Vancouver led the league in points at Christmas, Can they continue this run into the New Year?

[Breakers]

Vancouver has had the xGF% advantage in 7 of their past 8 games 5v5

 

[Brock Boeser Laser Show]

Vancouver has had the xGF% advantage in 7 of their past 8 games 5v5

System and defensive play doesn't get enough credit by outsiders. 3rd period today was a defensive clinic. 26-0 when leading after 2.

 

[Knight53]

Quinn Hughes
Elias Pettersson
Thatcher Demko

You’re going to defy odds when you have these calibre Franchise players.

 

[Sykur]

Honest question. Do you know what pdo is? You seem to think it's a measure of ability? It's not. Mcdavid, the best player in the league has a 5on5 pdo of 100. Dead average. Kind of blows a hole in your argument.

Do you know what PDO is? You seem to think its a measure of luck. It's not. Do you have any idea how meaningless of a stat it is when it doesn't even track powerplays, where McDavid does most of his damage?

 

[Jay26]

Quinn Hughes
Elias Pettersson
Thatcher Demko

You’re going to defy odds when you have these calibre Franchise players.

I can't believe after half a season and with so much real talent (aka not lucky) on the roster people are STILL going "Nuh uh! Vancouver is just lucky and actually not that good!!"

Almost everyone outside this market agrees that they're the real deal as a team once they watch them play. It's one thing to look at the spreadsheets without having watched them but once you do you realize they're the real deal.

That that Canuckland needs the validation. It's just funny to watch chronically online people give more credence to wonky numbers than what's actually transpiring on the ice.

 

[M2Beezy]

Man I love this PDO discussion

 

[CpatainCanuck]

I can't believe after half a season and with so much real talent (aka not lucky) on the roster people are STILL going "Nuh uh! Vancouver is just lucky and actually not that good!!"

Almost everyone outside this market agrees that they're the real deal as a team once they watch them play. It's one thing to look at the spreadsheets without having watched them but once you do you realize they're the real deal.

That that Canuckland needs the validation. It's just funny to watch chronically online people give more credence to wonky numbers than what's actually transpiring on the ice.

Yes, I think this phenomenon is a symptom of the Canucks playing on the West Coast when 2/3 of NHL fans are in the eastern time zone and don't watch any of the 10:00pm western games. If you actually watch the canucks play, it is obvious that they have been outplayed in very few of their wins.

 

[BWJM]

They’re alright. 61 pts is decent I guess.

 

[JAK]

Pdo between competing teams averages to 100 every game. All year. every team getting sore as the year goes on does not result in pdo dropping. Your theory just shows you don't understand what pdo is

How does PDO count empty net goals? Save % doesn't go down, but shot % goes up.

Some guy decided to make his own advanced stat by combining two stats and call it a day, why are we taking this stat seriously at all?

 

[Nogatco Rd]

I am hearing that, statistically speaking, it’s like Vancouver is playing with the equivalent of 7.2 skaters against their opponents 4.1. They’re just that good.

 

[DimitriL07]

29-pdo-11-3

 

[Shareefruck]

Drew Doubty had a fantastic answer on the Canucks inflated PDO below. It matches what I think and again fits in why I think this is mostly a solved question.

Regarding the other teams mentioned, yes, they did play deliberate styles (as well as have the talent) to support higher PDOs. The Rangers during the Shesterkin era have been a rush-heavy team, taking high quality, but a lower quantity of chances, with cycle/in-zone shots being taken. Prior to this year, Shesterkin was playing at an elite level, which puffed up their PDO too. The Bruins have been a consistently stifling defensive team, protecting the house and allowing lower-grade shots against. Both styles facilitate higher PDOs (though crucially, not a 105 level like the Canucks).

From what I observed of the Canucks, they do create a low-ish quantity of overall shots, but do have the skill to create quality looks. I also observe them scoring an inordinate amount of deflection/random carom goals, as well as unscreened mid-range shots, and that is mostly due to luck.

