Mmm, Tangy!

Bob McKenzie says Tanguay for Ryder. Matt at BoA has an informed response.

With all the staff sightings between between Montreal and Calgary this year, it's hard not to think 'where there's smoke there's fire.' Then you look at the names involved - Tanguay for Ryder - and think it's typical nutty media speculation. Tanguay automatically comes up because he's French. Ryder is mentioned because he's the goat du jour in Montreal.

Unlike most of the media regarding rumours like this one, McKenzie does recognize the real motivation here: the Flames need 08/09 cap space (which isn't exactly Earth-shattering news - BoA's Matt has talked about it for months) and the Habs have 08/09 cap space. To clear 08/09 cap space via trade, the only two realistic options are Tanguay and Aucoin. Both have no-trade clauses. Neither can be given up entirely for futures because Sutter can't weaken the team's chances this season. And Sutter can always clear 08/09 cap space by simply not re-signing UFAs Huselius, Langkow, Conroy and Yelle. It's not like he must make a trade.

From Montreal's perspective, they can't add a whole lot of salary for this season. To take on Aucoin or Tanguay, Montreal would have to give up a significant 07/08 salary. The Habs only have one player who fits the criteria, and that's Ryder. I would think the Flames would be a little wary of Ryders, given their experience with Daniel.

Aucoin doesn't make a whole lot of sense for the Habs. There are already more players than roster spots on the blueline, and more importantly the team's salary distribution is already defense-heavy. In addition to Ryder, the Habs would have to send one or more defencemen back. Brisebois, Streit and the youngsters are the only ones who won't take up much 08/09 salary. Something like Aucoin and Yelle for Ryder and Streit is possible, I suppose. I can't imagine why Gainey (who is dealing from a position of strength, being the one with the cap space) might make a deal that widens the F/D imbalance.

Tanguay makes more sense for Montreal (duh). He would even if he weren't French. The team's even strength scoring (Tanguay's bread & butter) has been improving, but it's still below average. The problem here, obviously, is that Ryder is nowhere near the player Tanguay is. That's true even if Ryder is on pace for his usual 30 goals. Gainey would have to sweeten the deal with significant futures. Even then, I have a hard time believing that Sutter would be willing to surrender such a big contributor this season.

For Calgary, there must be a better option out there for an impending UFA on a team with 08/09 cap space. Marian Hossa, perhaps?

Googling PJ Stock Returns A Lot Of Stock Photos Of Pyjamas

Once upon a time, Elliotte Friedman wrote sports columns in Western's Daily Student Newspaper, the Gazette. I read them - they were the only sports columns worth reading in the Gazette. Now, fifteen years later, Friedman and I have another thing in common: rambling, disjointed blog posts, the point of which (when they have a point) is difficult to discern.

Friedman's blog, From the Pressbox, is hosted at the CBC website. His latest post, Can youth, Koivu co-exist in Montreal? suggests that Saku Koivu is being (or should be) edged out by a youth movement. It features lots of speculation about Koivu's feelings.

Here's my response, which follows the classic blogger template of a hack & slash snip job of the original article followed by my witty remarks.

"...the Canadiens signed Markov, while making a below-market offer to Sheldon Souray. They knew Souray would decline and leave as a free agent."

Keeping up appearances of trying to sign the record-setting PP point man to appease the fans, knowing full well that Souray would receive and accept a better offer elsewhere? If this is really the way it played out, then it was a brilliant move by Bob Gainey. The thing is, the reported offer of $22M over four years (Hamrlilk's contract) was a bit more per annum than the offer Souray eventually accepted from Edmonton - $27M over five years. Gainey might have been cutting it a little bit too close with his bluff. If the move had backfired, this would truly be the season from Hell. In Gainey's defense, maybe Souray made it clear that the fifth year was non-negotiable.

Anyway, signing Markov was not a deliberate move toward a younger player. It was a deliberate move toward the better player.

"The team stuck with Christopher Higgins and Tomas Plekanec during good and bad, and it’s working. Higgins, 24, is an assistant [sic] captain while Plekanec, 25, is second behind linemate Kovalev in scoring. Carbonneau is following the same process with Guillaume Latendresse and Sergei Kostitsyn, both 20, and Kyle Chipchura, who is 21."

It would be nice to be able to look at these names and see a bona fide star. We can be pretty sure that none will be the player Koivu is. Someone might, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Over at Lowetide is a recent post mentioning that the Oilers have had "only" six top six picks in their history. Over the same time period, Montreal has had three, and none of them 'earned' by being a bottom six team. There was the Wickenheiser 1st overall in 1980 (acquired in a trade), Svoboda at #5 in 1984 (again, acquired in a trade) and Carey Price at #5 in 2005 - the result of the Crosby lottery. The last time Montreal 'earned' a top 6 pick, there were only 6 teams in the league. The highest pick they've been granted since the WHA merger was the 2001 #7, Mike Komisarek. As bad as the Habs have been over the last decade, they haven't been bad enough to earn a star.

This post at IOF nicely explains the Habs' LOFT issues. Be sure to look at the chart. Star players come early in the draft. A #10 forward pick only has about a 30% chance of becoming a mere 0.5 ppg player. Montreal has not had many top 10 picks. There are diamonds in the rough (see Detroit), but I think that's almost entirely luck.

My point is that going further with this youth movement is unlikely to result in improvement. The young Habs aren't the young Penguins. No one can step into Koivu's role yet, and I have strong doubts that anyone in the system will ever be able to do Koivu's job as well as Koivu.


"What I can see is Koivu looking around and realizing his friends are gone. The faces are younger, not familiar. He feels threatened. He wonders if he’s going to be next. (Although, it should be pointed out he has a no-trade, and, as of last Friday, says he hasn’t been asked to waive it.) He sees his offensive role eroding."

