teams would reach and agreement as to what the projected revenues would be for the next season. IIRC, if they could not fully agree, then the players could invoke an automatic 5% increase, as it is believed will be done this year. Each player then negotiates their own contract, and each team withing some fudge rules must stay blow a specific cap. The cap numbers are designed to come out to a prescribed percentage of all revenues going to the players. Costs for players not at the NHL level are not included in that percentage, they are just considered overhead.

Some will yell they the players must be getting shorted, because some teams are not spending all their money. NO. The number that was projected to meet the player's share is the cap "midpoint". Not only is there a maximum that at team can spend, there is also a minimum, which is set at $16M less than maximum. The projected point that would have the players receiving their share is the mid-point between the two, or $8 less than cap, so the composite average of all teams should be at this midpoint. Each year the actual average payroll has been higher than midpoint, which means that the players actually have contracts that call for them to be paid more than their share according to the CBA.

There are provisions for this though, and the result it the funny money situation, which means a dollar is not a dollar is not a dollar. Players do not actually get paid what the guaranteed contract says they are going to get paid, that is just a relative ballpark. More so, each year when contracts escalate, and especially those big money UFA contracts, the players are not taking a penny away from the owners, they are taking it from the other players. A guaranteed contract in the NHL assures that player a piece of the cake, and how big of a relative piece of that cake is, but not how big the cake is, nor that it will still be the same relative piece of the cake next year.

Here is a summary of what really happens. When the CBA was signed, the PA and the Board of Directors used a boatload of accountants to make a guess of how much revenues would be for the first year back. The percentage that belonged to the players was then divided be 30, and that became the mid-point for each team. A given team was then allowed to spend up to $8M more, or down to $8M less. As and average, the league chose over. These were only estimates though. Fans may have come back in droves, or they may have stayed home, so safeguards were put into place. The owners had to promise open books so that at the end of the year both sides would know exactly what revenues were. They were now partners, so no hiding numbers.

For every dollar teams over-spent on the cap, the players owed that dollar back to the owners, and the PA chose that they would spread that payback across all players as a percentage of their contract, so in case they owed the owners money, they set up an escrow account, and took an automatic deduction of every players paycheck, X% from each. At the end of the year, if players had been paid more than their promised share, the overage was to be given back to the owners from this escrow account, with all left over returned to the players. If on the other hand, the teams actually stayed below the mid-point on average (never gonna happen), or is money came in higher than the projected rate, the owners had to kick in the extra to the PA, who would add it to the escrow account before they sent the refunds to the players.

Some of the numbers in that article are actually a touch misleading, namely the stating that one year revenues were lower than expected. That is not true. All three years sited, revenues were higher than projected, one of the years the GM's actually out-spent the overage. The first year, actual revenues were such that the owners had to contribute to the escrow fund, and when it was re-distributed to the players, each player ended up getting paid 104.64% of their salary. Last season, teams again overspent the midpoint, but revenue out-paced that by a touch and players ended up getting paid 100.66% of what their contracts were for. In 2006-07, the over-spending outpaced the revenue overage. Revenues were still higher than expected, contract levels were even higher though, so the player had to fork over about 2.5% of their salaries, so for the first three years of the CBA, $100.00 in promised contract became $104.54, $97.50, and $100.66 respectively. THAT is how revenue sharing works.

This year though is an issue. At the All-Star break the PA announced that it was increasing escrow from 15% of every check to 25%. Now the reports say that it was an increase from 13% to 22.5%. That was a big warning sign that things might not be very rosy. The PA wants to make sure that they have more in escrow than they will need, because it is a lot easier to find a player in the off-season to say hey, got money for you, than to say ummm, you need to write a check so we can give money back to the owners. Cap for this year is about $56.7M. That gives a mid-point of $48.7, or a player's share of $1.461B. Though the numbers are close enough, I will leave the article's numbers, because they are doing the usual thing of using actual salaries rather than cap dollars, etc. The best numbers I can get for salaries actually paid is $1.597B. As teams use late call-ups and such, it will likely go a bit higher than that. That is $136M more than the midpoint. Numbers used in that article say that revenues are projected out such that players share should be $1.495B, or $34M more that what was projected for the cap, but they signed contracts for another $100M on top of that. That would mean that they would owe the owners $101M refund from that escrow account, meaning that each $100.00 in contract money becomes about $93.09. Unnamed sources are being quoted though as saying the owner's take-back will be higher than that, over $120M.

Those "unnamed sources" are the same ones that have been very accurate in the past when projecting what cap would be, and that the players intend to use the automatic 5% escalator for next season. If the owner refund came out to $136M, that actually means that the revenue estimates made last year were exactly right, and that the reason the players would be giving back 8.5% of their salaries is because they cooperated with the GM's to spend 8.5% more than what their own accountants told them would be there. The only part of these numbers that are really effected by the economy are merchandise and walk-up numbers. Real impact will not be seen until after the cap is set at $59.1 for next year. With that, teams will likely spend in the range of $1.7B on salaries, when the projected number would cover $1.533B. A large number of teams have already announced 5-20% price reductions for season ticket holders just to try to keep them though. Unless something turns soon, the actual revenues next season could easily end with requiring players to give back 30% of their salaries next year.

Comments on "Notes from the GM meetings"

2009-03-10T16:51:00.000-07:00

See they article HERE

Fighting: BS it should be taken out of the game and I would prefer to quit hearing it. I will state again, I consider Major Jr. Hockey to be professional, just to offset the questions on that. Fighting should not be in non-professional hockey, nor international hockey. At the professional level, it absolutely should be allowed, and as long as the league and the officials do not properly police the game, it should increase.

At levels like NCAA, and international hockey, out of the game and hearing to determine the cause to determine if the person should be out for the next game. Starter should automatically be suspended unless it is of the level of the officials failing to enforce something like a headshot. Repeat offenders, escalated suspensions. Basically it would be an almost automatic one, three, ten game suspension. Rec league, Peewee, Sr. leagues, get serious, out of the league on the first fight, on about the third, lifetime suspension for coach of any underage league. Control your kids or you don’t deserve to be a coach. That all said, that is for people who START the fight. A player is allowed to defend themselves if the officials do not get in there to protect them. NHL, AHL, and major jr. should be required to enforce any international suspensions (at the game(s) level), and be encouraged to increase any penalty. One game in a two week tournament, especially at the end of the tournament when the guy does not actually have to serve it, should be heavily penalized by the leagues.

At the NHL, AHL, Jr. level, I am tired of a guy who defends himself getting the same penalty as the guy who starts it. I have no problem with eliminating the instigator rule as many want, but I also do not have a problem with it being there if it is properly enforce. First, get the misconduct out of it, or better to me made it optional. If a guy clearly starts a fight in an unreasonable situation, he should get an extra. Unreasonable is if one guy has done absolutely nothing wrong and is not really a willing combatant. If both parties are willing, then let them go. Have the linesmen quit stopping willing fights. Stopping these fights, IMO, promotes the escalating loss in control of the game. I have been convinced by a linesmen that my opinion that second fights should be let go is probably wrong, probably.

Staged Fights: Don't particularly care for them, but not all "after the face-off" fights are staged. Some of them are becuase the linesmen are instructed to stop the guys who really want to go earlier.

Helmets/Fight Safety: The Quebec rule regarding requiring combatants to keep their helmets on is IMO 100% wrong. As long as the player has time to do so, they should be required to remove them. The right safety call is to require mouth pieces. I seem to recall that when Paul Karyia was hurt, that it was estimated that up to 90% of all concussions would be eliminated it players simply used them. Require them. It would be better for the game with or without fighting.

Stop the automatic penalties on both players. One guy wails on the other, and one play does not even try to throw back, why should the penalty be called on both guys? This is especially true on the automatic even ups. Just a guess, but I would guess that 1/3 of the time of roughing called on both players, one of the two did nothing. Guys are simply allowed to remove a player from the other team off the ice, or get a free shot in, because either one or both are called most of the time.

If a fight starts because of a cheap play, there should be no instigator. That said, I do not automatically think that there should be extra penalties off clean hits. Huh? With the increase in openness of the game, there is an increase in guys who really cannot protect themselves getting run by players taking advantage of them. This is like the old times when they gave 99 a personal protector. Fine, I have no problem with that. A guy needs to keep his head up and not put himself in certain positions. Yes, there is a fine edge between guys fighting every time there is a clean hit, and guys being expected to protect the skill players that the league needs on the ice, but players and officials understand that fine line when they are allowed to play or officiate to that level. It is not something I can really put into words, but people who understand the game, many I think will understand and agree with me on the difference.

Head shots: Get them out, period. The same with ALL of the hard penalties. I’m tired of a soft hook being called, and a cross-check to the kidneys or throat might not be called at all. I agree with the standard currently used for obstruction penalties, I have run then numbers and shown that the calls are down, not up, as most people claim. The players adjusted almost instantly to them, and it opened up the game as it was intended. Now get the penalties that are dangerous under control. I know that it was said more contact would be allowed in front of the crease. No problem with that when a guys is camped. Part of what I think needs cleaned up though is the blasting guys after the shot, either cleaning them out so while the puck is still live, or blowing them up after the freeze. The pounding a guy after he gets knocked onto the goalie is dumb and dangerous. Call the rough if the guy was put on the goalie through no fault of his own, call the goaltender interference if it was his doing.

The idea of always having a February break: I like it, a lot actually. Load up the first half of the season with more games, then allow the bulk of the players a break to heal the bumps and bruises for the run. As far as extending the all-star stuff, fine, if that is what you want. Don’t like the all-star “game” at all myself, but some do, so fine. It doesn’t really hurt anything so whatever on that.

AND MAKE ALL GAMES WORTH THREE POINTS!

Coaching Changes

2009-03-10T12:39:00.000-07:00

From NHL.COM http://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=413208 Not sure the will leave it up, but I will not cut and paste as it is copyright material and I will respect that. The article though is about how positive the coaching changes have been over the season. Well in light of the Montreal situation, I want to examine that. There have been seven changes in season, let's look at them, in order:

Chicago: Savard out, Quenneville in. The Hawks have been amazing under the new coach and JQ might have been the right coach to begin with. But it also might not have been the miracle turn-around that Quenneville is being credited with, and there is no question that the way the situation was handled. Savard was let go because of the horrible start the Hawks got off to. Huh? 1-2-1 with a very young team is a horrible start? Since when? And who says they started any better under Quenneville? This was a young team that did not know how to win.

When JQ took over, the Hawks were 0-2-0 on the road, and 1-0-1 at home. Under Quenneville, they then went, 8-1-3, impressive, opps, those were in home games. Over the same period, they were 3-3-3 on the road. Two of the road wins were in the sideshow known as a shootout and most of those nine games were against not very good teams at least at that time. The home record is extremely impressive as has been their whole season. I see no actual proof that it has anything to do with Quenneville. I happen to think that he was probably the better choice to coach the season. My issue is that I think the was it was handled was classless. The move was obviously planned, and should have been done before the season started.

Tampa Bay: Melrose our, Tockett in. It took a whopping 16 games, and a 5-7-4 record. For the record, that is .438 record by NHL computation and on points. Melrose was an insane pick to begin with, and everyone with a clue knows that St. Louis runs this team and he and his NTC are the problem here. The selection of Tockett was not a lot brighter. He has no more control over St. Louis than Melrose, is not a lot better. Oops, I guess .410 is not better at all, is it. Tocket will probably be let go. That will be the third coach these players have gotten out of there in 12 months.

Carolina: Laviolett our, Maurice in. Laviolett was at .520 and the team was not playing well. Mauice is .593 and clinging to a playoff spot in the Eastern dogfight that has a one point spread from 5 to 9, and only three more points in each direction for 4th and 10th. No question that the Canes have improved, as I think Laviolett had lost the team, but the improvement has been slow. Deadline should help the team, and I now think they will grab one of those five spot, and I actually had been calling for the move and thought it should have been done sooner.

Ottawa: Hartsburg out, Clouster in. No idea why this move took 48 games to make. Hartsburg was listed as a well respected coach. I do not know by who, he has never come close to winning at the NHL level. Hartsburg was replaced by the Sen's AHL coach for the remainder of the season. A 9-5-3 since the change is a huge improvement, but the Sens' pretence that they could still make the playoffs was just that, a pretense. Will Clouster keep the job, I only give him 50/50. Along with it taking way too long to make the move, I do not understand why they brought in someone they did not intend to keep the position rather than bring in a coach to learn the team and get ready from next season. If Clouster has this team continue to play spoiler, they may have done exactly that without meaning to.

Pittsburgh: Therien out, Bylsma in. This is another move that I called Therien in the hot seat much earlier. Not sure why it took 57 games of out of the top 8 hockey for a team that was written in for the SCF and with two of the poster boys for the NHL in the line-up. Coaching that can't win, at least in the regular season, with those players, has problems. After over-performing in the playoffs last year though, this was definitely more of a wake-up call than anything. That, and for some reason, an injury to Crosby. Once more this year, the Pens pulled in players at the deadline that will help at the cost of part of their future. They really do not seem to think with Crosby and Malkin though that they need to worry about that, that pulling in vets at the end will work. In their case, it might be, but it is a dangerous strategy.

Rangers: Renney out, Torterella in. The change really was made too late to make much of a difference. The Rangers early season success was smoke an mirrors, and I expected Renney to be the one to pay the price. New York was not the team they seemed early, and though only by one point, after the change have fallen out of a playoff spot. Coaching was not the issue, and I expect them to be one of the two odd teams out.

Montreal: Carbonneau out, Gainey in. OK, 66 games in, I am sorry, but this is a stupid and arrogant move for the GM to take the bench from a guy who turned this team around last year. The GM was one of the problems to begin with, and panicking with 16 games left, just when the team seems to be pulling out of it's slide, as I said, stupid and arrogant. Boy, will Gainey pat himself on the back if they make the playoffs, hoping that people ignore the minor fact that they have 11 home games and 5 road games left and the #2 points per game at home in the East. Slick move Gainey. I picked Montreal to miss the playoffs on this move, but the fact is it will be ridiculous if they do not make it. Gainey should be removed if they make it or not.

Final Rankings before the playoffs.

2009-03-08T22:17:00.000-07:00

Until the playoff teams are finalize, probably my last pre-playoff rankings. Only teams with a realist chance of making the playoffs included. I will not include the requirements of "must be in the top 16 to be ranked in the top 16" because of virtual dead heats. Rankings are based on chances to win the cup, not best regular season games. Correction to these rankings. Since Gainy was stupid enough to fire Carbonneau and arrogant enough to replace him with someone named Gainy, the rankings need to be re-arranged.

1. Detroit Red Wings (94 pnts) (16 GR ) The champs are still the champs, and they still seem to refuse games against the pretenders to their thrown. They also seem to score goals at will.
2. New Jersey Devils (87 points) (17 GR) Contrary to the announcers at HNiC, and the San Jose Sharks, THIS is the hotest team in the league, not Vancouver, results in the past 10 not withstanding. The Return of Martain Broduer, the additions, this team has displace Boston as the most feared team in the East even if seasons in the standings. They are also one of only two teams so far with 20 wins on the road
3. Calgary Flames (84 points) (16 GR) They are not going to move out of the #3 seed in the West, but seeding in the West is just going to make a difference in the home ice advantage. In the West, there has been a heavy home ice advantage.
4. Boston Bruins (95 points) (15 GR) If Boston intends to remain in the #1 spot in the league, the need to start winning. The are also one of three of the top six seeds with a losing record in the last 10 (4-5-1). They do have a weak remaining schedule that could put them on a roll into the playoffs, and they are teh second team that has 20 wins both home and on the road.
5. San Jose Shark (94 points) (18 GR) A very good chance of winning the president's trophy due to games in hand, but only if they start acting like they want to win any games at all. They join Boston with a losing record in the last 10, also 4-5-1. They are being hurt by a long list of injuries, but also a long list of poorly played games, including dropping a 3-0 lead at home, and not even responding to mid-game closed door rippings called a meeting. A weak remaining strength of schedule could help put them back onto a roll.
6. Vancouver Canucks (76 points) (18 GR) Not a likely threat to catch the Flames for a top three seed, and all but locked into meeting Chicago in the first would from the 5th slot. Like the Devils, they are riding a hot goalie that is well rested. Injuries though would destroy this team, but thus far they are staying incredibly healthy and coming out of the brutal NorthWest have them playoff ready.
7. Washington Capitals (86 points) (15 GR) I find a real drop off from the first six, but a top three seeding could benefit the Caps. I simply find that the top six teams have the ability to shut down a two player team. The weakest remaining schedule could put them on a roll going into the playoffs, but that can also be a curse when the meet a solid team in the playoffs.
8. The Philadelphia Flyers (80 points) (18 GR) I do not see any sign that this team will drop from the #4 seed in the East, nor do I see any real chance of any of the top four in the East having a lost of trouble in the first round. The second round is where the wars will start, and this team is ready to go to war.
10. Chicago Blackhawks (81 points) (18 GR) The Hawks have hit their first bump in the road since early in the year, and I am just not sure that this young team is ready for what they are going to face in the Nucks in the first round. 12 of their remaining 18 games though could help offset the second hardest remaining strength of schedule.
11. Pittsburgh Penguins (76 points) (15 GR) After the top 10, I see another major drop in play, but this team added substantially at the deadline, and have seemed to turn it around. Cynicism aside, I still cannot imagine the hit that NHL marketing will take if Sid the Kid is not in the playoffs, but it remains amazing how experts ignore how much better this team plays with Crosby is not in the lineup. No home out of the top ten is even close to a lock gor the playoffs, and the Crosbies are only one point from out of the playoffs, but do have one of the softest remaining strengths of schedule. With 10 of their remaining 15 games at home they probably as close to a lock for making the playofss of slots 5 through 10 in the East, but their home and road record might as well be identical.
12. Florida Panthers (76 points) (16 GR) In a dead heat with the Rangers and Pens in points, but this is a team that started the season as one of the worst in the league, and now is only four points from fourth in the East, but also one point from 9th. Their 14-14-4 record on the road though indicates how badly they would like to catch fire and pull out fourth in the East.
13. The Carolina Hurricanes (75 points) (15 GR) Though behind the Rangers in the standings and giving up a game in hand, I put the Canes higher because they have been incredibly hot, and the Rangers have been slowly sliding sing the first 15-20 games of the season. Three extra home games do help.
14. New York Rangers. (76 points) (16 GR) Part of the dead heat for 6-8 in the East. deadline adds would help rescue the Rangers. The steady slide though, I still give them a good chance of sliding out of the playoffs with only one point on the Canes and three on the Sabres.
15. Buffalo Sabres (73 points) (16 GR) A pattern here. I do not especially considered the 10th place team in the East better than the 6 through 11 in the West, but I do give them a better chance of getting out of the first round, if they can get into it.
16. Edmonton Oilers (70 points) (17 GR) A three game home over road advantage, and almost as good of road record as home, I give Edmonton the best chance to make the playoffs out of the Western logjam, and the best of the mess to pull a first round upset. The game in hand over those they are fighting give them an advantage as well in making the cut.
17. Dallas Stars (70 points) (16 GR) Currently in 9th in the West, they also have more road that home games, are only 14-14-5 on the road, 3-6-1 in the last 10, but they are out of 7th on tie breakers and seeing the teams ahead of them, I see them making it on a flyer. Especially since there of the six teams fighting for three playoff spots have an even worse road record.
18. Columbus Blue Jacks (72 points) (16 GR) The Jackets have very little chance of making it out of the first round with a brutal road records, but the do have two points in the race, and have two game home edge in remaining games. They also have been good when playing the best teams in the league. They do have the toughest remaining strength of schedule in the league however.
19. Montreal Canadiens (77 points)(16 GR) Not withstanding the panic which is going on in Canada, the slide that was going on for the Habs was mostly on the road. The good news for them is that they are only 3 points behind the Flyers from home ice in the first round, and two thirds of their remaining 15 games are at home. The bad news is that Philly has two games in hand, three points in hand, and their road record is not as brutal at the Habs. That was until Gainy's latest move. Hab's out of the playoff's for their 100'th year celibration.
20. Minnesota Wild (69 points) (17 GR) One point back in the race, and very erratic, they have as good of a chances of making the playoffs of any of them.
21. Anaheim Ducks (68 points) (15 GR) One and two games less than the competition, and they sold at the deadline. They also have possible the best defense in the league with Pronger, Niedermayer, and Whitney which could get them in from the 11th spot. It will be very tough to make the cut though.
22. St. Louis Blues (66 points) (17 GR) I give very little chance for them to make it, but with two games in have on most of their opponents, only four back, it is possible.
23. Los Angeles Kings (65 points) (17 GR) The Kings have insisted upon stay in reach all year, and are still there. I will still say they are not going to make it, but like the Blues, they have extra games and are only 5 points back. The need a huge roll of the dice, but it is possible.

Strength of Schedule

2009-03-07T05:19:00.000-08:00

Strength of schedule is obviously changing right now with the deadline shuffle, but I calculated it any. Fairly straight forward calculation the number of points expected from the remaining games for a team, if played by an average team. Wordy way to say it, but I'm trying to translate numbers into words. Say the team is Anaheim. At the moment, they have road games remaining against COL, EDM, NSH, SJ, VAN, and two with PHX. At home they have games with COL, DAL, EDM, MIN, NSH, PHX, VAN and two with SJ.

