Norris Trophy Power Rankings: Rielly on top with gaudy offensive numbers

[WesMcCauley]

Reilly ranks 5th on his team for SH TOI.

I said the same thing when Karlsson won and I'll say it again. If you have the BEST DEFENSEMAN IN THE WORLD on your team, he is going to be out on the PK pretty much every single time.

A dman who scores points but is sheltered from tough defensive situations is basically a 4th forward. Sure, Reilly is great offensively but the real problem is with the nature of the Norris trophy itself. There really needs to be a best defenseman & best offensive defenseman award going forward. Reilly, right now, is the best offensive dman in the league but he is far from the best overall dman.

Playing on the PK is the easiest job to do in the NHL in terms of how difficult it is. Which is why 4th liners and bottom pair defensemen do it.

Players like Karlsson who btw is a very good PKer play more 5v5 and on the PP because specially Karlsson is so much better then everyone else 5v5 and 5v4 that it would be a complete waste to play such a difference maker more minutes on the PK. Only so much icetime to give the top players and it makes no sense to waste it on PK when thats where other defensemen on the team has the best chance to «replace» a top defensemen.

 

[The Winter Soldier]

Keep patting yourself on the back.

Here's what you did. Very simply put.

You said the last 5-6 Norris winners were 25+ mins in TOI/GP and were 1st-12th and that this is a great predictor.

Then I checked and found 18-19 stats eliminate (using your great predictor) a couple of guys that many think are contenders. I didn't get into much detail but in case you're wondering.

As of today:

Burns- P/GP-1.09, TOI/GP-24:13 (20th in the league)
Rielly - P/GP-1.10, TOI/GP-22:26 (44th in the league)
Letang-P/GP-0.92, TOI/GP-25:59 (4th in the league)
Giordano P/GP-0.95, TOI/GP-24:45 (15th in the league)

Then, despite the fact that Burns doesn't fall under the 25+ minutes or 1st-12th ranking great predictor of yours, you bent the requirements and basically said he's close enough. Rielly isn't. I assume you'd have done the same for Giordano.

That's why I brought up your history. Because you're trying to come off as some unbiased analyst who's come up with some great predictor. But when it's challenged you moved the posts and defended a guy who's close enough.

I hope Gio and Burns get played a bit more. Otherwise you may have to move your predictor down to 24+ minutes.

Or you can just do that now...as long as it eliminates a Leaf.

You are still wrong. The predictor I cited favours Burns over Rielly. Last 6 Norris winners in non strike shortened seasons, placing for D men and TOI/GP

No Norris winner won with averaging 22 mins of usage or placing in the mid 40's in TOI/GP as Rielly is. Strongly suggesting a Defenceman that is used in sheltered mins is not looked upon favourably. Whereas a Defenceman that is used in all situations and is a mins eater is looked upon more favourably.

2012.
Karlson, 8th in TOI/GP, 25:19
2013- strike shortened season
2014
Keith, 15th in TOI/GP, 24:39
2015
Karlsson, 3rd in TOI/GP, 27:15
2016
Doughty, 3rd in TOI/GP, 28:01
2017
Burns, 12th in TOI/GP, 24:52
2018
Hedman, 5th im TOI/GP, 25:51

NHL.com - Stats

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Playing on the PK is the easiest job to do in the NHL in terms of how difficult it is. Which is why 4th liners and bottom pair defensemen do it.

Players like Karlsson who btw is a very good PKer play more 5v5 and on the PP because specially Karlsson is so much better then everyone else 5v5 and 5v4 that it would be a complete waste to play such a difference maker more minutes on the PK. Only so much icetime to give the top players and it makes no sense to waste it on PK when thats where other defensemen on the team has the best chance to «replace» a top defensemen.

I've always said you can't fault a guy for his deployment, it's about net impact and what they do with it. It makes sense to play guys to their skillset.

The flipside of the problem you describe is a guy like Colin Miller who everyone was lauding last year as a possession savant and thus a defensive monster but then without noting he had about the softest minutes in the nhl in terms of competition and something like 70% ozone starts. like, you'd better damn well crush those minutes.

That's not at all EK's deployment so not trying to draw the comparison, only that if you're giving a guy more offensive minutes and he's killing it, great, but I think people in general also need to find a way to give more credit to people who are getting absolutely crushed in their minutes, someone like PK Subban last year, who was absolutely killing it despite being used as a shutdown d most of the year. But instead what usually happens is the guy with offensive deployment gets to lord their numbers over the guy with defensive deployment no matter how much they're excelling. I wish there was a sum/net way to account for the differences to show true overall performance because the defensive guys get a raw deal on HF.