Well, since I'm not privy to all of Saku's hopes and dreams, all I can see is Koivu outperforming every other forward on the team at EV. If (big if) his offensive role is eroding, it's chiefly because his defensive role is expanding due to a lack of centres capable of taking faceoffs in their own zone against the other teams' top lines.


"P.J. Stock made the point in the pre-game the other day that Koivu was being turned into a checking centre."

Jesus Murphy, I can't believe this 110% hogwash* is now polluting the commentary on HNIC. P.J. Stock made a career out of absorbing blows to the head. He now goes by P.J. because it's easier for him to spell than 'Phillip Joseph.'

Chris Higgins has been a fixture on Koivu's wing. Checking lines generally don't feature the team's best scoring winger (Higgins). Maybe nuances like that are a little too subtle for a former NHL goon to notice, so how about this: if Koivu has been used as a checking centre, then Sundin, Sakic, Datsyuk, Lecavalier, Jokinen, and Marc effing Savard have too.

I'll stop here. The fact is, at 33, Saku Koivu is still the best forward on the team (granted, this team is dressing two #6/7 defensemen as forwards so the title of 'best forward' carries less weight in Montreal than it does in, say, Detroit). The Canadiens are still on pace for a playoff spot. Just what is the point of all the criticism?



* - This is weird - I Googled "tqs 110%" to find a link to the TV programme. It came up #1. #5 was this page describing stats courses at the University of Washington. Apparently, "TQS 110... Addresses introductory statistical concepts and analysis in modern society." There it is in black and white.

транскрипция?

Bullet points today, because rum n' nog shortens my attention span.

o The guys are brothers, but apparently that's not enough for nhl.com to spell their surnames identically. Kostsitsyn? Kastsitsyn? The Canadiens' page spells it a third way: Kostitsyn. There must be someone out there who can offer some consistent written translation of languages that use the cyrillic alphabet.

o Speaking of Sergei/Siarhei, there was a recent Mike Boone post at Habs I/O that said Dale Hunter believed Sergei/Siarhei was more NHL-ready than his London Knights linemates Sam Gagner and Patrick Kane. That may be. Of the three, only Kane (playing with Toews and Ruutu) has played a significant role in the NHL this season, and consensus is that it was he who drove results in London.
After working for 2+ years before earning a spot in the Canadiens' lineup, I wonder how Andrei - the older, more experienced, bigger, faster, and more skilled of the two - feels about his kid brother being airlifted onto the top line and getting more minutes?

o In the eight games since this post the Habs' EV shot differential has dropped considerably. Through 24 games, they were getting outshot 30.1 to 31.9 per 60. In the last eight games they've been outshot 24.4 to 31.5. Carbonneau's frantic line juggling is not working.

o Is Randy McKay's real first name Hugh???

o On the Mike Richards deal...

One NHL GM, who obviously wanted anonymity, said he didn't understand the point of the Richards deal.

"He's not a $6-million player next year and he still would have been a restricted free agent," said the GM. "The guy had 32 points last year. I know he's had a great eight weeks so far... but could you not have just done a three-year deal at $4 million per year and then re-address it after that? Maybe do eight or nine years at that point when you have a better handle on what the player is all about?"

Why would an NHL GM bitch about it? If it's a bad deal, it's primarily bad for the Flyers. I suppose it could be bad news if you have some comparable players approaching RFA and possible arbitration. If this contract overvalues Richards in a compensation structure with a cap and linkage, it just means someone else out there must be undervalued. A smart GM would shut up about the Flyers' dealings and exploit the undervalued segment of the player market.

o Koivu's two goals on Saturday were his first two 5-on-5 goals this season. He had one other EV goal that was scored 4-on-4. Before anyone mistakes me for Al Strachan, I'm *not* saying Koivu is underperforming. He's having a better season than last year. I could watch a video loop of him shredding Ian White down low for hours. If by some freak accident both Saku Koivu and I get invited to the same holiday party, he should stay away from the mistletoe.

o The Leafs looked bagged in that game. It seems like there have been a lot of games this year where a team will play back-to-back games, but their opponent in the second game does not. That said, how stupid is it to dress Belak in that situation? With a tired team, Maurice needed four usable lines.

Diary of a Madman

Someone recently told me that some of my posts assume an unrealistic degree of familiarity with some rather obscure stats. This post is intended to be a bit of a primer for other Habs fans, demonstrating how I interpret some of these numbers for the Habs. If you think this is all hogwash, you're not alone. If you see something that piques your interest, I recommend reading some archives of some of the more numbers-oriented blogs listed on your right. Especially the Oilogosphere ones.

These are 5-on-5 numbers from behindthenet.ca.



The columns are Games Played, Time on Ice per 60min (that's 5-on-5 time per 60 minutes), Quality of Competition (v. v. v. important), Goals For (by all players) while on the ice, Goals Against while on the ice, and the Corsi Index. The Corsi number is like a plus/minus for shots directed at the net by your team minus those from the opposition (shots for + missed shots for + opposition blocked shots - shots against - missed shots against - blocked shots). The number shown doesn't include the blocked shots, and it's a number per 60min.

If you want to get a handle on who the important players are and who is doing a good job given their role, these numbers are valuable. 5-on-5 hockey is at least two thirds of the game. In addition to the goals scored/allowed, events at 5-on-5 determine who gets the PPs and determines whether you make it to OT/SO. PP/PK performance is certainly valuable - probably moreso on a per-minute basis - but the bulk of the game is decided 5-on-5.

