Is the Selke an accurate award?

[MCR74]

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.

That didn't take long.

 

[I am Bettman]

I’ve been looking into the stats, and I was surprised to find that Jordan staal had a 55% Corsi while having the 13th highest d-zone start percentage of all forwards. The forwards with similar deployment around the league all had sub 50, and most of them were sub 40%. Carolina is a Corsi friendly team, but it’s impressive nonetheless. Eriksson-Ek also had 55% Corsi with 33rd highest defensive start percentage, which may be even more impressive given the state of the Wild. I’m not sure what criteria was used for the Barkov win, as he was 77th in dzone start%. His Corsi and Fenwick are very high, but his other defensive stats like takeaways, blocks, hits, are good but not the best in the league. Florida’s takeaway stats at home/60 were 133% higher than their away takeaways/60 as of 2022. The next highway discrepancy was 65%. JEE on the Wild had 60 more hits than Barkov and the same ratio of takeaways/giveaways on a WAY worse team. I’ve watched Barkov a lot, he is definitely good defensively, but the eye test is not dominant enough to justify the voting discrepancy over his peers imo.

 

[Jericho111091]

"Accurate" in that the winner is usually somebody that you could make a reasonably convincing arguement deserved it, but the nominations and voting are often a bit of a mess

 

[Oddbob]

That’s not remotely true. They were definitely inconsistent when they were younger, but not anymore. Just look at Leon in the playoffs this year. He’s been a beast without the puck

Oiler fans always say this and I see no difference.

 

[guzzy]

Every single available stat says so. 592 players played more than 500 minutes 5v5 this past season. Crosby was 574th in GA/60. The Penguins bled goals when he was on the ice. 552nd in xGA/60. Bled chances too. What's he doing so great if he can't prevent the opponents from scoring or creating chances?

Alright smart guy. Why don’t you create a poll to see who the better two way player is? Regardless, like my original post said, McDavid and dmt in the top 20 for two way players

 

[njdevils1982]

When you have a moment check out the YouTube video where he's on a talk show with the stars of the old sitcom Two Broke Girls and he records a personalized version for one of them. George is the single greatest character in the history of scripted comedy in my view.

not a chance... did you forget about balki from perfect strangers already?!

 

[My3Sons]

not a chance... did you forget about balki from perfect strangers already?!

Balki and Latka from Taxi never did it for me but I’m the first to acknowledge humor is subjective.

 

[njdevils1982]

Balki and Latka from Taxi never did it for me but I’m the first to acknowledge humor is subjective.

latka was good and on a good show...

the former was a joke

both the show and my post.


but you knew that


///

we should get back on topic and bring up the point that nico will back in the top 3 for selke next season.... a tremendous 3rd line center

 

[My3Sons]

latka was good and on a good show...

the former was a joke

both the show and my post.


but you knew that


///

we should get back on topic and bring up the point that nico will back in the top 3 for selke next season.... a tremendous 3rd line center

Best 3C in the league.

 

[Mrb1p]

No not at all lmao.

 

[TheNumber4]

What metric or stat would HF say is an objective measure of Selke-ness.

 

[Skolman]

Clearly not.

Auston Matthews deserves to win every league award.

 

[Paper]

It has nothing do with accuracy, just defense.

 

[Shareefruck]

Why? That's not part of the criteria for the award.

The criteria is:

"the forward who best excels in the defensive aspects of the game."

And why should bottom 6 forwards be excluded? Whoever is excelling at defense should be the guy.

To play devil's advocate, while I don't agree that that should be part of the criteria, I DO think that the outcome is usually that the true best defensive forward is typically capable of putting up some modest points.

The reason, I think is that to some extent, offensive zone ability is actually part of being a good defensive forward. It's not JUST how well you relieve pressure in the defensive zone alone. There is SOME truth to "the best defense is a good offense", and the best defensive forward needs to be capable of maintaining possession/causing some trouble for the opposition in the offensive zone (and the neutral zone-- everywhere, basically), which requires some level of non-trivial offensive ability that would tend to result in some halfway decent totals.

Hell, even being effective in your own zone typically requires some level of transferrable offensive skill-- if you can't pass to save your life or handle the puck like a grenade, your defensive ceiling is bound to be limited.

 

[Buck Naked]

Alright smart guy. Why don’t you create a poll to see who the better two way player is? Regardless, like my original post said, McDavid and dmt in the top 20 for two way players

Why would we need a poll that would just show that people suffer from groupthink? You have the numbers right there. Think for yourself and don't bother with what other, uninformed people think. What do you think when you see those numbers? Do they reflect a good defensive player? Don't be like the others and just stop thinking because the numbers go against your world view.