SJ averages giving up 0.58 points per game at home, and 1.00 on the road. Those are averages for all of SJ's and COL's home and away games to date. That is, in home games, SJ is 26-3-4, and 5 of those wins were in OT, so in 33 home games, SJ has earned 56 points, but they have also surrendered 19 points. They earn 56/33 or 1.70 points per home game, while giving up 19/33 or 0.58 points per game. On the road on the other hand, SJ is 16-8-6 with 2 of those win in OT. Therefore, they earn 1.27 points per road game, while giving up 1.00 points in the standings per road game they have played. Ignore the points earned, for COL, the averages are 1.09 point per home and 1.48 per road game surrendered. To come up with the strength of reamining schedule for Anaheim, you would take the average points surrendered per game for each of the oponents Anaheim has remaining and average them, for home and away games. Start with one game at COL (1.09) a home game with them (1.48), a home game with SJ (1.00), two on the road (0.58 each), and so on, then divide by the number of games and you will get a comparative strength of schedule by the number of points that teams would be expected to give up in those games.

DISCLAIMER: The description of this calculation just given is one of many "accurate" measure of strength of schedule. They are for information only. It is a statistical calculation for a continuous data model, the only a discrete number of games remain. If teams played thousands of games, the expected results would approach those numbers. Probabilities express likelihood over unlimited samples, not what will actually happen.

That all given, the remaining strength of schedule for teams follow:

wsh	1.23	min	1.13	car	1.08
bos	1.20	mtl	1.13	nyi	1.08
van	1.17	ott	1.12	la	1.07
nj	1.15	edm	1.11	ana	1.07
sj	1.14	dal	1.11	stl	1.07
pit	1.14	nyr	1.11	det	1.07
tbl	1.14	phx	1.11	nsh	1.05
phl	1.14	cgy	1.09	col	1.05
buf	1.13	atl	1.09	chi	1.04
fla	1.13	tor	1.09	cbj	1.03

The Larger the number, the easier the rated remaining schedule.

Grading the Deadline.

2009-03-07T02:32:00.000-08:00

My prediction on pre-guesses as to how to grade the efforts of teams at the deadline. First, I think it has already been shown that effects of deadline deals almost always seem like they are going to be bigger than they are going to be. The buyers to not improve themselves close to what they think they are going to, sellers do not make out like they should. In the case of the sellers, mismanagement of assets is how they often got into seller mode to begin with, so who would really expect them to suddenly get smart.

This year was not an especially active year. One reason is that a lot of the teams were looking at the draft board for next year, and suddenly, 1st's were not being offered for rentals. I graded what did go on in the following way: For short term, that is the remainder of this year and the playoffs, I counted only players that are to contribute now. Prospects, picks, contract positions do not matter. I grade players moved from 1 to 6, and there were no 6's moved this year, and then subtracted for roster players that were moved. If I felt that a team benifited beyond actual ability, that is team make-up was improved, I might give them an extra point in their rating.

For long term, I look at what they gained are lost in terms of pick, prospects, and players with a chance they might keep them. A seller who dumped a UFA they had no chance of re-signing and got assets for them, that is a positive trade. A 1st pick gets a 3, 2nds a 2, and such. Get a UFA with no chance of signing them, and I give you a long term 0, but if the team will be in the running to sign them, I give my value of the player minus 1 or 2 according to the likelihood of signing them and overprice. An RFA, I give value, or value minus 1 if they are going to take a big raise. Teams that I do not discuss either did not make any splash, or came out of the trades at near a wash. Here are the players:

Ahaheim was one of the heavy players, giving up Pahlsson, Montador, Kunitz, Huskins, Moen, All UFA’s, 4 prospects, and a conditional pick. Adding Whitney (signed long term), Wisniewski, a Role forward, 3 prospects, and a conditional pick. Anaheim gave up a lot, but the fact is, they will re-sign any of those players they were going to anyway. They are probably still just as likely to make the playoffs as before, and Whitney will allow them to move on with either Neidermayer retires, Pronger is traded, or both. Grade Anaheim -4 short term, +6 long term, and with a chance to even get by the short term.

Boston, added Montador and Recchi, and picked up a 2nd that mostly offsets the loss of the prospects. Give them a +5 for this season and a wash long term.

Calgary made big splashes with Leopold and Jokinen, but it did not come free. Give them a +7 short term on the face, but not so fast. In Jokinen, we are talking a player who has yet to play in a single playoff game. Certainly an upgrade on Lombardi, but not a free one. I will only give Calgary a +5 short term here. Long term, Both these guys are UFA’s, and Jokinen is an expensive one, they will not keep him. Throw in the 1st and 2nd they game up, long term -5.

Columbus just made no sense to me, and I am including them just to say that. They are not a big mover for this year, but they gave up what used to be sited as their prize goalie, and a 2nd, and got a mediocre center/wing in return. Not a real benefit short term, and not very smart at all to me.

Chicago may well have won a prize by picking up Pahlsson. Assuming he gets healthy, he makes this team much harder to play against, and as a premier third line center will mean far more to their defense than Wisniewski, and their blueline has plenty of depth to lose him. With the makeup of this team, +3 easy, and potentially a +5 here from one player. It also puts Chicago into the best position the get Pahlsson signed for next year which would turn out even bigger. Chicago did not make this move just for this year, now they need to get Pahlsson to cooperate and convince him he wants to stay in Chicago.

New Jersey added Havelid and got him cheap. Adding a top 4 defenseman and not paying much is an automatic +3 at least for this year and no more than a minus -1 for the future, a very good trade. But then they added Shanahan to the third line, and getting Brodeur back looking like 10 years ago, cheat and give the Devils +8.

Pheonix certainly did nothing to help right now, but their season is done. That said, they were going to give Morris and Jokenin up as UFA’s anyway, Upshall is no downgrade and probably a better fit than Carcillo, they should be Lombardi re-signed, picked up prospects, a 1st, 2nd, and 4th. If they don’t bungle, they should come out of this about +5.

Pittsburgh bought some help again, but they was they are playing the game is going to keep them a three man team forever, or until those three guys retire. Guerin may help, Kunitz already has. Both are UFA’s, they will not even try to sign Guerin, and will be lucky if they can keep Kunitz. The loss of Whitney though will cost them at least half of the improvement, so change a +5 to a +2 which does not keep pace with the competition, and make it a -3 next year.

San Jose did not do a lot, but the pickup they got should help, a +3 for Moen. If they cannot make him more than a rental, it will cost them from prospects -1.

The Rangers for once did not grossly over pay in adding parts that might help them in Morris and Antropov. It might be enough to slow the skid and keep them in the playoffs. They are still not much more likely to get out of the first round though. Give them a +4. Depending on what happens with Morris, -2 for next year.

Toronto, in return to becoming a dumping ground, effectively bought picks. They picked up two 2nds, a 4th, and a conditional, and did a lot of feeling out for value. Now they know what they can trade and get in return in the off-season, and what things are going to cost in the UFA market. Burke may have played this very smart and I will give him a +5 base to begin with.

Buyers:
BOS +5/Even
CGY +5/-5
NYR +4/-2
NJ +3/Even (Effectively +8)
CHI +3/Even (Could be as high as +5/+5)
SJ +3/-1
PIT +2/-3

Sellers
Ana -4/+6 (Could still make the playoffs)
PHX +5
TOR +4

The Eastern Winds they are a-changing

2009-03-02T23:04:00.000-08:00

First, I will say that Boston is for real, period. I called them real before the season, and they have outplayed anything even I though they would. Suddenly though, the surprise that is real is getting reeled in by recent developments.

Even a bigger surprise to me than Boston, is how the Devils stayed in without the greatest goalie of all time for 50 games. I also questioned it if would actually be good for the team if he came back, would he really be in form. Question answered, Marty is back and the Devils are better for it.

They added Shanny a while back when most expected him to go to either the Rangers or Nucks. I did not even hear many that had Jersey on the radar for him.

Now they pull off Havelid for a 24 year old prospect and an ECHL player. They may still have room for another deal, especially if they drop a roster player to do it. What if the pick up Guerin, Smyth, Trent Hunter, Antropov, Recchi, Gary Roberts, Tkachuk, Kuba, Bonk, or De Vries. Not all of those guys are good fits for the Devils, but some very much are, and all are likely available.

There is a saying amongst NJ fans, "In Lou we trust", and he is in a position once more to show why they say that. The East is suddenly a dogfight,

Deadline Trade Results

2009-03-02T19:49:00.000-08:00

I did a look at the past few deadlines. I went 3-10 days before the deadline, depending on the first high traffic day or first that included a #1 pick. It takes considerable time to go through these to weed out the majority of the trades that are not of any measurable significance. These are the numbers I come up with by seasons, leaving out all picks that really had no effect on teams. These are of course only my evaluations of trades. I only included trades that involved a playoff team.

Buyers are playoff teams trying it make a run, Sellers are teams that are dumping for the future. Trades were rated for Sellers if it improved the team overall, not that year. For buyers, I rated short term effect in how the added player(s) improved the team compared to what was given up for that season's run. Long term for the Buyer is what the gave up, versus what they earned outside of that playoff run. Rating potential were limited from -5 to +5, except a major contribution to a Cup winner could be a 6.

I give specific notice to Stanly cup finalists, showing all their trades. I may add more, if time permits and my health simply leaves me the energy. Not doing well I am afraid and this takes considerable time.

2001-2
I could only get actual deadline day
37 players, 16 picks

Only two trades of significance, and I will detail them. The Cup Finalists, Carolina and Detroit did not play that day, they were happy with their teams.

Dallas traded Joe Nieuwendyk, Jamie Langenbrunner
to NJ for Jason Arnott, Randy McKay and 1st.
This trace did not help either in 01-02, and may have hurt NJ's chemistry, but Nieuwendyk and Langenbrunner were key members or 2003 NJ SC Camps.

Wsh obtained Adam Oates from Phi for Maxime Ouellet first, second, third
(Martin Vagner, Maxime Daigneault and Derek Krestanovich).
Philly wasted the picks, Oates did little to nothing with Oates.
This should have been a significant exchange and effectively cost both teams supstancially.

2002-03
I have completely screwed up. The list I had was wrong and showed almost none of the trades. I will try to re-do this year.

2003-4
86 players, 32 picks
Cup Champs (NJ), Neckar for (6th) 2 games as depth def.
Finalist (ANA) added Simon who played a significant roll for (Betts, McLennan, propect), a win

Overall, I found 8 deals to have made any difference at all.
Sellers had a significant net loss in one deal (-3), washes in three (0's), minor in one (1), good returns twice (3's), and one very high win (5).

Short term, these 8 deals all helped the buyers, with a 1, 2, and five 3's. One team I rated a 4, Anaheim for Simon

Long term though, buyers paid a lot, I gave two positive on long term, both 3's. One broke even, then there were two at -1, twon at -2, and one -5.
ST: Buyers 5, sellers 1, even 2
LT: Buyer 1, seller 4, even 3

2005-06
54 players traded. 23 draft picks. Last 3 days.

Finalist (EMD) added Samsonov for (Reasoner, Stastney, 2nd), Roloson for (1st, cond. 3rd) Very good trade for Emd.
Camps (CAR) Added Recchi (Nordgren, Kolmos, 2nd) This trade I rated a 6 short term, a significant add to the camps that did not cost much. It also added significant long term value.

I have five trades that meant anything, and in two teh seller got completely fleeced, a -3, and -2. The other three, sellers earned a 2, 3, and 3.

Short term buyers, all improved, with a 1, 2, two 5's and a 6.

Long term, I gave two of the buyers a high price at -3 and -2, three winners at 2, 4, and 5.

I gave the buyers 3 to 2 over the sellers both long and short term. Not a good year for sellers, with as usual most of the trades being meaningless.

2006-7
80 players, 47 picks

Camps, ANA 4 deals, 3 were dumps, added May, and a 1st for a long term win on a dump.
OTT made two trades, neither with any effect. One did not play, and one was non-productive, but they gave up about the same to get them.

I had a high number of 16 of the trades than changed things.
For the sellers, four trades were blown. A -3, and three washes.
Five were minor improvements, 1's and 2's.
Five though were +3, and two were +4.

Short term, two buyers completely blew it, -3 and -2, with two washes.
There were four 1's, six 2's, and one 3.
Long term, I have the buyers at two -4's, two -3's, three -2's, two -1's.
Only one buyer made it up to a 3 long term.

Even with the sellers that screwed their chances up, I only have 5 buyers winning over the sellers short term, and only two of 15 long term. It was a very poor year for buyers.

2007-8
48 player, 23 picks

Camps, Detroit got Stuart for (2nd, 4th) a win, and mad a prospect swap with no bearing
Pittsburgh got Hossa, Dupuis, Armstrong, Christenson, Esposito, and a 1st in a very good draft. It was a short term win, but will cost. They also picked up Gill, for a 2nd, and 5th, a much better long term return and good short term.

I found 7 trades to be of any significants

Sellers pulled some very bad moves, with only three long term winners and three significant losers

Sellers I rated three with 3's one of whom could go much higher, two 1's, and two -2's.

Buyers got a short term returns in these deals of four 2's, two 3's, and a four.

Long term I gave buyers two 3's, two 2's, then -1, -3, and -3.

A Detail Game Review

2009-02-28T05:58:00.000-08:00

First, some explanations: The simpler form of review is to just use some of the comments I have as a general tone of the game, and then opinions on specific calls (good, missed, weak). We would then add more subjective comments on our overall ratings of the referees. Under this system, each official would get the same rating for the game, under the assumption that this would even out as referee pairings rotated even for Jr. officials.

I added more in this, a bit more subjective, and a way of rating each official independently. In this, I give guys pluses and minuses for all things they do. Explain a call, get a point. Good positioning, get credit. Poor positioning, get dinged. In this way, if one guy is making all the calls, he is the one getting most of the credit/blame. Often in this way, the senior official will dominate the comments, and there will often be a larger range in the scores. In this form, I note who made the call, and who should have. Rather than both getting credit for each call, I will normally give the one that makes the call twice the credit/blame as the other, and typically will call a typical minor a “6”, so a guy who makes a good call on a minor will get a +6, his partner a +3. (Quite often, the other guy has the call too, the other official just got it first, was lead, etc. They are a team though). In this game, I called one penalty a 4 rather than 6 because it was trivial (at 20:00 in the third), and one an 8 because it was a more impressive call. Points that both officials are getting judged I will list the main official, say 21, and then put something like +6/3, meaning 21 will get a +6, 11 a +3. Pluses are a credit, minuses are a ding.

Here are my details for the game:

TBL/VAN (TB Telecast)
VanMassenhoven (21) Sr
Sutherland (11) Jr.

1st Period

Good early spacing +1 each
Good move in on goal play 11 +1
Got caught in scramble 11 -1
65 interf/trip off faceoff. Should have been called, BUT, interfered with team recovered, looked like warnings were given out to set tone, call it a wash overall.
21 clear high stick, 90 call (+6/3)
11, good anticipation position +1
30 hook on PK, dressed up, let go on goop position by both officials (+2/2)
50 slash/hook let go at end of PK. Calling this a miss. High, both should have had it. (-2/2)
11, ahead of semi-break +1
21 slow on semi-break but good cover by angle, call a push
11, slow to the net. -1
11, demonstrative on hand pass to squash complaints. +1
30 dress hook let go (+2/2) on tone setter
11 skating error, turned innocent but allowed a player to back into him. -1
11- 50 cross-check. 50 that only half would call. Was a hard x-check out of a scrum, good call (+8/4)
11, player whined for penalty on a very good defensive slide play. Was waved and called off to play on. +1
21 good position on goal call. +1
21 call hook, solid 80 hook to the chest, impeded and caused TO in the offensive zone. Announcers of course called it a weak call. (+6/3)
21 Dressed up lost edge trying for an even up call ignored (+2/1)
11 Big hit high on chest, could easily have been called but good position showed NC. (+2/1)
21, good avoid corner play +1
11, slow on transition play -1
21 excellent position on net scramble + talked in play about player/goalie position +2
11 40 hook, but stick hold made it look 60+. Did not bite, good NC +2
11 good trail. +1
Missed TMM. Not a ref charge except 11 was right there and could have taken it. -2
11 Good position to see close save +1
21 called out warnings on light crease contact. +1
21 called out warning on 40 hook to avoid calls +2
11 good work to avoid traffic +1

Above average positioning and communication period. Give 11+4, 21+3 above sited.

Calls/misses/weak: 3/1/0 + 1 fair wash out.
Detail scoring
11: 35/8
21: 34/2

2nd Period

Good maintenance of position in end-to-end action +2/2
11 late getting to a deep puck, but kept good angle, call a wash
21 Good communication on argued face-off position. +1
21 hook (70) with good view (+6/3)
21 again good communication on light goalie contact +1
11 good ND on dress-up to appear as trip. +1
11 good pos on icing race, ahead of linesman. +1
Good work on multiple quick direction changes in the neutral zone +1/1
11 very good position on net scramble +1
21 Poor position on 30 Intf. NC was due to not seeing play, not seeing it should be no call. -2
21 Good jump in on pushing in goal/on goalie. +1
11, very slow/never got into position on possible goal. Never made a call. Took a long review AFTER a goal was scored at the other end. Though the homer announcers said otherwise, I would have said 40% that it could have been calls a goal because the puck was not flat (at least ¾ was over the line on the kick out) -5 on the play.
21 slow getting in to net on good goal at other end. Poor sequence by both officials. The fact that there was a scrum to watch I will partially offset. -1
11 Bodyclash dressed as a trip. Good NC +2/1
11 40 hold let go +2/
11 40 hold let go, this time with warning +2/1
21 30 shove into board dressed up, good NC +2/1

Positioning in the 2nd was not as good at times, but communication was good. Outside of the one big error by Sutherland, above average period. Give each +2.
1/0/0 on calls
11:18/5
21:19/3

3RD Period (Starting 1-1)

21 boarding (80) (+6/3). Should have been 11’s call, clear view but never raised his hand -1
11 good communication why face-off out of zone. +1
At this point, fed up will TB color man. Borderline dangerous boarding and calls it a basketball foul. Got worse the rest of the game. Terrible homer whiner.
11 Good dodge of hard around +1
21 Good dodge of corner clash +1
11 Another good jumpover +1
11 Yelling about hold sticks to control +1
Color man cries more than St. Louis on no call on embellishment. +1/1
11 Much better position on bad angle goal. +2
21 good coverage on 2-on-1 rush to cover both goal view and possible penalty. +2
11, slow on sudden net scramble. -1
21 Noticeable good high coverage +1
11 recovered from earlier slow cover to give very good low coverage. +1
21 missed puck played with high stick -1
11 call trip. TV view looked like weak call about a 30, but he had a very good view, and made the call late in a 2-1 game against the trailing team. Must give the benefit of the doubt that it was a good call. (+6/3)
21 good position in rotating through low play for a better angle. +1
11 good hustle an position for view of possible trapezoid play. +1
21 good ignore on a dive. +1
21 Missed a 90 trip with clear view. 11 takes no blame as this was behind the net and he was high. This was a clear call of the score/clock. Call would have been on trail team (2-1) with about 20 seconds left. Unacceptable -5.
21 another good NC on and embellishment. +1
21 Good position on final scramble and no early whistle. +1
11 Good high coverage at end looking for cheap stuff. +1
21 Called DOG for covering the puck, but it was at the final horn. Good call but meaningless (thus a good play by the defender since it was well outside the crease). (+4/2)

Give both another +2 for positioning
Give 11 +3 each for not dropping standards.
Give21 +2 each for not dropping standards until last 30 seconds.

3/1/0
11 26/2
21 22/6

Game Totals:
7 solid calls 2 misses 0 weak 1 washout on an early callable.
11: 79/15
21: 75/11

In raw penalty scores, 7/9 or 77.7%
Detail scores
Sutherland: 84.0%
VanMassenhoven: 87.2%

COMMENTS: First, this was a pretty easy game to officiate. There was not a lot of cheap stuff, no stick work, except in the views of a very biased TV crew, all the calls were pretty straight forward. In my detailed numbers, there is usually a spread between the officials, in this one there was not, which is the mark of a game that was well done and the Sr. did not dominate.

Now, to specifics.
Positioning was in most cases excellent. Sutherland is the better skater of the two, but almost the entire time, both kept very good position. Communication in the game was superior. The game was well controlled, start to finish, and for 99% of the game the calling standard stayed consistent. Until 30 seconds left, I questioned only 3 call/non-calls. I thought there was one miss, one that normally should have been called but they used it as a “good” wash-out to set the standard, and one that looked weak to be, but the official had a 100% view so I had to give him the call. If it were not for two plays, the officials would have gotten A’s in this game.

The Bad:
Sutherland had a very bad play IMO were he failed to get position, never even seemed to realize he should have been making a goal/no-goal call. When a goal was then scored at the other end on the same sequence, it could have been an officiating disaster, but in a close call Toronto ruled it was not a goal.

VanMassenhoven, in a well officiated game, with 20 seconds left failed to call a blatant penalty because it was on the team behind in a one goal game and would have finished the game. That is officiating the game to the score and time, and that is not acceptable.
Those two plays dropped both officials from A’s to B’s.

VanMass acted as senior, but did not dominate. Except for PP's, and the last 5 minutes of the game, they switched sides almost every stoppage. VM did take attack on every PP and for the last 5.

Replays

2009-02-25T21:02:00.001-08:00

OK, another reactionary post. This is not to rip how bad a call was, but rather that I consider the process that the call was made if wrong.