If you accept that, the next important piece is who the player in on the ice with/against. Most Habs fans are aware of the team's lines and defence pairings. Less well known is how those lines are used by Carbonneau and how they are addressed by opposing coaches. The most common misconception revolves around just who is on the checking line (hint: it's 'none of the above'). The second most common misconception is the even strength effectiveness of the Kovalev/Plekanec line. Sure, they score some at 5-on-5, just not as much as they surrender. And they do it against weaker opponents than the Koivu line. And their penalty differential is worse. Anywho, the QUAL COMP column is the important piece of the above table. If you Google 'Desjardins' and 'quality of competition,' you'll find lots of interesting discussion. It's not a perfect stat, to be sure. I find that when I compare QUALCOMP to the players each Hab regularly faces according to the shift charts and Hockeyanalysis stats, they mesh very well. YMMV. Now we have an idea of the difficulty of the players' icetime, and that provides context for the GF/GA.

Finally, the Corsi column. Obviously GF/GA are the currency of wins and losses. The problem with looking strictly at goals is sample size. A few extra saves in one end of the rink and not the other can make a good player look bad, or vice versa. Shots directed at the net are a good proxy for GF/GA, and they provide a much larger sample size. It tells you which end of the ice is seeing most of the action.

So.... what can we take from these numbers?

1. Markov and Komisarek are playing against the best players in the league. If you were to look at Hamrlik's +8, compare it to Markov's -9 and conclude "Hamrlik's been playing better defensively," you'd be wrong. It's easier to shut down Kyle Wellwood's line than it is Mats Sundin's line. There are some factors besides QUALCOMP that explain the huge +/- discrepancy between these two that I'll get to in another post.

2. Koivu, Higgins, and Ryder are (or were) also playing against the best players in the league. This is a major departure from last season, or any of the last 5+ seasons for that matter. Last year the Bonk/Johnson checking line faced the top opposition. Despite this shelter, the Higgins/Koivu/Ryder line were terrible at even strength. This season the trio has actually been in the black when playing together, and they've done it facing the top lines in the league way more often than last year. This has to be taken into consideration when looking critically at their performance.

3. Trevor Linden, Joe Juneau and Radek Bonk are all veteran players who were brought to Montreal to play a checking role. I assumed Bryan Smolinski would inherit that role this season, but it looks like Carbo was having a hard time trusting him. Judging by his +8/-16, it's understandable. Again, there are other factors at work that mitigate the +/- discrepancy. Smolinski's line has still been the usual 2nd option against tough opposition, after Koivu's. His loss due to injury is a big deal.

4. Dandenault has been awful. Just awful. It's shocking that he's been given so much responsibility, being a frequent winger for Smolinski (a big factor in Smolinski's +8/-16). Dandy's been shuffled from line to line and he's getting blown away everywhere.

5. Hamrlik and Brisebois have been the second pairing, and they've done well. Hamrlik is a vast upgrade over Souray, 5-on-5.

6. Kastsitsyn/Plekanec/Kovalev have performed no better than Koivu's line, 5-on-5. And they're facing mediocre opponents. There have been some recent games where the opposing coach focused on the Kovalev line rather than the Koivu line but that's only because of the bizarre decision to put guys like Streit or Kostopoulos or Dandenaullt on Koivu's wing. For the most part, the Kovy line has been getting plum icetime and not doing as much with it as we would hope. Same as last season.

7. Mark Streit looks bad in terms of GF/GA, especially considering his 3rd pairing status. However, his +8/-17 doesn't seem to jive with his Corsi number of -1.7. Shooting luck is a huge factor here (again, I'll discuss in a later post). He's been good.

8. Surprise, Chipchura is not this team's checking line centre.

9. Kostopoulos has been getting 4th line minutes and he's one of four regular forwards with Corsi numbers on the right side of zero. Maybe it's time to give him a little more responsibility.

10. Gorges has been getting a free ride from fans/media. He's been the worst defenseman while facing the softest opposition. With nine frigging defensemen on the roster, this guy should not be playing.

Conclusions and Contradictions.

With the hindsight of 29 games this season Brisebois has been OK, but the decision to bring him to town looks like a bad one.

Immediately after the offseason FA frenzy, The team had seven defensemen: Markov, Komi, Hamrlik, Streit, Dandenault, Bouillon and Gorges, plus the guys on the farm. Up front they had lost the entire checking line of Perezhogin/Bonk/Johnson, and replaced them with Smolinski and Kostopoulos. Now, Smolinski is a versatile player but had never in his lengthy career (to my knowledge) demonstrated that he could play a role like Bonk's. Kostopoulos was a 4th liner in LA. Even if you give Gainey the benefit of the doubt with Smolinski (maybe he saw something that indicated he could be a shutdown guy), it seems clear that there were holes in the bottom six forward spots.

As the summer wore on and Bonk and Johnson remained unsigned, Gainey picked up a retreaded Patrice Brisebois for $700k. So now we're up to eight defensemen and ten forwards. Interesting. That, in a nutshell, is why we are now seeing Streit and Dandenault playing on the wings.

I just don't get it. Why sign Brisebois when Dandenault is an adequate 3rd pairing RD, and then bump Dandenault up to the wing? Why not skip the middle man and just sign a competant RW?? I would have been happy to see Bonk back - he signed for a cap hit of $1.5MM over two years in Nashville. Gainey must not have wanted to commit to that 2nd year. Tangent time: Speaking of Bonk, it looks like he was the one in the driver's seat last season - not Johnson. Bonk's doing for the Preds what he did last year for the Habs. Johnson's in St. Louis and he's been used in a similar role too but with ugly results.

So. Here we are with the top two lines playing tougher roles but coping pretty well, and a weak bottom six. They were keeping things close to even at even strength, and doing great on the PP. So what does Carbo do? He loses patience with Ryder's stagnant counting numbers and screws up the top line. And he continues to give significant icetime to Dandenault, Begin, Latendresse, Chipchura - all bottom six forwards who are getting beat up regularly. There are deeper teams than Montreal who are limiting their 4th liners to significantly less icetime. It's puzzling.