 

[v00d00daddy]

Reilly is 5th in SH TOI/GP on TOR, which IMO is a better indicator than just SH TOI.

Martin Marincin is the guy who, when played, kills more penalties than Rielly and Dermott. He's been dressed 8 times this season.

 

[v00d00daddy]

You are still wrong. The predictor I cited favours Burns over Rielly. Last 6 Norris winners in non strike shortened seasons, placing for D men and TOI/GP

No Norris winner won with averaging 22 mins of usage or placing in the mid 40's in TOI/GP as Rielly is. Strongly suggesting a Defenceman that is used in sheltered mins is not looked upon favourably. Whereas a Defenceman that is used in all situations and is a mins eater is looked upon more favourably.

2012.
Karlson, 8th in TOI/GP, 25:19
2013- strike shortened season
2014
Keith, 15th in TOI/GP, 24:39
2015
Karlsson, 3rd in TOI/GP, 27:15
2016
Doughty, 3rd in TOI/GP, 28:01
2017
Burns, 12th in TOI/GP, 24:52
2018
Hedman, 5th im TOI/GP, 25:51

NHL.com - Stats

I'm not the one who brought up TOI. In fact, I've said that they need to play him more or he has to run away with the point total to be a front runner for the Norris.

You're the one who picked some number that is what gives you a good predictor. When I pointed out that number eliminates other contenders you changed your "analysis" in order to include everyone but Rielly.

BTW

2011 Norris

Lidstrom TOI/GP 23:28
Weber 25:19
Chara 25:26

Coincidence that you stopped at 2012?

 

[The Winter Soldier]

I'm not the one who brought up TOI. In fact, I've said that they need to play him more or he has to run away with the point total to be a front runner for the Norris.

You're the one who picked some number that is what gives you a good predictor. When I pointed out that number eliminates other contenders you changed your "analysis" in order to include everyone but Rielly.

You may not like it. But it would be an outlier for a Defenceman to win a Norris trophy in what I would term as in more sheltered mins. You brought up Burns as a false equivalency to Rielly, not me. When shown you were wrong in comparing the 2 in terms of TOI/GP. Instead of accepting your error, you brought up posting history and other non related topics.

The point is, Burns fits the profile more than Rielly does as a Norris winner at this point. He is used in all situations. He has over 30 mins more on the PK than Rielly has, more mins overall, and is beating him in the scoring dept too. The TOI/GP usage is a good stat and predictor as I have shown. You may disagree that Rielly may beat the odds as a outlier choice, but I am citing true factual examples in recent years, that sheltered D men have not been looked upon as favourably. If you were a Coach would you not want a stud D capable and proven to eat more mins than a player that needs sheltered less mins to succeed? The former would be an easy choice to most.

 

[Mattb124]

Martin Marincin is the guy who, when played, kills more penalties than Rielly and Dermott. He's been dressed 8 times this season.

Understood. Do you think that the fact the Rielly's PK time gets cut when Marinicin plays is a positive or negative commentary on the coaching staff's faith in Rielly's PK ability? I would assume the latter, which was the point for my prior post.

 

[The Winter Soldier]

Burns at 80:49 SH TOI, 3rd on the Sharks team on the 5th best PK team in the NHL should also be a plus in his factor as well as him leading the Sharks team in scoring with 47 points.

 

[Yackiberg8]

I've always said you can't fault a guy for his deployment, it's about net impact and what they do with it. It makes sense to play guys to their skillset.

The flipside of the problem you describe is a guy like Colin Miller who everyone was lauding last year as a possession savant and thus a defensive monster but then without noting he had about the softest minutes in the nhl in terms of competition and something like 70% ozone starts. like, you'd better damn well crush those minutes.

That's not at all EK's deployment so not trying to draw the comparison, only that if you're giving a guy more offensive minutes and he's killing it, great, but I think people in general also need to find a way to give more credit to people who are getting absolutely crushed in their minutes, someone like PK Subban last year, who was absolutely killing it despite being used as a shutdown d most of the year. But instead what usually happens is the guy with offensive deployment gets to lord their numbers over the guy with defensive deployment no matter how much they're excelling. I wish there was a sum/net way to account for the differences to show true overall performance because the defensive guys get a raw deal on HF.

