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BottleOfSmoke

10/17 GDT: Detroit Red Wings @ Montreal Canadiens, 7:00 EST

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You're selling Kronwall short. Lots of people do. He consistently posts as good, or better, seasons than all the other 1A defenders. Yet he never gets any love. He plays in every situation. Is very good on both sides of the puck. Hell, he had more powerplay points than Duncan Keith AND Drew Doughty last season. And he's an excellent penalty killer. Yet for some reason people say he's not a top guy.

I don't agree.

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You're changing the argument. I was just saying that our goalie, and defensemen have played well through 5 games. Which they have. Our defenseman haven't taken many penalties and haven't gotten scored on much. Can they be better? Sure. But this tendency to blame every loss on the defense is bullcrap.

No you're saying "well, the defenseman might not be that bad, but that's not REALLY defense. The whole team is defense, and in that regard they've sucked". Which still isn't true.

Our team isn't getting scored on much. Plain and simple. Whether you're referring to the defensemen exclusively, or the defenseman + the defensive aspects of the fowards' game, or all of the above plus the goalies.

We're just not getting scored on much.

Could we be better offensively? Absolutely. How? By scoring on the powerplay (for one thing). Something I said a half a page ago.

You're misinterpreting what I wrote. I was explaining why forwards have the amount of penalties they do, not insinuating that they're the main reason why our defense is so bad like you seem to be suggesting. How many of those penalties do you think were the result of an isolated lazy play by the forward? How many were the result of a defensize zone turnover or somebody trying to cover for someone else missing their assignment? Although just a side note I do believe forwards are responsible for team defense the same way that defensman are responsible for team offense. And I think both sides of the puck have been poor in that regard, as I mentioned earlier. Aside from Zetterberg, Larkin, Abdelkader, and the goalies, I think this team hasn't played well in just about any category.

But again, you're exclusively grading the defense just by even strength goals against. Do you not care about shots against? Scoring chances against? Defensive zone turnovers? Neutral zone turnovers? Missed assignments? Scoring chances generated? Goals? Assists? Giveaways? Takeaways? Time spent in defensive zone? Time spent in offensive zone? First pass out? The only criteria that you're judging the defense on is even strength goals against, which is a stat that is heavily influenced by the performance of the goalie, and ours happen to be playing pretty solid hockey right now. And again, it makes absolutely no sense to me, because last year with Babs behind the bench you had a field day against this defense because they were so poor in the transition game. I would expect you to be up in arms about how bad its been this year because of your history, but the reaction is quite the opposite from you and I don't get why.

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You're misinterpreting what I wrote. I was explaining why forwards have the amount of penalties they do, not insinuating that they're the main reason why our defense is so bad like you seem to be suggesting. How many of those penalties do you think were the result of an isolated lazy play by the forward? How many were the result of a defensize zone turnover or somebody trying to cover for someone else missing their assignment? Although just a side note I do believe forwards are responsible for team defense the same way that defensman are responsible for team offense. And I think both sides of the puck have been poor in that regard, as I mentioned earlier. Aside from Zetterberg, Larkin, Abdelkader, and the goalies, I think this team hasn't played well in just about any category.

But again, you're exclusively grading the defense just by even strength goals against. Do you not care about shots against? Scoring chances against? Defensive zone turnovers? Neutral zone turnovers? Missed assignments? Scoring chances generated? Goals? Assists? Giveaways? Takeaways? Time spent in defensive zone? Time spent in offensive zone? First pass out? The only criteria that you're judging the defense on is even strength goals against, which is a stat that is heavily influenced by the performance of the goalie, and ours happen to be playing pretty solid hockey right now. And again, it makes absolutely no sense to me, because last year with Babs behind the bench you had a field day against this defense because they were so poor in the transition game. I would expect you to be up in arms about how bad its been this year because of your history, but the reaction is quite the opposite from you and I don't get why.

By your definition of "defense" this is just as much the result of the offensive players performing badly as the defensive ones. It's a tautology.