The NHL Coach Farm Team

An interesting post is up at Eyes on the Prize. Robert L recommends that fans have patience with Coach Carbonneau.

When questions arise about the competency of Canadiens' coaching, the club's recent history of head coaches looms large. There are a couple of noteworthy observations:

- In the last decade, the team has hired four consecutive rookie head coaches.
- In the last fifteen years, every head coach has had a francophone name.

The francophone thing is simply a reality of the Montreal market. The political climate dictates that not only must a coach be fluently bilingual, but his mother tongue must be French. The fluently bilingual Pat Burns was hired back in 1988. I strongly doubt that a rookie head coach with a name like 'Pat Burns' would ever be hired nowadays. It wouldn't matter if his mother tongue was french or if he could speak like Gérard Depardieu. It's an unfortunate limitation for the organization, but c'est la vie. What are you gonna do.

The francophone requirement informs the hiring oddity noted in the first observation. In a competitive endeavour, when you hold yourself to a constraint to which your direct competition is not held, you are at a disadvantage. There just aren't as many good options available. That's why we've seen a series of coaches with zero NHL head coaching experience upon their arrival. To be sure, good coaches are out there that fit the constraint (Lemaire, Jacques Martin), but there are many more that don't. If this were the Hamilton Canadians, the string of Vigneault-Therrien-Julien-Carbonneau would not have evolved. One would have to think that a good, veteran non-francophone coach would have broken in at some point.

I'm not saying that Vigneault, Therrien, or Julien are bad coaches. Au contraire. The Canucks, Penguins and Bruins obviously think highly of them. The thing is, these guys had to cut their teeth in Montreal. They were fired from the Canadiens, presumably for a perceived lack of performance. If there was a lack of performance, how much of it could have been attributed to inexperience? It looks like these guys learned from their mistakes.

On to Carbonneau. Back in 2003 when Bob Gainey jumped back into the biz, he inherited Claude Julien as head coach. Gainey was patient and waited a season and a half before canning Julien. His record over that time was 60-46-7-10. Gainey filled in as interim coach for the remainder of the 05-06 season bringing with him Carbonneau as an assistant. Gainey stated openly that 'his man' Carbo was being groomed for the head coach position starting 06-07.

Carbonneau's qualifications at the time? He spent two seasons as an Assistant Coach behind Michel Therrien in Montreal. Then he was hired by Gainey as Assistant GM in Dallas, a title he held until Julien was fired in 2006. To summarize, he had accumulated 2.5 years of experience as an Assistant Coach at the NHL level and zero as a Head Coach anywhere prior to his Head Coaching job with the Habs.

When Claude Julien was hired, he had spent 2.5 years as Head Coach in Hamilton, plus four as coach of the QMJHL Olympiques. Therrien was a Head Coach for four seasons in the AHL and another four in the Q. Vigneault spent 7.5 years as Head Coach in the Q, and another 3.5 as an assistant with the Senators.

One of these things is not like the others. Yes, the Habs have introduced four cookierookie coaches in the last ten years. Yes, all four currently hold NHL Head Coaching jobs. Three had accumulated extensive head coach experience before their hiring. One had not. Carbonneau's pedigree makes one wonder whether he will learn from his mistakes and become a better coach.

There is evidence to suggest that Carbo's not exactly doing a bang-up job (see below). I won't get into it in this post because I have a feeling that pretty much everything I have to say in this space will, in some way, comment on Carbonneau's performance.

You're all wrong. All of you.

Up until game #23, Michael Ryder was playing his usual role as Saku Koivu's finishing sidekick. In the three previous seasons with this gig he scored 25, 30, and 30 goals. Nothing spectacular, but reasonably good production considering his pedigree.

In the first 23 games this season, Ryder was on the ice for 303 shots directed at the net by Montreal and 242 against in 5-on-5 play (see behindthenet). That's a differential of +2.7 per game, or +7.1 per 60 minutes - the best on the team in both cases.

Ryder's been on for 9 GF and 8 GA. Not exactly Crosbyesque numbers, but try to find another Habs forward in the black. The huge thing here is the 8 GA. That is superb. It's a vast improvement over last year's performance by the first line. Unlike last year, they've frequently been doing it against the opposition's top lines. Well done, Mike. Kudos to the entire top line, up to game #23.

In 5-on-5 hockey, Ryder's been on for 17 penalties committed by Montreal and 35 committed by the opposition. Overall, Ryder has committed 4 and drawn 10 himself (see ontheforecheck).

Up to game #23, Ryder had 70 shots. He was on pace for 250, which would have been a career high.

Overall, Ryder was on pace for a typical Ryder season with one big exception. Um, make that two big exceptions. He's been much better defensively, and his shooting percentage was only 4.3% rather than his career norm of 12%.

Ryder's catastrophically rotten performance? Nothing more than a run of bad luck shooting. On March 10 Sidney Crosby had a shot% of 3.8% over his previous 20 games. If I recall correctly, very few fans called for Crosby to be waived and replaced with an AHL call-up. NHL shooters, like any string of coin tosses, will have cold streaks. It happens.

Unfortunately when it happens in Montreal the entire fan base and sports media join forces to proclaim that the player is bringing shame to the CH by playing so poorly. After all, they're The Most Knowledgeable Fans In The World (tm). Just ask them. Then something really screwed up happens: the coach starts to believe them and then acts on these idiotic assertions. Now we have Mark Streit on the 1st line. I hope you're all happy.

On the flip side, Mathieu Dandenault has escaped the fury of the fan base and media. Clearly because he's big presence, a fast skater and a stand-up guy. It sure as hell can't be due to a good performance.

