Around the league part 2

[Herby]

5-15-20 and +16 in 12 games for a 9-2-1 team.

Little brother gets a lot of the press and Matthews goal-scoring has been insane, but Q Hughes has been the best player in the NHL so far this season.

 

[lumbergh]

Not really. Shooting percentages and save percentages can run to extremes, particularly over small samples. The Canucks are scoring at greater than a 15% clip right now. Even the Oilers only finished last season at around 12% (which is where the top teams each season usually land). This Canucks team does not have 3% better natural shooting talent than the Oilers team from last season. And Demko and DeSmith just are not collectively going to save 93.6% of the shots the rest of the season. This article has a pretty good example of how PDO is something that normalizes close to 100 for most teams in the long run: The Canucks are the NHL’s most surprising breakout team. Can it last?

Ugh. I can't say this enough times. PDO is not a proxy for "luck". If bloggers say it enough times, it becomes conventional wisdom, but it doesn't make it correct.

Wanna guess which team had the highest PDO last season? Boston Bruins at 1.040. Wanna guess which team had the best record last season? Boston Bruins. Wanna guess which four teams had the worst PDO last season? The Sharks, Blue Jackets, Ducks and Blackhawks. Wanna guess which four teams had the worst records last season? The Sharks, Blue Jackets, Ducks and Blackhawks.

Explain to my why 13 of the top 15 teams in the league had PDOs >1.0 while the 12 of the worst 13 teams in the league had PDOs <1.0. Was it luck?

You might think, what's the difference between a PDO of 1.010 versus 1.00? It's just 1.0%, right? That can't mean anything, right? Being that a team takes ~2300-3000 shots in a year, that 1% results in a difference of 23-30 goals. That's the difference between a good team and a mediocre team. Every playoff team last season except the Panthers had a goal differential of +20 or more.

Season after season PDO is strongly correlated with point percentage. It's not rocket science. You can look it up yourself.

Yes, the Canucks' PDO is absurdly high in 12 games this season. It doesn't negate the fact that they have been really good at outscoring their opponents. That's what PDO measures. How good you are at putting the puck in the opponent's net and how good you are at keeping it out of your own in one simple number. It's also how you mostly win games.

PDO is really useful. It tells you how good a team has been. You can calculate it yourself, there's no hidden formula. It's. Not. Luck.

 

[Fishhead]

Vancouvers PDO is exceptionally high. The blowouts play a part, but the gap between VAN at #1 and VGK at #2 is bigger than the gap between VGK at #2 and Buffalo at #19. They are still a good team, but they've had the bounces going their way against below-average competition. The last thing you want is to be regressing back when you play tougher competition, but it is what it is.

I still think they're a playoff team, Seattle is probably the only west team that's really "due" for good luck and isn't really far behind. SJ, Calgary, and Edmonton have been unlucky, but it's a longshot for them at this point for a gain in bounces to make a big enough difference.

 

[lumbergh]

5-15-20 and +16 in 12 games for a 9-2-1 team.

Little brother gets a lot of the press and Matthews goal-scoring has been insane, but Q Hughes has been the best player in the NHL so far this season.

Oh hey, guess who has the second highest PDO in the league amongst defensemen (>100 minutes) this season? Quinn Hughes.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Ugh. I can't say this enough times. PDO is not a proxy for "luck". If bloggers say it enough times, it becomes conventional wisdom, but it doesn't make it correct.

Wanna guess which team had the highest PDO last season? Boston Bruins at 1.040. Wanna guess which team had the best record last season? Boston Bruins. Wanna guess which four teams had the worst PDO last season? The Sharks, Blue Jackets, Ducks and Blackhawks. Wanna guess which four teams had the worst records last season? The Sharks, Blue Jackets, Ducks and Blackhawks.

Explain to my why 13 of the top 15 teams in the league had PDOs >1.0 while the 12 of the worst 13 teams in the league had PDOs <1.0. Was it luck?

You might think, what's the difference between a PDO of 1.010 versus 1.00? It's just 1.0%, right? That can't mean anything, right? Being that a team takes ~2300-3000 shots in a year, that 1% results in a difference of 23-30 goals. That's the difference between a good team and a mediocre team. Every playoff team last season except the Panthers had a goal differential of +20 or more.

