Aren't those all team stats? xGF would be more a symptom of the lower lines being dreadful and not getting or attempting shots while giving up a lot of both. And didn't he play above the expected in most categories? I don't think those illustrate the point.
What I have learned, expected goals is maybe most horrible stat to analyze NHL defencemen.
It will work with forwards, but with defencemen, you should go with real goals like GF%, as a starting point.
Great defensive defencemen like Esa Lindell are preventing real goals, not anything expected shit.
Also, Lindell does not create anything expected, because he is stay-at-home-type, and that does not make him a bad defenceman.
It's so flawed stat that all of jakewalmans in the world are statistical flukes and traded for free, then the time to count their real value comes.
If you want to give some stats to analyze a NHL defenceman, please give me:
- GA/60
- DZone exits/60
- Controlled DZone exits%
- HDCA/60
- Quality of competition
Then we are discussing.