Is the Selke an accurate award?

[super6646]

this is ....... really sad at this point.

How did they do this year?

47 points -150

last year

60 points - 87

3/4 of a goal per game better with him than without.

So, first off, you are dead ugly, mongoloid idiot wrong

Secondly, a year later and you still need to broadcast how stupid you are.

Is this at all necessary?

 

[Phil McKraken]

Would like to see more 4th line PK kind of guys get honored.

What are we even measuring at that point. Best forward who isn't good enough to utilize for offense?

That's kind of the problem with the Selke as a whole. I'm pretty sure guys like McDavid, MacKinnon and Kucherov would be Selke finalists every year if they re-prioritized their game enough from offense to defense

People love to treat athletes like boy band members with their own unique specialities that can't be replicated, but I have the controversial opinion "defensive skill" is just "skill", and that defense is simply an easier version of offense. Anyone who disagrees should explain what part of defense isn't also part of offense.

 

[elmaco]

this is ....... really sad at this point.

How did they do this year?

47 points -150

last year

60 points - 87

3/4 of a goal per game better with him than without.

So, first off, you are dead ugly, mongoloid idiot wrong

Secondly, a year later and you still need to broadcast how stupid you are.

Wow you must love Erik Karlsson

 

[Sniperberg]

Forwards should focus on scoring the goal while defenders do the defense. Having an award for best defensive offenseman is just stupid.

You want more defense? Play with 3 defendermen instead of 3 forwards.

 

[JackSlater]

As much as I generally hate Selke voting, it's hard to beat Jack Adams voting when it comes to inaccurate. It's just really hard to look at a given season and be confident on which coach did the best job of coaching. Selke is second worst, with voters openly admitting that they consider offence, which is completely irrelevant to the definition of the Selke, and likely being unable to identify defensve play unless a top defensive player does well in the defensive stat that is in fashion at the time.

As others have said, the Selke winner is usually pretty good, but the other results from it are often horrible.

 

[Winged Wheel Willy]

It is not. The Norris is distorted as well, but this is the worst. The Selke imo is an award for the likes of Keane, Pandolfo, Madden, Pahlsson, Fiddler, Draper to get their day in the sunshine, but it has mutated from best defensive forward to best 2-way player.

 

[Buck Naked]

Forwards should focus on scoring the goal while defenders do the defense. Having an award for best defensive offenseman is just stupid.

You want more defense? Play with 3 defendermen instead of 3 forwards.

Yes. Let's also go back to 1929 and reverse the forward passing rule. Also, all goalies must stand up at all times. Screw this entertaining game we hate so much so that we spend time on forums spewing on it for evolving and being a fun watch. Darrrrrn it!

 

[Spearmint Rhino]

If you could pick anyone in the league which 3 forwards do you want on the ice protecting a one goal lead in the final minute of Game 7 Stanley Cup Final?

I don’t think Matthew’s would be in the Top 30 let alone Top 3

 

[Midnight Judges]

Sharks were -55 when Karlsson wasn't on the ice.

Karlsson was also +/- 0 at 5on5 playing behind by far the leagues worst goaltending with a -44 GSAA. His bad +/- was solely due to 25 empty net goals against.

He also put up 101 points playing with bad players, finishing 2nd in the league in 5on5 points with 65, which was also ahead of McDavid.

The Sharks would had a historically terrible season if they didn't have Karlsson, who was clearly the leagues best defenseman that season.

Uh huh. Then he went the Penguins and the Penguins' winning percentage went from .555 to .538.

So that's your theory? A team added the best defenseman in the world, had all their star players remain healthy, and somehow got worse?

 

[Midnight Judges]

The tough thing to overcome for the Selke is many of the actual best defensive players in the NHL are unheralded 3rd liners.

So it's hard for the media to build a consensus behind relatively unknown players like that. It's much easier for them to get behind a big name.

Additionally, many of the voters are misappropriating the award to pump up their favorite players and support a desired (false) media narrative. So there is an integrity issue as well in the hockey media.

Players like Sidney Crosby who bleed goals against, can't hold a lead, don't PK, aren't deployed in a shutdown role, are used overwhelmingly for offense, and just plain aren't good at defense to begin with, have no business being anywhere near a Selke ballot. There isn't an argument to be had there (watch - anyone takes issue with this paragraph isn't even going to bother to try and justify it, nor will they provide any supporting statistics). Yet he's been placed above the actual great defensive players on many ballots over the years - including Bergeron, Datsyuk, Barkov, Couturier, Kopitar, etc.). -Because that is simply the narrative some fans desire to be told.

The Selke is a great concept. It was clearly created to give credit to the low scoring unheralded players doing the important dirty work - the Bob Gaineys of the world. Unfortunately, it's been abused to the point of meaninglessness.

 

[LudwigVonKarlsson]

The Norris is more inaccurate because you can score 100s of points as a defenseman and your team can still be one of the worst five teams in the league because you suck at defense, Erik.

This isn't basketball, no one player can make you a playoff team, even McDavid missed the playoffs in 3/4 of his first 4 years in the league and was considered one of the best players in his rookie year.

