08-09' Blackhawks (46-24-12) 104 PTS - 4th Seed In The West!

[Derwood]

serious Hockey question (because I don't know the answer):

 

Since they eliminated ties, why do they continue with the points system in arranging the standings? Why not go to a traditional win % system like every other sport? I understand that they're giving a point for a SOL, but how different would the standings really be if you scrapped that and went to win %?

SOLs screw with the winning % system, since it's technically a loss for one team and a win for the other, and yet an extra point is awarded.

 

what I'm asking is why not ditch SOL's, make it a straight up W-L record and go with win %?

[bukie]

serious Hockey question (because I don't know the answer):

 

Since they eliminated ties, why do they continue with the points system in arranging the standings? Why not go to a traditional win % system like every other sport? I understand that they're giving a point for a SOL, but how different would the standings really be if you scrapped that and went to win %?

SOLs screw with the winning % system, since it's technically a loss for one team and a win for the other, and yet an extra point is awarded.

 

what I'm asking is why not ditch SOL's, make it a straight up W-L record and go with win %?

Because the league still wants to reward a team for pushing a game past regulation.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

serious Hockey question (because I don't know the answer):

 

Since they eliminated ties, why do they continue with the points system in arranging the standings? Why not go to a traditional win % system like every other sport? I understand that they're giving a point for a SOL, but how different would the standings really be if you scrapped that and went to win %?

SOLs screw with the winning % system, since it's technically a loss for one team and a win for the other, and yet an extra point is awarded.

 

what I'm asking is why not ditch SOL's, make it a straight up W-L record and go with win %?

 

They feel that ties are the end of regulation are boring, and that any system that doesn't give something to the loser will lead to boring, defensive endgames.

[Derwood]

serious Hockey question (because I don't know the answer):

 

Since they eliminated ties, why do they continue with the points system in arranging the standings? Why not go to a traditional win % system like every other sport? I understand that they're giving a point for a SOL, but how different would the standings really be if you scrapped that and went to win %?

SOLs screw with the winning % system, since it's technically a loss for one team and a win for the other, and yet an extra point is awarded.

 

what I'm asking is why not ditch SOL's, make it a straight up W-L record and go with win %?

Because the league still wants to reward a team for pushing a game past regulation.

 

At least they ditched the ties. Those were the worst.

[bukie]

I'm probably in the minority, but I liked the system they went with for a year where they awarded 3 points for a regulation win, 2 for an OT win/SOW, and 1 for an OT/SOL. It was too hard for the average consumer to keep up with, though, on the whole. At least then all games are weighted equally, and teams would actually go for the win in regulation since it meant something extra.

[bukie]

Wonderful stuff. Thank you.

 

The next step would be to see how each team is translating goal differential into points. I suspect the Hawks are getting the hockey equivalent of a pythagorean screwjob.

 

If only they'd go ahead and do Hockey Prospectus like I keep hoping.

The trouble with doing a pythagorean system is it will come up with an equivalent winning percentage, which just doesn't work with hockey.

 

Or maybe it will if I modify the rate calculations slightly and do it based on current points / possible points.

[bukie]

Even more stat geekery...

 

Thanks to Kyle, I started thinking about a possible way to do a pythagorean based on goal differential.

 

In baseball, the Pythagorean expected value for a team is calculated by

            (Runs Scored)^2
-------------------------------------------
(Runs Scored)^2 + (Runs Allowed)^2

 

That works for baseball because the average team is at .500.

 

However, as has been discussed, a winning percentage is impossible to calculate accurately, because teams are awarded for overtime losses, meaning not every game has an equal weight. So, I calculated the average number of points per game to be approximately 1.125, or 9/8.

 

So, I decided to come up with a slight variation on pythagorean with the average PPG factored in (which will, obviously, fluctuate from week to week and even year to year). To calculate the pythagorean estimated points for a team, then, I went with the following formula:

 

       (Goals Scored)^2
------------------------------------   * (Total Possible Points) * (Average PPG)
(Goals Scored)^2 + (Goals Allowed)^2

 

...with the total possible points being twice the number of games played (i.e. a win every game).