Situation, Sharks-Red Wings game. Puck crawls over Conklin's shoulder and kicks to the corner of the line and post. Sharks players are trying to dig to make sure the puck goes in. Detroit players are digging from both sides to make sure it does not cross they line. Referee is in perfect position behind the net and is frantically signally goal, but we all know this will go to replay. We end up with, not being able to know the exact conversation, what appears to be an official trying to defend his call against the War Room in Toronto, and being over-ruled. Finally, the announcement is made, No-Goal, reversal on replay. OK, so the definitive evidence of replay got the call right as the NHL so prides itself on.

Not so fast my friend! I see these replays, and what I see on the replays is a puck which is somewhere just over, or not just over the line, I can't tell which. I see a defensive, black taped stick come in, push the puck further, no way of knowing how far, and then pulling it back out, no way of knowing how far, and absolutely no way to see exactly where anything is, except for this professional referee, who has done his job perfectly to get into position for the best angle on the play. The only definitive thing in the entire play is an official with his eyes fixed exactly on the play frantically signaling good goal.

So, the War Room in Toronto must have better angles on the camera, better cameras, etc. No, actually they don't. Further, they relay to the announcers on inquiry that they used the rear angle to make the call. The TV viewers are shown this rear angle, and there is certainly nothing definitive about it, especially when you take into account that simple geometry would say that with a clear view of the puck, from that angle a full inch of clearance between the puck and the red line would be needed to call definitive goal, and there was certainly nothing that would definitively overturn the on ice call.

I have some problems.

The NHL was the pioneer in sports of using the replay to try to get calls right. Hockey was the innovator, and part of the innovation was the rule that the human element should stay part of the processes, and that there was no guaranty that replay was flawless and always going to have a better view of the facts, so the rule became that overturn on replay had to be by definitive evidence. No "I thinks", no "Maybe's", but only that the call on the ice was NOT correct. Yet, what is happening more and more on a game by game basis is that replay is being used to make a best guess.

Originally, the way the replay worked in the NHL was that the official on the ice made a call. If there was and issue that replay needed to be involved in a review, the call would be made, and the official that made the call would get on the phone and talk with the replay official. The replay official would then talk with the on ice who made the call. If replay did not agree, they would tell on ice what they saw, and try to convince them to change the call. But it was on ice's call. If replay said, I think I can see the puck on the line, and on ice says no, I saw white, it is a goal, he signaled such, and play went on. Then Toronto got involved. For some games, Toronto might also me on the phone, not just the replay booth. Well, this automatically gave more clout to the booth than when Toronto was not on the phone. Is this because the replay was more accurate? No, it was because the bosses were on the phone, so on ice was more obliged to agree, or they were telling the boss no.

Well, this also created inequities. Some games got to call Toronto, some did not. Further, some had better place, better quality, and more cameras. So, the playing field was leveled. All calls go to Toronto, and all arenas are required to have standard camera positions in HD, and all camera angles from the team broadcasts are also made available for replay (no hiding an angle that shows the play until too late.) Even playing field for everyone.

Next, every close play became disputed and open for review, so now seldom is a goal scored without at least a brief delay for a review. OK, can live with that to get the calls right.

Then there started to be a call that the technology has improved enough, why do we not have the person who is actually making the call seeing the replay, rather than relaying to them what the replay shows. The teams have HD monitors on their benches/press boxes/tunnels. They know what the replay shows. All the fans and players would, except the arenas are prohibited from showing the replay in house. They only one that did not see it was the official who was supposed to make the call. So Toronto decided we were right. The official making the call should see the replay. so they ordered HD display monitors for the officials at each arena, right? Well no, not exactly. They simply took the calls on replay away from the on ice official.

That is right. They took the call away from the guy who is paid to make it. If the play goes to replay, Toronto no longer advises the referee, they tell them what to announce as the call. It has gotten to the point that a good share of the time the official on ice does not even make the call, they just blow the play dead and go straight to the replay, why bother, Toronto is just going to make the call anyway. Any overturn is supposed to be definitive proof, so give Toronto the edge, don't make a call on ice, and then they can just make best guess. No reason to make a call that you are not 100% on, and Toronto to not be able to overturn you because they are not 100% on the overturn. Pardon me, but that is chicken shit, but that is what it has become, and it makes the referees look afraid to make the call.

Now though, another step has started occurring. Tonight's call is a perfect example. Dave Jackson, the referee, worked his tail off. He got into a perfect position, perfect angle, on the back of the net. This is a very close play, puck near the line, black sticks going after the puck, and a professional NHL official right on the spot. Staring at the play. Definitively signaling that it is a good goal. This is no doubt here to the official at all. As I said, there is absolutely nothing definitive in those replays. If before you saw them you thought the puck went in, you still thought so after. If you did not think it went in, you still didn't. Me, I thought the puck was still on the line, the defender pushed it in and then pulled it back out. What I think does not matter though, nor does if it was a good goal or not, or if the call was gotten right or not. What matters is that the system is screwed up.

Why do we even have officials on the ice making the call? Half the time they act like they are afraid to make it. Some of them were too lazy to get into position, figured they can just let Toronto make the call. Now the ones that do work hard enough to do so are made to look like fools because Toronto will over-rule them without the evidence to do so. Those replays simply did not show if the puck was in or not, there was no way that any call on the ice, goal or no-goal should have been over-turned.

Even when there is a "clear view" on the screen, guess what, geometry still says it is NOT definitive. When the rear angle is used, depending on the angle of the camera, the puck must clear the red line by 1/2 to 2 inches before white can be seen between the puck and the line due to line of sight. If you don't believe, I suggest a high school geometry book, it is pretty straight forward. That is only if the puck is flat and on the ice. If it is off the ice, of say standing on end, the line of sight gets worse. How about that overhead that is directly over the goal line. Well, first, it is not directly over the goal line, if it was, the crossbar would block the view of the goal line. The camera is forward of the goal line in order to give the view. If the puck is flat and on the ice, this give an accurate view. If the puck is off the ice, or rotating, then this view is routinely wrong. A flat puck that is off the ice will appear to have crossed the line before it actually has, and a rotating puck may appear to have not crossed the line when it actually has.

Then there is the issue that every goalie in the league has learned to routinely block the view of those cameras. There is the fact that every one of us has repeatedly seen the momentum of a shot take a goalies glove past the goal line, and we know that puck is in the goal, the it cannot physically be seen, and so it is called no goal.

I hate tinkering with equipment, but it is time to quit playing around. The replay situation that we have at present I no longer have any use of. I would rather have absolutely no replay calls than the half way, double standard system we currently have. It is really time though to simply do it right. Put telemetry chips into to pucks. It needs to be perimeter chips, not center chips, because rotating pucks only need to enter the goal on height, not width. Track the puck and rule by were the puck really is, or go back to just letting the guys on the ice call the game. The only time Toronto should be butting into a call for hundreds of miles away is for a gross error or a rules clarification, because rulings like are occurring now look far more like bias than it was in the past.

Fix the freaking system.

Penalty call rate by type

2009-02-20T23:13:00.000-08:00

This is a comparison of call rates for the last two seasons. Total numbers of each call for the 07-08 and 08-09 seasons are shown. The comparisons are percentage change in rate this year versus last year. The numbers for this year are through game 817, while last year is for 1230 games, so the rate comparison is done by normalizing out to 1230 games, so on a give call, 817 calls this year would be the same rate as 1230 last season, one per game. A positive percentage means more of that call is being made this year, negative means more last year.

Some notes:
I broke out majors called for each penalty so that could be seen separately as a subset of the type.
Instigators have three entries, total, those from have on a face-mask, and misconducts. This year there has been 29 instigators, of which 1 was for have a face shield, and two were misconducts (typically the linesman attempted to restrain the instigator and they fought through. This is pretty much the definition of an aggressor penalty.)

Items I find of note from people's inquires:
Instigators are considerable down.
Holding, Tripping, Hooking, and Holding The Stick, the four "soft" calls that are getting sited with a lot of grief, are all down in call rate, from 3.2% to 12%. Interference and Goaltender Interference are both up.

Possible properties for sale

2009-02-18T21:32:00.000-08:00

None of these are sure things for sale, but these teams all have potential sale items.

Colorado is not typically a seller, but could very well be out of it by the deadline in two weeks. If so, long shot that Sakic would be available, more likely would be Laperriere, Leopold and Arnason. Tharnqvist and Guite would be low level.

Phoenix, is likely to be out with the tanking job they are doing (1-9-0) in the last 10. The only item of real interest though would be Morris, who would not be available unless the Yotes know they can't sign him.

The Kings could well be out by the deadline, but Lomardi has shown he really is not inclined to force sales, and it will be mostly seconday players they would have available. A win agains Anaheims leaves them only two points out of 4th, but with a tough road trip looking at them.

Phoenix if tanking, but the only player that will draw interrest would be Morris, and Phoenix will not really want to sell him.

Buffalo is not likely to sell, but rumors do surround Afinogenov, the only real prize they would likely draw heavy interest.

Nashville has no real history of what they will do as far as selling, since they are used to setting up to lose in the first round of the playoffs. Between now and the deadline will tell if they can scratch back in, but right now it is not looking good for them. Bonk and deVries are the targets of value if they should chose to sell.

Rumors galore surround the Ducks, with them dropping to 11th after dropping a home game to LA. Before the deadline, they have six road games, all against teams currently in playoff slots, including Det, Chi, and Bos, giving them a good chance to be out of it by the 4th, with there already being rumors they are shopping Neidermayer and Pronger. Morrison, Marchant, Pahlsson, Moen, Hedican, Montador, Huskins, Festerling, and both Niedermayers are UFA’s, Marchant has a NTC but would likely waive it if the Ducks start selling. Pronger has one year left, raising his value.

If the Ducks start selling, Scott Neidermayer will have a big market. Pronger would have a huge market. Pahlsson a lot of people would want. Marchant, Moen, Morrison, Hedican, Mantador, and Rob Niedermayer at the least would draw lesser bids.

Pronger, if moved, would almost certainly go to Toronto for either Kubina or Kabrele, and that could happen even if the Ducks do not tank.

S. Neidermay would take a major prospect or a 1st, and a lesser pick, Pahlsson at least a second, and the rest a 2nd or less.

Projected Standings

2009-02-17T20:54:00.000-08:00

I will try to update this every day or two for the rest of the season. The projected final standings for the season (UPDATED 2/26):

East		West
BOS	115	SJ	118
NJ	109	DET	116
WSH	105	CGY	104
PHL	100	CHI	105
MTL	96	VAN	96
FLA	94	DAL	89
NYR	93	CBJ	88
BUF	92	EDM	87
PIT	92	NSH	87
CAR	91	MIN	87
TOR	84	ANA	85
OTT	78	STL	85
TBL	72	LAK	81
ATL	71	PHX	78
NYI	63	COL	74

For the numbers people, this is not a straight points per game projection. I took every team, and computed the points per game earned and surrendered, at home and away. I then set up every teams remaining schedule, and figured projected results. That is, San Jose has earned a little better than 1.75 points every home game, and surrendered 0.54 points. They have a home game against Atlanta, who has earned 0.86 per road game, and given up 1.28. Based on this, SJ would average 1.52 points in the game, Atlanta 0.70. Add these up for the rest of the year and add it to the current number of points, you get a new projection. This gives a projection based on strength of remaining schedule.

I decided to take this a step further though, that is I did this recursively. I computed a new ppg earned and given up for each team, and then did it again, until the numbers did not move. This gives a 2-3 point move in projected points for teams based on strength of schedule.

Over on http://hockeynumbers-gooseman.blogspot.com/ I will put a bit more detail on the numbers for those interested.

The Exchanges Begin

2009-02-17T18:20:00.000-08:00

Atlanta got the trading season going, shipping Mathieu Schnieder to the Montreal Canadians, along with a conditional 3rd or 4th round pick, in exchange for a 2nd and a 3rd, setting the early price.

Schnieder was not having a great year, and at 39 has lost several games to injury, but to go this early in the deadline season, and for a slightly lower price than expected, would indicate the Thrashers were not getting a lot of calls return. I would have expected a 1st, or maybe a 1+4 from a team that needed some offense from their blueline, I am thinking the Pens, Nucks, Devils off the top of my head. Since I do not expect those teams to stand pat, they must have bigger targets in mind.

In other news, Kabrale has given a list of 10 teams to the Leafs that he will waive his NTC for given his fear that the Leafs will invoke a clause that says they can trade him over the summer if they miss the playoffs. Burke states that he is unlikely to trade him until summer, if at all. This is a clear indication that Burke is actively talking to teams.

Referee Data

2009-02-16T13:00:00.000-08:00

I have done some additional analysis of data gathered from game summaries to date (through roughly 830 games). Keep in mind that this data does not evaluate the quality of the calls, only the numbers of calls made. Considerable trends can still be made from this. I will not be making statements as to which this indicates are the "best" officials. Actually, I somewhat will, I will state what I think are the most likely to be what I want to see out of an official, but this data is open to reality, and different people might see the data to mean something different. First, let's start with the data. Note, in each table, I do include the data for the part time officials, but separated it from the full time officials. All full time referees had 45-50 games at the time of this snapshot, while the part time guys were at 9-10.

Now, what the data is. The first table is a summary of calls by game. I have shown a bit of this data before, but this time I did something slightly different, I removed three calls, too many men, fighting, and puck over the glass. None of these are open to any real interpretation, and though fighting can be partially a product of referee control of the game and if they miss calls, only partially. I chose to leave in misconduct as an at will penalty by the referee. With those calls removed, the league average calls per game is 9.8. I give three sets of numbers for each official, average calls per game, variance from average, and standard deviation of calls, and I rank officials by these numbers. Rank is not a rating, per se, it is only a relative ranking.

What do these numbers give you? The raw numbers of calls will generally correlate with the tightness of an official. The lower the number of calls, it can generally be assumed the more blatant of a penalty is required to have the whistle be used. A lower number can also indicate that the official keeps better control of a game as well. The variance from average is how far does this official stray from average. This is really the same number as total calls, but IMO in an easier to see order. Assuming that the average of officials is the correct level of calls, this is a rank that on the surface would be closer to a rating of the officials. IMO, that is not valid without considering the third number however, standard deviation.

The StdDev is of spread of calls per game. Calls per game of penalties I counted were from one call in one game (4 total that game a fight and one puck over the glass) to 29 (36 penalties in that game included 3 fights). StdDev is a measure in this case of how much a particular official varies in number of calls. A high number here would indicate that the official either calls the game as it occurs, that he is erratic as an official and the players do not know what will be called, or that, or that he completely loses control of games. A low number would either indicate that the official almost has a predetermined number of calls he makes, or that he has complete control of the game. We have all seen all of these cases. In general, one could assume that a middle of the pack number would be optimal here, so I ranked the officials according to variance from average (3.55) on this numbers. I added one more number, and that was a combined ranking. The number used on this is open for interpretation, but I chose an average of 2*(variance of number of calls)+(variance of standard deviation)with the numbers used being relative ranking. This number MAY be considered a guess at a rating of the official.

Why do I consider standard deviation important and why am I showing it? I use StdDev on many of these tables somewhat to show possible bias and erratic nature. Here is a comparative visual, using officials Auger and Dweyer for call differential, the next table. Dweyer has the highest standard deviation on call differential, with a call differential of 0.88 and StdDev of 2.81. Auger has a differential of 0.46 and 1.44.

The call differential is the is a comparison of how many calls against the home and visiting teams. I use visitor calls minus home calls (except I accidentally used reverse signs on the graph). In the example, Auger call just under 1/2 more penalty on the visitors, Dweyer almost a full penalty per game more on the visitors than the home team. Since EVERY official calls more penalties on the visitors than the home team with the exception of one of the subs, no home team is being jobbed by the officials as every home fan in the league thinks. I show the numbers in the chart as percentages. The league average is 12.1% slant towards the visitors, or nearly 0.6 more penalties per game on the visitors. On this chart, I show differential, variance of differential, and StdDev by game, and then rank each of these. IMO, both differential and StdDev are independently valuable.

In this example, you can see that Auger's game calls do not vary. He calls almost all of his games between even and two calls in favor of the home team, which means he is a believes in the theory that a well called game is calling nearly the same number of penalties on both team. Dwyer's calls are on the other hand are all over the place, but also largely symmetric, meaning he does not care in the least about call differential. I agree with Dwyer's profile myself, as it looks to me that he is calling the game as he sees it, not by anything pre-determined. Dangers to me are graphs that are not symmetric, or that are too compact (Auger's).

Chart three is calls by period. An interesting item on this chart is that usually one would expect the most calls in the first, least in the third, from two phenomena, officials swallowing the whistle, and players getting used to the officials as the game goes. This is not the case, almost every official calls the most penalties in the second period. I added flags to this one rather than rankings. And official that had calls drop by more than 9% in the third period off their own call rate, I labeled as a probable whistle swallower. McCreary has his bolded because a 17% drop from the second to the third is simply unacceptable. 11 of 32 have been labeled as swallowing the whistle in the third. One of these though, O'Halloran, has a contradiction: He is tied for the league lead with 6 OT calls. Not surprisingly, games worked by all five subs result in whistles being swallowed in the third period. I labeled four officials with "L", for level calls. They are within 2% of even calls for each period. Two officials, marked "+" actually have call totals go up in the third.

The final table is on games by team location, mark national. There is a common perception by many that Canadian based teams receive biased officiating. I looked at all games between US based and Canadian based teams. The league average show NO bias, with only, with 22 calls more on Canadian teams through 261 games. Though only possible bias is by officials, and by assignment. Leggo has worked only 10 of these cross country games, while Lee has worked 23, nearly half his games. Ranks are by Absolute variance, StdDev, and a combination. Five guys are in the range that could be immediate questionable mode, with a differential of more than 1, and two others over 0.80, but before there is a lot of yelling, five of the seven lead away from Canadian. The five subs, simply should not be allowed to work mixed nation based games.

Bit of surprise from the Blues Crew

2009-02-08T12:32:00.000-08:00

Blues make a choice in goal. I have been trying to remove the Blues from consideration for the playoffs from some time, going so far as to list the players they should have available at the deadline, but they have continued to refuse to go away. Yes, they cannot seem to get out of last in the West, but they are only 5 points out of 8th, and 9 points out of 5th. That is a lot of teams to jump over, but there is still about 30 games left for most teams, it is not out of line.

The Blues just might have made the choice for me though with a rather surprising choice in my mind, having waived Manny Legacy and demoting him to the AHL when he cleared.

Now do not get me wrong, I do not think that Legacy is the key to the Blue's future. The issue is that the team has stayed in the hunt using a two goalie system, and then they suddenly abandon it just when it comes stretch time when they are still in the hunt, and don't just bench a goalie, they drop him down to the minors.

I listed Legacy/Mason as a single entry in my For Sale ad, but really figured it would be Legacy with his UFA status. They have young goalies, and face it, neither of these guys are a goalie that they are looking at to carry them to the promised land. That said, let's look at the numbers, and Mason clearly has better ones, younger, another year under contract, a high SV%, and fair GAA, oh, and a losing record. Legacy is a UFA, low SV%, poor GAA, and a winning record.

The Blues though clearly threw the puck to Mason just before the break though, and he took his 3-13-1 record out and turned it around, going 5-1-2, winning the job. That made Legacy expendable and deadline fodder, but sending through waivers to the AHL? You don't expect to get any bids at all for him? I know that unless someone gets hurt a backup goalie is not going to bring a lot at the deadline, but they will bring something.

I might be cynical, OK, I am cynical, but this smacks loudly to me of a team looking at its other deadline assets and thinking this is a good time to bring up some young kids.

Referee Call Tightness

2009-02-04T20:00:00.000-08:00

OK, Got the error fixed, and added another table.

As some may know, a couple years ago some of us did a review of all referees in the NHL, with multiple reviewers around the League hitting every referee in league multiple times, and trying to get them with as many teams, or at least as many team styles as possible. It was very extensive and informative, but also very time consuming. Unfortunately, due personal situations, we have not been able to continue that effort. What I have done though is collect as much data as I could from the game summaries from game 2000 though present. At least Easy and I will be looking at due various analysis of the data for various factors.

This is the first of the factors I have looked at, a simple look at the number of calls per game. As individual games have not be reviewed as part of this, there is no claims here to the quality of the calls made. I have a good idea of that from having watched games, but will not give such a subjective statement, only the recorded numbers.

I am posting two sheets here. The First sheet is just a straight average of calls per game for season. On it, you can see 2005-06, right after the strike, when the league was going to initiate "strict enforcement of the rules", and calls went up to 12.2 per game. Calls per game went up a little. 06-07, poof, gone, calls right back to where they were, in the 10.2 to 10.8 calls per game range. Having watched some of those games critically, some of the referees were simply revolting against the orders to call games tighter. Last year the call rate jumped up to 11.4 per game, and this year a lot of people are complaining the too many calls are being made, and that those calls are too soft. There is 11.3 calls per game being made, slightly down from last year. The players have adjusted to the call level, and it is not an issue. As calls become tighter near the playoffs, as they always do regardless of the league saying the will not, the call count will likely go down even more, and I would guess the final number for the year will be about 11.0.

The second sheet is for the 2008-2009 season. Included are only the full time referees, not those that are fill-ins and mostly AHL officials principle being given a try-out. There are 34 referees in this group. I did a comparison showing the relative call levels for each referee is a percentage of the league average. 100% would be exactly on the league average. I show the referee, the relative value, variance from average, and a grouping value. Group zero are those referees within +/- 2.5%, of the league average. The next groups are +1, and -1, and are those referees that vary from the average by 2.5-5% in each direction, slightly loose (higher levels of calls) or slightly tight (lower call levels). +2 and -2 would be a variance of 5-10%, the guys who are noticeably tight and loose with their calls. At 10-15% variance are the officials in groups +/-3, very tight and very loose referees. Then there are three guys who are more than 15% off norm, the WTH game are you watching group, AKA at the +/-4 guys.