Zone starts don’t play as big a role as people think because they don’t account for the fact that the majority of every players starts come on the fly. For example Hjalmersson has the lowest offensive zone start % in the NHL this year but he only starts in the defensive zone 22% of the time.

Colin Miller had a lot more offensive starts than defensive last year as you said but he started in the defensive end 10% of the time. Not much difference between 2 extreme cases.

 

[Martin Skoula]

Understood. Do you think that the fact the Rielly's PK time gets cut when Marinicin plays is a positive or negative commentary on the coaching staff's faith in Rielly's PK ability? I would assume the latter, which was the point for my prior post.

Marincin's only value to the team is the fact that he's a great penalty killer because he is tall and has a long reach for blocking lanes. Who would you rather have blocking a shot with his face, your replaceable #8 guy or your Norris contending #1? We get 90% of the PK success for 0% risk of injury, sounds like a good trade-off to me.

 

[Yackiberg8]

Understood. Do you think that the fact the Rielly's PK time gets cut when Marinicin plays is a positive or negative commentary on the coaching staff's faith in Rielly's PK ability? I would assume the latter, which was the point for my prior post.

You don’t get it man. The Leafs don’t want Rielly doing the heavy lifting on grunt work blocking shots and dumping the puck if they have other guys who can do it. Rielly does not play sheltered minutes he has as many offensive zone starts as he does defensive.

As I’ve stated before, with the exception of Giordano, all the other Norris favorites being mentioned in this thread are not in the top 2 dman SHTOI for their team. Teams do not usually play their top players on the PK unless it is their specialty.

When comparing raw numbers people need to remember the Leafs have the second fewest SHTOI in the league.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Zone starts don’t play as big a role as people think because they don’t account for the fact that the majority of every players starts come on the fly. For example Hjalmersson has the lowest offensive zone start % in the NHL this year but he only starts in the defensive zone 22% of the time.

Colin Miller had a lot more offensive starts than defensive last year as you said but he started in the defensive end 10% of the time. Not much difference between 2 extreme cases.

With respect to starts, Hjalmarsson has started 52 in the offensive zone, 287 not in the offensive zone (134 are dzone). Literally almost 6 times difference.

When we're talking about stats at an elite level, 5-10% is a big deal. 600% is a really big deal.

Yes, I'm aware most shifts start on the fly and yes, I'm aware of the articles describing how the longer the shift goes on the less the zone start matters. It's why a lot of elite d-men have positive shot differentials despite terrible minutes. But I feel like that also can't be ignored and is an important piece of context, especially for the guys who are being matched to specific competition, because that's an important part of their role identity (and part of the reason Hjalmarssons results are so impressive despite being statistically set up to fail).

 

[v00d00daddy]

You may not like it. But it would be an outlier for a Defenceman to win a Norris trophy in what I would term as in more sheltered mins. You brought up Burns as a false equivalency to Rielly, not me. When shown you were wrong in comparing the 2 in terms of TOI/GP. Instead of accepting your error, you brought up posting history and other non related topics.

The point is, Burns fits the profile more than Rielly does as a Norris winner at this point. He is used in all situations. He has over 30 mins more on the PK than Rielly has, more mins overall, and is beating him in the scoring dept too. The TOI/GP usage is a good stat and predictor as I have shown. You may disagree that Rielly may beat the odds as a outlier choice, but I am citing true factual examples in recent years, that sheltered D men have not been looked upon as favourably. If you were a Coach would you not want a stud D capable and proven to eat more mins than a player that needs sheltered less mins to succeed? The former would be an easy choice to most.

So Rielly is "sheltered" because he plays 1:47 less per game than Burns?

And now you're cherry picking. Yeah Burns has played 30+ minutes more on the PK. Kinda helps that SJ averages 2:00 penalty minutes more, per game than the Leafs (who are lowest in the league). But yes, Burns kills more penalties. But they're pretty close in TOI per game

EV TOI
Burns 19:17
Rielly 18:34

SH TOI
Burns 1:53
Rielly 1:14

PP TOI
Burns 3:03
Rielly 2:38

TOI/Shift
Burns 0:56
Rielly 0:47

Shifts/GP

Burns 25.9
Rielly 28.4

Again, that leads to Burns playing 1:47 per game more than Rielly and that makes one a contender and the other not?

 

[v00d00daddy]

Understood. Do you think that the fact the Rielly's PK time gets cut when Marinicin plays is a positive or negative commentary on the coaching staff's faith in Rielly's PK ability? I would assume the latter, which was the point for my prior post.