His Corsi number (a measure of shots directed at the net for/against) is -21.1. That's the worst in the league if you exclude anyone under 10 games played and Eric Boulton. The next worst regular forward in Montreal is the rookie Kyle Chipchura at -9.7. Dandenault has been shuffled from line to line and he's been poison on every one of them, hemorrhaging shots against. He's committed 6 non-coincidental penalties and drawn 2. He's been on the ice for 8 GF and 15 GA, 5-on-5.

There are two mitigating factors for Dandenault: he's been facing tough opposition, and he's a defenseman playing forward. Both of these lay the blame squarely on Carbo. Dandenault should not have his current role.

Same goes for the Ryder debacle. It may sound like I'm blaming the vocal fans and media, but obviously the coach has a responsibility to look a little deeper at a player's performance. If the coach of this team falls for the same foolishness as the raving lunatics on TV and on the message boards, we're in deep trouble.

Puck Luck

They're off to a good start. Still, Habsland has this nagging feeling. The ominous shadow of last season hangs over this team. They were off to an even better start in 2006 when the wheels fell off. We can blame 2006-07 Maple Leafs MVP c difficile all we want, but deep down we all know they were doing it with smoke and mirrors.

The $64,000 question is, Will the same thing happen this year? Let's pop the hood and look for some warning signs through the first 24 games.

1. Even Strength

All stats in this post are from behindthenet.



I'm only including the 4-on-4 info for the sake of completeness. It's irrelevant compared to 5-on-5.

First off, the +32/-43 in 5-on-5 play looks like trouble. It's eerily reminiscent of last year. Good teams don't get outscored 4:3 at even strength. The shot differential is negative, but it's nowhere near this 4:3 ratio. They're only being outshot by 1.3 shots per game, 5-on-5.

If you look a little closer, you'll find the Save percentages are the difference. The league average EV Sv% is .916 (calculated by adding up each team's Sv% and dividing by 30). As expected, Huet and Price are above average at .924. Montreal shooters have been making opposing goalies look like Tretiak. Collectively, they have had a .940 Sv% - the Habs have been shooting 6% at ES. Only the Rangers have been worse, at 5.4%. I can accept that Montreal shooters are below average, but this looks suspiciously like a run of bad puck luck.

What if we plug in some numbers to account for the bad luck? If opposing teams merely had the same kind of goaltending Huet/Price provided at ES (a solid .924 Sv%), Montreal still would have scored an additional 8 goals. I think it's fair to keep the Habs' .924 Sv% as is - goaltending is a team strength. Here's the revised table:




If Montreal could shoot a below-average 7.6% rather than an abysmal 6%, they would only be outscored 40:43 at ES. If they could shoot at a league-average 8.4%, they would be outscoring opposition 45-43. But let's not get carried away. Shooting 7.6% is a reasonable goal for a team comprised of four 4th lines.

Puck luck at even strength: Unlucky by 8 goals (-8)


2. Power Play

It's a different story on the PP - shooting percentages are abnormally high.




League average Sv% are .870 for 5-on-4 and .750 for 5-on-3. As unlucky as the Habs have been at ES, they've been extremely lucky on the PP. We can be pretty sure that the Habs PP is good, this being it's second successful year in a row, so we'll grant them a 5-on-4 Opposition Sv% of .850. That's still a lot better than average, but you have to consider that had they not scored on some of those 'lucky' shots, the PP would have continued and they would have had more shots.



Puck luck on the PP: Lucky by 4 goals (+4)


3. Penalty Kill



Things look normal for the 4-on-5 penalty kill. League average Sv% is .870 - Price/Huet performing at .882 is reasonable. The 3-on-5 Sv% is way out of whack. They're giving up fewer goals per minute when down two men than when they're down one. Those numbers will change by the end of the season. A .760 Sv% is more reasonable for 3-on-5 situations. With some rounding, that means 4GA rather than 1.



Puck luck on the PK: +3 goals, all 5-on-3

3a. SHGs

The other piece of puck luck on special teams is the 4 shorties scored and none allowed. Last season, the Habs scores 15 and allowed 5. There is probably some repeatability there, but not the 3:1 ratio. I'll use a completely arbitrary and unjustifiable 4:3 ratio as reasonable. This means the Habs are up another 3 goals here due to luck.

Puck luck with SHGs: +3 goals


4. Penalties taken/drawn

On average, Montreal is on the PP for 7.6 minutes per game and spending only 6.8 minutes on the PK per game. The success of the PP means that the difference between penalties drawn/taken is even greater. This is a huge improvement over last season, and it's a bit of a wild card. I'm not optimistic that they'll be able to sustain this, but then again I'm wrong an awful lot.

If the Habs conformed to the league average, they would have been on both the PP and PK for an equal 7.3 minutes per game. This would have resulted in a 2 goal swing downward - instead of scoring 4 more PPGs than their opposition, it would be down to a +2. However, I'm going to call this one a wash because they just might be able to continue drawing more penalties than they commit.

Puck luck on penalty differential: 0


5. Empty net goals

They've scored 3 and allowed 4.

Puck luck on ENGs: -1 goal


6. Goalposts

As of Nov. 23, the publication date of this post at IOF, opponents hit seven more posts than did the Habs.

I don't know what to make of this. There is some debate regarding the accuracy of the stats. No one calls shots that go off a post and into the net 'lucky' for the shooter, but shots that hit the post and stay out are somehow 'lucky' for the goalie. There must be some number of goalposts hit that would have been saves if the shot had been aimed an inch or two closer to the centre of the net. Intuitively, something tells me the luck value of a goalpost is not more than half a goal. I'll call the -7 goalpost differential equivalent to 3 goals worth of luck. I'll allocate two of those to 5-on-5 and one to 4-on-5.

Posts: +3 goals.