Referees Larue, McCauley, and Sutherland (just out of the group -4) do not appear to be calling the games and likely were talked to about that fact at the All-Star break. Having watched some of their games, those numbers are accurate, they are not calling the games. At the other end it O'Rourke who is calling 6% higher than the next closest official, and again not really liking to call out specific officials, but O'Rourke is making calls as guys come out of the dressing rooms. A total of 8 of the 34 officials are in groups 3 and 4 which a variance from average of more than 10%, 2 high and 6 low, making these the referees you might not want to see if you want the games called consistently from a game to game.

I added one additional table. Just a preliminary on home vrs. visitor call differential. Home fans always feel that their team is being jobbed by the officials, well, here are the raw stats. The league average is differential is that 4.8% extra of all calls go to the visitors, 47.6% to 52.8%. Only two officials, Jackson and Devorski, have called more on the home team than of the visitors. O'Halloran is exactly even with 251 calls on each team. The biggest "homer" in the league is Brad Meier with a whopping 12.7% differential, the only referee over 10%. Many of the "usual suspects" are in the high end. What does that mean? Some of the guys that home fans love to boo, and think are ripping them off actually have some of the highest differentials towards the home team in the league. The next 9 after Meier are Joanette, Lee, Shick, McCauley, St. Pierre, Morton, McCreary, Auger, and Koharski. Fraser, the official that gets booed in almost every arena in the league, just misses the list at #13.

NHL Trade Strategies and Results

2009-02-03T09:48:00.000-08:00

The following was put together by SJ_Easy, a hockey fan in the San Jose area. I make the same offer to others, if you would like to publish anything hockey related for sharing and discussion, I would be happy to do so as long as it is in reasonable taste. This particular discussion is looking at different trading strategies over the last ten seasons by team, and what results they had. These are Easy's comments, feel free to add you own thoughts of you see as patterns.

The accompanying data was collected to try and segregate the effect of transactions on NHL team results. The data collection took over 50 hours so far and there may be a few mistakes although double-checking has probably reduced the error rate to under 5%. If there is a mistake I will be glad to update the tables based on confirmation of the error. However, I believe that the information is accurate enough to provide a description of activity by team and to arrive at some conclusions.

It is not entirely possible to separate acquisition activity from other factors. A team with a poor drafting/development history will be forced to raise their activity in the acquisition market. A team with a limited budget may be forced to refrain from activity due to budget. However, it is my opinion that there are patience and planning factors for team management that also plays into the numbers.

Teams had four criteria for success: Stanley Cup finals appearances, Cup wins, stronger playoff performance and finally points in the standings. From the data represented in Table 4, it appears that there is correlation between playoff improvement and Cup wins with lesser trade activity. In looking at the data, it appears that the majority of successful teams do pursue the lesser activity route by using a scalpel rather than a meat cleaver. With outside suggestions we decided to divide the team descriptions into Dynasty Mode and Slash and Burn. Teams with a 10 year activity level under 15 top 10 transactions were considered Dynasty Mode. Above 20 indicated Slash and Burn. Some teams have switched styles mid-stream but they are relatively few despite the number of front office changes. Colorado and Dallas are two that have switched modes. Another reader of the preliminary results made the analogy to Brain Surgeons and Mad Scientists with Mad Scientists representing the Slash and Burn mode.

In collecting the data and with the help of another reviewer some comments regarding the raw data are appropriate. In looking at the teams that were successful with S&B mode, it was apparent that their activity level dropped just before attaining their cups as exemplified by Tampa and Anaheim. That activity drop was not seen for the Canes. Dynasty mode was applied to the style whether a team was successful or not. It was appropriate to apply that mode to Ottawa, Buffalo, Montreal and San Jose despite their lack of cup wins. Two of those four teams have had close calls for the cup with Buffalo coming close twice.

One other observation is that either a deadline move in the top 5 or a off-season acquisition in that area improves chances. It doesn't mean an outgoing roster player, but does indicate the level of acquisition necessary to improve results. It is noteworthy that top 10 zero-move teams tend to disimprove on playoff performance although the ones that do not disimprove still have a chance at the cup. More than two top 10 moves and more than one top 5 move tend to seriously reduce cup chances and I would venture that is due to a familiarity factor with the team. It would seem to indicate that stability is the easier path to success and would suggest that players feeling that stability become better performers. Too much stability also seems to induce a laissez fair attitude where at least limited activity is advisable.

Some cogent comments from another reviewer.

Neither strategy is going to work unless luck in the form of things like injuries, and the secondary moves also fall into place.

Higher trends for the League: 11 teams fit into the category of 1 to 5 top five transactions. Of those only Vancouver and Montreal have failed to at least win one conference title. The group has 15 conference and 8 Stanley Cups. The group of 6 to 13 top five moves has 19 teams, with 5 conference titles and 2 Cups. Tampa Bay with 6 top five moves at one end of the group has one cup, and Anaheim with 13 top five moves has two conference titles and one cup.

Each of the sorts pull out more of the subtleties of this, but keep in mind that the number of trades does not always relate directly to these general strategies. Large numbers of trade can also be due to not yet having established a working base such as the expansion teams, rebuilds, changes in ownership/management, bad drafting, and so on. In general though, I think the trends show that either approach can work. The Fans often call for what would amount to slash and burn, but that is actually the much more difficult path to pull off.

If you would like to download the Excel data sheets, please feel free to do so by clicking here..

A couple of notes on the data. Easy gives an explanation in the page labeled "scoring", but a couple of quick comments. The definition used for top 10 transactions are those involving top 6 forwards or top 4 defenseman. Top 5 player transactions are a bit more subjective, but for a given team must include at least one defenseman and two forwards, and can include a goalie if that goalie is of high enough reputation.

The summary pages are those that are sorted "By Top 5", "By Top 10", and "By Playoff Points". In the summary pages, you will notice two entries for the expansion teams from the last 10 years. One is for the actual numbers for that team, the second is for "normalized" numbers for those teams, that is to project their numbers from 6-8 years, to 10 years for direct comparison with other teams. I highlighted the normalized entries in blue, but decided to leave both entries in so that they could be seen either way. Note that for these expansion teams it should be expected that their transaction level is likely higher in the first few years than what their long term strategies would be.

There may be an issue with some lower resolutions not showing the slide bar correctly. If you have the problem, I recommend downloading the sheets. If you cannot do so, let me know and I will try to find a way around the issue tonight. I am sorry for the issue, I did not realize it existed for the frame under blogger/google docs to this extent.

AHL Call-up

2009-02-02T21:25:00.001-08:00

Ottawa made yet another call-up from the AHL for their struggling team, Cory Clouston. This is noteworthy only because Clouston is a coach, not a player, tabbed to replace Craig Hartsburg.

The firing of Hartsburg is not a real surprise, I have been expecting it at any time since November, and as the Sens showed no signs of turning it around, it was only a matter of time. It does cost the Sens a chunk of change though, as Hartsburg failed to make it out of the first year of a three year contract. The team is buried in the East and not playing hard at all. Hartsburg in fact has complained repeatedly about exactly that, they did not play hard. The only problem is that getting a team to play hard is the coach's responsibility, even when the players are the ones not putting out.

Some analysts are yelling about Hartsburg being let go mid-season. Bunk. Why keep a coach all year if you have already decided to lose him at the end of the year. This is not like Chicago that let a coach go after four games, this the 50 games into a season for a team that expected to be in the playoffs and is not going to be.

I have heard him called a well respected, veteran coach. By what standards would anyone evaluate him as such. His first year in the NHL, the Blackhawks finished in second in the Central under him and lost in the second round. The year before they had finished third in the strike abbreviated season under Darryl Sutter but went to the Western Conference Finals, so that is not especially impressive. In two more years, he finished 5th in the Central both seasons. Then in Anaheim, his teams finished 3rd, 5th, and were in 5th when he was fired in the third year. In Ottawa, fired in 5th place. Three years in the playoffs, his teams won only one round. At the NHL level, I am still looking for the well respected part. I see a who had teams get worse under him each year he coached them.

Hartsburg however is not, by far, the only problem in Ottawa. They have a team with players that do not have enough self respect to play as professionals when they are being paid to do so. That is unacceptable. They have a GM that hired, and then was forced to fire, a coach that was not qualified, and is at least in part responsible for putting that team that is not professional on the ice. I am not sure that Bryan Murray should not be paying the price as well. The only problem with that though is that it was only days ago that the owner of the Sens popped off his mouth about not blowing up the team. That makes be wonder who the GM of the team really is, Murray, or Melnyk.

Blues Moves

2009-02-02T20:47:00.000-08:00

The Blues have a bit of a quandary. They are not going to make the playoffs from the 15th spot at this point, but in points they seem to be in reach. They have assets they could move at the deadline, but will they be able to? Assuming they decide to sell, these will be what they have to choose from.

Manny Legacy/Chris Mason. Legacy is 35, has a (13-9-1) record, and is a UFA. He is considered a quality back-up to marginal starter. Chris Mason is 32, has a (6-14-1) record, and has one year left, and is a marginal starter. It the Blues were to offer one up in part depends on their thoughts on ability to re-sign Legacy, and where they think the prospects are. If they should offer one up, who do they even think is the better goalie? Legacy has the record, but Mason's numbers are actually better. My guess is they try to re-sign Legacy and go with split duty again next year, but if a contender loses a starter, offers will come. I doubt that the Blues are going to be actively shopping unless they know they will not be signing Legacy.

Keith Tkachuk, $4M, UFA, 36 years old, (15-17-32 ). Tkachuk has shown he can still put up numbers, particularly on the PP. KT has a NTC, but would very likely be willing to waive it at the deadline to go to a contender, especially since the Blues would be very likely to make an offer to sign him again off the UFA market. Tkachuk would be in the same market as Guerin and Weight, and would be looking at a 1st and 3rd in return. Expect that to happen.

Andy McDonald, $3.33M, UFA 31 years old. (6-12-18) a broken ankle has limited McDonald to only 16 games, with very good numbers in those 16 games. The Blues likely would prefer to sign McDonald, and it is unknown if he will even be back by the deadline or up to speed if he is back. He would bring a solid return if he is though, possibly as high as a 1st.

Dan Hinote, $1M, UFA (32) (1-1-2) 13 games to injury. Hinote has been a bid disappointment and it is unlikely that the Blues are looking to sign him. Look for Hinote to be shopped as a depth forward, but no to bring a lot in return, maybe a 3rd.

Mike Weaver $700K, UFA (30) (0-4-4). Weaver is a cheap, depth forward. The Blues really have no reason to be looking at signing him for next year with the blue liners they expect to have in the line-up next season, so look for him to move on deadline day. He will not brinf a lot though, a prospect or a 4th.

Leafs in the wind

2009-02-02T19:40:00.000-08:00

The Leafs are not going to make the playoffs, and with Burke are GM, they are going to make moves. The will in fact be a major player in the UFA market. That said, they have cap room, and plenty of it, so they do not need to dump salary. They only need to trade if they do not want the player, or do not think they can keep them. I have taken most of the younger guys off the board for them, it would make no sense.

Pavel Kubina it a littl bit different. He has one more year at $5M, and a limited NTC. He gave a list of teams he would accept, and they could trade to those without concent. If they want to trade him, it would make sense for him to just waive the clause. If the Leafs do not make the playoffs, the NTC is suspended at draft time. Trading him would really not make a lot of sense unless they got a huge offer though.

Blake and Hagman are both putting up numbers, signed for term, and Hagman has a no move clause. Kaberle is also putting up numbers, still has term, and a NTC. It would make no real sense for them to either try or him to wave.

Jamal Mayers. Has another year at $1.33M. He has put up nothing in numbers (1-5-6). This is a taget for Burke to trade, in the offseason if not at or before the deadline. A team that needs more toughness without worry about 3rd line scoring could well make an offer. Do not expect them to get a lot in return though, Jamal will not generate a bidding war, a 2nd would be a bonus.

Nik Antropov, $2.05M, 28 years old, (15-22-37), UFA. Burke should already be working on an extension for Antropov because he is going to get paid. If talks are going nowhere, then Antropov will become a classic deadline rent-a-player, and would like bring on the order of a 1st and a 3rd.

Dominic Moore, $900K, 28 years old, (11-20-31), UFA. Dominic has been a bargain. This is another guy who Burke should already be talking to his agent. If he can't get at least some headway, there will be a market. Any team that thinks they might get him reasigned would likely give up a 2nd.

Mike Van Ryn, 29 years old, (3-6-9) at $2.9M with another year left. Not sure how Burke will feel about Van Ryn, but I am not sure that the Leafs are really getting their money back from MVR. I am also not sure there will be a big market for him either though. If he wanted to move Van Ryn, this would not seem a deadline deal move though.

Curis Joseph, $700K, UFA (1-5-1). If there is a market, Joseph will be moved anytime between now and the deadline. 6th rounder at the outside, probably a 7th.

Revenues

2009-02-02T15:46:00.000-08:00

The NHL is reportedly hurting due to the economy. It is something that now jointly and directly affects both the players and owners due to revenue sharing. There are a large number of fans that routinely call for to things, moves to Canada, and contraction. Contraction isn't going to happen. It is not on the table, and it is not going to be. The league wants more money, not less. Bettman insists that movement is not on the table. Bettman needs to get realistic. Owners cannot really put pressure on other owners to move, they can't create that kind of in fighting. The players can though via the NHLPA.

Let's look at some numbers. Attendance. Over the last eight seasons, I looked at the bottom 10 in attendance since 2001, since those were the years I could quickly find. Teams that have been in the bottom 10 over those years:
CGY, TB, BUF, COL, 1 time each. LA, STL, CBJ, twice. PIT three times. ANA and FLA four times. Of those, the only ones that really concern me are Columbus because it is the last two years when the team is becoming more competitive, and Florida. Anaheim was the years they really were not competitive, and LA was still over 16K when they were on the list.

Next, you have Carolina at 5. That is an issue, because they have been competitive, even won a title and still do not draw. That make it a strong issue about why is there a team there, but the league really wants a team in that region.

At 6 you have NJ, CHI, and BOS. Two original six and one of the most successful teams in the last 10+ years. New Jersey simply has a horrid location, New Jersey. Chicago and Boston though, there is no mystery on them, management and ownership. One change in ownership, changes at GM and philosophy, and become competitive, and Chicago is leading the league in attendance and Boston is just fine. NJ I will address.

At 7 year, you have Washington, Atlanta, Phoenix, Nashville, and the Islanders at all eight years. I do not really care if the league wants a team in the area or not, Nashville has no business having a team. Three straight years in the playoffs, and still bottom ten in the league. They have never been over 16K, only over 15K twice, and have been at low as 13.1K.

Atlanta is a city that already had one team fail. I really do not think a team belongs there either, but they seemed to be building a bit more of a following until it collapsed this year along with play.

Phoenix should not have a team, period. How do you force a move out of a team when they just built a new arena though. The league felt they could handle a team simply because they supported minor league team. They are a minor league city. They should not have they Diamondbacks in baseball either.

Now, the Devils, the Islanders, the Caps, 21 of a possible 24 bottom ten finishes. Add Boston, then you have 27 of 32. It might be a US hockey hotbed, but there are simply too many teams in too small an area within too small of an area, BOS, NYR, NYI, NJ, WSH, PHL. It cannot handle it. Washington will turn around in attendance with the stars they have, Boston the same, and they Rangers are never a problem. Devils and the Isles. Two teams with huge traditions. One with a brand new arena and much recent success. But their location stinks. Islanders, come on, how could you blame the Isles?

Well, a team, IMO, must be removed from there, and due to there complete lack of direction, inane ownership, and the actual damage they are doing to the league through insane contracts, the Islanders are the team that should have pressure put on to get out of there, and that is a shame.

There is another big factor in "league revenues", and that is that the cap is not doing what is was supposed to. It is not being correctly administered, and the fans do not understand that. If a team is one dollar below cap, that teams fans start screaming murder. The teams are not supposed to be at cap.

The cap was designed in such a way that when the number was put up for the year, that was the maximum amount that any team could spend. The minimum amount was that minus $16M. The average for the league was supposed to be cap minus $8M, not cap. Only 4 teams are under the midpoint. It should be 15, not 4. The average is about $5M higher than it is supposed to be, and actual salary is higher. Then there is another $12M in injury money that does not count against cap, guys like McLaren getting played $2.5M for playing in the AHL, etc. That is a lot og economic impact. The past couple of years, the only reason players did not have to give money back was that income came out a lot higher than projected. Not the case this year, and that is likely to cost the players money they expected to get. And if they have to give money back to the owners, they are going to look at those teams at the bottom of that list and say "you are costing us money!"

Now, one point in favor of those owners: NSH, CBJ, PHX, ATL, NYI and CAR have been responsible enough to have 6 of the 7 lowest payrolls in the league.

Now, on moving teams: Where to. One of the issues is the questions of how many cities that might be able to support a team have NHL class arenas? I will ignore that, and just talk some cities.

Canada: Winnipeg. Windsor is often mentioned, but that may kill Detroit and the Wings would certainly have to be paid off by the rest of the league to approve. I am not at all sure they area could support two teams. Hamilton/Toronto: Getting the Leafs and Buff to approve, and can that area really support three teams long term? Not much else big enough to really take a gamble on.

US: East, really not much with a chance of supporting a team that does not have one. Mid-West, Indianapolis, had a team fail already. Cincinnati, right by a struggling Cleveland. Memphis, not much better than Nashville. Wichita or Kansas City might be a real option. South, I hate teams in the south, and it would be brutal conditions to keep a rink in order, but Houston would be a long-shot. West, Las Vegas is repeatedly mentioned. I have lived there. It would do worse than Phoenix unless tickets were bought by "businesses" and given away. San Diego, better than PHX, but not likely to succeed. Portland or Seattle, those would be the best US options IMO.

Thrashers for Rent.

2009-01-29T23:08:00.000-08:00

Atlanta is in non-compete mode, but if some of their prospects pan out and they hit the free agent market, they could turn around. If they are not willing to spend the money, they the league and the PA should really start putting pressure for them to be moved.

The Thrashers really have very little at forward at all, let alone with trade value. They might look at giving up Kovalchuk, Kozlov or White and playing the free agent game, but this team is already $12M below cap this year, they don't need to unload to do that.

Marty Reasoner (31) 8-8-16. Current $1M, UFA. Reasoner it a cheap, depth center/wing, PK guy who can chip in a bit. Probably would not pull more than a 3rd. ATL would probably be better off re-signing him.

Eric Perrin (33) 5-7-12. Current $750K, UFA. 33 and only in his 3rd year. This is a guy that most would not put into the NHL and is playing third line for the Thrashers, showing their issues. He is a place holder waitig for replacing. Likely could pull only 6th for someone looking for depth.

Mike Hoffman (28). Currently $550K, UFA. Huge enforcer who would pull a 6th at the outside but could be picked up by someone needing some protection down the stretch.

On defense, Enstrom was just given a big extension, Hainsey is long term, Bogosian has two more years and then is RFA. They are going nowhere.

Niclas Havelid (35) 1-10-11. Currently $2.7M, UFA. Havelid will be made available if they Thrash does not think they can sign him. I think they are talking, but if those talks are not going well, they would probably be looking at a 1st, but would prefer prospects that would be ready to play next year.

Mathieu Schneider (39) 4-7-11. Currently $5.75M, UFA. Schneider has no business still being in ATL at the end of the end of the season. As a rent-a-player, Schneider will still be a target, should pull about a 1st and 3rd, and the Thrash should jump at that.

Canadian Fans Weigh In On Fighting

2009-01-28T15:01:00.001-08:00

Partial results of a poll of Canadians has been published by TSN. See the article here: http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=264784&lid=sublink07&lpos=headlines_nhl

The poll of 1,000 households by phone call indicated that 52% of those polled felt that fighting in hockey should be banned. Of those that actively followed the NHL, only 30% agreed. I have given a couple of posts on fighting, and the very fact that I have even commented on it gives a pretty good indication of how I feel on it at the NHL level, but I will go ahead and comment in detail.

Fighting has no place in under-age hockey at all, and for that matter any amateur hockey. Any fight under 13 age groups should be a banning for the player, and probation for the coach. Second offense for a team, then the coach starts taking suspensions. First offense should be on the order of half a season to a full season. Second offense I could easily see no sanctioned hockey until age 15. All other 17 and under amateur, say a 3 game suspension on first offense, season on second offense. Other amateur hockey, senior, rec leagues, etc., maybe one game on first, 5 on second, season on third. Penalties should be escalated for aggressor type situations, where one player simply did not want to go, a player will not stop, intentionally injury, when it is rules an undefended attack, etc.

I consider Jr. hockey to not non-amateur. In lower levels of Jr., rules should be similar to adult leagues. Major Jr. , I lean towards similar rules to current international rules: fight=game misconduct and 1 game suspension. The suspension at the major Jr. level is debatable. US college, at the club level, similar to adult leagues, at NCAA level, similar to international. I greatly disagree with the rule to require helmets be left on at the Jr. level, in fact think that exactly the opposite, helmets should be required to be removed.