If the offense IS the defense (or a big part of it as you've suggested), and the defense is bad at doing offensive things (we've already determined they're not getting scored on), then what does that really mean?

That the team overall is bad at moving the puck and getting sustained offensive zone pressure? I agree. But that can hardly be called "bad defense".

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By your definition of "defense" this is just as much the result of the offensive players performing badly as the defensive ones. It's a tautology.

If the offense IS the defense (or a big part of it as you've suggested), and the defense is bad at doing offensive things (we've already determined they're not getting scored on), then what does that really mean?

That the team overall is bad at moving the puck and getting sustained offensive zone pressure? I agree. But that can hardly be called "bad defense".

So what's your definition of defense? Even strength goals against exclusively? How convenient. And every other defensively-influenced statistic under the sun we're just going to throw out the window because it doesn't support your argument?

If we go by your incredibly narrow interpretation of what defense is, then yes I agree the even strength goals against...err... "defense" has been well up to this point (if well is considered 14th in the league). But shots against is bad. Defensive zone turnovers are bad. Outlet passes have been bad. Scoring chances against have been bad. The list goes on and on. But don't let that fool you into thinking our defense is bad.

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You're selling Kronwall short. Lots of people do. He consistently posts as good, or better, seasons than all the other 1A defenders. Yet he never gets any love. He plays in every situation. Is very good on both sides of the puck. Hell, he had more powerplay points than Duncan Keith AND Drew Doughty last season. And he's an excellent penalty killer. Yet for some reason people say he's not a top guy.

I don't agree.

Maybe it's Ericsson, but that pairing has looked terrible so far this year. They are getting beat consistently.

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So what's your definition of defense? Even strength goals against exclusively? How convenient. And every other defensively-influenced statistic under the sun we're just going to throw out the window because it doesn't support your argument?

If we go by your incredibly narrow interpretation of what defense is, then yes I agree the even strength goals against...err... "defense" has been well up to this point (if well is considered 14th in the league). But shots against is bad. Defensive zone turnovers are bad. Outlet passes have been bad. Scoring chances against have been bad. The list goes on and on. But don't let that fool you into thinking our defense is bad.

Sure, all those things are bad. But they're worse if they're leading to goals against. Which are they aren't...so far. That's my point. We're not getting scored on much. So while there's definitely room for improvement, this knee jerk blame the defense stuff is overblown. Because all their potential pitfalls (which you've correctly pointed out) haven't translated into goals against (which you're glossing over).

Sure turning the puck over is bad. It can lead to goals against. But if it hasn't lead to goals against (it empirically hasn't...so far) then it's a little hard to blame that for our losses. And that was the only thing I was addressing to begin with.

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Kip all it takes is for your goalie to have a lesser performance and those goals against can turn into top 10 WORST in the league.

And then we will have our beloved members complain about how Jimmy sucks. Or how Mrazek should still be in AHL.

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Kip all it takes is for your goalie to have a lesser performance and those goals against can turn into top 10 WORST in the league.

And then we will have our beloved members complain about how Jimmy sucks. Or how Mrazek should still be in AHL.

I get that, but that didn't happen, so it's clearly not to blame for the last two losses. It's like you're trying to blame real losses on potential shortfalls. For far, in 4 of our 5 games, our defense has been good. How do I know? Because we didn't get scored on much. Seems pretty simple.

We've won three times. Another game we lost because of 5 on 5 play. And another we lost because of awful special teams play.

To sum up our team by saying "our defense is bad" completely ignores the fact that for 4 of our 5 games, our defense was very good. So good in fact, that we hardly got scored on.

Should we try to improve it? Absolutely. But any attempt to try and paint our defense as some bottom tier group of losers (as many folks consistently do) completely ignores objective reality.

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Sure, all those things are bad. But they're worse if they're leading to goals against. Which are they aren't...so far. That's my point. We're not getting scored on much. So while there's definitely room for improvement, this knee jerk blame the defense stuff is overblown. Because all their potential pitfalls (which you've correctly pointed out) haven't translated into goals against (which you're glossing over).

