Leafs are horrible at blocking shots. Does it matter?

[Just Linda]

Stumbled across this and thought I could offer my 2 cents.

I had a coach once who used to work for London under Bill Hunter. He had an aggression ratio that he says he copied from them that used hits vs blocked shots to calculate if a dman was being too aggressive or too passive. Too many hits and not enough blocks was a sign that you could be too aggressive on D, too few hits and too many blocks meant you were being too passive. When I touched base with him last year he let me know they don't use the same measures as back when I played so I'd assume they don't use that anymore.

The game has changed a lot since then but shot blocking just means they be out on your heels more than you'd like them to. It's not surprising that the teams with the least amount of blocks have mobile, modern dmen. Guys who block lots are slower or are more likely to be out of position (or play for a dinosaur like Bill Peters).

Having a low amount of shot blocks is a good thing.

 

[banks]

To what extent do they differ and which teams are known for overrating their players? Just curious not sure if there's an actual answer to this.

The term is "arena statistics" and it's a league wide problem. It's hard to find a ton of data on it, unless you want to deep dive into the numbers yourself. But there's a real difference in stats like hits, blocks, giveaways and takeaways, depending on the rink. Each location has people paid to track these things, and they aren't as consistent as they should be.

Heres an article from last season saying games in Vegas count more blocks, while the games in CGY and NJD tend to count less per-game.

Vegas was a league leader in blocks last season, but the away teams in the VGK rink had a similar average to the Vegas squad. It was just that they counted them easier at that particular arena.

 

[Havoc]

Am I really logging into a hockey forum seeing people click No / Depends for blocks being important.

Does game flow / chance circumstance mean nothing to anyone. Block the shots when it's necessary for them to be blocked. Not every shot needs to be blocked and not all teams will get equal opportunity for blocks, that doesn't mean blocking is not necessary.

If there's a stat to show (shot that should have a block attempt / non-block attempt ), use that. Teams with the lowest rating approaching 1 need to do something about their blocks. This stat doesn't exist so everyone just click Yes unless you're saying you want to be like the Sabres.

 

[Shooter2x]

"Keefe says the Leafs are really missing Muzzin in their own end in terms of blocking shots, clearing the crease etc."

Dubas finishing touch to the top 4 is a block master as well.

The professionals in the NHL are a "Yes".

 

[Legion34]

I seem to recall a lot of Dallas' cup winning success coming from Hatcher and Ludwig blocking shots. They were the first team I noticed that really did this well.

Their shin pads were bigger than modern goalie pads.

 

[riffle]

It might if someone other than Marner, or someone who doesn't have this kind of spirit, is on the ice in a critical situation.

As a fan, I don't want to be watching and wondering "what if" so and so was willing to lay out and block a shot that ended up in the back of the net.

 

[kb]

The main reason you have to block shots is because you don't have the puck and you are in scramble mode on D.

I can't believe there are people here who log in and say yes, it's more important to never have the puck and be playing in scramble mode D.


/end

(2 can play at that game, but only one of us is correct)

 

[Havoc]

The main reason you have to block shots is because you don't have the puck and you are in scramble mode on D.

I can't believe there are people here who log in and say yes, it's more important to never have the puck and be playing in scramble mode D.


/end

(2 can play at that game, but only one of us is correct)

If you're calling me out, you seem to have stopped reading my post after the first sentence. I covered game flow.

 

[riffle]

The main reason you have to block shots is because you don't have the puck and you are in scramble mode on D.

I can't believe there are people here who log in and say yes, it's more important to never have the puck and be playing in scramble mode D.


/end

(2 can play at that game, but only one of us is correct)

No team has the puck anywhere close to 100% of the time, so in the times you don't have the puck you should be willing to block shots.

Leafs are synonymous with a team that makes "business decisions" on the ice. I don't like those kinds of players. Me-first guys are not who I would want to be playing with when the goal is to win a Cup. I get the counter-argument of Ondrej Kase. See, look, guy plays hard when he doesn't have to and is out all the time. He should make more business decisions so he can stay on the ice. Kase is a beauty. Not everyone who plays like him ends up hurt all the time. I'll take 23 of him vs. 23 business decision makers. May have trouble icing a full roster, but at least they'll play the right way and not the new age increasingly accepted less than full-throttle way. Kase wouldn't be Kase and I wouldn't want him if he didn't play as he does as that makes him so valuable and uniquely him.

This is about guys who either do or don't want to do the little things that don't show up in box scores and contribute to the intangibles, and thus discounted to the non-metric of "heart".

 

[zeke]

"Keefe says the Leafs are really missing Muzzin in their own end in terms of blocking shots, clearing the crease etc."