NHL, ECHL, and AHL level hockey, greatly REDUCE the instigator calls, it should be strictly in the aggressor, undefended attack, and unprovoked attack on a skill player. Reduce the automatic calling the penalty on both players. If one does not seem to be a willing combatant then stiffer penalties should be given to the aggressor, in fights ruled to have no justification. If there is any time to do so, i.e. two willing fighters square off in a "let's go" situation, both fights must remove the helmet, forget the consideration of shields, just take them off.

The Sr. league death was an accident, pros can/should handle themselves. Let's get rid of the broken hands and guys being cowards and not removing their lid.

My opinions.

Tampa Bay Bargain Bin

2009-01-27T22:57:00.000-08:00

Lacavalier, St. Louis, Malone, Stamkos, Prospal, and Meszaros have almost $29M in cap tied up, all for a minimum of 2 more years. Lacavalier is for another 11 years, and though many might be willing to cover his $85M contract, it is very unlikely he will be moved unless the Lighting simply decide to cash it in.

St. Louis would, as usual, draw misplaced interest, but he seems more interested in killing coaches than waiving his NTC and trying to win meaningful games.

Stamkos, at least has almost $3M of his in bonus clauses, but not even TB management seems off center enough to try to blame things on and 18 year old. Malone, Prospal, and Meszaros would all bring big returns, but Tampa Bay would get fleeced and would be foolish to try to pull a deal on any of them right now. Any such move should be off-season or a re-build deal with another non-contender.

Unless St. Louis suddenly chooses to waive his clause, don’t expect any of those names to move. The items that Bolts will have up for auction though are:

Mark Recchi (40) Current $1.5M UFA, straight rent-a-player. (10-21-31) Recchi can still bring some offense, but is no longer any threat to be a top liners. He will be picked up by someone as an depth winger or for the second power play unit. Bidding might go as high as a 2nd rounder.

Olaf Kolzig (38) Current $2.5M UFA (2-4-1). The Bolts may try to get Kolzig some games before the deadline to get someone interested for a backup. It is unlikely he will draw more than a 4th round pick. Ollie the Goalie is off the board, out 3-4 months with a ruptured tendon.

Gary Roberts (42) Current $2.4M UFA (2-1-3). Roberts has only gotten 19 games in all year, but if he can get healthy, someone might give up a 6th to have him in the locker room.

Marek Malik (33) Current $1.25M, UFA. Someone will offer up to a 2nd round pick for added beef on the blueline for the playoffs.

The Bolts do not looked posed to even come out of the deadline as a winner. Guys like Roberts and Recchi will only have limited market, but a team like Chicago might want one of them just to talk with the youngsters. Do not be shocked though if something bigger does happen with them. Not the constant rumors of Lacavalier to Montreal for trash though. There could very well be a move between the Bolts and the Leafs though with both teams looking to mix and match some names.

Garage Sale: Ottawa

2009-01-26T21:50:00.000-08:00

The Sens season is going down the tubes and they are showing every sign of no longer even pretending. They are a mess, and one of the reasons for the mess is straight forward, most of their roster is tied down long term. That is something most teams want, and it is great, if the team decides to play. The Sens are not, and some heads need to roll. This team has a lot of star power. What they do not have though is a team.

The only roster players not signed for next season are Chris Neil, Dean McAmmond, Filip Kuba, and Martin Gerber. When looking at deadline dealers, you are usually looking at UFA's, so start with them.

The Sens have been trying to move Gerber's $3.7M UFA contract for some time, but have not been getting takers, including his clearing waivers last week. He will most likely be moved soon as a dump by the Sens to a team that needs a backup. Calgary is rumored, and they have the space. Washington and Colorado could also be interested in bidding if the Sens will sweeten the pot. The Sens are going to come out the losers on this one, but are just looking to cut their losses anyway.

A grit player, someone will try for Neil. If he is not part of another deal before then, Neil can be had at the deadline for a third.

McAmmond is not really doing anything wrong, but at 35 he is a fast 3/4 liner for a contender. PK role player but not much size. He could be moved for a 3rd.

Other than Kuba, the Sens are not really looking like a deadline player, but they need to regroup for sure. Fisher, Heatley, Phillips and Spezza all have forms of NTC/NMc's but would not be moved in any case.

The Sens will start to make moves soon. Donovan, Ruutu, and Jason Smith are veteran grit players that could well be moved soon. Anything more will a big trade, except for one prize:

Filip Kuba (1-24-25) $3.0M, UFA. Kuba will be, or likely already is, a hot commodity for any team that needs a PP QB. Some teams are likely to start bidding soon, not waiting for deadline, but the Sens will sit on this one unless the offer is big. At team like the Rangers might already be looking at offers.

The trade of Kuba is one that the Sens must handle carefully as a key to a rebuild. If no one comes up with something big before then, at the deadline the Sens should pull down 2 firsts + 2 prospects should be about the return.

Players for sale

2009-01-26T20:17:00.000-08:00

The Post Holiday Hockey Sale season is starting to shape up as teams are declared out of the running, by me, if not (officially) by their GM's. The buyers will be the usual suspects, and most of the selling will not happen until March 1-4, but there are players on the table already, GM's are drooling, and everyone is starting to warm up the cell phones. Let's look at the first page of the for sale list, the New York Islanders. Who should the GM's be sending the scouts to see?

Mike Comrie Currently $4.0M, UFA. At 28, not great numbers, and a UFA, Comrie is a bit of a trade enigma. Could be a depth 2/3 center rental, or a trade with the intent to sign. The current price of $4.0M seems steep for a guy with 60 point high with 500 NHL games. It is questionable if he is in the plans in New York to re-sign at those numbers, and he may not wan to waste more of his career there either, so a parting might be mutual. He will be available for bids unless the Isles are working actively on an extension. They have plenty of time on their hands, so maybe they are. 6-9-15 is not enough to bring high bids, so expect it to take two prospects to get him. Bidders will be limited.

Mike Sillinger. Current: $2.2M, UFA. 37 and only 7 games played off of hip surgery. There will be no bids at this point, but Sillinger has a few weeks to show how much of a crap shoot he is. If he can play, he will get bids, but they will not be high. No bids at this time, but he could pull down a second and a third.

Andy Hilbert. Current $675K UFA 8-9-17 (27) Hilbert is on IR, so his availability is a mystery right now, but med info would certainly be shared with any suitors. If he can play, he can add depth. This is a player that the Isles should be looking at getting to sign, not sell though. If they do not think they can sign though, they will make him available. Depending on how many games he can get before the deadline, they could probably pull a 3rd, and a 5th for him.

Andy Sutton Currently $3.0M + 1 year, and on IR. Sutton should be back from IR shortly, and is a known commodity. With another year at $3.0 Sutton would not be cheap, but he is also not the type of player that a team would likely really want to rebuild around. To get Sutton would take a roster defenseman, a prospect, and a pick. That makes Sutton either a player to be moved soon, or likely not at all. Teams that need more toughness may be taking a look though.

Brendan Witt Witt is a player teams love, including the Isles when they just signed him to a $3.0 2 year extension. At 33 he should be in his prime, but is putting up no numbers, on a very bad team. Even with bad numbers, it would take a huge bid to get him. Do not expect it to happen. Witt will be one of the pieces the Isles will try to rebuild around. It would take I first line forward and a first to get him, minimum.

Doug Weight. (38) Current $4.3M, UFA. Proven winner. Weight will be one of the biggest prize on the market. It will be a bidding war from all the usual suspects. It will take a minimum of a first, second, and a prospect, with it being unlikely that Weight will be moved before March 3rd for a classic rent-a-player in a bidding war.

Bill Guerin. Currently (38), $4.5M, UFA. Classic rent-a-player, again. Guerin has a NTC but will wave it because he wants a cup. Then again, he sure showed that the last time he was a UFA and signed with the Isles, didn't he. Comments aside, he will wave, and there will be a bidding war, almost as high as for Weight. First and a third will get you to the table.

The Isles will be feeding Guerin and Weight the puck as much as possible, and then will be listening to the phone. Anyone who thinks they have a chance will try for Weight. Guerin has burned some teams in the past, so a few will shy away. Very few will bid until the deadline, but Vancouver could be a wild card, as they could fit one of them now, and might well be interested in adding Weight.

Instigator

2009-01-23T20:41:00.000-08:00

I did a bit of analysis of the rate that instigator penalties are called with fights. I thought claims that 13% of fights last season were substantially out of range, so I did some data harvesting of the NHL scoring summaries. There are errors in some of these sheets, and some that are even missing, but these numbers are close to accurate. I was able to gather numbers from 2000 through about the mid way portion of this season, so approximately 1230 for the years other than this year 2008-2009, with about 620 for this year (so for totals, double this year). In the past I have used numbers from Hockeyfights.com, they sometimes count things as fights that was listed only as roughs on actual scoring. I do admit that when I thought the 13% number was way out of line, I was thinking instigators per fighting penalty, rather than per fight, so my estimates needed to be doubled. My next idea was that as the number of fights has dropped the number of roughing calls would have gone up. This proved not to be true, roughing calls have roughly followed fighting calls.

By year, this is the number of fighting calls, instigator calls, and percentage of fights that included instigators assuming that fighting calls are even (which they are not, occasionally only one player receives the penalty), and I threw roughing calls in for good measure.

Year	Roughs	Fights	Instigators	Rate
00-01	1741	1172	56	9.56%
01-02	1841	1421	82	11.54%
02-03	1675	1201	58	9.65%
03-04	1651	1416	54	7.63%
05-06	1021	810	48	11.85%
06-07	1135	885	53	11.98%
07-08	1463	1324	47	7.10%
08-09	747	798	20	5.01%

I will continue to believe that the instigator is not the biggest factor in the changes in rates of fights in the game, but the numbers do show that it either has and effect, or the league has instructed it to be called in a way that goes along with the increase. As for my opinion of if the penalty should exist: Some who even agree in large part with my opinions on what really causes the increase, and added a few others (like feeling that players simply are not as mean as they used to be), but still would like the call eliminated. Personally, I do not care if it is called and instigator, if a game or misconduct is used, but it do think there needs to be some call. The rate at which it should be called though would be more in the line of 1-2%, rather than the 11-12% it has been called some year, or even the 5% this year.

When should it be called? Guys should not be able to come off the bench as go after someone, that should be a match penalty. A hack or known instigator should not be able to start a fight with a player like Crosby, Kane, Toews, and so any, unless that player is silly enough to willingly drop the gloves. If one guy simply does not want to go, that is an instance. I saw a simple example, an incident that a non-fighter got no call at all, but a much larger player who does drop, got a rough, instigator, fighting call, misconduct, and game (29 minutes). Without seeing the incident, THAT is an instigator.

While we are at it, I would like to see third-man-in largely eliminated. Games for second altercations: why? Lose them. I would like to see the linesmen quit jumping in when both guys want to go. I do not like the staged fights, but in the course, let them go. Face masks, get them off or misconduct, just get them off. I would prefer seeing everyone take the lid off, but definitely the masks. If you have time to square up, you have time to get the lid off. If on the other had a guy is trying to remove his, and the other guy jumps him, that is at least a game, just get him out of there. An argument could be made for attempt to injure on that one. And while we are at it, let's know of the stupid off-setting roughing calls when only one guy does anything. It is not a roughing penalty on me for hitting your hand with my face.

A few tidbits about the data, the top three teams in instigator calls are PHX at 14.3%, EDM at 13.2% and BUF at 13.1%, but the Buffs have not taken a call in the last two years. Half the teams in the league have yet to be called for an instigator this year, while CBJ leads the way with 3 and a 12% rate. CAR, COL, and DET each have only 6 instigators for the period, TOR 5, with CAR having a 4.0% rate, and TOT 3.4%. EDM sat the most instigators at 24, while CGY is the run-away leader with 428 fighting majors while the other end has even a larger span with DET having only 133 fighting majors.

CBA Not To Be Revisited.

2009-01-23T16:10:00.001-08:00

The NHLPA met and today announced that they like the current CBA a lot more than they thought they did. A 45% growth in the salary cap over three years seems to have swayed their opinions. The PA had the option of re-opening negotiations for next season, but has officially passed on that option, which means the current agreement will stay in place for another two years. This forgoes the possibility of any work action by either side until the end of the 2010-2011 season, a very good thing for the league. The current state of the economy, and general health of some franchises in the league are still causing some issues that will start causing increased pressure to address, and other ramifications of the announcement and timing.

The timing issue, this effected what some players could sign for this year. In prior years of the CBA, teams were allowed a bit of a fudge factor in the cap, that is bonuses. Player bonuses counted against the cap, even if the play was unlikely to make those bonuses, until such time that it was impossible. For instance, if a player had a bonus clause that said he got $500,000 if he scored 20 goals, that bonus number counted against the cap until the end of the season, even if he only had 1 goal through 60 games. It is [I]possible[/I] that he would score 19 goals in 22 games. It the clause said though that he had to play 60 games, and with 40 games left he only had 19, he could not make the mark and the bonus is dropped. Those rules are still in place for this year. However, in the past, a team could exceed the cap by up to 6%, if that excess was all bonus money, and if the players actually made the bonus, they were charged against the cap the following year. That rule was not in place this year, because there was not guaranty that there would be a cap, or even a season, next year, so all bonuses had to fit under cap this year. If the CBA had been extended before the season that would not have been the case.

A bigger issue was raised in the fine print of the announcement though. Players put part of their pay into an escrow account, which is used to offset any possible shortfall in income for the league. Expected revenues determine cap, with the players being guaranteed a specific percentage of that money. If more money is collected by the owners than expected, then the owners have to fork over a percentage of the extra, and the players get a bonus check. If revenues are less than expected, then the players have to refund part of their pay to the owners, and that is what the escrow account is for. If it is not needed, it is returned to the players. The PA is entirely in control of this, it is not in the hands of the owners. It has already been estimated that revenues would at best cause the cap to be flat for next year, possible drop a bit. The PA just gave an indication though that they think it might be worse than that. Escrow for the first half of the season was set at 13.5% for each player to cover anything they might have to give back. The PA has decided that this might not be enough! They have raised the escrow deduction to 25% for the remainder of the year. This will average out to about 19% for the year of every player’s salary is in danger of going back to the owners, so that $2,000,000 contract that John Defenceman signed might actually be $1,600,000, a chunk of change less than he thought he was going to get. This is also an indication that the PA thinks that cap is going to go down next year, not stay level.

This is really going to start generating more pressure from both the owners and the players on franchises that are costing them money. When Tampa Bay throws $10,000,000 at VC, and then can’t put enough people in the stands to hold up league revenues, other teams end up having to pay part of his salary, as does Crosby who sells out every rink he plays in. If cap goes down, those guys who are looking for new contracts next year are not going to get comparable contracts, because their team will not be allowed to give it to them, even if that team does have enough, because another team without the revenue spent money they did not earn. More, guys who go to arbitration will get the money, while those who are not eligible, or choice not to, will get the leftover scraps. The Commish can yell all he wants that all franchises are going to stay put, but if this continues for any length of time, he will have a full revolt on his hands, and one of the ramifications of the owners and players being a partnership under this CBA, they will almost all agree.

NHL bias

2009-01-22T14:01:00.000-08:00

I know I am not the only one that is tired of blatant bias by the NHL. I am not talking about the stuff that all fans cry about with their “own” team, the claims that the NHL is out to get them, and Kerry Fraser and the rest of the referees job them, and so on. BTW, note that the “Fraser Sucks!” chant is heard in every arena in the league that the fans have enough experience to figure out who the referees even are. I would bet that in 75% of the arenas 90% of the fans could not name more than five NHL referees, with the three most common mentioned being Fraser, McGeough, Koharski, and McCreary, in that order, and most of them probably do not even know McGeough retired (and I bet they can’t spell his name any more consistently than me if they even try to spell it other than as Magoo).

I am not talking about the Eastern bias, which is real but also understandable. The bulk of the teams are in the East, the bulk of the fans and writers are in the East, and while Western fans see Eastern teams, few Eastern fans see Western teams except when they are forced to play out of their time slots.

I am not talking about the accusations of Canadian/US bias, Original Six/Twelve/Twenty versus expansion teams. Not Elite versus teams that do not have their name of the cup. I will not even comment on that. Nor the habit of the league catering to, AKA caving to, the media. I am not even talking about the aggravating habit of games being officiated to the score-board rather than the on ice action.

My issue is with marketing. I am tired of it. There has long been a habit of marketing the stars. That is partially fueled by Bettman and his background, and that process having been successful with the NBA. I can even live with some of that, I understand it. But what really is wrong with also marketing the working stiff of the NHL too, a big part of what makes the game great. Show the hitting. Yes, I know you are afraid of that, and I am not asking that in the official marketing promos that you go back to the old days of promoting the fighting to non-fans, I am just talking good, clean hit. So average Joe grinder getting mobbed after an OT goal, it does not have to be All-stars on every league commercial.

That still is not, really, the bias I am talking about. I am talking about the poster boys. I am talking about it being presented like Ovechkin and Crosby invented the game. This is not the CHL, Crosby Hockey League. Do you not understand how the All Crosby-All the Time presentation is going to KILL the league, not promote it? Do you not understand that this promotes the fans of 29 other teams believing that games are fixed by the league? Pittsburgh is not even in a playoff slot at the All-star break, but I will bet that if you were to poll every hockey fan in the Canada, 75% of them will say that the Pens will be in the SCF, and 50% of them think they will win it, while in the US about 90% think they will be there, and 75% think they will win it. They do not think this because they think the Pens are the best team, they think it because they are sure that is what the NHL wants.

A prime example is that I have spent two weeks seeing this commercial promoting “Sidney Crosby, the most exciting player in the NHL”, or the world, of something like that. It is close enough to the right wording, don’t care if it is exactly right, it makes me sick enough that I don’t listen close enough right at the moment to know if I have exactly the right wording. My response: SAYS WHO, other than the NHL PR machine? Without hesitation, AO is a more exciting player. Crap, Malkin may be. I find if more exciting to see a team like Chicago that most did not give a chance developing into a power. I find the team play of Boston, Detroit, San Jose, with stars all around, where on any given night Marleau, Thornton, Kane, Versteeg, Toews, Datzuck, Zetterburg, Kessel, Toews, Kane. Promote the freaking league, not Crosby.

Let Them Play Boys

2009-01-22T12:35:00.000-08:00

I'm going to add a late comment on the Sharks/Nucks, one that I have been holding off on, but decided I just can't let go.

There is no question that San Jose was just flat, but there have been other games like that which they have still showed speed. In addition, no many times Drew claimed the Nucks were not playing a trap, they were playing a pure NJ/Minn trap, a technique that does not work against the Sharks any longer. They have too much size, speed, skill to be bottled up by it in the new NHL. As much as some try to whine, and whined for years under Wilson about playing dump and chase, they are ignoring that this is exactly what the Sharks are doing when someone tries to throw a trap against them. What do you think they are doing when the coach say chip the puck behind the D and then set up, that is dump and chase, it was just that under Wilson, they dumped and stood.

So why did the trap work (for 59+ minutes) in this game? For exactly one of the reasons Drew Remenda was praising the game! All year he has been whining about the officials calling cheap penalties, AKA, calling the rules like they are told to. Well, in this game, they put out two officials, Fraser and McCreary, who refuse to do that, and Drew praised them for "Letting the boys play". Guess what, that allowed the old-time trap to work, and we got an old time clutch and grab game that was damn boring, and yet he and most others fail or refuse to see that. "Let them play" = continuous interference and holding, hooking in the neutral zone, and boring, boring hockey.

I do not mean to pick on Drew for this point, I like him as a color guy, and I hear the same comments in many, many other telecasts. And I disagree with all of them and the Sharks fans and Canucks fans got a prime example of why. If that is what people really want to see, then let's go back to the old standards, otherwise: Call the game by the rules.

Anatomy of a contract blunder

2009-01-20T20:56:00.000-08:00

Anatomy of a contract blunder

In the summer of 2006, Garth Snow pulled off what he, his owner, and especially his player felt was a major coup, the signing of a franchise goaltender to a long term contract. And in a time of escalating salaries, they got him for the bargain price of $4.5 million per. One little catch though, 15 years. 15 years! In a league of all guaranteed contracts! Just to make something clear, I thought the Isles were idiots at the time, and said so, so do not think I am playing hindsight here, but while the Islanders still have a bit less than $57 million of that contract left to pay, let’s see how that investment is paying off:

In the 2000 entry draft, New York made history by making DiPietro the first #1 overall pick in NHL history.
After a short stay in the IHL, DiPietro got the quick call up in the oo-o1 season to strut his stuff:
The results were not so good. 3-15 in 20 games. .878 save %, 3.49 GAA. Rick might not have been quite ready yet.

After most of the next two years in the AHL, DiPietro got another taste in 02-03:
10 games, 2-5 .894 and 2.97. A little better, but certainly not all-star material. He did get 15 minutes of uneventful playoff action.
All of that earned him a new one year contract.

03-04 he spent only a couple games in the AHL, splitting duty most of the year with the big club.
Now DiPietro showed that he did have NHL skill in 50 games going 23-18 with 5 shut outs, .911 and 2.36
Even though he only went 1-4 in the playoffs, that was not his doing. .908 and 2.14 and the win was a shutout.

More than good enough for a new RFA contract, but it was for the 05-06 season due to the stoppage.
Missed one game with a concussion.
Missed five games with a knee.
63 GP for a 30-24-5 record with 1 SO, .900 SP, and 3.02 GAA. Really not stellar numbers, but for a non-playoff team, well, they still aren’t stellar

06-07: Coming off a year that he finished 32nd in the league on GAA and 26th in SP. DiPietro is rewarded with a 15 year, $67.5 million contract. This is while he is still a RFA, not a UFA.
Misses 3 games (groin).
Misses 1 game (lower body).
Misses 2 games (neck injury).
Misses 7 regular season, and 1 playoff game (headaches, read concussion).
Finishes the year 32-19-9, 5 SO’s, .919, 2.58 GAA. 6th in SP (good) 16th in GAA (average).
Got lit up in the playoffs, 1-3, .898 3.31, one and done.