Sure turning the puck over is bad. It can lead to goals against. But if it hasn't lead to goals against (it empirically hasn't...so far) then it's a little hard to blame that for our losses. And that was the only thing I was addressing to begin with.

Like I mentioned earlier on in this conversation, that's a very dangerous game to play, especially with such a small sample size, and a couple hot goaltenders buffering those numbers. Anyway, my position was never that it was exclusively defense that is to blame for our losses. I think almost the entire team stinks right now in just about every facet of the game. Defense included.

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Like I mentioned earlier on in this conversation, that's a very dangerous game to play, especially with such a small sample size, and a couple hot goaltenders buffering those numbers. Anyway, my position was never that it was exclusively defense that is to blame for our losses. I think almost the entire team stinks right now in just about every facet of the game. Defense included.

Sample size only matters if you're projecting to a larger universe. I'm not. I'm saying they've been good so far. I'm not saying they'll be good all season. I'm summing up the 5 games in question, so which other sample should I use?

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Sample size only matters if you're projecting to a larger universe. I'm not. I'm saying they've been good so far. I'm not saying they'll be good all season. I'm summing up the 5 games in question, so which other sample should I use?

It also matters if you're worried about variables skewing the data, such as goaltending. Especially when the only statistical criteria you're interested in looking at is ESGA which is primarily a goaltending statistic.

Edited by Echolalia

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It also matters if you're worried about variables skewing the data, such as goaltending. Especially when the only statistical criteria you're interested in looking at is ESGA which is primarily a goaltending statistic.

As I pointed out in the other thread. Our goalies have been worse, statistically, than our overall defense. We've got a top ten defense in terms of goals against. Our goalies are ranked 15th and 17th in Save Percentage, and 14th and 31st in Goals Against Average.

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It's not some trick of the numbers. Our defense is giving up a fair number of shots. But neither of our goalies are playing out of their minds. So apparently the shots against have been pretty easy to handle. Which is probably attributable to the defense only allowing low percentage shots.

Again, try as you might. You're just not going to be able to prove that the defense has been as abysmal as everyone seems to think they've been. At least not up to this point.

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As I pointed out in the other thread. Our goalies have been worse, statistically, than our overall defense. We've got a top ten defense in terms of goals against. Our goalies are ranked 15th and 17th in Save Percentage, and 14th and 31st in Goals Against Average.

Your conveniently leaving out one of the most important primary stats for defense which is shots against. For which we rank the 9th worst in the league.

That's much worse than the goalie primary stat which is GAA/SV%

Mentioned this in the other thread as well but our Shots against per game is 3rd worst in the league. That's not a good sign so far.

Edited by kickazz

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As I pointed out in the other thread. Our goalies have been worse, statistically, than our overall defense. We've got a top ten defense in terms of goals against. Our goalies are ranked 15th and 17th in Save Percentage, and 14th and 31st in Goals Against Average.

You're erroneously using data which includes power play goals against in that category, which is a poor comparison because by your own admission you're measuring defense performance exclusively by even strength goals against (which is just ridiculous). It also doesn't accont for the amount of shots or scoring chances our goalies have faced compared to other teams, which is disproportionately high relative to other teams. Mrazek (who was in net during the game in question) is 7th in the league in even strength goals against, and 10th league wide in ES save percentage, and when you limit that to goalies who have started in equal or more games as him he's 8th league-wide with a .953 save percentage, which is damn good. Its also worth mentioning that he's facing 32 even strength shots/game while the next highest ES shots/game goalie above him has only faced 26.5 shots/game. The average for the top 10 goalies is 23.2. Very managable workload for the best in the league. So I disagree vehemently that our goalies have been worse. Howard hasn't been all to hot, but Mrazek is maintaining top 10 stats while facing an average of 9 shots more than the competition.