Total: Habs have been lucky by 4 goals. Instead of a +7 differential (69GF, 62GA) in these situations, we should have expected only +3 (73GF, 70GA). They may not be quite as good as their record indicates, but they're not a sub-.500 team either. As long as no major injuries strike, everyone gets their flu shot and there are no lengthy skids of bad luck, they should stay above .500 and make the playoffs.



Update: It looks like I might have double counted a shorthanded empty net goal. It doesn't change the conclusion much - the good luck on the PP and 3-on-5 PK has been countered by rotten luck scoring at 5-on-5. The team should be able to maintain a slight positive goal differential.

Ryder Criticism. Alan Ryder, that is.

I read all of Alan Ryder's columns at the Globe & Mail. I'm a fan of his and it's great that he has a mainstream forum for his number crunching. Ryder's latest piece is on one of his hobby horses - respecting the shootout.

His conclusion is that there is little correlation between a goalie's hockey performance and shootout performance, therefore coaches and GMs need to spend more time thinking about the shootout. Especially those crotchety old-schoolers North of the border. To be honest, I find his dismissive tone of 'traditional hockey values' getting in the way of smart decisions a little insulting.

According to Ryder's table, there have been 337 shootout points awarded. Over the same time span, there have been 3373 non-shootout points awarded. That 3373 includes wins and OT/SO losses. So it's fair to say that the importance of the shootout is one ninth of the importance of regulation/OT NHL hockey.

For the most part, NHL coaches aren't morons. Say a coach has to decide between two players available to dress for a game. The two have identical regulation/OT performance but one happens to be a shootout ace. The decision is obvious in this case. The difficulty arises when there is a trade-off.

Let's compare Player A and Player B. Player A is fantastic in shootouts - he contributes 0.5 points more than Player B for every shootout. Unfortunately, he's not quite as good at regulation/OT hockey and contributes team 0.1 points per OT/regulation game less than Player B. Player A's net contribution:

0.5ppg*(1/10) - 0.1ppg*(9/10) = -0.04ppg

So Player A contributes 0.04 fewer points per than player B.

Similarly, if player C costs you 0.5 points per shootout but gains you an extra 0.1 points per regulation/OT, he's worth 0.04 points per game more than player B. Because of the rarity of the shootout, regulation/OT performance is much more valuable than shootout performance.

To sum up: Although 1/10th of all available points is a significant fraction, 9/10ths of all available points is nine times more significant. If you're facing a trade-off, you need to gain 9x more shootout value than you lose in regulation/OT value.

Next, let's look at Ryder's table of team shootout performance and compare it to regulation/OT performance:


Click the table for a clearer image. The SO record columns are copied from Ryder's table. I got the Non-SO record numbers from NHL.com.

The correlation between SO% and Non-SO% is -0.15. Good shootout teams are slightly less likely to be good 65-minute teams and vice versa.

The negative correlation is small but significant and completely unsurprising. It suggests the trade-off between shootout performance and 65-minute performance is real. Kiprusoff sucks in shootouts, but wins a lot of games for the Flames. Jussi Jokinen isn't that special in the first 65 minutes (recent 4-goal games notwithstanding), but is crackerjack in the shootout. Ryder's perspective that there is a lack of 'market competition' is explained by some teams having regular players that happen to be great shootout performers (i.e. Dallas), and some teams having great regular players who happen to be lousy shootout performers (i.e. Calgary).

To be fair, the main thrust of Ryder's article is that the backup goalie should come in as the closer for shootouts if he is the better shootout performer. It's a good point. The reason it doesn't happen is probably because coaches prefer not to put a 'cold' goalie in that situation, either due to injury concerns (seems goalies do the splits a lot in shootouts) or concerns about the performance of a 'cold' player. I'd like to see evidence that a player can be put in this situation regularly and perform at his usual 'warmed up' level without a greater risk of injury before I'd endorse the idea. Raycroft looks like the perfect guinea pig for the experiment.

Update: Ryder responded to my comment on his article thusly:

"You are absolutely correct that the shootout is 'only' about 10% of the game. But 'only' 3-4 players per team affect that 10%. And, of course, the goaltender is always one of those players. In the case of forwards the leading shootout contributions of all time have come largely from guys who don't perform at the same level in skating time. They are, in effect, shootout specialists. The shootout tests finesse. But the Leafs trot out their power forwards. The story with goaltending is more complex. You would not choose a single goaltender based on a stand-out shootout record. But, just maybe, you might choose a backup based on that metric AND use him as your closer."

Unbalanced

It's often been said that this year's edition of the Habs features an odd combination of special teams prowess and even strength ineptitude. But just how broad is the chasm? Well, not including empty net goals, they've allowed 41 more than they've scored at even strength and they've scored 26 more than they've allowed in all special teams situations. If your car tires were this far out of balance, you'd experience some seriously uneven tread wear.

But how do they compare to other teams? Let's see... NHL.com has usable team GF/GA data from the last five seasons. To compare teams, I invented a number called Powerplay IMbalance Points, or PIMPs. It's the goal differential of your special teams minus your goal differential at even strength. The more PIMPs you have, the greater your even strength suckage compared to that of your special teams.

Here are the teams having the top 20 PIMPs over the last five seasons:



The first thing you notice is that these teams, by and large, stink. It contains the 30th place team in each of the last four seasons. The only club in the top dozen with a better than .500 win/points% is your 2006-07 Montreal Canadiens, smack dab between this year's .344 Flyers (.344w%) and the powerhouse 01-02 Bluejackets (.348w%). The only team to score more PIMPs than the Habs were back-to-back editions of the Bluejackets. If they printed up t-shirts to commemorate that feat, I'd buy one.

Now here is the "bottom" 10. They are teams who perform much better at ES than on special teams:



Particularly weird is the appearance of the 05-06 and 06-07 Leafs and Sabres on both lists. The 05-06 Sabres were dominant on special teams and average at ES. This year, they're dynamite at ES and sub-par on special teams. The Leafs have flipped the other way, from being a good ST/bad ES club last season to a bad ST/good ES club this year.