Season after season PDO is strongly correlated with point percentage. It's not rocket science. You can look it up yourself.

Yes, the Canucks' PDO is absurdly high in 12 games this season. It doesn't negate the fact that they have been really good at outscoring their opponents. That's what PDO measures. How good you are at putting the puck in the opponent's net and how good you are at keeping it out of your own in one simple number. It's also how you mostly win games.

PDO is really useful. It tells you how good a team has been. You can calculate it yourself, there's no hidden formula. It's. Not. Luck.

Like before, I think we're having two different conversations.

PDO is a measure of how good your shooting and goaltending has been. I think we all agree on that.

Some won't--but I agree that the best teams will slightly outperform and the worst teams will slightly underperform the magic 1.0 #--because they have better shooters and/or goaltenders.

But you seem to suggest that a near 1.1 PDO is normal and indicative of how good the team is when really it's MUCH more likely that they're not continuing to shoot 15% AND get .940 goaltending all year. No one but you agrees with that, and that's why we call it 'luck.' Hell even the Van fans talk about their fortunate bounces thus far, wanna go argue with them about it? It's not saying they're bad--only that they've been very good AND very fortunate and other stats suggest their play overall needs some improvement and that PDO is ripe to come down in short order.

 

[Herby]

Vancouvers PDO is exceptionally high. The blowouts play a part, but the gap between VAN at #1 and VGK at #2 is bigger than the gap between VGK at #2 and Buffalo at #19. They are still a good team, but they've had the bounces going their way against below-average competition. The last thing you want is to be regressing back when you play tougher competition, but it is what it is.

I still think they're a playoff team, Seattle is probably the only west team that's really "due" for good luck and isn't really far behind. SJ, Calgary, and Edmonton have been unlucky, but it's a longshot for them at this point for a gain in bounces to make a big enough difference.

Vancouver is running well this season, I think they ran pretty poorly last season and should have been a better team.

Sometimes the hockey gods have a way of correcting things, in 2014 the Kings ran extremely well, and then the next season we were one of the unluckiest teams in the league.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Vancouver is running well this season, I think they ran pretty poorly last season and should have been a better team.

Sometimes the hockey gods have a way of correcting things, in 2014 the Kings ran extremely well, and then the next season we were one of the unluckiest teams in the league.

They definitely deserved a better fate last year and banged-up Demko was a large part of the concern.

Hockey gods appear to be rewarding them for that a bit now.

 

[Fishhead]

PDO correlates with wins, but it definitely has a bounce or luck component. It's not purely luck but at the NHL level of competition where the gap between teams is small except for a few outliers, luck makes all the difference in the world. The Islanders had the 2nd highest PDO in the league last year and barely snuck in. Far better than the Kings, and they weren't as talented or as good as the Kings were. Boston was stupid high last year - the gap between them at 5v5 and the NYI at #2 was almost exactly the same as the NYI at #2 and the CBJ at #32. They got fortunate last year in the regular season, leading to historic numbers. Then they got bounced in the first round when things stopped going their way. It's not like a team that good just forgets how to play, that's the lucky/hot/cold component of it.

You make your own luck, too, which can't be ignored either, so good teams generally have positive PDOs. Over a season other teams adjust and inevitably everyone bunches up.

 

[lumbergh]

Like before, I think we're having two different conversations.

PDO is a measure of how good your shooting and goaltending has been. I think we all agree on that.

Some won't--but I agree that the best teams will slightly outperform and the worst teams will slightly underperform the magic 1.0 #--because they have better shooters and/or goaltenders.

But you seem to suggest that a near 1.1 PDO is normal and indicative of how good the team is when really it's MUCH more likely that they're not continuing to shoot 15% AND get .940 goaltending all year. No one but you agrees with that, and that's why we call it 'luck.' Hell even the Van fans talk about their fortunate bounces thus far, wanna go argue with them about it? It's not saying they're bad--only that they've been very good AND very fortunate and other stats suggest their play overall needs some improvement and that PDO is ripe to come down in short order.