Edited by Echolalia

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This just in, I was wrong (sort of). We're not top ten in Goals Against. When I started this conversation (hours ago) espn hadn't updated their website from saturday's games yet. It's now updated, and as a a result of the Montreal game, we're now tied for 13th.

However, as I stated before. Three of Montreal's four goals were powerplay or empty netters. So they can hardly be attributed to "poor defense". But I did want to ackowledge the change for discussion's sake.


Your conveniently leaving out one of the most important primary stats for defense which is shots against. For which we rank the 9th worst in the league.

That's much worse than the goalie primary stat which is GAA/SV%


Mentioned this in the other thread as well but our Shots against per game is 3rd worst in the league. That's not a good sign so far.

I've already discussed shots a bunch of times. So no, I'm not leaving them out.


You're erroneously using data which includes power play goals against in that category, which is a poor comparison because by your own admission you're measuring defense performance exclusively by even strength goals against (which is just ridiculous). It also doesn't accont for the amount of shots or scoring chances our goalies have faced compared to other teams, which is disproportionately high relative to other teams. Mrazek (who was in net during the game in question) is 7th in the league in even strength goals against, and 10th league wide in ES save percentage, and when you limit that to goalies who have started in equal or more games as him he's 8th league-wide with a .953 save percentage, which is damn good. Its also worth mentioning that he's facing 32 even strength shots/game while the next highest ES shots/game goalie above him has only faced 26.5 shots/game. The average for the top 10 goalies is 23.2. Very managable workload for the best in the league. So I disagree vehemently that our goalies have been worse. Howard hasn't been all to hot, but Mrazek is maintaining top 10 stats while facing an average of 9 shots more than the competition.

Overall team goals against stats count powerplays too. I'm not holding anything against the goalies and that i'm not counting against the team at large. If you exclude powerplay and empty net goals, our GAA goes down even further. The stats I reported (Goalie stats, and team stats) all include powerplay goals in the totals.

I excluded powerplay goals, and empty netters, in my conceptualization of "team defense" because the two are not really correlated. Lots of bad teams have good penalty kills and powerplays. However those things are not indicative of the quality of the team's offense and/or defense.

Edited by kipwinger

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Overall team goals against stats count powerplays too. I'm not holding against the goalies and not the team at large. If you exclude powerplay and empty net goals, our GAA goes down even further. The stats I reported (Goalie stats, and team stats) all include powerplay goals in the totals.

I excluded powerplay goals, and empty netters, in my conceptualization of "team defense" because the two are not really correlated. Lots of bad teams have good penalty kills and powerplays. However those things are not indicative of the quality of the team's offense and/or defense.

lol i have no idea what you're trying to say here so maybe I'm misinterpreting what you're saying, but my point was that its unfair to include powerplay goals and empty net goals against the goalie stats while only using even strength goal against to count against the defense . In this case the criteria for goalies is much bigger (and includes way higher scoring chances) than the criteria used for defense, yet you still used those numbers as an argument to why defense is playing relatively better than the goalies. I would expect goalies numbers to look worse if they're also being evaluated based on powerplay and empty netters, and defense are only on the hook for even strength goals. When the criteria is the same for both goalies and defense, the picture looks much different.

Edited by Echolalia

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lol i have no idea what you're trying to say here so maybe I'm misinterpreting what you're saying, but my point was that its unfair to include powerplay goals and empty net goals against the goalie stats while only using even strength goal against to count against the defense . In this case the criteria for goalies is much bigger (and includes way higher scoring chances) than the criteria used for defense, yet you still used those numbers as an argument to why defense is playing relatively better than the goalies. When the criteria is the same for both goalies and defense, the picture looks much different.

I wasn't using only even strength goals to "count against the defense". The team's goals against average includes powerplay goals against. And that's the number I'm basing my argument on.

When I said "we're not getting scored on, at even strength", my point was that a disproportionate number of goals which make up our GAA came came on the powerplay. And our GAA is still among the best in the league (or was when I started the coversation hours ago).

