Come! Hug me, for I am an anteater! (Photo: Alex Brandon)
Kevin Klein at Japers Rink wrote a piece about the correlation between puck possession during close games (measured in unblocked shot-attempt percentage) and success. It’s compelling stuff. Here’s my own version of that research.
Since 2009 and excluding the short season, the top five teams in the league based in the standings control an average of 53.1 percent of unblocked shot attempts. Below them, the solid playoff teams (ranked 6 through 10) get about 51.5 percent of the shot attempts.
Teams 11 through 15 get 50.5 percent and teams 16 through 20 get 49.2.
The not-so-good teams own just 48.3 percent of shot attempts. The bottom-5 teams, who are basically your draft lottery teams, get 47.2 percent.
Last season the Caps most closely represented a draft lottery team. This year, with 54.25 percent possession according to fenwick-stats.com, the Caps look more like a Stanley Cup contender.
That doesn’t mean they are one; the season is still way too young. In the coming weeks we will learn for sure. In the meantime, next time save percentages throw the Caps into a five-game slump, look back at that chart and remind yourself that the Caps climbed from the far right to the far left in just five months.
(Freaking Oates, man.)
Previous snapshots: week 1, week 2, week 3
Let’s do the numbers. These are current as of noon on Sunday, November 9th, except they totally do not include Saturday’s game against the Hurricanes. The sample is restricted to 5v5 hockey when the score is close. That means the score is within one goal in the first two periods and tied in the third. There’s a glossary at bottom with an explanatory video.
Forwards
| Player | GP | TOI | SA% | Goal% | PDO | ZS% |
| Latta | 7 | 49.6 | 62.3 | 100.0 | 103.5 | 52.4 |
| Ovechkin | 13 | 135.4 | 60.4 | 50.0 | 95.7 | 56.8 |
| Fehr | 10 | 90.3 | 58.0 | 80 | 107.6 | 47.0 |
| Ward | 13 | 109.7 | 57.8 | 50 | 98.4 | 54.7 |
| Backstrom | 13 | 135.9 | 57.5 | 41.7 | 93.9 | 52.3 |
| Burakovsky | 13 | 98.8 | 53.9 | 58.3 | 103.0 | 66.7 |
| Kuznetsov | 12 | 75.6 | 51.9 | 60.0 | 102.1 | 61.1 |
| Johansson | 13 | 99.0 | 51.5 | 50.0 | 100.0 | 60.8 |
| Beagle | 8 | 53.6 | 51.4 | 33.3 | 95.9 | 39.1 |
| Brouwer | 13 | 103.8 | 51.2 | 50.0 | 99.5 | 62.9 |
| Wilson | 5 | 42.7 | 48.2 | 33.3 | 88.0 | 61.5 |
| Chimera | 13 | 98.6 | 47.8 | 42.9 | 98.4 | 50.8 |
Defense
| Player | GP | TOI | SA% | Goal% | PDO | ZS% |
| Green | 12 | 115.9 | 61.7 | 63.6 | 101.3 | 63.9 |
| Schmidt | 13 | 111.9 | 59.0 | 75.0 | 108.0 | 53.5 |
| Niskanen | 13 | 142.7 | 51.2 | 42.9 | 96.8 | 58.2 |
| Carlson | 13 | 140.7 | 51.2 | 50.0 | 100.1 | 51.5 |
| Orpik | 13 | 154.0 | 50.8 | 40.0 | 97.0 | 58.7 |
| Alzner | 13 | 130.0 | 50.0 | 33.3 | 93.6 | 54.3 |
Observations
- The Caps still control 54.3 percent of unblocked shot attempts (54.09 during close games). Now they’re actually starting to win games as well, which I think is a nice little bonus, like when the peanut shell contains three nuts instead of just two.