07-08: Year two of that monster contract.
Missed 3 games (knee).
Missed 3 games (personal).
Missed final 9 games (Hip surgery).
63 GP, 26-28-7, 3-SO’s, .902, 2.82. 33 in GAA, 34 in SP, and remember, there are only 30 teams in the league.

08-09: A real eventful year for the lifetime contract man:
Knee injury before the season.
Missed two games (knee).
Lower body injury.
Missed 27 games (2 knee surgeries)
Missed 3 games (groin)
Missed remainder of the season (knee, expect more surgery).
5 GP, 1-3-0, .892 SP, 3.52 GAA. Pay $4.5 million. Not bad.

No telling how many other injuries (rumors or other knee scopes and concussions). Enjoy 12 more years of this Isles, because no one is going to want him in trade.

Rankings through 1/18

2009-01-18T23:40:00.000-08:00

Sorry for those that may have been checking in. Between a case of the flu and working on a couple of larger projects, I have been a bit behind. We will call this one the all-star update of my ranking. Two new policies will go into place this update, first that teams which do not have a legitimate chance at making the playoffs will be dropped from the rankings. The second it that my rankings are going to be based on odds of teams advancing in the playoffs if they were held today, not what I expect those odds to be at the end of the season. With more than half the season gone, teams should have done quite a bit to show they can compete. To that point, even though this will change from week to week, to the rated in the top 16, a team must currently be in the top 8 in their conference, that is, they would be in the playoffs if they were held today.

For elimination from the ratings: Since there have been 30 teams, only four teams with under 90 points have made the playoffs, while 11 with 90 or more have missed, so even though only 12 teams are above that pace at this time, I will still use that number as the target. Since only five teams are over a .667 pace for the first half of the season, I think it would be more than fair to say that a team that has been winning at a .420 is going to just up to .700 for the rest of the season. For now, I will but the following criteria on elimination: lower than 12th in their conference, need a winning percentage or .700 the second have to reach 90 points.

On those grounds: The Isles (51 pace, 15th in the East, .838 need to reach 90) are out. The Thrashers have been playing much better, but are just too far out (66 pace, 14th East, .736 needed to reach 90). Tampa Bay I almost let stay in after taking LA and ANA, but the embarrassment in SJ, I have to drop them, but do give them a very slim chance of proving me wrong, I just don't think so (69 pace, 12th in East, .703 to reach 90 points). OTT is in 13th in the East but is on a higher pace than TB at 71, and needing .679 the rest of the way to make 90, I doubt I will keep it in long. TOR at a 75 pace is in 11th and need .662 to reach 90. Not sure that you could give me high enough odds to bet they would make it, in fact I expect Burk to start gutting the team soon, but they will stay for now.

In the West, because of the tightness for sixth through sixteen no one will be eliminated. MIN and COL in 11 and 12 are very much a part of the fight in the North West though they must start doing better than .500. Nashville has now faded to 13th, and 4th in the Central, where they are accustom to pulling an easy second place and on pace for only 78 points. It will take .635 to make 90, and do not have the manpower for that right now, but they need to make the playoffs so look for them to be looking for some trade additions. LA, 76 pace, 14th in the West, and needing .645 to reach 90 are a very long shot unless Lombardi starts pulling improvement deals it isn't going to happen. It doubt it, they will probably stay in build mode. STL is 15th and on a 71 pace and would take .684 to make 90. It is not going to happen but the conference is tight and they are competitive, so they stay in the list.

1. Detroit Red Wings (1) (68 pnts 124 pace) (2) (8-1-1) Very hot team going into the break. Only regulation loss in ten was quite a shoot-out in San Jose in the first match-up between the two western big guns when they both came to play.
2. Boston Bruins (2) (70 pts 128 pace) (1) (7-3-0) Boston has finally lost a couple, but they can still only be called hot, and they are sea-sawing with San Jose for first int the league.
3. San Jose Sharks (3) (71 pts, 132 pace) (1) (6-2-2) Won a barn-burner with Detroit in what might be the game of the first half of the year, but also had their long home point streak broken by CGY.
4. Washington Capitals (5) (61 pts 109 pace) (2) (7-3-0) The Caps have stayed hot, and another win against the Bruins was huge for a team that wants to prove it is ready to win and are not going to coast through the season.
5. Chicago Blackhawks (4) (58 pts 111 pace) (4) (5-4-1) The Hawks have hit their first bump since early in the year. It will be interesting to see if this is just a glitch, a young team getting tired, or if teams are getting them figured out.
6. Montreal Canadiens (6) (60 pts 112 pace) (4) (8-2-0) Montreal is going to the break on fire, and are in fact in position that should Boston stumble the can take a run at them, not that Boston has given them even time to think that will happen.
7. Calgary Flames (11) (58 pts 106 pace) (3) (7-3-0) The Flames do not believe the hype that the division is the Nucks to lose. They don't even seem to be conceding the WCF to San Jose and Detroit as two wins agains SJ prove.
8. New Jersey Devils (8) (57 pts 104 pace) (5) (6-4-0) The Devils have moved into second in the Atlantic dogfight, and adding Shannahan just might put them over the top.
9. New York Rangers (9) (58 pts 101 pace) (3) (5-4-1) The Rangers are scraping it stay ahead of Philly and NJ, but it continues to look like it will only be a matter of time.
10. Philadelphia Flyers (7) (57 pts 104 pace) (6) (5-3-2) The Flyers continue to not finish when they had the opportunity to get past the Rangers, and have in fact let the Rangers slip past them.
11. Vancouver Canucks (10)(50 pts 87 pace) (5) (2-5-3) The 'Nucks can only be said to be struggling right now as the try to integrate Sundin, but have finally gotten Luongo back in the line-out. Expect a turnaround, but right now Calgary is pulling away and acting like a contender for it all, not just the NW.
12. Anaheim Ducks (12) (51 pts 89 pace) (5) (4-5-1) The Ducks continue to play like pretenders, playing .500 hockey.
13. Pittsburgh Penguins (13) (50 pts, 87 pace) (9) (4-6-0) After sliding to 10th, the Pens finally picked up a would of wins and pulled bat up to 8th. The Anointed ones are playing anything but like such.
14. Phoenix Coyotes (15) (51 pts 89 pace) (6) (6-4-0) The Yotes continue their assault on respectability and are actually in a dead heat with ANA for 5th in the West, and 2nd in the Pacific.
15. Buffalo Sabres (16) (51 pts 93 pace) (7) (7-3-0) The Buffs Have gone on a run and are trying to show they are not planing of running from the playoff race,
16. Edmonton Oilers (18) (49 pts 89 pace) (8) (6-4-0) Edmonton continues to play everyone tough, and win more than they lose. MIN and COL are nipping at their heels and it will be a fight the second half.

17. Minnesota Wild (17) (47 pts 88 pace) (11) (5-4-1) MIN is another team that just does not seem to be able to win more than ever other game when they have hot teams ahead of them. The conference is so tight from 5-15 that a 3-4 game run will scramble the standings, but right now MIN need one of those runs for a team that was supposed to be competing to the division, not sitting in the 11th slot.
18. Carolina Hurricanes (14) (47 pts 84pace) (10) (4-6-0) The Canes need the break to catch their breath and try to regroup. Florida has slipped past the Canes and both are chasing the 8th slot.
19. Florida Panthers (22) (49 pts 91 pace) (10) (5-3-2) The Panthers are really starting to gel under their new coach and are not gently knocking on the door of the playoffs with games in hands. It is yet to be seen if they will make it, and things change as the year gois, but right not this would be a tougher team to play than the teams just about thin that are sill n the playoffs.
20. Columbus Blue Jackets (21) (48 pts 87 pace) (9) (7-3-0) The Jackets are probably wishing the break is not coming. The are playing their best hockey of the year, and not alternating big sins with bad losses, and now find themself knocking on the door for a top 8 slot..
21. Nashville Predators (20) (43 pts 78 pace) (14) (3-7-0) Nashville is floundering and sliding down the Western standings, slipping to 4th in the Central. Look for the Preds to be looking to try to bring in someone via trade.
22. Colorado Avalanche (19) (47 pts 84 pace) (12) (4-6-0) Hover the .500 line, and stay in touch but behind. Status quo for the Avs.
23. Dallas Stars (23) (45 pts 86 pace) (10) (5-3-2) Continuing with their addition by substaction performance, the Stars continue to try to real in the playoff spots above them, a feat they are now in contact with.
24. Toronto Maple Leafs (25) (41 pts 80 pace) (11) (3-6-1) A slide just before the break opens yet another door for Burke to find excuses to clean house.
25. Los Angeles Kings (24) (41 pts 76 pace) (14) (3-6-1) The Kings just refuse but alternate between competing and looking like the will just fade out, in part depending on who they draw that week.
26. St. Louis Blues (27) (38 pts 69 pace) (15) (4-5-1).The Blues are still in contact point wise, but they are really only a spoiler. Some of the teams in the East make them look respectable though.
27. Ottawa Senators (26) (37 pts 71 pace) (12) (3-5-2) Ottawa is just looking forward to the clearance sale as players fight to save their jobs.

Rankings throug 1/5

2009-01-05T22:15:00.000-08:00

OK, I skipped, last week, there were too many good games to take the time. Hey, a few teams took the time off too, so give me at break. This is the last week that I will include all 30 teams in the rankings. From now on, any team that cannot reasonably make the playoffs will be considered a non-factor and dropped. Initially, I will remove teams from the rankings at 41 games played with needing to go more than 0.667 the remainder of the way to reach 90 points. Even though there are only 6 teams in the West, and 8 in the East on pace to reach 90, it will take at least that many to make the playoffs.

Those in danger with the % of points they would need to reach 90 are:
STL in the West at .662, but the West it too tight, though they should need 3 or 4 points.
OTT at .644 and 4 games to pull it up. They need 4 points in the four games.
TBL at .674 and 2 games to pull it up. The need all 4 points.
ATL at .703 and 1 game to pull it up. A win will not do it, they will be removed next week.
NYI has already reached 41 games, and are at .756. They will be removed.
The numbers would be that 36 points at 41 games would be needed, all other teams already have that.

At the top, I am finally going to make some changes amongst the top 3, and will give my reasons with those teams.

Detroit Red Wings (2) (26-7-5 57 pnts 123 pace) (2) (7-2-1) The Wings have being a bit inconsistant, dropping games to lessor teams. In big games though, they have shown Chicago and San Jose who the bic boys still are. They possess the Cup, and have shown the Hawks and Sharks they are not ready to give it up just yet, they move to #1 for the first time all year.
Boston Bruins (3) (29-9-4 62 pts 130 pace) (1) (9-1-0) Boston continues to just shred the East, and in the last two weeks it has been top of the East competition. They show no intention of giving up first in the East. That is goint to move them to #2 even though they trail San Jose overall, as I neet to put the #1 team in the East in the top two.
San Jose Sharks (1) (29-4-5 63 pts, 136 pace) (1) (6-1-3) Sharks Fan is gripping as the Sharks slump. Hockey Fan on the other hand does not see 6-1-3 as much of a slump. Their pace has dropped all the way for 137 to 136. It will drop more, maybe this week as they have a tough road week against the Western Canadian teams. I am moving SJ to third, but not because I think they are in any trouble. Detroit is still the team to beat in the West, and the other team in the SCF will be from the East, so SJ is #3. It is a big drop to #4 though.
Chicago Blackhawks (6) (21-8-7 50 pts 105 pace) (4) (8-2-0) The Hawks had the Wings in sight with a 10-0 run, but have still been blistering with those two losses their only blimish in what seems a month. They are solidly in fourth in the West with the third best record. With the way this team has been playing, they could turn those losses to the Wings into a big possitive learning experience.
Washington Capitals (7) (26-11-3 55 pts 113 pace) (2) (9-1-0) Matching Bostons 9-1-0 run, the Caps have been blowing teams out. The thoughts are that they are still a regular season team that will feast on a weak division, but they have been all but unbeatable at home, and are in position to get a lot of home playoff games.
Montreal Canadiens (10) (22-10-6 50 pts 108 pace) (4) (6-3-1) Montreal is finally showing their early season form again. They are no threat to catch Boston, but have moved solidly into the #4 slot in the East and are showing that they want in the race come playoff time.
Philadelphia Flyers (5) (21-10-8 pts 105 pace) (5) (5-3-2) The Flyers got cold on a Western run that could have jumped them to first. The good side for them though is that it was against western teams, so they were not feeding their rivals. They are one point back on actual, but one point ahead on pace with the Rangers, even with only picking up 12 of 20 points.
New Jersey Devils (12) (23-12-3 49 pts 106 pace) (6) (7-3-0) The Devils did not play great in the last two weeks, but that still gave them the best results in the Atlantic for the period. As with Philly, the are back on points, but ahead on pace, making the top of the Atlantic a three way deadlock.
New York Rangers (4) (24-13-4 52 pts 104 pace) (3) (5-4-1)The Rangers are struggling, and are holding on to first in the Atlantic but are third on pace. They do so only because teams behind them are also struggling. 5-4-1 is not going to get it done though.
Vancouver Canucks (8)(21-15-5 47 pts 94 pace) (5) (4-4-2) The 'Nucks try to hang in, but with the Sundin signing, and hoping to get Luongo back soon, the NW should really be theirs to lose at this point, but the Flames seem to have not been told that yet though.
Calgary Flames (13) (23-12-4 50 pts 104 pace) (3) (7-2-1) The Flames do not believe the hype that the division is the Nucks to lose. They seem to be set to continue to fight for it even when Mats and Luongo are in the lineup. And they have been hot as they have jumped over Van and are trying to separate.
Anaheim Ducks (9) (20-15-5 45 pts 92 pace) (6) (4-4-2) Another team in the west that continues to muddle along at .500, staying in a playoff slot, but keeping everyone in contention in the conference and showing no sign of being the team their tallent says they should be.
Pittsburgh Penguins (11) (19-17-4 42 pts, 86 pace) (9) (3-7-0) The Pens are playing terrible hockey. At they moment, they are not even winning enough to pad their states. It things do not change, expect players to start being moved, though bit players are all they have to move. How long without a turn-around will the coaching staff be safe?
Carolina Hurricanes (15) (20-5-5 45 pts 92 pace) (7) (7-3-0) A very nice run have the Canes back into 7th. They are going to need more runs like this to stay in the hunt.
Phoenix Coyotes (19) (2-0-1) (19-16-5 43 pts 88 pace) (7) (5-3-2) The Yotes keep their head above water and hang onto the #7 spot. They continue to claw and hang in there. Someone is going to get hot, and they hope it is them.
Buffalo Sabres (17) (19-15-5 36 pts 90 pace) (8) (5-3-2) The Buffs continue to try to hang in now holding the 8th slot.
Minnesota Wild (18) (19-16-3 41 pts 88 pace) (8) (4-4-2) .500 in the last 10 is still enough to put them into 8th in the hip-hop West race.
Edmonton Oilers (22) (19-16-3 41 pts 88 pace) (9) (5-4-1) Tied on points, another 11 point run would put them in showing just how close it is. This team is making everyone pay for every point they get against them despite less talent.
Colorado Avalanche (16) (19-19-1 29 pts 82 pace) (12) (5-5-0) The Avs continue the show exactly how the bulk of the west are playing. .500 for the past 10, .500 for the season. Win and extra game and you might be in the playoffs, lose and extra game and you are out.
Nashville Predators (14) (17-18-3 37 pts 80 pace) (14) (3-6-1) Nashville has dove down to next to last in the parity that is most of the West. 7 points of 20 will not keep you in the race for long. They are by no means out of with the tight pack, but if they get back in the race they will be looking at a 7-8 slot and playing a team that should take them apart in the first round yet again.
Columbus Blue Jackets (20) (18-17-4 32 pts 84 pace) (10) (5-4-1) Another team tottering between contender and pretender in the West. A point over .500 moves them up.
Florida Panthers (21) (17-16-6 40 pts 84 pace) (10) (3-4-3) Sliding a little bit, but they are right on the Pens heals for #9, and one warm streak from reaching the top 8.
Dallas Stars (25) (17-16-5 39 pts 84 pace) (11) (6-3-1) It really would not take much of a run, but a team that have greatly improved by removing Every.
Los Angeles Kings (23) (16-16-6 38 pts 82 pace) (13) (4-4-2) The Kings just refuse to go away in the all .500 West.
Toronto Maple Leafs (26) (16-173-6 38 pts 80 pace) (11) Yet another .500 team with players trying to keep from being traded. With Burke in the front office, they may just be delaying the inevitable.
Ottawa Senators (24) (13-18-6 32 pts 71 pace) (12) (3-6-1) The Sens in full tank mode at the moment, and getting close to no longer being a consideration.
St. Louis Blues (27) (15-21-3 33 pts 69 pace) (15) (3-7-0).The Blues are still in contact point wise, but they are really only a spoiler. Some of the teams in the East make them look respectable though.
Atlanta Thrashers (28) (13-22-5 31 pts 64 pace) (14) (3-6-1) Simply not much good.
Tampa Bay Lightning (29) (11-18-10 32 pts 67 pace) (13) (4-4-2) A .500 stretch constitutes a hot streak for this team.
New York Islanders (30) (12-25-4 27 pts 55 pace) (15) (2-7-1) There really is nothing to say.

Holiday Crunch Results

2009-01-05T21:47:00.000-08:00

Well, the backup of games through the Holiday season is finally complete, so let's see who the winners and losers were.

TEAM	RECORD	POINTS	Pcnt
ANA	(3-4-2)	-8	-0.308
PHX	(4-2-1)	-2	-0.083
SJ	(4-0-2)	8	0.500
DET	(5-1-1)	8	0.333
CHI	(5-2-0)	8	0.308
NSH	(2-4-0)	-10	-0.455
CGY	(5-1-1)	12	0.462
VAN	(3-4-2)	-2	-0.067
MIN	(4-3-1)	-2	-0.077
COL	(3-4-0)	-4	0.167
EDM	(5-2-1)	10	0.357
BOS	(7-1-0)	20	0.714
MTL	(4-1-2)	4	0.143
BUF	(4-2-2)	-2	-0.071
NYR	(2-3-1)	-6	-0.300
PIT	(2-7-1)	-20	-0.556
PHL	(4-2-2)	4	0.200
NJ	(6-3-0)	6	0.214
WSH	(5-1-0)	10	0.500
CAR	(5-3-0)	0	0.000
FLA	(4-2-2)	6	0.273

In the West, winners were SJ AT 0.500, Calgary 0.462, and Edmonton 0.357. The Wings had continued to play a bit erratic, and then showed that they were still the team to beat by taking two big wins against the Hawks, who were tearing it up until that showdown. Taking big hits were Anaheim and Nashville.

In the East, the winner was hands down Boston at 0.714 with Washington also having a good time at 0.500. The Atlantic could have had some big movement, but no one really capitalized, on the Rangers tanking at -0.300. Pittsburgh has Pens Fan, and NHL Marketing in turmoil with their -0.556 in 10 games.

There is now a virtual three way deadlock at the top of the Atlantic, with the Pens not bring one of that trio, having dropped to 9th in the East.

In the West, Nashville has not only been passed by Columbus in the Central, they are ahead of only St. Louis in the West, but not even St. Louis is out of contact with 10 points separating 7th and 15th.

Fighting revisited again

2008-12-31T14:26:00.000-08:00

I was watching a game the other night, and again the subject of fighting came up, and as usual the subject went directly to the bemoaning of the instigator rule. I still have trouble with these supposed hockey experts who continue their fixation on the non-issue of the instigator penalty. It is almost universally orated that the instigator penalty is responsible for the demise of fighting in the NHL. These orators continue to be almost universally wrong because they continue to speak from their gut feel and skip looking at the facts. The instigator rule had absolutely no effect on fighting in the NHL, none. The first year that it was in place, there was a major dip in fighting.

I made a chart back in November showing the average number of fights per year, per team in the NHL since the 89-90 season. As stated, I did not accumulate the numbers, I lifted them from Hockeyfights.com. I will not reproduce the chart now, it is still valid, in fact at the time if projected about a 56-fight average for this year, while it is now at 57. I would expect this number to drop a bit later in the season, as teams like San Jose are dropping off in fight count after feeling they needed to establish themselves earlier in the season, but so far the number has been tracking as solid. You can see that graph here:

What is shown there is that the number of fights per team was steadily dropping until after the lockout. Though there was quite a bit of bounce in the numbers, the graph shows a basic linear trend of dropping about 2.5 fights on average, per team, each year, and this did not change when the current instigator penalty was instituted, at all. It the instigator penalty was responsible, there would not be this linear nature, there would have been a big drop that year, and that year only and then a lower trend would continue. The actually was a large drop that year, but the next year the number jumped back up to the linear projections, and then spent the next four years above the projection including 96-97 when fighting actually made it back to the level of the year prior to the instigator rule. It did not affect the trend.

What really caused the drop in fighting? I will site items that I believe caused it:

The league wanted to change its image, and in trying to attract new fans abandoned some of the long time fans.
The continued influence of European imports without the fighting background that is included in North America.
Rising salaries. Skilled players were less likely to be willing to engage in fighting and risk injury, so fighting was relegated strictly to a handful of designated fighters.
The success of a handful of teams that largely refused to fight, namely Dallas, Colorado, and Detroit.
And in my opinion, the biggest single cause: Clutch and Grab hockey.