Again, to believe the Canucks can sustain the highest ever PDO in NHL history, you'd have to believe they're either more efficient/talented than any other team ever, or they've unlocked a playstyle that maximizes efficiency that no other coach or club has discovered. I think the onus would be on you to explain why either of these scenarios would be true. Based on watching nearly every game and just the general likelihood of one of these scenarios, I do not find these to be plausible conclusions.

They are a good team. In the past 30 games they're above 52% xG and scoring chance share. And we know they have efficient players and plus-level goaltending. That is a threatening mix. They've also had a healthy dose of luck. It's possible to accept both things.

This is more informative, but again, it doesn't really answer my question, I'm curious what the reason is behind those other teams not being able to continue their high PDOs if their playstyles supported it. Is it ACTUALLY a sustainability issue (where they keep doing the things that would lead to that high PDO, but it just can't keep happening?), and what makes that play style unsustainable? Or is it just a matter of it being impossible for injuries/personnel/coaching to remain consistent enough to allow those conditions to exist long term? (as a Rangers fan seemed to point out, in their case, it wasn't really anything to do with being unable to sustain it, their playstyle just went in a different direction for some unrelated reason)

The onus isn't on anyone to prove anything (you're saying that as if I'm suggesting it necessarily IS sustainable, which I'm not intending to do), I'm looking for an actual explanation that's more compelling and interesting to me than "the numbers make it statistically unlikely for it to bear out, period, so I'm going with that."

Sure, it might be far more likely one way than the other, which allows you to play the odds, but that doesn't really tell you anything-- it isn't really a satisfying explanation that makes you go "Oh, of course that's actually what's happening, and I can see why that can't continue".

 

[Ace of Hades]

I can't believe after half a season and with so much real talent (aka not lucky) on the roster people are STILL going "Nuh uh! Vancouver is just lucky and actually not that good!!"

Almost everyone outside this market agrees that they're the real deal as a team once they watch them play. It's one thing to look at the spreadsheets without having watched them but once you do you realize they're the real deal.

That that Canuckland needs the validation. It's just funny to watch chronically online people give more credence to wonky numbers than what's actually transpiring on the ice.

In fairness, It's mostly just these salty crying Oiler fans (+ a few leaf fans) that happen to be very vocal about it. Entertaining to read how they are more of them than the Canucks fans in this thread.

Other decent amount of posters have given Canucks their due.

 

[JAK]

PDO doesn't explain why Rangers, Knights and Kings have all regressed.

 

[Sykur]

 

[jackjohnson]

Honest question. Do you know what pdo is? You seem to think it's a measure of ability? It's not. Mcdavid, the best player in the league has a 5on5 pdo of 100. Dead average. Kind of blows a hole in your argument.


Even so. The leafs have had arguably the worst goalie injury luck this year and their pdo is still above 100.

Is PDOnthe most important stat in the world and is it an accurate indicator and the best predictive stat? No, so I don't get why people only focus on PDO. PDO doesn't answer many questions and doesn't factor in many things. There are 100 stats, you can't tell me PDO factors all those stats into one. People here especially Oilers fans are using stat the wrong way and they are only looking at that stat only and nothing else.

 

[jackjohnson]

How does PDO count empty net goals? Save % doesn't go down, but shot % goes up.

Some guy decided to make his own advanced stat by combining two stats and call it a day, why are we taking this stat seriously at all?

Only thing I see are trolls looking up to see which stat makes the Canucks look bad and just focus and bring that up instead of regulation time wins, offensive zone possession time, GF, GA and points and point percentage etc.

 

[Sykur]

Is PDOnthe most important stat in the world and is it an accurate indicator and the best predictive stat? No, so I don't get why people only focus on PDO. PDO doesn't answer many questions and doesn't factor in many things. There are 100 stats, you can't tell me PDO factors all those stats into one. People here especially Oilers fans are using stat the wrong way and they are only looking at that stat only and nothing else.

