Canuck PK as the Tochett Era Starts

[JamesB]

14 minutes ago, Alflives said:

OEL is great and Hughes is the problem.  Now that’s a brilliant perspective.  

Should be easy to trade OEL then. 

I thought of saying that "If OEL is at one end of a list and Hughes is at the other pretty much everyone would assume that Hughes is on top, not the reverse."

 

But the reverse is true in this case. I didn't make that up. That is what the numbers say.  And, frankly, by the eye test, Hughes has not looked on the PK this year. He is a great young D-man, but not as complete a D as a lot of people want to think.

 

As for OEL, his contract is bad and his overall play has declined. And he is of course impossible to trade. But he is not very noticeable on the PK and that is a good sign for a D. He also had very good PK numbers last  year.

[Ted Lasso]

I predict our PK won’t get any worse from here on out.

 

 

[Guest]

Just now, Kenny Powers said:

I predict our PK won’t get any worse from here on out.

 

 

If they hit 70% by the end of the season, it will be a miracle. 

 

We are so so sooooo bad right now.  65% and the next closest team is at 70%!  

[Fanuck]

Only one direction the PK can go, right?

 

That said, historically speaking Tocchet's PK units have been better than average.  Not only do they keep goals against down, but they're active on the short-handed chances side of the puck as well.

 

I'm not a statistician, but I wouldn't be surprised to learn that if we had even a 'league average' PK, we could easily be in a WC position right now.  

 

As it is, the only thing winning does for us at this point is worsen our lottery odds sadly. 

[-AJ-]

24 minutes ago, JamesB said:

This is a very good point. I noticed the same thing. However, when I have done this in the past that effect was less obvious. For example, during the peak years of 2009-2012, Burrows and Kesler had lights out PK numbers even though they were always "first over the boards".

 

But probably quality of competition is having some effect. Horvat and Petey have usually been going out first, along with Schenn and Hughes, so they play against the first unit PP on the other team.

 

However, usually the penalty killers change up faster than the PP so the secondary PK unit gets some time against the top PP unit. And even the second unit PP is pretty good.

Still, I think you are right that quality of competition has some effect that helps the second PK unit. What makes it worse is that the Canuck first unit PK has often gotten trapped on the ice and unable to make a quick line change.

Good thoughts. In my own analysis I tend to track both defensive proficiency metrics as well as overall use (I use % TOI SH), since the two seem to be somewhat inversely correlated, helping to reduce covariance. This gives one metric in favour of those who play PK1 and one that appears to be in favour of PK2. It's similar to the issues that arise from using "per 60" metrics, which end up often showing offensively talented third liners as some of the best players in the league. The stats are fine, but probably need to be corrected for due to context, such as competition, like you said.

[philtbc829]