Dubas finishing touch to the top 4 is a block master as well.

The professionals in the NHL are a "Yes".

 

[Jarqui]

Some goalies prefer to leave the shot blocking to the goalie

Belfour Finally Finds Good Match in Dallas Defense

In case you missed him, Ed Belfour was the solitary man at the end of the ice.

www.latimes.com

 

[Dreakmur]

Am I really logging into a hockey forum seeing people click No / Depends for blocks being important.

Does game flow / chance circumstance mean nothing to anyone. Block the shots when it's necessary for them to be blocked. Not every shot needs to be blocked and not all teams will get equal opportunity for blocks, that doesn't mean blocking is not necessary.

If there's a stat to show (shot that should have a block attempt / non-block attempt ), use that. Teams with the lowest rating approaching 1 need to do something about their blocks. This stat doesn't exist so everyone just click Yes unless you're saying you want to be like the Sabres.

I don't think you'd see any rational person argue that blocking a shot isn't important. That wasn't the question in the poll. The poll specifically showed shot block totals and seemed to specifically ask if blocking a lot of shots lead to winning games. As you quite nicely explained, it is complicated. A shot block is good, but a lot of them may indicate a different problem.

As usual, we have our right vs. left camps forming. Anyone who loves Dubas will come in here and argue that whatever we're doing is great, and anyone who hates him will come in an argue the opposite.

 

[Sypher04]

Am I really logging into a hockey forum seeing people click No / Depends for blocks being important.

Does game flow / chance circumstance mean nothing to anyone. Block the shots when it's necessary for them to be blocked. Not every shot needs to be blocked and not all teams will get equal opportunity for blocks, that doesn't mean blocking is not necessary.

If there's a stat to show (shot that should have a block attempt / non-block attempt ), use that. Teams with the lowest rating approaching 1 need to do something about their blocks. This stat doesn't exist so everyone just click Yes unless you're saying you want to be like the Sabres.

I think you are conflating two different things. Of course shot blocks matter. I think you’d be hard pressed to find a single person here who would disagree with that. But do they matter in the context of us the stats shown in the OP? Probably not. Because having a high quantity of blocks isn’t indicative of good defensive play. Teams that have the puck a lot, like us, and don’t spend a lot of time hemmed in our zone, are inevitably not going to rank high in blocks.

 

[zeke]

View attachment 526383

For completeness, here's Gio and Boosh's numbers for the whole season not just with the Leafs:

Gio 5.30
Boosh 3.99

 

[zeke]

Am I really logging into a hockey forum seeing people click No / Depends for blocks being important.

yes you are.

why? because we are looking not at block shot ability in this thread but just Total Blocked Shots - and total blocked shots is usually a stat that bad teams do very well in, because the other team has the puck and is shooting at them all the time.

 

[kb]

yes you are.

why? because we are looking not at block shot ability in this thread but just Total Blocked Shots - and total blocked shots is usually a stat that bad teams do very well in, because the other team has the puck and is shooting at them all the time.

Ding ding ding!

And that is before we even get into the whole "what counts as a blocked shot" angle that is different in all 32 cities.

 

[Cams]

Where is the stat for attempted blocked shots that end up in said teams net (own goal)? Lately the Leafs have to be somewhere around .9/gp.

 

[Havoc]

I don't think you'd see any rational person argue that blocking a shot isn't important. That wasn't the question in the poll. The poll specifically showed shot block totals and seemed to specifically ask if blocking a lot of shots lead to winning games. As you quite nicely explained, it is complicated. A shot block is good, but a lot of them may indicate a different problem.

As usual, we have our right vs. left camps forming. Anyone who loves Dubas will come in here and argue that whatever we're doing is great, and anyone who hates him will come in an argue the opposite.

We differ in what we consider complicated I guess. Sitting here trying to quantify it in a way you can just look at a stat and say yes or no is complicated yes.

I don't think game flow makes it complicated. Owning possession time, the totals will be low unless you have Dion Phaneuf teeing it off at your head. If you're giving up shots where it's better to let the goalie see all of it, your totals will be lower. This is all straight forward.

"A lot " is relative to the team. I don't see any usefulness in trying to quantify it like this. If you're not blocking shots when you're supposed to your GA/60 will go up which will correlate with not winning as many games as you should. Our own coach identified a blocks issue during .500 play for a 20 game stretch and I imagine if you poll all 32 coaches you'd get close to 100% yes.

 

[Mess]

Blocked shots are saves the goalie is not faced to make,

Teams with the best shot blocked records are assisting their own goaltender in helping him with his GAA and impacting his sv%.

A team can never score a goal on a shot attempt that is successfully blocked. Therefore by extension the more successful shot blocked the lower the actual goals against becomes.