The Hockey Guy actually did a video on this a few days ago, looking up the top 4 PDO teams of every year going back 10 years, and also looking up outliers and other interesting wayward data.

Quick summary: PDO is neither a guarantor of success nor luck. In fact, it's almost completely random and is completely divorced from anything that would indicate a pattern of achievement. Top teams have had bad PDO, shit teams have had good PDO. It is possible to win the Presidents trophy with a bad PDO. It almost doesn't matter.

With that said, there are some general indicators, the most obvious being that good teams generally have good PDO. It's not a perfect 1:1 relationship (ie: The team with the best PDO is the team with the best record, second best PDO second best record, etc), but teams in the top 5 PDO are often in the top 5 standings. Not all of them all the time, but mostly.

Another thing he pointed out is playoff success. The only certainty is that the top 4 PDO teams make the playoffs. A team with a top 4 PDO has never missed the playoffs in the past ten years. After that, playoff success is random: Some of them bounce in the first two rounds, some of them make the Conference Finals. Some of them win the Cup. PDO predicts nothing.

 

[Raistlin]

It's really grinding their gears eh?

Demko is a good goaltender and there's nothing fishy about a .916 save percentage from him.

It's the offensive numbers that are as egregious as I've ever seen it in the NHL. Relative to the rest of the league, which is the point of sustainability here, you have to go back like 4 decades to find a stat as stupid as Vancouver at 13.8%.

If you regress them to 12.2%, which would STILL be unsustainable and STILL be #1 in the NHL this year, they'd lose 20 goals in 40 games played. That's like 8 points in the standings alone, and it doesn't address how GF going down often equates to GA going up. Less offensive confidence, less conservative hockey protecting leads, etc.

They should still be a playoff team? I don't think so. At least, not a safe one. They'd be in the wild card fight. This makes sense as they're at best an inch better on paper than they have been in years past and other tell-tale numbers like shot differential and scoring chance differential are signaling this is an average hockey team.

All I'm saying is enjoy this while it lasts and hope your management team understands it's not real., because there is serious work that needs to be done if they want to get back here.

So nice that Oiler fans went from cautioning Canuck fans to worry about next week after october, then next month after november, then now Vancouver fans should know that everything is a mirage and that we should really prepare ourselves to miss the playoffs in 2025 after the new year.

 

[Kairi Zaide]

How does PDO count empty net goals? Save % doesn't go down, but shot % goes up.

Some guy decided to make his own advanced stat by combining two stats and call it a day, why are we taking this stat seriously at all?

"Save%" in that context does go down - just not for the goalies as we usually know it. The shot towards an empty net is counted, and so is the goal. For this purpose, teamwide, "save %" is simply ([shots against] - [goals against])/[shots against]. Semantically it makes little sense to call it "sv%" because of this specific outlier where a save can't be made given a shot against, sure.

That said,
1) empty net goals have minimal impact on these metrics, as they represent less than 5% of all goals scored,
2) it's not rare for teams facing an empty net to be faced with a far more shots that wouldn't have happened if the goalie hadn't been removed (score effects stuff), thus also mitigating the impact on overall PDO as scoring an ENG often means the opponent didn't score (for instance, this season, teams face around 30 shots against per 60 minutes outside of empty net situations, where they face around 68 shots against per 60 minutes when their opponents remove their goalie - that's aroun 2.25x more)
and most importantly,
3) it's always good to look at PDO contextually (looking at the components independently and dependently, as well as in given situations, notably 5v5 - not just "all situations")
4) PDO is an indicator, not a rule or anything. I wrote an essay earlier in this thread about that lol - and some others have provided good insight too. The people that give PDO a "bad reputation" amongst some aren't the analytics people. It's the parrots out there.

 

[WTG]

It's not about when the PDO regresses, it's about how high they can set the PDO record.