Where did I suggest that a near 1.1 PDO is normal? Where did I say that Vancouver is going to continue shooting 15% and get .940 goaltending all year?

PDO is an indicator of how good your team HAS BEEN. It's not a measure of luck.

You're right. We're having two different conversations. I'm in reality-land talking about a stat that shows what is. I'm not talking about luck, what should be, who deserves what. Just stop taking my posts into shoulda-woulda-coulda land.

 

[Kingfan1967]

Hatred for San Jose runs deep, but on Thursday I will be rooting so hard for the Sharts. My goodness the meltdown in Oilertown might just be the greatest of all time if they lose. LOL. Just this once Sharts please make us all proud.

Is it wrong to hate watch that game? At least one of them will LOSE, and a win won't really help either one of them.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Where did I suggest that a near 1.1 PDO is normal? Where did I say that Vancouver is going to continue shooting 15% and get .940 goaltending all year?

PDO is an indicator of how good your team HAS BEEN. It's not a measure of luck.

You're right. We're having two different conversations. I'm in reality-land talking about a stat that shows what is. I'm not talking about luck, what should be, who deserves what. Just stop taking my posts into shoulda-woulda-coulda land.

Right here:

It might actually suggest that PDO is a very valuable stat as it relates to how good a team is.

When you say it's how strong your goaltending and shooting has been, you are correct.

When you say it has value to how good a team is...it opens the door to the above conversation.

Don't act surprised-pikachu when that gets questioned!

 

[Schrute farms]

J/K --

 

[King'sPawn]

PDO is the new age +/-. It's extremely context dependent but gets treated like it paints a perfect picture.

 

[bland]

So much wasted time just to understand that Vancouver is playing well.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

So much wasted time just to understand that Vancouver is playing well.

Copy and paste is hard!

Actually if anything that's why we're having the PDO discussion--actually watching vancouver and other metrics suggest their actual on-ice play (vs results) leaves a lot to be desired (at least when Pettersson / Hughes are off the ice).

I'd hypothesize their play as a team will pick up as their PDO settles, but that the Kings will pass them soon, and we'll be heading into the Christmas break something like VGK-LAK-VAN-ANA with the gap tiny between Vegas and Kings.

There's being opportunistic and then there's being dominant. Vancouver has been the former so far, Kings the latter.

 

[lumbergh]

PDO is the new age +/-. It's extremely context dependent but gets treated like it paints a perfect picture.

What context do you need to add save percentage and shooting percentage? Good teams generally have high PDO, bad teams generally have low PDO. The only way to outdo PDO is to regularly outshoot your opponent.

Edit: You're right if you apply PDO to individual players. It has to be applied in the context of the team's overall quality. However, PDO can be applied to team stats easily with no additional context.

 

[johnjm22]

In 2012, the Kings were 28th in PDO (out of 30 teams), but the 6th highest xGF%.

This years Sharks are 32nd in PDO, and 31st in xGF%.

This years Oilers are 30th in PDO, and 3rd in xGF%.


PDO with some context gives you a better idea of what to make of a team. Sharks are getting bad results as they should, Oilers are playing a lot better than their record.

 

[lexlavender]

Ugh. I can't say this enough times. PDO is not a proxy for "luck". If bloggers say it enough times, it becomes conventional wisdom, but it doesn't make it correct.

Wanna guess which team had the highest PDO last season? Boston Bruins at 1.040. Wanna guess which team had the best record last season? Boston Bruins. Wanna guess which four teams had the worst PDO last season? The Sharks, Blue Jackets, Ducks and Blackhawks. Wanna guess which four teams had the worst records last season? The Sharks, Blue Jackets, Ducks and Blackhawks.

Explain to my why 13 of the top 15 teams in the league had PDOs >1.0 while the 12 of the worst 13 teams in the league had PDOs <1.0. Was it luck?

You might think, what's the difference between a PDO of 1.010 versus 1.00? It's just 1.0%, right? That can't mean anything, right? Being that a team takes ~2300-3000 shots in a year, that 1% results in a difference of 23-30 goals. That's the difference between a good team and a mediocre team. Every playoff team last season except the Panthers had a goal differential of +20 or more.