 

[HockeyVirus]

Most of these voted on awards, either the voter is scared of being judged when their ballot is public and vote for "safe" options which is why the same names are winning certain awards all the time or they are complete homers who exclude clear favorites for guys they watch all the time.

I am not a professional, but I dedicate a lot of time to watching hockey. At least a game a night all season long, with bursts of watching many many games during certain exciting times of the year. And even I don't know every single player inside and out, only the teams I watch regularly.

I don't believe for a second 100 people have watched enough game footage of all teams to make an accurate judgement of who is actually the best. It is basically a narrative vote.

 

[Midnight Judges]

Most of these voted on awards, either the voter is scared of being judged when their ballot is public and vote for "safe" options which is why the same names are winning certain awards all the time or they are complete homers who exclude clear favorites for guys they watch all the time.

I am not a professional, but I dedicate a lot of time to watching hockey. At least a game a night all season long, with bursts of watching many many games during certain exciting times of the year. And even I don't know every single player inside and out, only the teams I watch regularly.

I don't believe for a second 100 people have watched enough game footage of all teams to make an accurate judgement of who is actually the best. It is basically a narrative vote.

Agree with the thrust of your point, but time constraints being the case, they could at least follow the defensive statistics. Currently, they don't.

 

[tsujimoto74]

The Selke is 100% the most reputation-based award. Norris isn’t far behind, though.

 

[zenator]

It should be a player that is matched up against the opponents' best line regularly. One that plays the hardest defensive minutes.

Not the highest scoring player who is reasonable defensively.

Barkov and Bergeron make sense, as they are often used to shut down opponents.

Bob Gainey is a true example of Selke. He is probably the greatest defensive forward ever. If he was around today, the writers wouldn't vote for him as he didn't have enough points.

While Matthews is ok defensively for a scorer, his coaches match him up to get him away from the opponents' checkers. I doubt he has ever been intentionally used to shut down the opponents' scorers.

It's a tough category to evaluate. Shouldn't be left to clueless writers, who are less capable than even us goobers on HFboards.

The Selke should be judged by coaches or GMs.

 

[Perfect_Drug]

I felt like there were a few years Phil Danault was the #1 defensive center back when he was in his 20's on the Habs.

But he never had the proper supporting offensive numbers to be considered.

 

[Golden_Jet]

They definitely got it right this year.

 

[Bjindaho]

This. There are often nominees even who raise eyebrows, but I can’t think of anyone who’s actually won where you can’t at least make an argument he was the best.

There are weird winners every once in a while, but most years end up being someone who deserves it.

Some examples that I can think of are Toews (Bergeron), Yzerman (Handzus or Ricci) and Datsyuk (Kesler, Richards, Madden) who all fill the good 2 way player, but were never in the same category as the top guys.

Those guys were offensive guys who didn't completely collapse against top guys, whereas Bergeron, Handzus, Ricci, Kesler, Richards and Madden basically only played against top guys.

 

[Buck Naked]

I felt like there were a few years Phil Danault was the #1 defensive center back when he was in his 20's on the Habs.

But he never had the proper supporting offensive numbers to be considered.

After that playoff run with the Habs I was so sure he was gonna be the new "hip" pick for the Selke for years to come. Kind of faded away as he got to the Kings. Sad, because he's still amazing defensively!

 

[Suntouchable13]

I just don’t know if any of the awards being voted on by the PHWA are “accurate”. Some of these guys are hacks. Remember when they voted Ovi for LW and RW for the year end all star teams? I don’t put much stock in the awards that they vote on. The awards are mostly just fluff anyway.

 

[Reality Czech]

Forwards should focus on scoring the goal while defenders do the defense. Having an award for best defensive offenseman is just stupid.

You want more defense? Play with 3 defendermen instead of 3 forwards.

Well we already have the Norris for best offensive defenderman so it makes sense to have one for defensive offensemen.

 

[BonMorrison]

It is absolutely just a reputation award. Matthews being a finalist this year is a good example. He had an absolutely elite Selke level season two years ago but wasn't a finalist. Everyone hasn't shut up about it since and now he's a finalist despite not even playing at the same level defensively as he did two years ago.

 

[Machinehead]

Awards can't be entirely accurate all the time. If it was entirely accurate Bergeron would have won like 17 of them.

Barkov this year was accurate.

 

[Sniperberg]

Yes. Let's also go back to 1929 and reverse the forward passing rule. Also, all goalies must stand up at all times. Screw this entertaining game we hate so much so that we spend time on forums spewing on it for evolving and being a fun watch. Darrrrrn it!

The NHL should make new rule that gives defensemen 2 minute penalty if they score goal and offensemen the same if they play in their own zone.

 

[SnowblindNYR]

No award is accurate (although sometimes "right" people wins), and yes- Selke is one of most inaccurate, due to defense being hard to quantify, and most "defensive forwards" simply not being a star players... So it usually goes to some star player with reputation of "being good at defense", who had best overall year.

BUT, IMO people gives awards more meaning than they actually deserve- I understand that every organization needs awards, but people don't need to make such a big deal out of them. you know yourself who in your opinion was best player/forward/defenseman. You don't need some random commite to tell you this.

Considering I assume they're used in contract negotiations and HHOF induction I think they're a big deal.