Hey SensChirp faithful, KarlssonFan here again with another numbers-filled read.
Last time we looked at CorsiFor%, CorsiRel, and other possession stats. If you don’t feel comfortable with them yet, I suggest you take a look at my previous post for a refresher, because I won’t be going through the basics of Corsi today. That being said, we will be looking at a couple of new toys today: line combinations and With-or-Without-Yous (WOWYs). First I’ll look at the numbers and figure out which players help drive possession, and which players drag their teammates down. Then I’ll do Dave Cameron’s job and create some lineups using only current roster players, and then I’ll play Bryan Murray and propose some (hopefully) reasonable, controversial, and beneficial trades. Hope you all have fun reading!
With-or-Without-Yous (WOWYs):
These are great. Basically, sites like puckalytics.com (which is phenomenal, by the way), let you input up to 6 players and see how their stats compare while on the ice with the others in the group, and alone away from them. For the purpose of this, I have only done a maximum of 4 players at a time: a 3-forward line + Karlsson. Let’s run through an example:
Let’s say we want to look at Mark Stone and how he drives possession playing with different linemates. We input Stone and Turris to see what their numbers look like on the same line, and what they look like when playing apart. We’re going to look at CorsiFor% (shot attempts percent while on the ice), GoalsFor% (goals for percent while on the ice), and PDO (shooting% + save% — 100.0 is normal, higher is “lucky”, lower is “unlucky”. Generally PDOs of over 101 or so are not sustainable). Ottawa’s CorsiFor% as a team is 47.3, their GoalsFor% is 48.8, and their PDO is 100.8.
So, what does this mean? Looking at Corsi, Turris and Stone together is better than Turris with different linemates, and also better than Stone with different linemates. However, you can see that Stone’s Corsi alone is significantly better than Turris’s, which suggests Stone is the primary play-driver. However, Turris props him up rather than dragging him down, so he is not an anchor by any means. Their GoalsFor% don’t look too pretty, but they have been slightly unlucky together (and Stone has been quite unlucky alone), so we’ll give them a pass on that. Basically, Turris and Stone are a great combo that is way above team numbers, but Stone seems better alone than Turris.
Next, we’ll see what they look like together with and without Karlsson on the ice:
Stone/Turris with Karlsson on the ice: CorsiFor%: 55.2
Stone/Turris without Karlsson on the ice: CorsiFor%: 49.2%
Ouch. That’s a 6-point drop when Karlsson leaves the ice. However, when you consider that the Turris/Stone combo is still 2% above team average while playing with not-great defenders, it seems much better. It’s also worth noting that Turris/Stone raise Karlsson’s numbers as well.
Now everyone is probably thinking “yeah I know Turris and Stone are a wicked combo, I don’t need your stupid stats to tell me that”. So, let’s take a look at some other players and line combos that Dave Cameron has rolled out a lot, and we’ll see that there are a few startling numbers. We’re only going to focus on top-9 lines, because there is basically no data for a Dzingel-Lazar-Neil combination. We’re only going to look at CorsiFor%, but I’ll mention ridiculous PDOs. Lines that perform better without Karlsson are probably the “best” or most viable, because it means they can hold their own and don’t need to be propped up by our resident superman.
Hoffman-Turris-Ryan
CF%: 45.5
CF% w/ Karlsson: 53.9
CF% w/o Karlsson: 37.6
Well that is not very good at all. 37.6% without Karlsson?!?!?!! Very good with him, though.
Hoffman-Turris-Stone
CF%: 52.5
CF% w/ Karlsson: 53.9
CF% w/o Karlsson: 51.1
This is very good. 51.1% without Karlsson is almost 4% above team average. This is a legitimate 1st line.
Ryan-Turris-Stone
CF%: 52.8
CF% w/ Karlsson: 58.2
CF% w/o Karlsson: 44.4
Bear in mind that this line has a smaller sample size than the previous 2. Once again, it craters without Karlsson, but is dynamite with him.
Hoffman-Zibanejad-Ryan
CF%: 47.8
CF% w/ Karlsson: 54.1
CF% w/o Karlsson: 39.3
I’m starting to see a Karlsson-related pattern here…This line has an absurd PDO of 109.8 though, which is probably why Cameron keeps rolling them out together; the line seems better than it actually is.