In conclusion, no team in the last five seasons has performed the feat the Habs are pulling off this year. No one else has been this much worse at ES than on special teams and still finished better than .500. We Habs fans are witnessing something pretty special.

Market Watch - One Less Fish in the Sea

Sami Salo signed a 4-yr. extension at $3.5M per. Amazingly, that is the exact amount I guestimated he would get, albeit as an extension rather than on the free market.

The number makes $4.5M over 4 or 5 years sound like a reasonable deal for Markov.

~~~

A couple of bloggers have been tracking the odds of Eastern Conference teams making the playoffs: hockeyrodent and Hockey Numbers.

Also, Behindthenet.ca now has a blog!

Fighting Foofaraw

Although this year's fighting debate has already gone 11 rounds, Serge Savard just stepped into the ring with these comments:

"If I do the same thing (as Simon did) on the street, what do you think will happen to me? I'd be jailed."

This is an argument that has never made sense to me. If you crosschecked some poor unsuspecting schmuck in the small of the back while walking down the street, you'd be jailed. If you threw a perfectly clean hipcheck at some annoying mallrat, you'd be jailed. If you took your stick to the park and started firing 6oz vulcanized rubber discs toward a mime at speeds over 90mph, you'd be jailed. It wouldn't even matter that you were technically aiming for the fountain behind the mime and the mime just happened to be in the way.

There are things that happen in every sport that are not tolerated off the field of play. By playing the game, you're accepting some risks by implied consent.

BRB

We will resume our regularly scheduled programming in a couple of weeks.

Fantasy GM, part 2

The writing was on the wall once Rivet was dealt. The most probable scenario will see Gainey gun for Souray. If you're listening to what the pundits say, that will probably mean breaking the Koivu cap. Say Souray signs for $5M, which is the low end of what people are saying he'll get:


Now we're at $41.5M, leaving $3.5M to spend on two remaining spots. Those spots are the ones currently occupied by Radek Bonk and Mike Johnson, who bring down a combined total of $4.2M. This is not good.

Unless Bob Gainey has some pleasant tricks up his sleeve, we're looking at essentially the same team as we have this year. Two veterans (Rivet and Abby) are replaced by two minimum wage earners and $3.5M in cap space instead of the two most reliable forwards (Bonk & Johnson). That's not exactly a formula for success. They say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

So let's try something different.

First off: let Souray walk. In Hockey Pools 101 they teach you not to buy a guy after a career year. By all means, get involved in the bidding to drive up the price, but do not buy. And another thing: would you pay $5M for a 30-goal right wing PP specialist? Then why pay that much for a 30-goal PP specialist d-man? Those goals can be replaced much more inexpensively by addressing the team's needs up front.

Second: Pull a Lamoreillo and treat the Hamilton Bulldogs crowd to the Sergei Samsonov show. Admit the mistake and don't send good money after bad. The Montreal Canadiens are a profitable enough organization to afford this.

Third: As soon as July 1 rolls around send Saku to Kimmo Timonen's house with a Texas mickey of Finlandia and instructions to reminisce about their exploits while playing together on their national team. They were on the same WJC team in 93 and 94, TPS Turku in 94-95, World Cups in 96 and 04, World Championships in 99 and 03, and the Olympics in 98 and 06. There is no doubt in my mind that Timonen is a more valuable all-around player than Souray, and he will come a lot cheaper. His numbers are a little better than Markov's, but he's also a little older. A contract similar to Markov's seems reasonable. If Timonen doesn't bite, the backup plan is Sami Salo.


There! That leaves $8M in cap space for three forwards.

Now we have options. Gainey could go for strength down the middle by landing a star centre. This would be a great environment to ease kids into the lineup:



Alternatively, players like Bonk and Johnson seem to be undervalued. That makes them wise choices in the FA market. Getting them signed for small raises would allow the space to go toward some help on Koivu's wing:



Or we could try to nab the 'Next Radek Bonk,' aka Patrick Stefan. He comes with the added advantage of having an Embarrassing Youtube Discount. That would clear enough space for some serious help for Koivu:


Hey, a guy can dream, can't he?

Fantasy GM, part 1

This year's playoff drive certainly has been inspiring. I've been inspired to ponder how the team might look next season.

Here's the team's current roster when healthy:



The astute observer will note the number of names with white backgrounds not earning their keep.

The salary numbers come from nhlnumbers.com. They may not be exact, but they're close enough. Total salary is in the ballpark of $41M.

The total signed for next year is $23M. Murray and/or Lapierre are the only two signed names that stand a chance of losing their roster spots, and they would be replaced by someone with similar salary. Next year's RFAs are earning $5.4M and the UFAs are about $12.6M.

It's unlikely that any of the RFAs will disappear. They all should return, and here are some WAGs of their price tags:



$2.5M should be quite reasonable for Ryder. Tomas Holmstrom just signed a 3-yr extension at $2.25M per, and J.-P. Dumont got $2.25M over two years as a UFA. Guys with similar numbers to Higgins and Plekanec generally don't make $1.5M, but I'll peg them for the amounts shown just to be on the safe side. Perezhogin has had scant numbers this year and should be under $1M. Gorges' and Komisarek's numbers appear on the high side but salaries have a tendency to be surprisingly high year after year.

That puts us at a total of $32M with holes at C, W, #2G and two gaping ones on defence. If the salary cap is $46M next year and Gainey keeps a $1M buffer, that leaves $13M to complete the roster.

Let's start with the easy decisions. Sign Markov and use a rookie backup netminder.

