Monday statgeek: In defense of Mikael Grabovski

Volatility measures the number of total goals per 60 minutes a player was on the ice for. The idea is that goals are more likely to occur when certain players are on the ice.

It took a couple of weeks, but it appears that Tom Renney has officially nixed the dreaded 10 - 14 - 6 - 77 penalty killing unit that was responsible for ten powerplay goals against. Last night against Chicago his top unit on the first powerplay of the game for the Hawks was Andrew Cogliano, Dustin Penner, Jim Vandermeer and Ryan Whitney. Shawn Horcoff saw just 25 shorthanded seconds and the defensively inept Tom Gilbert has been placed on a unit with Theo Peckham.

I bring this up because it marks the end of a highly votile shorthanded unit. Not only did Horcoff/Eberle/Whitney/Gilbert give up a tonne of goals, but Eberle scored two shorthanded goals. Perhaps the Oilers just thought their top unit was going through a rough patch, thought that teams would play less aggressively against Eberle in fear of the shorthanded goal, or were more worried about fixing their system before changing the players.

Probably the third option is the right one, since the Oilers gave up a powerplay goal to Fernando Pisani last night.

Total volatility: EV/SH/PP goals per 60 (Min. 10 minutes ice time per game + 8 GP)

EDM - Colin Fraser - 7.85
EDM - Jordan Eberle - 7.53
EDM - Shawn Horcoff - 7.37
EDM - Ryan Whitney - 7.35
CGY - Rene Bourque - 7.29
EDM - Tom Gilbert - 7.29
OTT - Ryan Shannon - 7.16
CGY - Cory Sarich - 7.08
OTT - Chris Phillips - 7.05
OTT - Jason Spezza - 6.59
CGY - Matt Stajan - 6.44
VAN - Daniel Sedin - 6.42
TOR - Nikolai Kulemin - 6.40
OTT - Sergei Gonchar - 6.39
VAN - Henrik Sedin - 6.38
VAN - Kevin Bieksa - 6.34
VAN - Peter Schaefer - 6.32
EDM - Kurtis Foster - 6.24
VAN - Raffi Torres - 6.21

You may notice that not many Montreal Canadiens are on this list. Montreal, as you'd historically expect, do not give up a lot of goals, and this year they aren't scoring any.

EV Volatility

CGY - Matt Stajan - 8.14
OTT - Jason Spezza - 7.38
TOR - Nikolai Kulemin - 7.17
EDM - Dustin Penner - 7.08
CGY - Cory Sarich - 7.01

It's mostly the same players. Matt Stajan has not been on the ice for a special teams goal, despite his 37 minutes of powerplay time.

Goals for per 60 at EV

OTT - Jason Spezza - 5.08
TOR - Mikael Grabovski - 4.29
EDM - Ales Hemsky - 4.29
EDM - Dustin Penner - 4.17
MTL - Jeff Halpern - 4.05

This stat is really good for judging offensive output and to defend a player who's playing well but is not scoring many goals (hint hint, Grabovski, 1 G 7 A)

Goals against per 60 at EV

CGY - Matt Stajan - 4.29
OTT - Chris Phillips - 4.25
CGY - Steve Staios - 4.24
OTT - Sergei Gonchar - 3.93
CGY - Rene Bourque - 3.50

Despite Senators General Manager Brian Murray telling reporters he chose Gonchar over Anton Volchenkov because he wanted to be the team shooting pucks at the net rather than blocking them, Gonchar is really doing horrible in the goals against department. Mind you, Volchenkov has played just three games but has allowed two goals.

This next statistic, in an effor to get Montreal players showing on the lists, subtracts your goals for minus your goals against, essentially plus/minus per minute.

Minute-adjusted +/-

OTT - Jason Spezza - 2.77
MTL - Mike Cammalleri - 2.73
EDM - Ales Hemsky - 2.50
EDM - Sam Gagner - 2.50
TOR - Mikael Grabovski - 2.45

...and the worst...

MTL - Tom Pyatt - -2.00
OTT - Sergei Gonchar - -1.97
OTT - Chris Phillips - -1.75
OTT - Chris Kelly - -1.74
VAN - Peter Schaefer - -1.64

Powerplay goals for (Minimum 15 minutes total)

VAN - Henrik Sedin - 14.67
VAN - Daniel Sedin - 14.67
VAN - Christian Ehrhoff - 13.33
VAN - Ryan Kesler - 13.04
VAN - Alexander Edler - 12.77

Somewhere down the list, you'll run into players from other teams. This powerplay unit is incredibly automatic. Not only do they score, but they score quickly. Goals per minute is probably a better indicator of effectiveness than goals per attempt.

Lowest powerplay goals for (Minimum 15 minutes total)

CGY - Matt Stajan - 0.00 (37 MIN)
MTL - Jaroslav Spacek - 0.00 (26 MIN)
TOR - Luke Schenn - 0.00 (15 MIN)
CGY - Jay Bouwmeester - 1.18
MTL - PK Subban - 1.20

Lowest shorthanded goals against (Minimum 15 minutes total)

VAN - Jannik Hansen - 0.00 (25 MIN)
MTL - PK Subban - 0.00 (19 MIN)
MTL - Jeff Halpern - 1.71
MTL - Brian Gionta - 2.50
VAN - Dan Hamhuis - 2.86

Shorthanded goals against (Minimum 15 minutes total)

EDM - Jordan Eberle - 21.60
EDM - ...ahh screw, it, it's all Edmonton players for a while. Then you get to Peter Schaefer at 13.04. I swear a little to myself, wonder why the fuck Alain Vigneault still puts him on the ice when you have more valuable pylons sitting in the equipment room (with a lower cap hit, I might add).

Your all-votile team. Scoring lots of goals and giving up lots as well

C - Henrik Sedin
L - Daniel Sedin
R - Peter Schaefer
D - Chris Phillips
D - Sergei Gonchar

Makes the Sedins look bad there. Second team:

C - Mike Fisher
L - Nikolai Kulemin
R - Daniel Alfredsson
D - Robyn Regher
D - Alexander Edler

That's more what I had in mind. Third team:

C - Mikael Grabovski
L - Raffi Torres
R - Mikael Samuelsson
D - Jay Bouwmeester
D - Christian Ehrhoff

Fourth line:

C - Brendan Morrison
L - Alex Tanguay
R - Jarome Iginla

I wonder if Sutter will try to use that one on the powerplay... with Regehr and Bouwmeester at the point? Stay tuned for vindication.

UPDATE - I guess I may as well have the lowest qualified votile players:

MTL - Brian Gionta - 2.50
MTL - Travis Moen - 2.50
MTL - Scott Gomez - 2.52
MTL - Tom Pyatt - 2.80
VAN - Jannik Hansen - 3.05
VAN - Andrew Alberts 3.30
TOR - Freddy Sjostrom - 3.33
MTL - PK Subban - 3.40
TOR - Tim Brent - 3.49
TOR - Colby Armstron - 3.50
CGY - Ian White - 3.67
MTL - Lars Eller - 3.69
VAN - Aaron Rome - 3.80
MTL - Hall Gill - 3.90
MTL - Mike Cammalleri - 3.93 (Cammalleri is on for so few goals, but he's usually celebrating when he is on for one. This is something we like to call a "really good hockey player")
OTT - Jarkko Ruutu - 4.00
TOR - Tyler Bozak - 4.10
MTL - Tomas Plekanec - 4.12
OTT - Erik Karlsson - 4.12
MTL - Josh Gorges - 4.24