Byron Bader draft rankings
- Thread starter BerthMania
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I am interested to see what, if any changes in rankings there will be once it is fixed. I'm not sure how the application of stats in the model is swayed, to be honest, if all prospects of the same league are raised at the same time.
It also came across (to me) that he was already aware of the issue, but I don't know for sure.
It also came across (to me) that he was already aware of the issue, but I don't know for sure.
The biggest issue is, if he stays counting all USNTDP games as equal, it already has a boatload of flaws. The double counting is bad, but not addressing how the USNTDP system plays is fundamentally flawed.
Do you mean weighing USHL games the same as other USNTDP games? I'm not sure if he does. If he's counting "all" games as one big pool then that would point to him doing that, which would be a problem. How much of one is over my head.
He counted non-USHL games. That means he counted games vs much weaker opponents likely equal to the USHL, and games vs tougher opponents less. Figuring out how to quantify the USNTDP schedule is a nightmare. And, historically, USNTDP numbers vs the USHL would be inflated for the U-18 team.
jc17
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I'd love to know the actual process though. The real key thing here is what league factors are they applying for adjustments to the multiple different opponents USNTDP plays. Like, you can't value a D3 team the same as a D1, how are they using for an NHLe for the international tournaments like 4 nations/5 nations/U-18's. It's why trying to quantify USNTDP numbers is beyond a nightmare because there season is so parsed across leagues, and multiple leagues where creating a comparable to NHLe would be a nightmare.
Like the amount of work required to create something that accurately captured USNTDP production is nuts. You'd have to do a more complex version of the Backlund method (invented for Backlund when he was coming to the NHL out of the Allsvensken) where you are drawing samples from D3 players to guys playing u-18 and u-20 European leagues. Like, how do you value a game where they are playing opponents who might sniff the ECHL or lower European leagues but are 4 to 5 years older in a statistical model.
Masked
(Super/star)
The only thing he's good at is promoting himself. His lists are horrific in hindsight.
Assen na yo!
Thankfully, even Dubas isn't this nuts about analytics. This guy didn't have Knies in his top 32 last year, and usually NHL teams actual lists you are getting someone in your top 32 where Knies was drafted. And, its not like this guys list is some mock up consensus where they cancel each other out.
themelkman
Always Delivers
Just because it's an analytical model doesn't mean it's good. If he's inputting data improperly (which he was) or doesn't weight things properly (seems very much that way) the data it's spewing out is useless.
jc17
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Oh, I see what you're saying. I misunderstood and thought you were just looking for more detailed stats separated.
TopDownHockey has his own NHLE model, which splits by each league/tourneys: https://public.tableau.com/app/prof...ncyandProspectProjections/ProspectProjections
Regarding the strength of opponent vs college teams, I don't know how scheduling works but I imagine there's an assumption of somewhat consistent scheduling year to year, so when the points are tallied in the end, the aggregate was against a similar level of competition. But I don't know. It would be interesting to try to get a USNTDP strength of schedule by year.
themelkman
Always Delivers
No one’s saying to take it at face value as who you should draft. It just provides information on historical scoring and how current guys compare to similar production in the past.
It’s not the be all end all, but it’s useful information that more than one NHL org finds valuable
Uh, I understand an analytic model. But, this guy apparently doesn't understand how the USNTDP's stats work and created a fatal flaw in an attempt to create a model. He legit thought both Cutter Gauthier and previously Rocco Grimaldi had 50 goal USNTDP seasons. It's possible he somehow thought Matthews had a 75 goal one and Caufield had an 101 goal one (considering what he did for Grimaldi). If those are the inputs you are using for any analytic model is flawed, the results you publish will be flawed.
I'm not dismissing analytics, I'm dismissing this very sad attempt at one.
jc17
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You might not think it's good, but people are still sort of missing the point. The list isn't supposed to be a conclusive ranking of prospects. Omitting players well-ranked by the consensus, or adding low ranked players isn't "going too far with analytics", its just presenting what one metric shows.