Aebischer won't be back, and Gainey won't pursue a pricey #2 goalie. Halak or another cheap kid from camp will do just fine as a backup. Markov has to be re-signed. As mentioned several times before, Tomas Kaberle's deal should provide a ceiling for Markov. Philippe Boucher just signed a three year extension at $2.5M per. Nevertheless the market will not listen to reason. Markov will fetch over $4M per season with a long term deal.



That puts us at $36.5M with some difficult decisions to make in part 2.

The Aftermath

Ah, the NHL trade deadline - a good time to reflect on impermanence.

I had an ex who was not a hockey fan, but who still watched a fair bit of it simply due to association with yours truly. Her favourite player was Ryan Smyth. Why? Because he was by far the most emotional player on the ice after Canada won in Salt Lake.

After being traded to the Islanders, the poor guy was a wreck - see the clip up at CiO. When you invest as much in your job as Ryan Smyth does, the highs are ecstatic and the lows are agonizing. The sword cuts both ways.


Defending Bob

Pierre Lebrun:

"People will say Montreal was a big loser on the day but the reality is that Canadiens GM Bob Gainey was in a pickle. He's rebuilding the team while trying to remain competitive so dealing high draft picks or prospects for a rental was out of the question. On the other hand, with his team on the bubble, he couldn't afford to deal high-scoring defenceman Sheldon Souray despite the huge return he would have fetched. The Habs can't make the playoffs without Souray, so they'll accept that when he leaves town as unrestricted free agent in July that his stay in the spring was worth it.

Besides, Gainey deserves credit for pulling a first-round draft pick and a 22-year-old defenceman in Josh Georges in exchange for a rental, Rivet, on Sunday."

I think Lebrun hit the nail on the head.

As a dedicated fan, I would have been fine with Gainey taking the long view and getting what would have been a jackpot of a return for Souray in the ultimate sellers' market. But I'm not a season ticket holder, nor am I one of the twenty-odd roster players who have committed a good chunk of their careers to this season. As long as the playoffs are within reach, Gainey couldn't sell off his star rentals no matter what the market conditions were.

On the flip side, this year's team is not a Cup contender. It would have been utterly foolish to sacrifice the future by paying the going rates for rentals. By getting a great return for a role-player and keeping his major contributors, Gainey hedged nicely.

There have been a lot of comments criticizing Gainey, saying the team needed a goalie/#2 centre/winger.

The goalie criticism is baffling. The team still has a servicable starting goalie in Aebischer, and they are deep in prospects. Giving up assets for Curtis Joseph or some other retread who is no better than Aebischer/Halak would be wasteful. What probably happened was word got out that "Gainey's looking for a goalie" after Huet went down. Pundits automatically assumed that meant he sought a big name, when he may have been targeting a depth guy like Leighton all along.

The '2nd line centre' talk was foolish too. Bryan Smolinski is no better than Tomas Plekanec, and he would have cost a 2nd round pick. Yanic Perreault is no better than Tomas Plekanec, and he would have cost even more. Zubrus might be a slight upgrade, but is a slight upgrade worth a 1st round pick and a solid prospect?

The one valid criticism might be the winger. A true star winger (preferably a LW) would have improved the Koivu line and allowed Higgins to solidify another line. By star winger I mean Smyth calibre, or Tkachuk at the very least. That kind of upgrade would have cost too much. A rental of Smyth is not worth A. Kostitsyn, David Fischer and a 1st round pick.


Playoff Implications

While Bob Gainey kept a level head, some other GMs were buying like ugly spinsters at a bachelor auction.

If the Penguins were a fun team to watch before, they'll be an absolute hoot with Big Georges in the lineup. Gary Roberts is older than dirt, but dirt is still better than what Pittsburgh was trotting out on their bottom lines. They are looking solid for the #5 spot.

It's down to Tampa and Atlanta for the SE division title. Feaster only did some minor shuffling while Waddell was in full panic mode. Tampa had been rolling before the deadline while the Thrashers addressed their biggest need (a warm body to play centre), so I'll grant them both spots.

The Islanders added a star and should be OK unless the wheels fall off. I'll concede another spot to them.

Uh oh. That leaves Montreal, Carolina, Boston, NYR and Toronto all fighting for the last spot. The Rangers have been owned by the Islanders so far, and they face them four more times. Boston sucks. They're at -50 and lucky to be doing this well. So let's count out Boston and the Rangers. That leaves Carolina and Montreal at 5 to 2 odds, and Toronto at 5 to 1 because of the Raycroft factor.

Tangent time. Why hasn't the Toronto media been universally napalming Raycroft? He's been terrible. Just like any series of coin tosses, he's had his 'hot streaks.' But .894 Sv% on the season? Yeesh. There have been 25 goalies to play 40 games this season. Among them, Raycroft is #25 in Sv%.



Unrelated Trade Deadline Stuff

There was a highly entertaining article in USA Today (via Kukla's) in which Brian Burke documents his adventures leading up to the trade deadline. Some highlights:

"If you are offended by profanity, it's difficult to make a trade in the NHL."

"I call Montreal's (GM) Bob Gainey and push him about whether he's going to move any of his defensemen. Gainey says he's unsure if he's selling. Timing is beginning to be a problem. I decide to push on this, but I don't get anywhere."

"Craig Rivet is traded to San Jose by Montreal, and I call and whine to Gainey about not calling me back and telling me he was available. He tells me that I was late to that party, and he had been talking to Doug Wilson for three weeks. Fair enough."

"I told our younger players that I wouldn't trade them and I kept my word. But I did get May. He's a great character guy with a sunny disposition."

Final Filler

- What often goes unmentioned when discussing impending UFA players as 'rentals' is the exclusive negotiation rights a team holds until July 1. That must count for something.

- There is a new table up at Behindthenet. It ranks players according to penalties drawn/taken. Compare the relative positions of Rivet and Gorges.