 

[Chainshot]

They have an excellent goalie in Demko, EP40 gives them an elite 1C, and QHughes gives them so much from the back end. Almost all of the rest are on the same page and Tocchet has them playing the right way - sure, they can keep it up. I also appreciate that Allvin cares not for the idea that only helpful trades happen at the deadline and instead is constantly snipping and adding to the depth. Hard to argue the contributions from guys like Bleuger and Lafferty up front or Zadorov on the blueline.

 

[HolyCrap]

I’ve been trying to catch more Canucks games to watch. They have been pretty damn impressive every time I’ve seen them.

 

[Lawzy]

Demko is a good goaltender and there's nothing fishy about a .916 save percentage from him.

It's the offensive numbers that are as egregious as I've ever seen it in the NHL. Relative to the rest of the league, which is the point of sustainability here, you have to go back like 4 decades to find a stat as stupid as Vancouver at 13.8%.

If you regress them to 12.2%, which would STILL be unsustainable and STILL be #1 in the NHL this year, they'd lose 20 goals in 40 games played. That's like 8 points in the standings alone, and it doesn't address how GF going down often equates to GA going up. Less offensive confidence, less conservative hockey protecting leads, etc.

They should still be a playoff team? I don't think so. At least, not a safe one. They'd be in the wild card fight. This makes sense as they're at best an inch better on paper than they have been in years past and other tell-tale numbers like shot differential and scoring chance differential are signaling this is an average hockey team.

All I'm saying is enjoy this while it lasts and hope your management team understands it's not real., because there is serious work that needs to be done if they want to get back here.

How does one conclude that 20 less goals = 8 points in the standings? At the time you had written that post (prior to the completion of the Sabres game), the Canucks had only won 7 games all year by a single goal. Furthermore, how does one conclude that would then make us "be in the wild card fight" despite us being 6 (at the time) points up on 2nd in our division and a full 14 points clear of the WC1 position?

Show your janky math, please.

For the record, I absolutely buy the idea that the Canucks are over-performing but it's not as if they are winning tight games. They are blowing teams out of the water.

 

[jackjohnson]

Demko is a good goaltender and there's nothing fishy about a .916 save percentage from him.

It's the offensive numbers that are as egregious as I've ever seen it in the NHL. Relative to the rest of the league, which is the point of sustainability here, you have to go back like 4 decades to find a stat as stupid as Vancouver at 13.8%.

If you regress them to 12.2%, which would STILL be unsustainable and STILL be #1 in the NHL this year, they'd lose 20 goals in 40 games played. That's like 8 points in the standings alone, and it doesn't address how GF going down often equates to GA going up. Less offensive confidence, less conservative hockey protecting leads, etc.

They should still be a playoff team? I don't think so. At least, not a safe one. They'd be in the wild card fight. This makes sense as they're at best an inch better on paper than they have been in years past and other tell-tale numbers like shot differential and scoring chance differential are signaling this is an average hockey team.

All I'm saying is enjoy this while it lasts and hope your management team understands it's not real., because there is serious work that needs to be done if they want to get back here.

Not sure what Joy you guys get from discussing this to death like it will change anything. Then you make up a stupid theory that if their PDO is lower then they would be 8 points lower in the standings. Sure and if they don't have Demko and Petersson and Miller then they would be lower than Flames. If you also take out tocchet and Hughes, they would be lower. If I was taller the. I would be in NBA.

I mean these nonsense arguments just only proves how much you don't know about hockey.

How does one conclude that 20 less goals = 8 points in the standings? At the time you had written that post (prior to the completion of the Sabres game), the Canucks had only won 7 games all year by a single goal. Furthermore, how does one conclude that would then make us "be in the wild card fight" despite us being 6 (at the time) points up on 2nd in our division and a full 14 points clear of the WC1 position?

Show your janky math, please.

For the record, I absolutely buy the idea that the Canucks are over-performing but it's not as if they are winning tight games. They are blowing teams out of the water.

It's so funny how he comes up with this out of thin air. They are trying to use algebra to determine how good Canucks are.