Was 2020 Gibby an outlier?

[Hockey Duckie]

I recall saying aloud how in a few games that Gibby has let in some soft goals, but it is Gibby and he will get back on track. We can always rely on Gibby and he is the key to going far into the playoffs. Gibby needs more help in front of him if we are going to play this game of winning low scoring games. Lately, I have been listening to "Crash the Pond" podcast just to get any type of Ducks information fix. They used to be the Anaheim Calling guys and I do not agree with them often, but it is nice to have any Ducks talk, even if it is just used at background noise. In their latest installment, they talked about how terrible Gibson was last year. Although I denoted that Gibby has let in soft goals as well as others during the Game Day Threads, the podcast made wonder just how bad Gibby was last year.

Hockey Reference is a good source to piece together what we saw and how they recorded the games. They have quite a bit more stats than the usual lines you see on ESPN or on the official website. The 2020 recordings were eye-opening and the "Crash the Pond" guys were correct about Gibby's performance in 2020. (I did not include Gibby's 2013-14 season because he only participated three games.)

Anaheim Ducks
John Gibson
Year	GP	GS	SV%	SO	QS	QS%	RBS	GA%-	GSAA	AdjGAA
2014-15	23	21	0.914	1	13	0.619	4	101	-0.47	3.09
2015-16	40	38	0.92	4	21	0.553	3	94	5.46	2.46
2016-17	52	49	0.924	6	28	0.571	7	88	15.36	2.56
2017-18	60	60	0.926	4	39	0.65	4	85	25.3	2.63
2018-19	58	57	0.917	2	34	0.596	8	92	12.66	3.03
2019-20	51	51	0.904	1	22	0.431	10	106	-8.66	3.2

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Quality Starts (QS)
This stat was developed by Rob Vollman in the Hockey Abstract. It is a new stat to me and it seems to be consistent with other stats throughout Gibby's career, which is important to develop a picture for each season. The QS% is the QS divided by the number of games started. QS% > 60% is good, QS% < 50% is bad, and the average QS% is 53%. Again, everything seems consistent except Gibby's 2020 QS% is quite low and it is his first time producing below average.

I knew Gibby was letting in softies, but his QS% is informing me that he let in more than has ever before in his NHL career. Have I been conditioned that Gibby is not the problem that everyone else has been? Probably, but it also shows he is probably the most significant reason our looks better than it is because Gibby has been playing above average for several years.

RBS stands for Really Bad Starts, or games where a goalie has under an 0.850 save percentage. Last year was Gibby's worst RBS with 10 RBS in far fewer games played. Could other factors be how we played under new head coach Dallas Eakins? That has got to be a possibility, but Gibby has played under three other head coaches in Bruce Boudreau, Randy Carlyle, and Bob Murray. Maybe that whole thought of "we are a rebuild" mentality not only affected our skaters, but our goalie too? Our team has had it bad before, but fail safe in Gibby was no more in 2020.

GA%-
This stat is the goals allowed percentage relative to the league goals allowed percentage. With this stat, we get to compare Gibby with the rest of the league's goalie productions for that season. A rating of 100 is average, lower than 100 is better production, and higher than 100 means worse production to the league. A rating of 0, zero, means a goalie saved 100% of the shots.

Gibby's production here reiterates what the previous stats have show, which is Gibby was playing below of an average goal tender.

GSAA
Goals Saved Above Average, GSAA, stat are the goals this goalie prevented given his save percentage and shots faced compared to the league average save percentage on the same number of shots. This is another stat that compares Gibby to other goalies and it is crazy terrible! Did Gibby really give up that many softies that I simply just wiped away as Gibby has one of these games from time to time, but he had far more than I recall? Apparently.

So far, all these new stats reveal that Gibby was not even an average goalie last year, but it was just only last year as the rest of the his career the numbers show he was still playing above average.

Hockey Reference also breakdowns where Gibby gives up his goals. What can we dissect here, if anything?

Anaheim Ducks
John Gibson
			Even Strength	.	.	Penalty Kill	.	.	Short-handed (on PP)	.	.
Year	GP	GS	Shots	GA	Sv%	Shots	GA	Sv%	Shots	GA	Sv%
2014-15	23	21	565	41	0.927	96	16	0.833	13	1	0.923
2015-16	40	38	802	66	0.918	179	13	0.927	12	0	1.000
2016-17	52	49	1151	83	0.928	253	23	0.909	33	3	0.909
2017-18	60	60	1523	111	0.927	301	25	0.917	49	3	0.939
2018-19	58	57	1472	113	0.923	322	37	0.885	46	3	0.935
2019-20	51	51	1340	117	0.913	173	29	0.832	39	3	0.923

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

The production dropped across the board. The PK stat for the past two years is scary. Is that a similar production with fellow Duck Ryan Miller?