 

[Midnight Judges]

To play devil's advocate, while I don't agree that that should be part of the criteria, I DO think that the outcome is usually that the true best defensive forward is typically capable of putting up some modest points.

The reason, I think is that to some extent, offensive zone ability is actually part of being a good defensive forward. It's not JUST how well you relieve pressure in the defensive zone alone. There is SOME truth to "the best defense is a good offense", and the best defensive forward needs to be capable of maintaining possession/causing some trouble for the opposition in the offensive zone (and the neutral zone-- everywhere, basically), which requires some level of non-trivial offensive ability that would tend to result in some halfway decent totals.

Hell, even being effective in your own zone typically requires some level of transferrable offensive skill-- if you can't pass to save your life or handle the puck like a grenade, your defensive ceiling is bound to be limited.

I largely agree and I think you make a reasonable point, but if a player is truly doing all of those things, then measuring offense becomes moot because it will be a given. If a player is dominating possession, and excellent in the transition game, excellent at creating turnovers, excellent at outlet passes, and playing significant ES minutes, the points will generally come to some extent.

Personally I don't think I'd set the bar as high as 50 points though, and I don't think powerplay points are especially relevant to this threshold either. A player who plays excellent defense and significant minutes but no minutes on the PP may have as little as 30-40 points.

 

[Fatass]

Being that the media aren't hockey experts and playing defense is the most difficult trait to accurately measure by stats and probably by the eye test as well and the fact that it seems that a lot of players just get nominations year after year, is it the most inaccurate award?

Any award based on voting, especially by media, is questionable.

 

[loosemoose]

Selke has suprisingly good correlation with bunch of analytic measures of defensive play, despite being called a reputation award. It just happens to be that guys like Kopitar, Barkov and Begeron are guys that hockey pundits think "play the right way", but also have insane 5v5 playdriving profiles any way you measure it.

I find it odd that people don't moan about Hart, Norris and Vezina being suspectible to narrative and reputation based voting, even though they are in some sense even less objective - like often people just look at raw point totals among defenceman to determine who should win Norris and Hart winners are usually forwards with highest point totals. WIth goalies, some stupid stats like team wins are still a serious consideration for Vezina voters.

 

[Reality Czech]

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.

It's the most narrative driven award no doubt. Once a few people start pumping a guy up, others start echoing their opinions and before you know it people start acting like Marner and Matthews are better defensively than guys like Kopitar, ROR, etc.

I also think the Selke is occasionally used as a consolation prize for a guy who deserves some Hart consideration but falls out of the top 3. Of course, many of the winners like Barkov deserve the award, but many of the finalists are somewhat questionable.

 

[Juxta Position]

Oiler fans always say this and I see no difference.

Probably because Oiler fans see him every single game and you don't, so you rely on tired, years old narratives that support your personal bias.

 

[Oddbob]

Probably because Oiler fans see him every single game and you don't, so you rely on tired, years old narratives that support your personal bias.

Everytime I see him it is the same game play, so not a tired "narrative", or "bias"!

 

[Midnight Judges]

Alright smart guy. Why don’t you create a poll to see who the better two way player is?

Do you know what "argumentum ad populum" is?

 

[Shareefruck]

I largely agree and I think you make a reasonable point, but if a player is truly doing all of those things, then measuring offense becomes moot because it will be a given. If a player is dominating possession, and excellent in the transition game, excellent at creating turnovers, excellent at outlet passes, and playing significant ES minutes, the points will generally come to some extent.

Personally I don't think I'd set the bar as high as 50 points though, and I don't think powerplay points are especially relevant to this threshold either. A player who plays excellent defense and significant minutes but no minutes on the PP may have as little as 30-40 points.

Oh for sure, I was actually just thinking of a 20-25+ points expectation. The lowest total reasonable candidate I can think of is maybe someone like Jay Pandolfo from way back when, who never even broke 30 points (although I think that Devils system is a special extreme case and he actually is closer to a 30 point guy under more conventional circumstances).

 

[BigBadBruins7708]

What metric or stat would HF say is an objective measure of Selke-ness.

ESGA
ESGA/60
PK TOI
ES D-zone %
ES CFrel

basically the best currently available way to measure utilization and results

 

[GMR]

I believe either the players, coaches, or both should vote for the Selke. It's not an award that should be stats based or judged by untrained eyes.

With that said, I think Bergeron should win it this year.