- On October 1st, if you were to tell me that Alex Ovechkin‘s team would own more than 60 percent of the shot attempts while he’s playing even after the sample hit 130 minutes, I’d have slapped you in your stupid face. That number has been around 47-48 percent over the last three seasons, and it didn’t go above 55 percent even during the salad days of Bruce Boudreau (maybe more like all-you-can-eat-buffet days of Bruce Boudreau). I still suspect Ovi’s gonna drift down as the sample matures and land somewhere around 54 percent, but the turnaround in his game has been spectacular and raved about not nearly as much as it deserves. The goals are coming.
- Eric Fehr is outscoring opponents 4 to 1 in close game situations and 7 to 4 during all 5v5. He’s dominating out there– no matter what line he’s on. There is no defensible on-ice reason to scratch him. There just isn’t; the results are stupefyingly obvious. I am not a beat reporter and I don’t speak to Barry Trotz, so I’m desperate for someone to explain to me what the justification is to keep one of the Capitals’ best forwards and one of the league’s top decile possession players in the press box. A decision like that loses games.
- DC’s best kept secret, Nick Backstrom, is getting crummy goaltending. Caps goaltenders are saving 86.5 of shots during close games at 5v5 while he’s on the ice and 84.9 during all 5v5 situations. That’ll even out over time, Peter said hopefully, crossing his fingers.
- I think Michael Latta might be awesome. He’s not seeing a ton of action in our sample, and it’s abundantly clear Trotz doesn’t use his fourth line unless he has to, but Latta has done very well in limited exposure.
- A reminder that the snapshot is not absolute. These numbers are not measurements of how good or bad a player is, they’re just measurements of what’s happening on the ice while that player is on during a certain portion of the game. We know the limitations of these data and we avow them. So when Jason Chimera clocks in with the team’s worst shot-attempt differential, we have to acknowledge that it might not be the most flattering sample for his skill set. For example, I think Chimera has been pretty terrific at the penalty kill– particularly at threatening the opponent’s net while shorthanded. There’s more to hockey than just what’s in that table up there, and no one anywhere has ever said otherwise.
- Marcus Johansson was a static player for the last three seasons. Despite some fireworks during the power play, his 5v5 action was stable and not really noteworthy. Now check him out.
| 2013-14 | 2014-15 | |
| Individual unblocked shot attempts per 60 | 5.4 | 9.77 |
| Individual share of team shot attempts | 13.5% | 25.5% |
- Johansson’s personal shot attempt rate has nearly doubled, and his contribution to the total offense is up more than 10 percent. In an interview with Elliotte Friedman, new Caps analyst Tim Barnes said that hockey players change all the time. Mojo is a shining example of that.
- I’m leaving Brooks Laich off the sample until I’m not mortified over my “Brooks Laich will be an iron man again” prediction.
- Muneeb Alam ran the numbers on the best defense pairings during open play in this still-young season. Mike Green and Nate Schmidt were in the top ten. While I don’t think either one had a good week, it’s clear that they’re a great duo. Schmidt’s with-you-without-you numbers give me some pause, but I’m currently of the mindset that he deserves a spot on this roster regardless of the health of the depth chart and his own contract status. What say you?
Glossary
- 5v5 Close. Our sample. The portions of games when each team has five skaters and the score is within one goal in the first two periods and tied during the third.
- GP. Games played.
- TOI. Time on ice. The amount of time that player played during 5v5 close.
- SA%. Shot-attempt percentage, a measurement for puck possession. The share of shot attempts that the player’s team got while he was on the ice. Also known as Fenwick. Above 50 percent is good.
- Goal%. Goal percentage. The share of goals that the player’s team got while he was on the ice. Above 50 percent is good.
- PDO. A meaningless acronym. The sum of a player’s on-ice shooting percentage and his goalies’ on-ice save percentage. Above 100 means the player is getting fortunate results that may reflected in goal%.
- ZS%. Offensive zone start percentage. Excluding neutral-zone starts, the share of shifts that the player starts in the offensive zone, nearer to the opponent’s net.
Thanks to War On Ice for the stats.