 

That produced what I'll call Pythagorean Points (PYPs). This was interesting, but still a little misleading, because there was a variation on the number of games each team played. So, for example, the Hawks PYP was 33.9, while Vancouver's was 36.2, but Vancouver had played 3 additional games, so on average the Hawks were still doing better.

 

So, I took it a step further, and calculated the Pythagorean PPG (PY-PPG) in an effort to gauge the effective point rate of each team for comparison. Very similar to the prior formula:

       (Goals Scored)^2
------------------------------------   * (Average PPG)
(Goals Scored)^2 + (Goals Allowed)^2

 

So, finally, I ran PYP and PY-PPG on every team, and calculated the difference between the expected and actual values (a negative value for Diff means they are under-performing their expectation, and a positive value means they are over-performing their expectation), and then sorted the teams in order of PY-PPG (the expected point rate based on pythagorean) to come up with the Adjusted NHL Standings:

 

Eastern Conference										
Teams	      Division  Games Points  GF  GA   PPG    PYP   Diff  PY-PPG   PPG-Diff
Boston        Northeast    27     42  94  59 1.556   43.6   -1.6   1.614     -0.059
Pittsburgh    Atlantic     27     34  87  75 1.259   34.9   -0.9   1.291     -0.031
Montreal      Northeast    26     35  79  69 1.346   33.2    1.8   1.276      0.070
New Jersey    Atlantic     24     30  70  63 1.250   29.8    0.2   1.243      0.007
Philadelphia  Atlantic	  26     32  84  78 1.231   31.4    0.6   1.208      0.023
Washington    Southeast    28     33  88  86 1.179   32.2    0.8   1.151      0.028
NY Rangers    Atlantic     30     38  77  76 1.267   34.2    3.8   1.140      0.127
Ottawa        Northeast    25     25  63  63 1.000   28.1   -3.1   1.125     -0.125
Buffalo       Northeast    27     29  74  79 1.074   28.4    0.6   1.052      0.023
Florida       Southeast    27     27  67  76 1.000   26.6    0.4   0.984      0.016
Toronto       Northeast    28     26  84  98 0.929   26.7   -0.7   0.953     -0.024
Carolina      Southeast    28     29  71  83 1.036   26.6    2.4   0.951      0.085
Atlanta       Southeast    26     21  77  93 0.808   23.8   -2.8   0.915     -0.107
NY Islanders  Atlantic     27     22  70  94 0.815   21.7    0.3   0.803      0.012
Tampa Bay     Southeast    27     20  63  88 0.741   20.6   -0.6   0.762     -0.022

Western Conference										
Teams         Division  Games Points  GF  GA   PPG    PYP   Diff  PY-PPG   PPG-Diff
San Jose      Pacific      27     46 102  64 1.704   43.6    2.4   1.614      0.089
Minnesota     Northwest    26     31  72  56 1.192   36.5   -5.5   1.402     -0.210
Chicago       Central      25     31  90  73 1.240   33.9   -2.9   1.357     -0.117
Detroit       Central      26     40  95  80 1.538   34.2    5.8   1.316      0.222
Vancouver     Northwest    28     33  86  74 1.179   36.2   -3.2   1.293     -0.114
Anaheim       Pacific      28     33  82  79 1.179   32.7    0.3   1.167      0.012
Calgary       Northwest    27     33  80  80 1.222   30.4    2.6   1.125      0.097
Los Angeles   Pacific      26     26  69  72 1.000   28.0   -2.0   1.077     -0.077
Edmonton      Northwest    26     28  74  78 1.077   27.7    0.3   1.066      0.011
St. Louis     Central      26     27  76  81 1.038   27.4   -0.4   1.053     -0.015
Nashville     Central      27     30  77  85 1.111   27.4    2.6   1.014      0.097
Colorado      Northwest    27     27  72  80 1.000   27.2   -0.2   1.007     -0.007
Columbus      Central      27     25  76  86 0.926   26.6   -1.6   0.987     -0.061
Phoenix       Pacific      27     26  69  79 0.963   26.3   -0.3   0.974     -0.011
Dallas        Pacific      26     24  72  93 0.923   21.9    2.1   0.843      0.080

 

Interesting data, but take it with a grain of salt, as I currently have no idea how much this fluctuates from day to day, let alone week to week. However, according to the data:

- Minnesota is the team most under-performing their statistics, by a wide margin over the Blackhawks and Senators

- Detroit is the team most over-performing their statistics, by a wide margin over the Rangers.

