How much of the NHL is luck based? Out of all sports leagues, where does NHL rank in luck factor?

[Bjornar Moxnes]

Pretty much the title. Curious on how the NHL ranks as far as luck based.

 

[WhiskeyYerTheDevils]

Pretty high in terms of how often the better team actually wins.

 

[DJJones]

We have goalies and a puck flying across ice. No other sport has anything like that.

It's more about high variance than luck though

 

[JoeSakic13]

I believe the official breakdown is:

10% luck
20% skill
15% concentrated power of will
5% pleasure
50% pain

 

[tuozzi]

The more goals (or other points) the less luck is a factor. Soccer is probably the only major sport where luck is more significant. One fluke goal often decides the outcome.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Hockey in general is pretty heavily luck-based. There are a bunch of major confounding factors in every game. I started to list them, but it's a long list.

The better hockey team will win more games over a long enough schedule, but even the very best teams lose about 30% of the time. It takes very large talent gaps for results to become predictable in this sport, by nature of its inherent randomness.

 

[rynryn]

MIN are all luck all the time.

 

[The Professional]

More than people would care to admit.

 

[Obvious Fabertism]

There was an analysis on this that I read a few years back, statistically Hockey is the most luck based of the big 4 by a significant margin, at least game to game. The NFL season is shorter making for higher luck based win percentages and such, but Hockey is more luck based in game.

Hockey is luckiest major North American sport: Researchers | Toronto Sun

 

[Soundwave]

In hockey? Definitely more than most people probably think.

Basketball is probably the least luck based.

This happens all the time in hockey: team wins 3 games that they probably didn't play great in, they play harder the next 3 games but maybe lose 2 or 3 of them somehow.

 

[AdvancedPressure]

I think it is higher than most team sports, probably by a lot.

 

[Devs3cups]

Video by Vox I saw a few years back. Pretty much explains it all, hockey is heavily influenced by luck. Interesting video that’s for sure!

 

[MadLuke]

The more goals (or other points) the less luck is a factor. Soccer is probably the only major sport where luck is more significant. One fluke goal often decides the outcome.

Not sure about that, obviously their system of the very large sample of games to determine the winner will tend to be impossible for a lucky champions winner but how much control and action need to occur before a goal happen over the very large field, according to some study luck ranking look like this

Lottery/roulette


..... giant gap.....


Nhl Hockey (highest luck of any sport)

.... big gap....
NFL
MLB
Premier league

....big gap....

NBA
..good gap..
Chess

 

[Beau Knows]

Hockey is extremely luck based, even a 7 game series isn't necessarily won by the team that played best. Norm Macdonald said you should "never bet on football cause the ball ain't round", that especially applies to hockey.

 

[Anglesmith]

Individual games are. 82 games is enough to let the standings sort themselves out.

Similarly, baseball is a sport where anyone can beat anyone on a given night, but they play 162 games so that the cream eventually rises.

The main takeaway should be that hockey fans' tendency to put playoff results on a pedestal above regular season is a bit silly.

 

[Confucius]

Like soccer, hockey has a goalie and the way he plays determines the outcome most of the time. Soccer does have an advantage over hockey in that if their team D is very good they can hold the opposition to zero shots, which negates the goalie problem. The other sports are team D and much more predictable, although there is never a lock.

 

[1989]

I believe the official breakdown is:

10% luck
20% skill
15% concentrated power of will
5% pleasure
50% pain

Who are you, again?

 

[Fig]

Depends on the definition of luck I guess.

Gio once said something along the lines of, "Without hard work, you won't get those lucky chances." You can't score without making shot attempts and hockey is the type of game where you'll get flattened if you screw around too long.

Hockey is definitely more unpredictable than other sports, but perhaps that's because there's more in the game of hockey that's always statistically relevant vs irrelevant when compared to certain other sports.

Additionally, hockey is one of the few sports where your best players don't play the entire game for basically the entire season. A goalie playing 75% of games or more, you worry they're over worked. Skaters rarely play more than 50% of the game in terms of TOI. What is the difference in taking advantage of an opportunity all your players are constantly seeking vs luck?

Like soccer, hockey has a goalie and the way he plays determines the outcome most of the time. The other sports are team D and much more predictable, although there is never a lock.

In Basketball and Soccer, plenty of players play 100% of the game for the whole season. I can't think of another sport that actively cycles through multiple players every few minutes.

 

[MarkusKetterer]

Who are you, again?

He’s a minor fort.

 

[JoeSakic13]

Who are you, again?

 

[MadLuke]

Additionally, hockey is one of the few sports where your best players don't play the entire game for basically the entire season. A goalie playing 75% of games or more, you worry they're over worked. Skaters rarely play more than 50% of the game in terms of TOI. What is the difference in taking advantage of an opportunity all your players are constantly seeking vs luck?

Baseball is probably the worst in that regard, if you are lucky your star goes what around at bat 12.5% of the time and the opposing team can avoid them, the biggest star pitcher start 20-22 % of the games, it did show with Trout-Ohtani.

When you think about it in football, offense/d/special team, it is probably similar, the NBA could be special in that regard in north America.

 

[Fig]

Baseball is probably the worst in that regard, if you are lucky your star goes what are at the bat 12.5% of the time and the opposing team can avoid them, the biggest star pitcher start 20-22 % of the games, it did show with Trout-Ohtani.

When you think about it in football, offense/d/special team, it is probably similar, the NBA could be special in that regard in north America.

Baseball is basically one at a time vs the opposition though. Not multiple vs multiple like hockey. These constantly repeated actions make it much easier to predict statistically.

Fair point on Football, but it's still basically fixed match ups in comparison to fluid match ups in hockey, isn't it? (Ie: O line vs D line)

 

[notDatsyuk]

17.42% luck.

Oddly enough, that's exactly the same percentage as the percentage of statistics that are made up on the spot.

 

[MadLuke]

Baseball is basically one at a time vs the opposition though. Not multiple vs multiple like hockey. These constantly repeated actions make it much easier to predict statistically.

Fair point on Football, but it's still basically fixed match ups in comparison to fluid match ups in hockey, isn't it? (Ie: O line vs D line)

I was purely talking about the best players time playing the game being specially low in Hockey, I think Basketball is the big outlier on how high it is in that regard more than Hockey being specially low, not on the luck factor.

 

[Do Make Say Think]

Good games have a lot of variance