The Value Of An NHL Draft Pick
Jonathan Willis
March 10 2011 06:58PM
Late last month, Jason Gregor looked back at the NHL draft from 1996 to 2005, in an attempt to put a value on NHL draft picks. Gregor’s far from the first to do so; after the jump I’ll look at his work and that of others to see what we can say about the NHL Draft.
Correlation, Causation, and Coaching
Jonathan Willis
February 27 2011 11:56AM
As 2011 approached, there wasn’t much positive to say about the Toronto Maple Leafs. A 13-19-4 record had them sitting 13th in the conference with 30 points. They were just two points up on the woeful New York Islanders, one point behind the Edmonton Oilers, and 14 points out of the playoffs.
A week earlier, Calgary was in much the same position. Entering their December 23rd game against the Dallas Stars, the Flames had a 14-18-3 record, good for 14th in the Western Conference. Nine points out of the playoffs, they had played three games more than the last-place Oilers and somehow led them by a mere two points.
What has happened to these teams?
The First Overall Pick: Avoid Nugent-Hopkins
Jonathan Willis
February 05 2011 09:39PM
As it stands today, at least four players have a legitimate shot at going first overall: defenceman Adam Larsson of the Swedish Elite League, and forwards Sean Couturier, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Gabriel Landeskog.
After looking through the numbers, I’m convinced that Nugent-Hopkins would be the wrong selection.
Canada vs. Russia Postgame: Collapse
Jonathan Willis
January 05 2011 11:56PM
Three games were played tonight, one in each period. In the first, we saw the Canadian team we had seen throughout the tournament: a powerhouse, offensively capable and much too busy threatening to allow opportunities against. In the second we saw relatively boring hockey, punctuated by the occasional flurry.
Finally, in the third period, we saw either one of the greatest come-from-behind events in tournament history, or one of the greatest collapses.
Size Has No Impact On Faceoff Percentage: 2009-10 Data
Jonathan Willis
December 24 2010 10:36AM
A question that has come up a few times is whether big players tend to have an advantage when taking faceoffs. There is a certain logic to the idea that they do: after all, bigger, stronger players should be able to outmuscle their smaller counterparts in the faceoff circle.
The data, however, suggests something else entirely: that there is no advantage to being big when it comes to taking face-offs.