Again, you can think it's a bad metric, but people trying to argue that its an over-reliance on stats don't seem to understand that it is literally ONLY stats.
If Bader wants to defend the list as gospel, that's an over-reliance on stats but the presentation of the list is not.
Yikes. It is confusing how USDP vs USHL stats are often listed, but if you’re doing draft projection models professionally, you should know/understand this.
Also … a 5’8” 159 lb dman is not going 8th overall, nor should he. Although Bader and his model probably think Hutson put up 95 points
themelkman
Always Delivers
I think a lot of people don’t understand though. There’s a lot of people, specially fans of a team picking very early in the draft that were freaking out about this and calling him an idiot for how the model graded a guy who scored very low in his league this year.
I'm not sure you responded to the wrong person here, but I say that pretty clear. I understand its just a model. It's just numbers. But the data he uses to come to an output is flawed. That's my biggest problem with it. It's a bad analytical model. You can go through a bunch of examples of him not weighing certain factors properly, such as:
- Calling Devon Levi a low probability NHLer, even after his near-record setting NCAA year, due mostly to the fact that he was drafted out of the CCHL which he calls a tier three junior league. Clearly there's an over-reliance on the CCHL part, and not weighing enough a .952 SV% in division 1 hockey.
- Calling JJ Peterka a low probability NHLer because "Nobody (in 30 years) who's had a similar development path as Peterka has ever turned into a star. And over half of them don't make the NHL." (that's his exact tweet). Clearly, an overreliance on his DEL production and not nearly enough at his near PPG pace in the AHL in his D+2 season (and over PPG in the playoffs).
It could be argued that I'm a salty Sabres fan that doesn't like how he's ranked our prospects - but remove that part from the equation I would still firmly believe that the weights he assigns to CCHL drafted prospects + players that are drafted out of the DEL (Seider + Stutzle included) should not factor as much as what they've done against top-tier competition in their D+1/D+2 years.
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I'm calling him an idiot because he's created a broken system and charges people money for it. He's also managed to decide to count international games for all USNTDP players (since he somehow measures all their games) but can't figure out equivlancies for Hlinka, Olympics and the World Championships, which dramatically push Slafkovsky down (since two of those would be high leverage events). His system is so beyond broken that it creates massive flaws. I'm not against analytics, I honestly don't care who is the best prospect among Wright, Cooley or Slafkovsky is, and I personally think lists this broken being pushed around is actually a disservice to the analytics movement.
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Well, it's his model, so maybe he should be accountable for the reasonability of its outputs?
jc17
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We're in agreement regarding some of the issues with the quality of it.
Melkman said
which I believe was in reference to people taking issue with the ranking of specific prospects. I agree that it is far from perfect, and that there are plenty of blind spots. But, like I said before, a number of people (HF, twitter, etc) keep saying stuff along the lines of "he goes too far with analytics", which suggests they think he's making a personal ranking heavily influenced by stats, which is a misinterpretation of what he's presenting.
themelkman
Always Delivers
He totally is, but are you going to sit here and tell me the concensus is always right? Just because he’s off of the general opinion doesn’t mean it will be wrong in the end.
He’s only been doing the model for a few years so it’s tough to judge it on past success, but these rankings are put out for free with the intention to add some statistical input to peoples knowledge of the draft. He’s not claiming this should be the be all end all list of who you should draft
That's not at all what I am saying. But his model has been provably terrible and shouldn't be free from criticism. Perhaps he should have updated his inputs after it ranked Stutzle 10th in 2020.
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There were mainstream scouts who had him ranked in that neighborhood as well. As some have pointed out, the last couple drafts are probably going to be screwy looking back because of the limited playing time many prospects had during the pandemic. I don't think it would be wise to draw broad conclusions during that time.
And scouts touted Alexander daigle as the next Gretzky.
It's funny what is and isn't acceptable when ranking prospects.
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