Anaheim Ducks
Ryan Miller
			Even Strength	.	.	Penalty Kill	.	.	Short-handed (on PP)	.	.
Year	GP	GS	Shots	GA	Sv%	Shots	GA	Sv%	Shots	GA	Sv%
2017-18	28	21	595	35	0.941	126	17	0.865	18	1	0.944
2018-19	20	17	469	34	0.928	97	13	0.866	12	4	0.667
2019-20	23	19	552	43	0.922	118	19	0.839	15	2	0.867

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

That was an unexpected set of results. Our Penalty Kill has been bad for the past two years, but Gibby was amazing in 2017-18. Gibby had the same coach for 2017-18 and 2018-19. Yes, there are many factors, but there appears to be evidence that our PK looked great for so long because of Gibby's play.

In short, Gibby's 2020 year looks to be an outlier with respect to the rest of his young NHL career. There is a concern with his PK game. Is the drop due to the players in front of him, the PK scheme, or his lack of play? It is probably a combination of all three, but I would like to know what exactly caused the PK production drop for Gibby for the past two seasons. And could that be a barometer of his ES play leak?

With the way our team is setup such that we have a difficulty scoring goals, Gibby's performance needs to be above average if are to make a push towards the playoffs. Right now, I can say 2020 is an outlier, but that does not mean it will remain an outlier. It is just crazy to confirm that Gibby was a below average goalie last year. I hope last year was just an anomaly so Gibby can return to being an elite netminder. The shift of acquiring 200-ft players and the drafting of D Drysdale over any scoring forward at sixth overall makes even more sense now as GM Bob Murray needs to improve the defense in front of is net if his netminders are not going to be elite. We are paper Ducks if elite Gibby does not show up.

 

[member 330090]

IDK why this post made me convert. I have been going to ducks games from day 1. I watch the games or read all recaps in the news. I probably watched or read about every game from 90's-2018. I was at every game for the 07 cup run and finals. I really enjoy reading what you guys have to say.

I said that above stuff to try to legitimize this statement: "Its hockey, not the NBA." No single player can take over a team for a season or a series. Wayne and Mario didn't win a cup every year.

You are essentially looking at a team stat. No single player is going to make his shit team have amazing stats regardless of his position.

 

[DigiDuck]

Can Gibby be better? Absolutely. And it was apparent he mailed it in most of last season, which is frustrating to watch because of his talent level, and maybe even speaks to lack of professionalism on his part.

But, we don't need him to steal games to push us towards the playoffs. It's a rebuild. As painful as it is to watch a rebuild, a high draft pick is better for the org than Gibson having a Vezina-worthy season floating the team outside the Top-10. Especially with next season likely to be weird anyways because of a condensed schedule. Let's get him a better team in front of him first before we worry about subpar stats.

 

[Goose of Reason]

Gibson hasnt looked like himself since partway through 2 seasons ago. Carlyle hockey just seemed to break his spirit. I'll never forget Getzlaf having to yell at Randy to pull him after he let in 6 in a period and visibly didn't want to stay in at all.

 

[JohnnyDrama]

Getting dominated while your D consistently gives up endless high scoring chances every game, I’d say after a few years of that the fatigue and frustration can make you play worse. You can definitely tell Gibson was mailing it in at times but mainly because the team’s leaving him out to dry far too often. He’s still one of the best goalies in the NHL, 1 year where his stats dip when the team is pathetic (his stats were still good through the first part of this year IIRC) doesn’t change that. And his .917 last year is technically a dip from his usual .925 but I think those who watched and remember last season can attest to if Gibson wasn’t playing we would’ve finished dead last with how many times he stood on his head

 

[robbieboy3686]

This season the ducks not making the playoffs and having now an extended off season, is great for the ducks . For many years , we made the playoffs and went deep in them. It happens that players on the same team( that have been through many grinding long battle tested years) all kind of hit the wall at the same time ( add those use to winning players , now being in a rebuild ) you are not only physically fatigued, but mentally you just give up. That said, I’m sure everyone will be their top selves in this upcoming year, and those who don’t show interest will be traded away. That simple. To be clear, I have Gibby back to top form.