Not sure if it's about Babcock's faith in his ability to PK or Babcock's preference to play him more EV and on the PP. Let's see if any of this changes as the season goes on. Maybe he's saving him early in the season to play him more later and in the playoffs.

 

[Steeze]

If certain people on one side can come to agree that Rielly isn't the obvious front runner, then certain people on the other side should be able to agree that he at least deserves to be in the conversation.

 

[The Winter Soldier]

Not sure if it's about Babcock's faith in his ability to PK or Babcock's preference to play him more EV and on the PP. Let's see if any of this changes as the season goes on. Maybe he's saving him early in the season to play him more later and in the playoffs.

I am saying Burns has the advantage for the reasons you cited your false equivalency. As I said, you may want to pump Rielly as an outlier choice of yours over Burns. But I am citing history, and history is not on his side.

2012.
Karlson, 8th in TOI/GP, 25:19
2013- strike shortened season
2014
Keith, 15th in TOI/GP, 24:39
2015
Karlsson, 3rd in TOI/GP, 27:15
2016
Doughty, 3rd in TOI/GP, 28:01
2017
Burns, 12th in TOI/GP, 24:52
2018
Hedman, 5th im TOI/GP, 25:51

 

[Yackiberg8]

With respect to starts, Hjalmarsson has started 52 in the offensive zone, 287 not in the offensive zone (134 are dzone). Literally almost 6 times difference.

When we're talking about stats at an elite level, 5-10% is a big deal. 600% is a really big deal.

Yes, I'm aware most shifts start on the fly and yes, I'm aware of the articles describing how the longer the shift goes on the less the zone start matters. It's why a lot of elite d-men have positive shot differentials despite terrible minutes. But I feel like that also can't be ignored and is an important piece of context, especially for the guys who are being matched to specific competition, because that's an important part of their role identity (and part of the reason Hjalmarssons results are so impressive despite being statistically set up to fail).

He has started in the dzone 229 times compared to 807 times not in the dzone.

 

[The Winter Soldier]

I'll say this. In a game where Nashville and Toronto just played, where there was only one Norris candidate playing, Rielly.

Subban, Ellis, Ekholm, and Josi dominated. Clearly the 4 best d men on the ice tonight. There is a difference of reading offensive stats lines, and watching how a D dominates on both sides of the puck. Surely one of the Preds D men deserves to be in a conversation for the Norris. They are that good. You really appreciate this watching them play a full game.

 

[LeafFever]

No D gets his game broken down like this.
Does HF do this to OEL when he's voted a top 5 D without the stats or accomplishments?

 

[QJL]

Matthias Ekholm is forcing is way into the conversation. Obviously not close to Gio or Rielly yet but he’s having an incredible season.

 

[Man Bear Pig]

I'll say this. In a game where Nashville and Toronto just played, where there was only one Norris candidate playing, Rielly.

Subban, Ellis, Ekholm, and Josi dominated. Clearly the 4 best d men on the ice tonight. There is a difference of reading offensive stats lines, and watching how a D dominates on both sides of the puck. Surely one of the Preds D men deserves to be in a conversation for the Norris. They are that good. You really appreciate this watching them play a full game.

But you didnt watch the game.

 

[NiL8r87]

Are we still bashing Rielly in this thread? He hasn’t had the greatest week and fell behind Burns in points so pretty safe to say he isn’t the front runner anymore. Doesn’t mean he wasn’t through the first 35 games when people were asking the question.

 

[The Winter Soldier]

Matthias Ekholm is forcing is way into the conversation. Obviously not close to Gio or Rielly yet but he’s having an incredible season.

Any of Ellis, Subban, Josi, and yes Ekholm are all incredible D men. All mobile, all so sound on both sides of the puck. I also like the physical dimension of Ekholm. Not going to win the Norris, but these 4 were the best D men in a game where Rielly is supposedly up for the Norris. Just doesn't seem fair to Preds fans.

 

[Man Bear Pig]

Any of Ellis, Subban, Josi, and yes Ekholm are all incredible D men. All mobile, all so sound on both sides of the puck. I also like the physical dimension of Ekholm. Not going to win the Norris, but these 4 were the best D men in a game where Rielly is supposedly up for the Norris. Just doesn't seem fair to Preds fans.

Did you watch the game?

 

[NiL8r87]

Did you watch the game?

Rielly wasn’t good this game.