In other words, our stats are pretty good (both team and goalie stats). And they're EVEN BETTER if we don't include powerplays. And the reason this is useful is because we've given up a relatively large number of PP goals in our five games. But this shouldn't reflect poorly on the defense (or the goaltending) because getting scored on when you're short handed has little to do with the quality of your defense. Lots of bad defenses have good penalty kills, and lots of good defense have bad penalty kills. For example, last year Carolina and Colorado had top five penalty kills, but they weren't good defensive teams.

Our defense has been good. So good that we're not giving up many even strength goals. We're giving up a relatively large number of goals on the PK. Which makes the score look bad, but hardly reflects on the quality of our defenseman over these first five games.

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I wasn't using only even strength goals to "count against the defense". The team's goals against average includes powerplay goals against. And that's the number I'm basing my argument on.

When I said "we're not getting scored on, at even strength", my point was that a disproportionate number of goals which make up our GAA came came on the powerplay. And our GAA is still among the best in the league (or was when I started the coversation hours ago).

In other words, our stats are pretty good (both team and goalie stats). And they're EVEN BETTER if we don't include powerplays. And the reason this is useful is because we've given up a relatively large number of PP goals in our five games. But this shouldn't reflect poorly on the defense (or the goaltending) because getting scored on when you're short handed has little to do with the quality of your defense. Lots of bad defenses have good penalty kills, and lots of good defense have bad penalty kills. For example, last year Carolina and Colorado had top five penalty kills, but they weren't good defensive teams.

Our defense has been good. So good that we're not giving up many even strength goals. We're giving up a relatively large number of goals on the PK. Which makes the score look bad, but hardly reflects on the quality of our defenseman over these first five games.

We're going in circles here. If you still think the defense has been good, despite not even watching the last game and using one narrow, primarily goalie-based statistic for the basis of your argument, then clearly after two pages of debating, no amount of statistical or anecdotal evidence I or anyone else puts forth is going to change your mind. I still think you're crazy though. The whole team needs work.

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We're going in circles here. If you still think the defense has been good, despite not even watching the last game and using one narrow, primarily goalie-based statistic for the basis of your argument, then clearly after two pages of debating, no amount of statistical or anecdotal evidence I or anyone else puts forth is going to change your mind. I still think you're crazy though. The whole team needs work.

I really don't know how to make this more clear. Our team's goals against average is slightly above average (statistically). And it's negatively skewed by our bad penalty kill (30% of the goals scored against us have been powerplay goals). So our PK is bad. Not our defense. 30% is terrible.

For context, 13% of the goals we've scored have been on the PP. 30% for them. 13% for us.

We also have the tenth most penalty minutes per game (most of which were taken by forwards).

If you're shorthanded all the time, and you're not very good at killing penalties, you A) Don't get shots, B) Get shot on more often, C) Get scored on more (remember that 30%).

Through 5 games, we've been abysmal offensively and on special teams. Our goaltending and defense have both been decent to above average. And that's why we're 3-2. Any attempt to paint some "the defense is just as bad as the offense and special teams" argument is completely ignoring reality.

Through 5 games, the defense is the least of our concerns.

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We need to give up a lot fewer odd man rushes, part of that is the defenses fault for pinching so much, part of it is on the forwards for not recognizing they're pinching and covering for them. So far this season, I've seen sheahan and Larkin skating backwards like defenseman multiple times while the other team has 3 forwards rushing.

That needs to be fixed.

I'm thinking its just growing pains, new coach, new systems, new players, etc.

Edited by jimmyemeryhunter

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^ exactly the plethora of odd man rushes have got to stop. This is why I mentioned that "i miss datsyuk" because his elite backchecking usually bails us out with a nice takeaway. A simplistic example ofcourse.

Hopefully it gets better and things get tighter defensively. Still got tons of games to play.

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I really don't know how to make this more clear. Our team's goals against average is slightly above average (statistically). And it's negatively skewed by our bad penalty kill (30% of the goals scored against us have been powerplay goals). So our PK is bad. Not our defense. 30% is terrible.