[bukie]

For the people who couldn't care less about the numbers, here's a set of power rankings based on my calculations:

 

1. San Jose

2. Boston

3. Minnesota

4. Chicago

5. Detroit

6. Vancouver

7. Pittsburgh

8. Montreal

9. New Jersey

10. Philadelphia

11. Anaheim

12. Washington

13. NY Rangers

14. Ottawa

15. Calgary

16. Los Angeles

17. Edmonton

18. St. Louis

19. Buffalo

20. Nashville

21. Colorado

22. Columbus

23. Florida

24. Phoenix

25. Toronto

26. Carolina

27. Atlanta

28. Dallas

29. NY Islanders

30. Tampa Bay

[Hairyducked Idiot]

I pledge you the middle name of my first-born son.

[Cynosure]

Just got a chance to read the last 25 or so posts... very interesting stuff, thank you for that!

[Cynosure]

No Versteeg tonight, but I still think the Hawks romp the Senators.

 

4-1 or 5-2.

 

Goal from Kaner (he's due), and a couple points from Sharp.

[kujay]

It'll be radio only for me tonight. It would be nice of NHL.com would give online feeds for free to Center Ice subscribers. I'll be on the road tonight. I'm sure there's a way to watch the games online for a price, but I'm not going to do that since I'm already paying for CI.

 

And no, I'm not gonna buy a slingbox.

[Cynosure]

It'll be radio only for me tonight. It would be nice of NHL.com would give online feeds for free to Center Ice subscribers. I'll be on the road tonight. I'm sure there's a way to watch the games online for a price, but I'm not going to do that since I'm already paying for CI.

 

And no, I'm not gonna buy a slingbox.

 

Kujay, you know how to watch the games online for free, or you don't want to "steal" the stream?

[kujay]

It'll be radio only for me tonight. It would be nice of NHL.com would give online feeds for free to Center Ice subscribers. I'll be on the road tonight. I'm sure there's a way to watch the games online for a price, but I'm not going to do that since I'm already paying for CI.

 

And no, I'm not gonna buy a slingbox.

 

Kujay, you know how to watch the games online for free, or you don't want to "steal" the stream?

 

:D

 

I totally forgot about that.

[Cynosure]

God I hate work from 4-5pm on Hawks nights! I won't be home until 6, gotta cook some dinner won't be able to do my pregame research until 6:45ish... I like knowing everything from injuries, to scratches, and love to read up on players I haven't heard of... I am trying my hardest to refrain from doing that now and nto finishing up my damn work!!!!!

[Cynosure]

No Versteeg tonight, but I still think the Hawks romp the Senators.

 

4-1 or 5-2.

 

Goal from Kaner (he's due), and a couple points from Sharp.

 

PATRICK KANE

[kujay]

Somebody called it. Was that you?

 

Okay, I just realized after I yelled out "HE SCORED!" that I'm not in my living room and the people in the ten rooms around me just heard that. #-o

[Cynosure]

HAWKS GOAL

 

1 - 5:17 (PP) - Kane scores (13), assisted by Sharp (10).

 

Hawks lead 1-0.

[Cynosure]

Somebody called it. Was that you?

 

Okay, I just realized after I yelled out "HE SCORED!" that I'm not in my living room and the people in the ten rooms around me just heard that. #-o

 

I also said a couple points from Sharp.... and he got an assist ;)

[Cynosure]

"FIGHT"

 

Brouwer vs. Niel

 

Gay fight.

[manbearcub]

"FIGHT"

 

Brouwer vs. Niel

 

Gay fight.

So it was a good fight?

[Cynosure]

"FIGHT"

 

Brouwer vs. Niel

 

Gay fight.

So it was a good fight?

 

Touche...

Edited December 11, 2008 by Cynosure

[kujay]

Huet is standing on his head tonight.

[Cynosure]

Kujay, are you lfchockey on HFboards.com?

I knew Cold Play would be around when Huet is standing on his head

[kujay]

Jesus Kaner, 8 PIMs already.