Prince-Zibanejad-Ryan
CF%: 48.7
CF% w/ Karlsson: 50.8
CF% w/o Karlsson: 46.3
Again, small sample size, but seems promising.
Pageau was tough because he’s played with so many combinations of players (many of them including the now-departed Michalek), so I settled on just one line:
Smith-Pageau-Stone
CF%: 60.8
CF% w/ Karlsson: 64.1
CF% w/o Karlsson: 55.1
……………pardon my language, but holyshitwhat?!?! This sample size isn’t even that small, it’s close to 100 minutes. I’m sure this is going to regress, but wow are they ever dominant so far. 55.1% without Karlsson on the ice. Well worth a longer look, IMO.
So now let’s look at some players individually. I’ve chosen a total of 12 players not named Karlsson, and compared how they possess the puck with and without Karlsson, and how Karlsson fares without them. I chose 7 of our “best players” and 5 “controversial players” (did not include Phaneuf because he’s played what, 7 games?).
“Best players”:
Alright, lots of numbers. Let’s break it down:
-Ryan: terrible without Karlsson, drags Karlsson down slightly
-Turris: not very good without Karlsson, but raises Karlsson’s numbers
-Hoffman: bad without Karlsson, but raises Karlsson’s numbers
-Stone: fine without Karlsson, and raises Karlsson’s numbers
-Zibanejad: bad without Karlsson, and drags down Karlsson a decent amount
-Pageau: very bad without Karlsson, but only drags him down slightlyMethot: terrible without Karlsson, and drags him down a lot
Stone’s 48.3% without Karlsson is by far the highest of any of our big guys, and Karlsson’s 50.3 without Stone is the lowest. He boosts Karlsson considerably, and does not crater when Karlsson leaves the ice.
Alright, now on to the “controversial players”: Note: Ceci’s numbers are with and without Wiercioch, because he doesn’t play with Karlsson.
-Smith: not bad without Karlsson, raises Karlsson’s numbers
-Borowiecki: terrible without Karlsson, but actually raises his numbers
-Prince: very good (comparatively) without Karlsson, raises his numbers
-Wiercioch: not bad without Karlsson, raises his numbers
Prince has good numbers. Very good numbers. As in, “best possession numbers of any forward on the Sens”. Do not trade Prince, Mr. Murray. Give Prince real minutes, Mr. Cameron. Smith has surprisingly good numbers, Borowiecki predictably craters without Karlsson (but actually raises Karlsson’s numbers?!). Wiercioch has excellent numbers with Karlsson in a hyper-offensive role, but can’t hold his own pairing. He does very poorly with Ceci and Boro, but well with Wideman (in what I assume is a sheltered role).
Takeaways:
-Bobby Ryan is a possession anchor. Without Karlsson his line gets crushed. This is bad. Especially because he is signed at 7.25M for the rest of time.
-Mark Stone is awesome at everything.
-Kyle Turris is very good, but needs another good possession player to reach his potential.
-Mike Hoffman is wicked good with Turris/Stone, and should be kept away from Zibanejad/Ryan at all costs.
-Zibanejad is not, at this stage in his development, a possession-driving centre. He needs a) sheltered minutes, or b) good possession wingers.
-Methot needs Karlsson very, very badly, but drags him down. This is a problem.
-Pageau seems to be very good with good possession wingers.
-Smith is………a possession-driver?! Well, at least when he’s on a line with Stone. But he certainly exceeded my expectations. Maybe I’m too hard on him?
-Borowiecki seems to work well with Karlsson, but is just awful anywhere else.
-Prince needs to get a really good look before he’s traded. He makes everyone better.
-Wiercioch can do well in sheltered minutes next to Wideman (50.8 CF%) or Karlsson, but needs to stay away from basically everyone else (well, I don’t know about Phaneuf because they have played 0:00 together at 5-on-5). He needs another puck-mover.
-Ceci…it pains me to say this, but Ceci is a horrendous play-driver. Ceci-Phaneuf is 46.7%, Ceci-Wiercioch is 45.0%, Ceci-Methot is 39.1%.