For context, 13% of the goals we've scored have been on the PP. 30% for them. 13% for us.

We also have the tenth most penalty minutes per game (most of which were taken by forwards).

If you're shorthanded all the time, and you're not very good at killing penalties, you A) Don't get shots, B) Get shot on more often, C) Get scored on more (remember that 30%).

Through 5 games, we've been abysmal offensively and on special teams. Our goaltending and defense have both been decent to above average. And that's why we're 3-2. Any attempt to paint some "the defense is just as bad as the offense and special teams" argument is completely ignoring reality.

Through 5 games, the defense is the least of our concerns.

The issue I have is with you saying that our defense is fine when they're giving up the amount of shots on net they're giving up, the scoring chances they're allowing, the inability to get the puck out of our zone, the habit of regularly turning the puck over, the frequently missed assignments in the slot, the anemia of offensive contributions, the struggle to control rebounds, and so on and so on. Any of these parameters suggest that our defense is not "decent to above average", and all of them together scream that our defense has simply been awful. Its loony to neglect them and define good defense exclusively as low even strength goals allowed. All these other paramers are included in a defense's responsibility so why throw them out? Its like a doctor saying a patient is healthy because they haven't died yet despite they're not controlling their diabetes, hypertension, peripheral vascular disease, excessive drug habit, coronary artery disease, dislipidemia etc etc.

Also I'm not sure where "the defense is just as bad as the offense and special teams" claim is coming from. I've certainly never said nor implied that, and that hasn't been my argument, although for some reason you seem to be suggesting that it is. In fact I said a few times in this discussion that I think theres a ton wrong with this team right now, special teams included. But I'm not going to look at the situation with a narrow point of view and ignore all the problems with the exception of one or two. If the defense is playing poorly I acknowedge it as I'm doing now. Same with the offense, or goaltending, or special teams, or specific lines. That's something for whatever reason you seem to be struggling with.

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I really don't know how to make this more clear. Our team's goals against average is slightly above average (statistically). And it's negatively skewed by our bad penalty kill (30% of the goals scored against us have been powerplay goals). So our PK is bad. Not our defense. 30% is terrible.

For context, 13% of the goals we've scored have been on the PP. 30% for them. 13% for us.

We also have the tenth most penalty minutes per game (most of which were taken by forwards).

If you're shorthanded all the time, and you're not very good at killing penalties, you A) Don't get shots, B) Get shot on more often, C) Get scored on more (remember that 30%).

Through 5 games, we've been abysmal offensively and on special teams. Our goaltending and defense have both been decent to above average. And that's why we're 3-2. Any attempt to paint some "the defense is just as bad as the offense and special teams" argument is completely ignoring reality.

Through 5 games, the defense is the least of our concerns.

Over the last 3 years around 22% of all goals scored have been on the PP. 30% may look "terrible", and would be if it stayed that way for the whole year, but given it's so early in the year it's meaningless. It's one goal. If your stats can so easily be skewed by just one or two goals, you need to take them with a grain of salt. Shot attempts are a much better indicator at this point since they are much more frequent events. Even that, given how little time we've spent on special teams, isn't very good.

I said in the other thread; pretty much everything has been bad this year. That includes the defense. Maybe not as inept statistically as the offense, but just as bad as special teams, and much worse than the goaltending.

Furthermore, I think most people would include the PK in the broader "defense" category. Certainly possible to be good on one but poor on the other, but they're not exactly separate.

Further-furthermore, there's "defense" in the sense of our ability to prevent goals, which is a product of both our defensemen and forwards (most people I think exclude the goalie from team defense). But I think when it was initially brought up, "defense" was meant in the sense of our group of defensemen, and includes both the defensive and offensive contributions.

Bottom line is we can't hold on to the puck. When we lose it, we have trouble getting it back. We have the same problem at every strength. It means we generate few shots, allow a lot, and take more penalties.

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