When the cap was put into place though, the entire dynamics of hockey changed again. The first thing that happened was that teams could not afford to carry 2 or 3 fighters who could not play, and the pure goons found themselves either out of jobs or having to learn to actually skate and play. I know, WTF would that increase fighting. Well, the first year, it didn’t, there was a big drop the first year. But in the last three years though, there have been increases of 7%, 34% and 33%, or a total of 94% over the low in 05-06 of a bit under 30 fights per team. I will give three reasons why:

Anaheim. The Ducks decided to play intimidation hockey. They won. They also did it in an old-time way; they had their regular line players doing a lot of the rough stuff. Other teams had to react.
When you remove many of the pure thugs, regular line players are more willing to engage without fear of some gorilla that can’t even tie his own skates taking their head off. Also, the fighters themselves are on the ice more, so rather than skating 2 minutes and getting five for fighting, they might skate for 10 minutes, and get ten for fighting.
Finally, and by far the most important, the game opened up. Clutch and grab also meant less hitting. Less hitting means less emotion, and less fighting except for the silly staged fights. Open skating means big hits, which means fights. Open skating mean more guys getting out of position and using their sticks because of it, and then fights in retaliation. Open the game up and allow skating, and skill players can play. When skill players can play with skill, they will be targeted. Target a skilled play and he has to be protected.

Bottom line is forget the non-issue of the instigator, other than enforce it correctly. If a fighter instigates a fight with a skilled player, then toss the fighter. Otherwise, play hockey and let the game take care of itself.

Good Morning Hockey Fans

2008-12-30T11:24:00.000-08:00

Hey Sharks Fan: Tonight is a night to separate Homers from Hockey fans. For this early in the season, there are two of the biggest hockey games of the year. Unfortunately, both will be played in the Eastern time zone, but for those of us who have them, that is what Center Ice and DVR’s were created for. I hope that some of you have yours set up already. Hey Canadian Hockey Fan: This applies to you too. Remember, there are 24 NHL teams that are not housed in Canada, and some of them are pretty good. And no, Detroit is not a part of Canada, though Michigan has offered to give it to you before. Besides, remember that you get to take pride in the fact that except for Team Scandinavia in Detroit, these teams are dominated by Canadians, just like the rest of the league. Hockey Fans: Enjoy. Hope you either get to be home, or remembered to set up your DVR’s.

Boston (27-5-4) at Pittsburgh (19-13-4):
The Pens came into the season as the appoint ones, a cakewalk to the cup. Sid and Malkin unstoppable. The leagues anointed team. The start of the destiny. Much of the time so far this year they have been playing like they are waiting for the league to hand it to them on a silver platter. Crosby and Malkin have been destroying most of the league, no doubt about it. They have even been getting up as a team for big games. They have been dropping games to the likes of Tampa Bay and Ottawa though, teams that have trouble winning an inter-squad game. I don’t buy some of those stats either though. Show me numbers against Philly or San Jose, not stat padding in 9-2 games with the Islanders. Pittsburgh is still the Evgeny and Sidney show, and as long as that is the case, they will be inconsistent, but this is a team expected to win the toughest division in hockey and cruise the ECF. They are fourth in the division, and seventh in the conference. They are not going to miss the playoffs unless they take an injury from the dynamic duo, but the 9^th place team is only 3 points back on them.

The Bruins went on a run last year, but still not many people were believers. I believed, but only enough to put them as a contender. They have answered ever question put before them this year. Not just a balanced attack, they are dominating. First in goals for, first in goals against, dominant special teams. Goaltending that was considered adequate, but is leading the league. Injuries, they have just ignored them. The team has shown no weakness, and have even reeled in an incredible hot San Jose team, with a win tonight potential putting them back into a tie with them for first in the league. Few believe they can keep the pace up, but we are starting to question that too as they continue to defy predictions.

The Bruins have easy outs on this game. They have answered every challenge all year, they can falter and no one would really question them. You know they want this one though, and want it badly. The Pens, guys, this is put up or shut up time. People are already questioning ability, and now your heart is being questioned. If the Pens get worked by the Bruins, they need to really start looking hard in the mirror. This is a home game for the Pens, but that really has not been such a good thing for them. They have been much better on the road, only (8-7-2) at home. The Teddy Bears don’t seem to care, best road and second best home record in the league. This is a must game for the Pens, so my call is 4-2 BRUINS.

Chicago (20-6-7) at Detroit (23-7-5)
Detroit is still the team to beat, as their tuning up of San Jose proved. They are showing flaws. The give up too many goals for a normally solid defensive team. There is no question that the issue there has been between the pipes, but they are also giving up too many shots. Offense is not an issue, second in the league at 128 goals. A respectable (6-3-1) in the last 10 games, they have still lost 6 points in the standings to Chicago in that stretch. Detroit usually answers the bell when it sounds, but they really are not used to the need this time of year, and sure didn’t expect Chicago to be breathing down they necks.

The Baby Birds in Chicago are not playing like such babies. How could they be better than the (10-0-1) in the last eleven. OK, yes, they could have won that overtime game. That is freaking .955 on points over eleven games, in the NHL, not in the Chicago PAL, you don’t do that. The OTL by the way, was in a shoot-out, in Detroit. I don’t think half this team is capable of growing a playoff beard. I picked them of make noise this year in the playoffs, but if I were a GM in Chicago, I would be burning up the phone lines to get a bidding war going for one of my goalkeepers because if you add a vet forward and defenseman with skill to this team, they would have a real chance this year, not next. Before this last 10 games, they were below .500 in W/L (with OTL’s as losses), and had been caught by Nashville with contact lost to Detroit. Virtually every loss by this team though has either been by one goal (see the 7 OTL’s), or by two with an empty netter or a goal in the last two minutes when they were pressing to try to tie it. The only exception was a 5-2 loss in Los Angeles, otherwise they had very real chances to win every game all year. Regulation wins in the Home-and-Showcase with Detroit, and they would be ahead on games played for the division. Had they won a few of those 12 games they could have, they would lead the Red Wings. IMO, this is the best young team in the league, because unlike Washington and Pittsburgh, this is not a one-line team.

Everyone is looking at the Jan. 1 game between these two teams. That game is a circus show, a game to sell the sport and a treat for the fans. THIS is the game that means something. Detroit wants them both, but they want this one more. Chicago wants them both. Has they learned enough to know that this is them bigger game. Detroit wants to make a statement and put a beating on Chicago, like they did San Jose. I think the kids could get caught looking ahead, but I do not think they will get that beat-down. My call: RED WINGS 3-2 in yet another one goal loss for the Hawks, with a good chance than they pull one point out of it.

Holiday game scoreboard

2008-12-27T15:58:00.000-08:00

A little bit of grading of the main teams fighting for playoff spots with the number of big games between them that have been packed around the Holidays. So, I picked the time period from Dec. 19 to Jan. 4, 11 teams from the East, and 10 from the rest that are currently in challenging positions. I then split games between teams in your own conference and in that group, and those not, and created a little grading system.

For those teams that are not in your competing group, you get the number of points you earn in a game, minus the number you failed to earn: 2 for any win, 0 for an OLT (+1 for point earned, -1 for the point that was not), and –2 for a loss. For those teams inside you competing group, the proverbial four point games: You get credit for the points you earn, and the points you keep the other team from earning, you lose credit for points you fail to win, or allow your competition to earn. Thus, a regulation win in those games are +4 (2 points earned, 2 denied to a rival), a loss –4, OT win gets you +2 (2 points earned, 1 point denied, -1 point given up), and an OTL is –2 (1 point earned, -1 point lost, -2 points given up).

I then added a rating of how the team has done, not in this raw value, but against what was available. Through Dec 26th for instance, San Jose is 2-0 in this period. Both wins were against contending teams (NY and VAN), but one of those is from the East, so San Jose got a +6, with a maximum of +6, so a rating of 1.000. Boston on the other hand is 3-0, with two of those games being against competing teams, also a rating of 1.000. Give Boston the edge on the absolute results. Finally, I include a number of games left in the period such as (4-1), meaning four against competing teams, one outside their competing group. Philadelphia has a lot of test games in the period, but many are against West teams, so fit into the non-competing group. I will keep the little table in the widget updated through the 4th.

Continue the Christmas fun, how did they do?

2008-12-23T21:23:00.000-08:00

OK, after a fun night, let’s see how teams did against what they needed to do, and how I thought they would do. Yeah, yeah, I ran out of time and didn’t post that part. I’m honest though. Oh, bite me.

BOSTON @ NEW JERSEY
B’s took it to them. I had teddy bears in a one goal game. It was as I don’t count empty net games. Looked like a playoff game all the way. Both teams need it. Both teams wanted it. Boston got it. (1-0)

ATLANTA @ NY ISLANDERS

I had the Thrash in the who cares game. Thrash got it. Who cares. Bryan Little’s family was watching the Caps/Rangers. He’s ticked since he got two goals. 4-2 Thrashers. (2-0)

WASHINGTON @ NY RANGERS
I had the Rags in a one goal game. Freaking chokers. Come on, blew a 4-0 lead. Did not deserve a bonus point for that. The league should take it away from them. 5-4 Caps in OT. Objects in the rear view mirror may appear closer than they really are, and that means Philly is really close on the Ranges. (2-1, buttheads)

OTTAWA @ PHILADELPHIA
I expected a butt kicking. Turned into a shoot-out, but in the expected direction. Ottawa is all but done. Philly picked up another point and the Rangers, and are now only two back with three games in hand. They will be in first soon. (3-1)

LOS ANGELES @ COLUMBUS
I took the home guys in this one. Don’t know why, because I do not believe in the team in OH. Kings took it to them, 3-0. C-Bus tumbles to 14^th in the West, LA is now only 2 points out of 8^th. (3-2)

DALLAS @ TORONTO

I took Dallas as they have been coming on. I did not expect an 8-2 pounding though. That should help their stats a bit. Dallas is now only 3 out, though that only moves them up to 13^th, while TO started their Holiday early. (4-2)

TAMPA BAY @ PITTSBURGH

I of course had the Pens. The Pens choked a game that should have been a freebee 2-0 to a team that usually only gets points from OTL’s 2-0 Bolts. Goose drops to (4-3)

NASHVILLE @ FLORIDA

I took the Cats, and figured a one goal game. The sunshine boys actually took it to them though for a 3-0 win. That is not a good effort out of the Preds, and drops them to 9^th in the West. Florida got one they wanted and moved to only one out of the top eight. (5-3 for me)

ST LOUIS @ DETROIT

No brainer pick on the Wings in this one. They did not snooze, so they did not lose. 4-1 Wings in an easy one. (6-3)

CAROLINA @ MINNESOTA

I picked the Canes, in a close enough game I called OT. Well, it was close, 3-2, but went to the Wild. Both teams really needed at least one out of this game. (6-4)

PHOENIX @ COLORADO

Should definitely be close, good chance at OT, go with the home team in a game they both need. Avs simply need it a bit more than the Yotes. Bingo! Hit is on the head. Do I give myself a bonus for the OT? 5-4 Avs in OT. (7-4)

ANAHEIM @ CALGARY

I took Calgary because they have been playing better and needed it in their see-saw with Vancouver. I put the over/under at 7 on majors/roughing calls, and took the over. Let me down on the battles, too much Christmas mood and too close a game I guess, only a pair of fighting majors. Got the call on the game right though, 4-3 Flames, and a GM in Calgary named Sutter got to see a rookie he drafted, named Sutter, play his first NHL game, and score a goal as the Sutter family legacy continues. (8-4)

VANCOUVER @ SAN JOSE

Took the Sharks to continue their roll into the playoffs, fairly close game, say 4-2. Nope. It went to SJ, but it was no contest, 5-0. Vancouver dropped back out of first in the NW with the loss, SJ stay 3 ahead of Boston on the league, 7 on Detroit for the west, and 18 on Anaheim for the Pacific. Order the division banner now.

(9-4) is not bad, but I really expected to get at least 10.

Preview/Review

2008-12-23T16:05:00.000-08:00

Since almost everyone is getting in one last game before the brief break, thought I would put out a preview of the game, and a brief review of each of the teams to date:

BOSTON @ NEW JERSEY
Bruins. Lead NE, Lead East, Second in league 3 points back of San Jose. First in the league in Goals per game, first in the league in goals allowed, even though they are actually being out shot. Second in the league in PP%. Savard (11-29-40), Kessel (21-16-37), and Krejci (12-24-36) are all over a point per game. Sturm is on the trip, but if he plays it will likely not be much. Expect him back after Christmas with should strengthen this team even more.

Devils. 3rd in Atlantic, 6th in the East. Top ten in goals for and goals against, NJ is scoring a lot more than past years. Surprising, the Devils are 26th in the league in PK. The Devils scoring is lead by Parise (18-22-40) and Elias (16-21-37) over a point per game.

In what should be a marquee game of the night. Big Game for both. Boston is being questioned every game out as to if they are legitimate or not. New Jersey needs every point they can get to continue their run to stay in it without their Hall of Famer to be Goalie. The key could be if the game has a high penalty count as the Devil's terrible PK would be going against a murderous PP.

ATLANTA @ NY ISLANDERS
Thrashers: Kovalchuk (11-22-33) is at a point per game, White (11-18-29) and Kozlov (15-13-28) add punch, while the defense is the Judy, last in the league in Goals Against per game and PK.

Isles: Weight leads in points (7-22-29), while Streit adding (7-18-25) from the blueline is about the only bright spot for this team. Trail only ATL in GA/G.

Bottom feeder feast. Those in ATL and NY likely do not even care.

WASHINGTON @ NY RANGERS
Caps: 1-SE, 3-East for an obviously top heavy with that monster first line. Ovechkin (20-23-43), Backstrom (10-24-34), and Semin (14-18-32) are all over a point per, with Semin having missed 13 games putting him over 1.5 per game. Near the bottom of the league in goals allowed and PK.

Rangers: 1-Atl, 2-East. Zherdev (12-20-32) Leads a balanced attack, but a very poor PP puts them near the bottom of the league in goals for, but the best PK in the league has been winning games for them. They have actually been outscored on the season.

Another marquee game in a battle of division leaders, as the Caps try to show that their position is not just on the heels of a weak division, and the Rangers try to hold off the Flyers. As always against the Caps, the Rangers will need to contain the top line to win. A terrible PK for the Caps against a terrible PP for the Rangers, and the best PK in the league for the Rags means this game should be decided even strength. Stats say it should be a close game as both teams are near zero on point differential, with NY being negative.

OTTAWA @ PHILADELPHIA
Sens: Heatley (14-15-29) leads a team that, after four guys over 20 point, none among league leaders, and then a drop to 11 points. Kuba (1-21-22) leads the team in assists, and does so from the blue line, not center. At next to last in the least in goals per game, it is no wonder this team has shown no sign of getting back in the hunt.

Flyers: 2-Atl, 4-east, (7-1-2) in the last 10, this team is making up ground on everyone in the east, except Boston. Carter (25-14-39), Gagne (17-21-38) and Richards (13-24-37) are all over a point per, and form a monster first line. This is not a one line team though, with 4 others over 20 points. A good PK is also dangerous, leading the league in SHG. With the best PP in the league, the win special teams battles, and are not afraid to take penalties.

The Flyers will be very disappointed if they do not come out of this game with two points.

LOS ANGELES @ COLUMBUS
BJ's: Except for Nash (15-14-29) and Basarrad (10-15-25) the Jacks are not putting up a lot of points and not only are last in the league in PP%, they are a full 3% behind 29%. A respectable PK does not make that even close to even. 100 on PK + PP is average. C-bus in under 91.

Kings: Brown (13-13-26) and Kopitar (10-16-26) lead the way for a young team putting up respectable, but inconsistent numbers.

At 12 and 13, these teams are sliding down the standings in the west, though both are only 3 points out of 8th. Two points in this one though will help keep one of them in touch.

DALLAS @ TORONTO
Stars: Richards (8-20-28), Eriksson (18-8-26), and Ribeiro (4-22-26) are trying to be the Stars back in the hunt. (6-3-1) in the last 10 have gotten them to only 4 points out of 8th, but with 6 teams to pass to get there. At 27th and 28th in PP and PK, special teams are killing Dallas, but at least without Avery their PIM's should drop.

Leafs: Antropov (13-16-29), Stajan (9-20-29) and Ponikarovsky (11-15-26), with Kaberle (2-21-23) quarter-backing from the blue line are leading a balanced attack. 9th in goals for and PP have them putting a lot of goals up. 26th in goals against and 28th in PK have them giving up a lot of goals.

A match-up of one team trying to find a way to stay in contact, and another trying to get into the race for the first time all year.

TAMPA BAY @ PITTSBURGH
Lightning: The Bolts are simply a terrible team. They have take a lot of games to OT before losing is the only reason that are not even further behind. Last in the league in goals for, 21st in the league goals against is not a good way to play games. Lacavalier and St. Louis are both at (12-15-27) and pretty much nothing else offensively. Two new coaches since last year have made no signs of changes. It is time to try to get someone to take St. Louis, and possibly Lacavalier, and then push the reset button and start over.

Pens: (4-Atl, 7-east) The Pens need points to turn their skid around. Hugely top-heavy with Malkin (15-43-58) and Crosby (15-33-48). Add in Sykora (12-15-27) and one line represents over 40% of the teams total offense. The Pens lose too many games in blowouts and must get more offense from their other lines to compete in the playoffs. San Jose showed the correct blueprint for beating the Pens by playing first line against first line. If that match up can play at least close to even, you win.

This would be a huge give-away of two points it Pittsburgh does not dominate this game.

NASHVILLE @ FLORIDA
Preds: (3-Cen, 8-W) Dumont (7-22-29) leads in assists, Arnott (13-9-22) in goals, while Weber (11-15-26) from the blueline is the guy to stop. Nashville is not scoring enough, not surprising with the 29th PP in the league. Most other stats are right around the middle of the league, for a team with a record in the middle of the league. With Weber's cannon and Suter also on the blueline, there really is not an excuse for that bad a PP.

Panthers: (3-SE, 10-E, 3 points out) A (7-2-1) run has changed the Florida boys from a team competing with the bottom feeders to one who looks like they want to play more than 82 games. Bouwmeester (6-12-18) is the leading scorer and showing why he is such a coveted defenseman. Booth (12-2-0) leads in goals. This is a very low scoring team, 26th in the league, in the higher scoring conference, making the run more impressive. If they can start putting in goals, the will cause problems in the East.

Florida is finally showing their pre-season promise getting back into the East race, while Nashville tries to cling to 8th in the West. This could be a very good game between teams that know how important it is to get points.

ST LOUIS @ DETROIT
Blues: Boyes (16-15-31) and Tkachuck (12-12-24) are the bright spot for this team. The dark spots are the inability to win because of less talent than nearly everyone in the West, and Brewer's herniated disk. 27th in goals against, and too much reliance on the PP which is cooling down makes it very hard to do more than put out good efforts.

Wings: (1-cen, 2-w, 3-league) Datsyuk (11-26-37) and Hossa (16-15-31) lead eight over 20 points from the always balanced Wings attack. The number two goal scoring team in the league is finally holding the other team down as well. A very impressive pounding of san Jose has them looking to be in form for another run at the cup. 3rd in PP makes it painful to commit penalties against, and their PK has improved to very respectable numbers make it very hard to play a special teams game against them.

Unless the Wings take an early Christmas, this should be an easy one for them. They do need to keep from looking forward to their back-to-back with Chicago.

CAROLINA @ MINNESOTA
Canes: (2-SE, 9-E on tie breakers) Whitney (11-16-27) and Staal (14-11-25) lead for guys over 20 points on a team with very few guys scoring at all. A -23 for Brind'Amore is simply not acceptable. Soft division should still put them in the playoffs, but Florida is starting to breathe down their neck in their own division and Buffalo and Toronto are trying to go nowhere. Bottom 10 in PP and PK is killing the Canes.

Wild: (3-NW, 9-W) Koivu (11-22-33) leads this team in both goals and assist, but this team simply does not put up point and has only tow others over twenty points. 8th PP in the league, and second PK, but badly outscored 5-on-5. Play without penalties and beat them. 2nd in the league in goals allowed, but 24th in goals scored has them playing low scoring, tight games as usual. A free fall of (2-7-1) in the last ten has taken them out of the top 8, and four teams are one and two points behind. Minnesota needs to suvive and then recoup of the Christmas break.

These two teams are desperate for points, but just keep giving them away. An actual prediction: Carolina in OT.

PHOENIX @ COLORADO
Yotes: (3-Pac, 7-W) This is Doan's (14-17-31) team. Only two join him over 20 points, but 9 others form a balanced attack over 10 points. If they can start doing anything on the PP (27th) they may quit dropping right back to the .500 line. With other teams struggling and the NW beating each other up, it has only taken (5-3-2) to jump Pheonix into 7th in the west, and only 3 points back have them eying up the Ducks.

Avs: (5-NW, 11-W, 2 points out) Stasty (9-19-28) and Hejduk (12-13-25) are the only ones over 200 points. In the monster that is the NW, and the parity that is all but the top of the west, (16-16-1) have the Avs in last in their division, but only two points out of a top 8 slot. Colorado was left for dead early, but they seem to have gotten other ideas. Bottom half of the league in GPG, GA, PP, PK, and in most of them well into the bottom half. How in the world has this team gotten back into the running, but they are only two points out after being left for dead earlier. With improvement in those areas, they are right back in the race.