Leafs often outshoot the opposition but still lose the game and the secret behind that might be in the successful shots blocked, particularly from shots taken for HDSC areas which have a higher goal scoring outcome if not for being blocked. .

 

[zeke]

View attachment 526383

And a comparison to the 2 time cup champs

 

[zeke]

.

Leafs often outshot the opposition but still lose the game and the secret behind that might be in the successful shots blocked,

Blocked shots aren't counted as shots mess.

 

[Havoc]

I think you are conflating two different things. Of course shot blocks matter. I think you’d be hard pressed to find a single person here who would disagree with that. But do they matter in the context of us the stats shown in the OP? Probably not. Because having a high quantity of blocks isn’t indicative of good defensive play. Teams that have the puck a lot, like us, and don’t spend a lot of time hemmed in our zone, are inevitably not going to rank high in blocks.

I just don't find the usefulness of this thread then. The actual thread title of does it matter if you're horrible at blocking shots and the title in the poll is a clear cut yes. I mean what's the point in looking at raw totals for high possession teams? It's straight forward the total blocks will be low. We're making it complicated, but it isn't complicated.

When Leafs did go through a stretch of bad blocking our record wasn't great (I know goalies were 75% of it) so it's a pretty easy yes it matters. Clean up what Keefe said to clean up and you're looking at 70+ points % which it seems we are trending back too, which is more evidence for "yes". Defence looking great lately.

 

[zeke]

I just don't find the usefulness of this thread then. The actual thread title of does it matter if you're horrible at blocking shots and the title in the poll is a clear cut yes. I mean what's the point in looking at raw totals for high possession teams? It's straight forward the total blocks will be low. We're making it complicated, but it isn't complicated.

When Leafs did go through a stretch of bad blocking our record wasn't great so it's a pretty easy yes it matters. Clean up what Keefe said to clean up and you're looking at 70+ points % which it seems we are trending back too, which is more evidence for "yes". Defence looking great lately.

What people are disputing is the claim that the leafs are "horrible at blocking shots", based on the evidence of "total shots blocked".

Because if you use "total shots blocked" as evidence of "shotblocking skill", then you are actually FORCED to say that blocking shots is BAD.

And I'm not exaggerating - of the top 10 teams in total shots blocked, only one of them is even in a playoffs position - and that's the rangers, the team with the least impressive on-ice performance and the one that seems to be being carried by their goalie more than any other team in the league.

So if the question of the thread is "Is racking up lots of total blocked shots a good thing?", then the answer actually HAS to be a clear NO.

 

[Havoc]

What people are disputing is the claim that the leafs are "horrible at blocking shots", based on the evidence of "total shots blocked".

Because if you use "total shots blocked" as evidence of "shotblocking skill", then you are actually FORCED to say that blocking shots is BAD.

And I'm not exaggerating - of the top 10 teams in total shots blocked, only one of them is even in a playoffs position - and that's the rangers, the team with the least impressive on-ice performance and the one that seems to be being carried by their goalie more than any other team in the league.

So if the question of the thread is "Is racking up lots of total blocked shots a good thing?", then the answer actually HAS to be a clear NO.

That is a clear cut no.

I guess it's the way the OP worded everything where I can't commit to a non-yes answer. I do believe a teams commitment to blocking shots is a strong indicator of their commitment to defence. And the very last sentence asking "does blocking shots matter?" is a clear cut yes to me. As in, they laid out the total blocks being low, but the top teams are all low in blocks, so does blocking shots really matter? I mean, it's still yes. And we know why it's still yes because the reasons the totals are low are common sense.

That's where my confusion of "no" and "complicated" came in. It is a clear cut no if the definition of horrible shot blocking is not being good at giving your opponent the puck to shoot

 

[Mess]

Blocked shots is a primary contributor to impacting and lowering and debunking the accuracy of expected goals for % in analytics where shot metrics are attempting to predict goals scored.

HDSC = +% of xGF% - BS = actual GF

High Danger Scoring Chance [determined by where the shot attempt on net originated from] ---> expected Goals For [contributes a % towards an expected goal being scored statistic], however minus successful Blocked Shot = Zero actual Goals Against.

Therefore those that love xGF% as a predictor or team outcomes W & L, will adamantly disputed BS [as Bull Shit stat] were BS actually = Blocked shot and successfully lowers xGF and should increase xGA because it results in an actual zero goal against.

The reason our Leafs happen to lose to weaker/bad teams because it inflates expected goals for stats expecting a win by quality and # of shot attempts, but weaker teams often block more shots playing defense and assist their goalie so skilled teams struggle at times, because some high danger scoring chances are nullified ,and Leafs have a low shot block rate which results in goals against.