Alright, let’s do Dave Cameron’s job:
Offense:
Option 1): Load the top line
Hoffman-Turris-Stone (best line we have)
Prince-Zibanejad-Ryan (Prince is the hero here)
Smith-Pageau-Lazar (might be a good possession line, a la Condra-Pageau-Lazar)
Dzingel-Paul-Neil (don’t really care about 4th line…but Chiasson is awful)
Option 2): balanced lineup
Prince-Turris-Ryan (possession players for Ryan)
Smith-Pageau-Stone (this line has been nuts, for some reason)
Hoffman-Zibanejad-Lazar (best 3rd line in the league? best 3rd line in the league.)
Dzingel-Paul-Neil (same as above)
Defense:
With the players we have, there’s really only one good (“good”) option:
Methot-Karlsson
Phaneuf-Ceci
Wiercioch-Wideman
Although, I’d be interested to see how Phaneuf-Wideman does, and how Wiercioch-Ceci does in sheltered minutes.
Now, let’s do Bryan Murray’s job. In my opinion, the only thing better than “young players with lots of potential who have proven nothing” is “slightly-less-young-but-still-young-players who have proven to be good and are signed to good contracts”. Also, I’ve pegged the end of this team’s cup window at the 2018-2019 season. I’m primarily targeting players in their primes who can help now and for the next 3 years during our window, and only ones with good possession numbers. I also aimed to trade our players who a) have poor possession numbers and b) probably have higher-than-actual trade values. I really wanted to swing a Bobby Ryan-Sean Couturier deal, but with Philly’s cap hell, I didn’t think it would work. With that in mind, here we go:
Trade 1:
To Minnesota: Cody Ceci + 2016 4th
To Ottawa: Nino Niederreiter
Ottawa moves out hometown boy Ceci for 23-year-old Niederreiter, former #5 overall Islanders pick. Has not fulfilled his offensive potential, but is a very solid defensive possession player with high skill level. Would fit nicely next to Zibanejad, giving him a much-needed possession winger to play with. Minnesota hopes Ceci thrives on the 3rd pairing of a much deeper defense corps, and they believe he can eventually take on a top-4 role. They like that he will be cheap and under team control for the foreseeable future.
Trade 2:
To Nashville: Bobby Ryan + 2016 2nd
To Ottawa: Ryan Ellis + Colin Wilson
Ottawa reluctantly ships out Ryan and his huge contract for undersized defenseman Ryan Ellis and middle-6 forward Colin Wilson. The Predators are always looking for offensive help, and they covet Ryan and his attacking style, hoping he will mesh with Filip Forsberg and Ryan Johansen. Ellis was stuck behind the top pairing, and Wilson is added (and a 2nd the other way) to make the money even out. Nashville has enough cap space to absorb Ryan’s contract for the next while.
“Trade” 3:
To “the void”: Dave Cameron
To Ottawa: Best available wrongly fired coach (Hitchcock, Boudreau?)
Here’s the new optimized lineup for next fall:
Hoffman-Turris-Stone(Probably the best possible line we could ice)
Prince-Zibanejad-Niederreiter(Two possession wingers for Zbad)
Wilson-Pageau-Lazar(Wilson adds skill to what should be a great 3rd line)
Paul-Smith-Dzingel(Smith is retained and is a good 4th line C for the skill kids)
Neil
Methot-Karlsson(What else?)
Phaneuf-Ellis(Phaneuf is a physical presence for the undersized Ellis)
Wiercioch/Claesson-Wideman(Wiercioch excels next to a puck-mover)
Borowiecki
That’s a deep, skilled forward group that would thrive in a possession-based system. The first line is dynamite, as good as it gets. The addition of Niederreiter allows Stone/Turris to remain together without leaving Zibanejad out to dry possession-wise. Prince finally gets his shot in the top-6 and excels with skilled offensive linemates. Wilson slots into the 3rd line to make a more skilled version of Condra-Pageau-Lazar.
On defense, the top-4 looks rock-solid, partnering physicality (Methot, Phaneuf) with speed and skill (Karlsson, Ellis). The bottom pair would be just fine in a sheltered role, although Claesson might do better than Wiercioch during away games when we don’t get the matchups we want. Borowiecki and Neil should not see much ice team with a coach who rightly values possession and skill, but will get spot starts against select opponents.
Anyway, that does it for today, I hope everyone had a good time reading this!
Until next time,
KarlssonFan