Another game between teams that can't afford to lose points, this could be a good one too. Looking like another hard fought OT game just asking to happen.

ANAHEIM @ CALGARY
Ducks: (2-P, 6-W) Getzlaf (11-25-38) is over a point per game. Add in Perry (9-22-31), Selanne (14-13-27), Kunitz (8-14-22) and Pronger (6-14-20), plus a heating up Niedermayer, and you have the Ducks offense. There is just nothing else there. Selanne can only score on the PP (13 of his 14 goals), and was almost single handedly accountable for the improving PP, but he is out, so expect their PP to be as well. The PK is respectable, except for the fact that they have a huge lead in chances against. The Ducks continue to show it one night, and not the next, thus the .500 record in the last 10. Should be angry off their loss to Vancouver in another rough and tough game.

Flames: (2-NW, 5-W) Iginla (16-22-38) leads the way as usual in both goals and assists. For once though, he is getting help which makes this a very tough team. Cammalleri is at 26 points, while Phanuef, Langkow, and Betuzzi are all at 23 and 8 more of mostly castoffs from other teams are over 10 points. Kipper has a ton of wins, but bad numbers in goal. Number 5 in PK helps this team a lot. The Flames are playing flip-flop with the Nucks. exchanging the 3rd and 5th slots on a game by game basis.

This game is a war just asking to happen. Neither team can continue to drop points, and neither are hesitant to let them fly. Predict 8 calls for fighting or roughing in a slugfest.

VANCOUVER @ SAN JOSE
Canucks: (1-NW, 3-W) D. Sedin (17-18-35) and H. Sedin (4-26-30) are the keys amongst skater, leading 13 others that are over ten points. This team is getting much more contribution than expected, but still rely on Goalkeeping as their defense. The Nucks need points to stay ahead of the Flames in the NW, while they look forward to having Sundin change the dynamics of the team and getting Luongo back. Provided Luongo comes back all the way, this is the team to beat in the NW and will make a fourth quality contender in the West. That return should improve their already solid PK, and signing should help their middle of the pack PP.

Sharks: (1-P, 1-W, 1-League) Marleau (17-20-37), Thornton (8-29-37), and Setoguchi (16-18-34) have slowed a bit, but are still blistering and over a point per game each. Clowe, Pavelski, and defensemen Blake and Boyle are all over 20 points, for a team that has been surviving through injuries. At (7-1-2) the Sharks have experienced their toughest results of the year, and still they only lead the Bruins by three points overall. 5th PP, 4th PK, dropping to 4th GPG, 3rd GA, 5th PKA, tied 2 int PPG-Against.

Vancouver needs points, but is on back-to-backs after a physical game with Anaheim. The Sharks are looking forward to a couple days off to rest injuries over Christmas. If neither team decides to no show, this should be a good one.

Not bothering to join the rest of the league and playing tonight:

Chicago (2-C, 4-W, 5-league) Kane (16-23-39) and Sharp (18-11-29) lead the numbers, but 5 more are over 20, and another 7 over 10 points. They have in fact, 10 players with over 10 assists. This team can pass the puck. And now Towes is starting to get his goal scoring touch back, spreading the options even more. The Hawks have finally started having some of their luck in close games change, helping them go (8-1-1) and to win some road games. 4th on PP, 6th on PK, they can go with anyone on special teams. They have moved to 2th in GPG and 4th in GA. Have not been out of a game all year, but the away and outdoor games against the Red Wings will be a tell tale test for the youngsters.

Buffalo (3-NE, 8-E) Vanek (24-6-30), Roy (11-19-30), and Pominville (9-17-26) are leading the way, 10 others doing plenty to chip in. Too many goals against, but the #3 PK is keeping them in games. This team is fighting tooth and nail to stay in it. If they can find a way to get some help, they may make it. Miller is keeping them in a lot of games, and could really use some help.

Montreal (2-NE, 5-E) Tanguay (10-16-26), Kovalev (8-18-26), Markov (5-21-26), Lang (11-14-26), and Koivu (7-14-21) are throwing up the points, and getting support. Terrible PP and consistency are the problems. This also looks like too weak of a team for the playoffs.

Edmonton (4-NW, 10-W) Hemsky (10-23-33) is leading the way, with Souray at 23, and Horcoff at 22 points. Only seven others over 10 points show the lack of fire-power on this team. Mediocre PP and goals scored, terrible PK and bad GA, not sure how they are hanging in, but they are keeping contact.

Early season award

2008-12-22T16:25:00.000-08:00

Not Mid season yet, but I’m going to give an early season voting for awards anyway. Start with the easy one. Three guys separate from the pack, so I will only vote for three. I go with Sutter at the top because the fact he deserves it.

Sutter
Julian
McLellan

Lady Bing, of the Lady Gretzski as some have been known to call it. Again I will go with 3. I am putting Marleau there, but I could be talked into Campbell with only one minor penalty. The vote would likely go to Datsyuk to repeat.

Marleau
Campbell
Datsyuk*

Calder. There are a lot of worthy candidates this year, so I will go with 5. My pick is Versteeg though.

Versteeg
Mason
Hunwick
Wheeler
Rinne

OK, let’s start stirring it up. Hart. Top three most would consider no brainers, just a matter of order. This one may change a lot before the end, but I have to go with Malkin at this point. Four and five will be the ones that will cause disagreement. Yes, Marleau IS the sharks MVP to this point, not Thornton. This is also the first I will defend. Malkin has simply outplayed OA and Sid to this point. Iginla is still the best vet in the league. Marleau is tied with Thornton in points, leads the team in goals, plays on a very good PK, and is doing his scoring without racking up points with the extra man.

Malkin
Ovechkin*
Crosby
Iginla
Marleau

Selke and again will get some yelling. I am not being a homer on Marleau. I do not expect him to stay here, but to this point he does deserve to be on the list. The media will not vote for him though. My vote will not go to a Red Wing on this one. Sharpe is my first pick. I do not see the usual suspect, Madden in the top 5, maybe not the top 10. Voters would still go with Datsyuk

Sharpe
Datsyuk*
Kesler
Marleau
Zetterburg

Norris. Time for a shake-up here. No, I do not buy that Lidstrom is automatic, though with the voters he probably is. I expected Phfaneuf to take it this year, but I don’t think he is putting up numbers. I am in fact not giving him a top 5. I am also surprised with myself for leaving out two more automatics, Pronger and Niedermayer, but again, the numbers simply are not there. Now, no chance others would agree with these votes, in fact they would almost be sure to go with Liddy, but that is what opinions are for. I take Weber.

Weber
Lidstrom*
Vlassic
Chara
Boyle

Vezina. OK, I almost did not even bother. I have trouble picking anyone. How can you vote for a part time goalie? If I could split a vote between Fernandez and Thomas, fine. Luongo will likely come back in form and win it, but he is too low on GP’s right now. Nabokov and Kiprusoff are tied for the lead league in wins, Nabby with an incredible record, but neither has good numbers except for W’s. There is not real leader here, but I will go with Backstrom, for now:

Backstrom
Thomas
Luongo
Lunqvist
Nabokov

Those are my picks through 30-35 games. I will visit again at about 60, heading into the stretch drive. They should change a lot by then.

Holiday treat for hockey fans

2008-12-22T12:57:00.000-08:00

The NHL is treating fans with some big games for the holiday season to stack up against the Bowl games. OK the bowl games will kill hockey in the ratings, but at least hockey fans will have an alternative. Three of the Atlantic division teams will be beating up each other, plus drawing Boston, Montreal, and Washington, while Philly will be trying to pick up out of division points. Vancouver has big games all over the place. There should be some other very interesting games, especially for fight fans.

Teams with major standing consequences and wanting to make statements face the following in the next two weeks. Set up your DVR’s boys and girls.

Devils: BOS, PIT, NY, DAL, MTL, CAR
Rangers: WSH(2), PIT, MTL, NJ
Penguins: NJ, MTL, BOS(2), NY
Flyers: ANA, WSH, CHI, VAN
Canucks: SJ, ANA, EDM(2), PHI
Blackhawks: DET(2), CGY, PHX, PHI, MIN
Red Wings: CHI(2), COL, MIN

Games that could be especially interesting:

Mon Dec 22
ANA/VAN: Could be a war.

Tue Dec 23, 2008
BOS/NJ: Major test
WSH/NY: Rags need all the points they can get. Caps need to prove they belong.
ANA/CGY: Tune in fight fans.
SJ/VAN

Fri Dec 26, 2008
PIT/NJ: Pens need points. Devils need to prove their position is not chance.
PHI/CHI: Can the kids play with the big boys? Both want to stay on their roll.

5:00 PM ET

7:00 PM ET

Sat Dec 27, 2008
NJ/NY: More of the same.

Mon Dec 29, 2008
SJ/DAL: Always a big game, always.

Tue Dec 30, 2008
BOS/PIT: Both with a lot to prove.
CHI/DET: With back-to-backs and a show-case game, the Hawks and all of hockey have thes circled.
PHI/VAN: Nucks probably wish Sundin signed weeks ago.

Wed Dec 31, 2008
SJ/MIN: Wild are desperate while SJ has a shot at kicking a wounded dog.
EDM/CGY: The war.

Jan 1
DET/CHI: The show-case. Champs versus the future.
PIT/BOS: The return match.

Fri Jan 2, 2009
PHI/ANA: Another possible war.

Sat Jan 3, 2009
NY/WSH: Another return match.

Sun Jan 4, 2009
CGY/CHI: Will the Hawks have anything left after the Detroit games?
PIT/NY: One more for the Atlantic

Ranking updates through 12/21

2008-12-21T21:52:00.000-08:00

San Jose Sharks (1) (2-1-1) (26-4-3 55 pts, 137 pace) (1 .788) (7-1-2) OTL to C-bus and a pounding by Detroit marred the week for the Sharks. For the first time they showed a kick in the armor. They still have yest to lose at home in regulation, and even with the loss to Detroit, they still picked up 16 of 20 points in the last 10 games.
Detroit Red Wings (2) (2-1-0) (22-6-4 48 pnts 123 pace) (2 .688) (7-3-0) A huge win against the Sharks, but a loss to Colorado will keep them right at #2. The effort against San Jose say they are not planning on going away any time soon.
Boston Bruins (3) (3-0-0) (24-5-4 52 pts 129 pace) (1 .727) (9-1-0) Boston is now simply the hottest team in the league. Right now the top teams in the league are basically San Jose, Detroit, and Boston in a dead heat, then a gap to the rest of the league. There Philly and Chicago are the only teams even keeping them in sight.
New York Rangers (4) (2-1-0) (22-12-2 46 pts 105 pace) (2 .611) A 2-1 trip to California Shows the rangers can still contend, but gut are also steadily losing ground to Philly. It seem only a matter of time.
Philadelphia Flyers (5) (2-1-1) (18-8-7 43 pts 107 pace) (4 .545) (7-1-2) This week showed blemishes for the Flyers, but they still picked of 5 of eight points and are on pace to catch the Rangers.
Chicago Blackhawks (7) (4-0-0) (18-6-7 43 pts 114 pace) (4 .581) (8-1-1) 17 of 20 points, and 8 for 8 this week, the boys are not convinced they need to wait for next year. They now are solidly in the third best record in the West, but have no real chance of catching a top three spot. At five points behind Detroit, they are unlikely to close that gap except on a temporary basis. They seem to be starting to win some of those close games though.
Washington Capitals (8) (2-1-0) (20-11-3 43 pts 104 pace) (3 .588) (7-3-0) Solid in the last ten, they all but have the SE in hand baring injury. They played well without Semin, and have him back now. They still need to find a way to get more production from anyplace but thier first line though.
Vancouver Canucks (10) (2-1-0) (18-12-3 39 pts 97 pace) (5 .545) The 'Nucks try to hang in, but with the Sundin signing, and hoping to get Luongo back soon, the NW should really be theirs to lose at this point. They likely will not make that move for some time yet though.
Anaheim Ducks (9) (2-1-0) (18-12-3 39 pts 97 pace) (6 .545) Another test, this time with the Rangers, another loss. It now appears that the Ducks are not going to take a regular season run at the Sharks, and an injurty to their all-power play all the time scoring machine and their specialty team play may go into the tank. Pronger and Nieds are simply not putting up the numbers this team expects as well. The Duck may start looking to make some line-up changes soon after the start of the year. Expect them to talk with the Leafs.
Montreal Canadiens (10) (2-1-1) (18-9-6 40 pts 104 pace) (5 .545). Montreal had a better week, but needs to become far more consistant.
Pittsburgh Penguins (6) (1-1-0) (17-11-4 36 pts, 97 pace) (7 .533) The Pens continue to slide, and continue to get very little from anyone except Malkin and Crosby. Their record should get healthy with a soft stretch coming up, except for a real test in New Years back-to-backs with the Devils.
New Jersey Devils (11) (3-0-1)(19-9-3 41 pts 108 pace) (6 .613) (7-2-1) The Devils are officially now doing more than hang in there. With 7 points this week, and 15 or the last 20 available, they are actually on pace to catch and pass Pilly and New York, and the have already moved past the Pens. With their next three games comming agaist Boston, Pittsburgh and the Rangers, that may change in a hurry.
Calgary Flames (13) (2-0-1) (18-11-4 40 pts 99 pace) (3 .545) Solid bounce-back week to hold on to first place in the NW, but only by one over Vancouver. The two though are starting to seperate from the rest of the division.
Nashville Predators (14) (1-1-0) (16-13-3 35 pts 90 pace) (8 .500) Nashville is strugling to hold onto the 7th or 8th playoff slots. A brutal stretch of schedule against contending teams would be very telling about the season for this team.
Carolina Hurricanes (17) (3-1-0) (16-13-5 37 pts 89 pace) (8 .471) Carolina is fighting back to stay in the race.
Colorado Avalanche (18) (2-2-0) (16-16-1 29 pts 82 pace) (10 .485) With Minnesota and Edmonton struggling, Colorado is getting back into the race, making it up to 10th in the West.
Buffalo Sabres (19) (1-1-1) (16-13-4 36 pts 89 pace) (9 .485) The Buffs continue to try to hang in now holding the 9th slot.
Minnesota Wild (15) (1-2-1) (16-14-2 34 pts 87 pace) (9 .500) (2-7-1) 5 points of the last possible 20 as the spiral by the Wild continues and they have dropped from the top eight for now. Minnesota needs to right their ship in a hurry.
Phoenix Coyotes (20) (2-0-1) (16-13-4 36 pts 89 pace) (7 .485) (6-2-2) Another good week in a good stretch has jumped the 'Yotes all the was into the #7 slot. The question now is if they can hold it.
Columbus Blue Jackets (22) (1-2-1) (14-15-4 32 pts 80 pace) (11 .424) A big OT win against San Jose shows they can beat anyone. 0-2-1 on the rest of the week shows they can lose to anyone.
Florida Panthers (24) (1-1-1) (15-13-4 34 pts 87 pace) (10 .469) (7-2-1) Florida continues to learn, and stay on the prowle to move up and take a run at the #8 slot.
Edmonton Oilers (16) (0-2-1) (14-14-3 30 pts 82 pace) (13 .452) A slip for a team not in a position to have a slip. The Oil must reverse the this or the will lose contact with the playoff race.
Los Angeles Kings (21) (0-2-2) (13-14-6 32 pts 80 pace) (12 .394) The Kings have started to faulter for the first real time in the season. We will now see how they react to adversity.
Ottawa Senators (23) (1-2-0) (12-14-5 31 pts 77 pace) (12 .387) The Sens remain an also run. Teams are likely starting to scout them for deadline deals.
Dallas Stars (26) (2-0-1) (13-14-5 31 pts 79 pace) (14 .406) A solid week is a positive step, but they have a long way to go.
Toronto Maple Leafs (27) (2-1-0) (13-13-6 32 pts 82 pace) (11 .406) Some of the players seem to be gripping as the new GM decides who he is going to move. The selling could start right after the holidays.
St. Louis Blues (25) (1-3-0) (13-17-3 29 pts 72 pace) (15 .394) The Blues are trying to stay respectable, and they have a chance at that, but not a lot more.
Atlanta Thrashers (29) (2-1-0) (11-17-4 26 pts 67 pace) (13 .344) They did pick up one more point than the Isles, or a total of 1.
Tampa Bay Lightning (30) (0-1-1) (7-16-9 23 pts 59 pace) (14 .219) (1-7-2) The Bolts actually wona game this week.
New York Islanders (28) (0-2-1) (10-20-3 23 pts 57 pace) (15 .303) Now in full tank mode. the Isles have lost 6 straight and 8 of 9.

Defensive Scoring

2008-12-21T04:04:00.000-08:00

This is the era of offensive defensemen, or so it is stated quite often. Is that the truth though, or is that perception? Looking at the numbers for trends reveals the following:

9 teams have fewer than 10 goals from the blue-liners, with the league lows being TB at 4, and BUF at 5. 4 of those 9 teams would be in the playoffs today though.

At the other end: BOS (20), Fla (20), Chi (20), SJ (21), Tor (21), and NSH (22) are the teams at the top of defense goals, with only Fla and Tor out of playoff slots, and both of them are close.

Total points from the clue line, of the 7 teams under 55 points from the defense, only the Pens (53 points) are in a playoff slot. Another sign that Pittsburgh lack of distribution is a dangerous situation for success long term. STL (39) is at the bottom of the league in other stats as well.

Seven of the 10 teams over 70 points from the blue-liner would be in the playoffs, and the other three are not far back. Chicago (20-81), Detroit (15-83), and San Jose (21-93) are tops in the league, and the top three records in the West. Boston (20-71) is behind only Tor (21-79) in the east.

Verdict: The West is being dominated by teams with the offense from the blue line. In recent years, Anaheim has been dominant in this ares with two future Hall of Fame guys out there. Anaheim though is only (12-57), and that is not getting it done. Boston it terrorizing the East, and a good share of it is coming from the blue-line, even though the Teddy Bears preach defense first. There are teams out there that are competing without the D keying a good share of the attack, but amongst the contenders, they are the exceptions.

12/20 update on the top lines in hockey

2008-12-21T02:44:00.000-08:00

A Christmas update on the lines that each of their teams think are the best in hockey.

Caps
Semin	Ovechkin	Backstrom	Total
14-18-32	20-23-43	10-24-34	44-65-109
Pens
Malkin	Crosby	Sykora
15-40-55	13-33-46	12-15-27	40-88-128
Sharks
Marleau	Thornton	Setoguchi
17-20-37	8-29-37	16-18-34	41-67-108
Hawks
Kane	Toews	Versteeg
16-23-39	9-17-26	8-17-25	33-57-90
Wings
Holmstrum	Datsyuk	Hossa
9-9-18	11-23-34	17-16-33	37-48-85
Flyers
Gange	Knuble	Richards
17-21-38	13-10-23	13-24-37	43-55-98

The Wing and Hawks top lines are lagging a bit in points, while the Pens have jumped out the a big lead in the point total. The caps do have the lead in goals though, and have missed a lot of games from Semin's injury.

Pittsburgh's Number 1 line is scoring a ridiculous 41.8% if all points for the team. That is simply too many for a team that expects to win the cup. There are simply too many teams out there that can shut down a single line team. Washington is running 37.1%, and considering the number of games they have lost to injury, they are really too high as well, but they have shown they can win without one of the big guns off that line. Chicago and Detroit are both putting up big numbers without their #1 lines being less that 30% of the total team points.

Rangers vs Sharks

2008-12-21T01:26:00.000-08:00

Well, a very tired San Jose team went out a did a bit getter of a job at making a positive statement as opposed to the fall on your face job they did in Detroit. The performance against the Rangers was not exactly Earth shaking domination, in fact it was a scratch and claw, hang on by the tips of your fingers gut check. That may actually have made it a more impressive effort.

The Sharks got a quick two on and early 5-on-3 power play, and then spent the rest of the evening trying to hold New York off. In the third, the Sharks were in fact the team being dominated in the third with Nabokov holding off the onslaught.

I really doubt that this put a lot of scare into Detroit, but it should have gotten the attention of most of the rest of the league. A very tired team, playing a hot team from the East, getting badly outplayed, but taking a character win.

Some things are becoming very apparent with this team: Even on off nights, this first line is simply dominant. Clowe is an offensive force, when he gets in front of the net where he belongs. He needs to quite forgetting that. Nabby needs to become more consistent or they are going to have trouble in the playoffs. You can't give up softies in the playoffs and win. Boyle is good. Vlasic is the quietest star in the league that no one understands is a star. People continue to under estimate Marleau's contributions one the ice. Right now, PM is the best player on this team.

Of course JT is the best player on the team. Just ask anyone, they will tell you. He is a scoring machine. Let's look a the facts for a second though. Joe may be having his best season every to this point. Yes, I am serious. (8-29-37) puts him on pace of 92 point, tied for 8th in the league, but well off Malkin's pace or 138. For some reason, fantasy players seem to think that PP points are somehow a better stat than 5-on-5 points. Never have been able to see it myself. I find Marleau's stat, also tied for 8th with (17-20-37) more impressive on the surface. Then I add in that 12 of JT's point are via the PP, while only 5 of PM's come with the extra man. Then, Marleau is playing PK, with three of his goals coming short handed. The Sharks are also doing something relatively unusual: They are often playing their top line against the other team's top line, effectively neutralizing them at both ends of the ice. Look for Marleau to be a finalist for the Selke this year. With four minor penalties, expect him to be a finalist for the Lady Bing as well.