Season after season PDO is strongly correlated with point percentage. It's not rocket science. You can look it up yourself.

Yes, the Canucks' PDO is absurdly high in 12 games this season. It doesn't negate the fact that they have been really good at outscoring their opponents. That's what PDO measures. How good you are at putting the puck in the opponent's net and how good you are at keeping it out of your own in one simple number. It's also how you mostly win games.

PDO is really useful. It tells you how good a team has been. You can calculate it yourself, there's no hidden formula. It's. Not. Luck.

The translation to luck comes into play when all the data shows that eventually PDO regresses to 1 over time. That isn't to say that there aren't teams which can have a naturally higher than 1 PDO because they are extremely good, or the opposite because they are extremely bad. This is basically what you are saying.

However, when evaluating whether a team is good or lucky, that is where other fundamentals of advanced stats come into play. What is their possession numbers, their shot attempt percentages, their expected goals for, their shooting heat maps. All of these areas of data combined with PDO tell a story.

Right now, Vancouver has the following team stats:

5v5
Expected Goals For%: 44.97
Corsi for %: 48.52
Corsi Close%: 50.66

This, including their sky high PDO, tells me that they are a middling team that is getting lucky, and also them getting lucky early has them pumping the brakes on possession to maintain leads. They are not, on average, a team which is out possessing or out chancing their opponents currently.

 

[johnjm22]

I'm guessing EDM will be calling up one of their AHL goalies to give them a try.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

wow they arrived at the Cal Petersen moment early

 

[lumbergh]

The translation to luck comes into play when all the data shows that eventually PDO regresses to 1 over time. That isn't to say that there aren't teams which can have a naturally higher than 1 PDO because they are extremely good, or the opposite because they are extremely bad. This is basically what you are saying.

However, when evaluating whether a team is good or lucky, that is where other fundamentals of advanced stats come into play. What is their possession numbers, their shot attempt percentages, their expected goals for, their shooting heat maps. All of these areas of data combined with PDO tell a story.

Right now, Vancouver has the following team stats:

5v5
Expected Goals For%: 44.97
Corsi for %: 48.52
Corsi Close%: 50.66

This, including their sky high PDO, tells me that they are a middling team that is getting lucky, and also them getting lucky early has them pumping the brakes on possession to maintain leads. They are not, on average, a team which is out possessing or out chancing their opponents currently.

PDO does not regress to 1 over time. I just wrote earlier that the Boston Bruins had a PDO of 1.04 for 2022-23. It's because they're good. PDO just tells you they were really good.

Again, PDO does not equal luck. Regression towards 1 is true if the events that drive shooting percentage and save percentage are random. In reality good teams generally have high PDOs above 1 and bad teams generaly have low PDOs below 1. You can check this season after season. No regression.

I challenge you or any of the advanced stats cogniscenti to define luck without using PDO. What is puck luck? I'll wait.

 

[bmr]

I'm guessing EDM will be calling up one of their AHL goalies to give them a try.

Campbell played incredibly well for us. Was really like a career revival. Things can really change quickly in this sport.

 

[johnjm22]

The Oilers will turn it around very soon IMO.

 

[Axl Rhoadz]

I'm guessing EDM will be calling up one of their AHL goalies to give them a try.

Isn't it amazing that a coach/GM like Ken Holland/Jay Woodcroft can go from absolute geniuses to total bums in the span of like 10-12 games. Sounds like another team I know.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

PDO does not regress to 1 over time. I just wrote earlier that the Boston Bruins had a PDO of 1.04 for 2022-23. It's because they're good. PDO just tells you they were really good.

Again, PDO does not equal luck. Regression towards 1 is true if the events that drive shooting percentage and save percentage are random. In reality good teams generally have high PDOs above 1 and bad teams generaly have low PDOs below 1. You can check this season after season. No regression.

I challenge you or any of the advanced stats cogniscenti to define luck without using PDO. What is puck luck? I'll wait.

Let's make it simple--do you believe that the Canucks are a team that will beat the NHL record for shooting % by 3 whole percentage points

AND

That they will set the single-season goaltending save percentage record as well?