Conflict in the Crease

[PavelValerievichDatsyuk 1,935]

9 hours ago, Buppy said:

I'm sure a lot of coach's do believe in it, just like a lot of coach's and players have superstitions. Doesn't mean the logic isn't faulty. 

I was just saying that recent play alone (much less recent results, which is a bit different) shouldn't be the determining factor, and it seems you agree, you're just arguing that "hot hand" really means more than just that. If used to help choose between two good, basically equal, options, fine. Likely no worse than any other method of choice. Which is why I added the part about Mrazek and Howard being close enough that it probably wouldn't matter.

We'll have to agree to disagree here, I think. It seems outrageous to me to compare playing a hot player to superstitions or compare it to gambling. If someone played well in one game they will usually be at a comparable level the next game. It's not rolling the dice and expecting to get 7s twice in a row. It's not making a choice based on the cycles of the moon.

Even the best players go through high points and lulls. A good choice coach recognizes these and plays who's on. If someone's scoring, you put them on the top line or increased minutes. If a pitcher has a good game they'll get another game soon. etc

Edited November 14, 2016 by PavelValerievichDatsyuk

[chaps80 1,591]

2 hours ago, Jacksoni said:

 

As expected. He has given Tampa fits in the past. Hopefully it's a diiferent outcome than the first game of the season though.

[Wheelchairsuperhero 1,453]

2 hours ago, Jacksoni said:

 

This is the right move. Have to get Mrazek back in at some point, and Howard's hot streak was unfortunately stopped (obviously not entirely his fault).

[Buppy 1,720]

1 hour ago, PavelValerievichDatsyuk said:

We'll have to agree to disagree here, I think. It seems outrageous to me to compare playing a hot player to superstitions or compare it to gambling. If someone played well in one game they will usually be at a comparable level the next game. It's not rolling the dice and expecting to get 7s twice in a row. It's not making a choice based on the cycles of the moon.

Even the best players go through high points and lulls. A good choice coach recognizes these and plays who's on. If someone's scoring, you put them on the top line or increased minutes. If a pitcher has a good game they'll get another game soon. etc

Regarding the bolded:

First, it doesn't appear to be particularly true, at least not to a large degree, nor out of line from what you might see in a random sample.

I took the last 100 games (as of Nov. 11) for several goalies (Mrazek, Howard, Price, Lundqvist, Rask, Holtby, and Bobrovsky). I categorized each game as good (.925 or better), bad (below .905), or average. I also generated a random set of 500 games, and categorized them the same way.

Overall	Good	Bad	Average	Total	Good%	Bad%	Avg%
Mrazek	50	38	12	100	50.00%	38.00%	12.00%
Howard	43	41	16	100	43.00%	41.00%	16.00%
Price	59	29	12	100	59.00%	29.00%	12.00%
Rask	50	39	11	100	50.00%	39.00%	11.00%
Lundqvist	50	35	15	100	50.00%	35.00%	15.00%
Holtby	48	34	18	100	48.00%	34.00%	18.00%
Bobrovsky	46	40	14	100	46.00%	40.00%	14.00%
Total	346	256	98	700	49.43%	36.57%	14.00%
Random	231	223	46	500	46.20%	44.60%	9.20%
After Good	Good	Bad	Average	Total	Good%	Bad%	Avg%
Mrazek	26	17	7	50	52.00%	34.00%	14.00%
Howard	17	18	8	43	39.53%	41.86%	18.60%
Price	34	17	8	59	57.63%	28.81%	13.56%
Rask	25	19	6	50	50.00%	38.00%	12.00%
Lundqvist	29	13	8	50	58.00%	26.00%	16.00%
Holtby	20	19	9	48	41.67%	39.58%	18.75%
Bobrovsky	23	15	8	46	50.00%	32.61%	17.39%
Total	174	118	54	346	50.29%	34.10%	15.61%
Random	118	91	22	231	51.08%	39.39%	9.52%
After Bad	Good	Bad	Average
Mrazek	20	15	3	38	52.63%	39.47%	7.89%
Howard	19	18	4	41	46.34%	43.90%	9.76%
Price	18	8	3	29	62.07%	27.59%	10.34%
Rask	19	14	6	39	48.72%	35.90%	15.38%
Lundqvist	14	15	6	35	40.00%	42.86%	17.14%
Holtby	22	7	5	34	64.71%	20.59%	14.71%
Bobrovsky	17	17	6	40	42.50%	42.50%	15.00%
Total	129	94	33	256	50.39%	36.72%	12.89%
Random	88	112	23	223	39.46%	50.22%	10.31%
Difference	Good	Bad	Average
Mrazek	-0.63%	-5.47%	6.11%
Howard	-6.81%	-2.04%	8.85%
Price	-4.44%	1.23%	3.21%
Rask	1.28%	2.10%	-3.38%
Lundqvist	18.00%	-16.86%	-1.14%
Holtby	-23.04%	19.00%	4.04%
Bobrovsky	7.50%	-9.89%	2.39%
Total	-0.10%	-2.61%	2.72%
Random	11.62%	-10.83%	-0.79%
Average	-1.16%	-1.71%	2.87%

The top table is overall games, the second is a breakdowns of games following good games, the third following bad games. (For the first game in each set, I counted the previous game as average. It's only 8 games, so it wouldn't change much. Also, some games are the last game of a season with the next being the first game in the following season. Again though, only a few games.)

The last table shows the difference. A negative number shows that result as being less likely following a good game than following a bad game. In most cases you can see there's little difference. Less even than you'd expect from complete randomness. In most cases the numbers are quite close to the overall numbers, which suggests that overall ability is a much better indicator future performance.

 

Secondly: We know hockey isn't exactly a random event, and the stats won't give a perfect picture of how a goalie really played. I don't think there's any question that players can be streaky, hot or cold. The problem is, like I said before, that you just can't know if a particular streak is going to continue. So again, if you're talking about two options that are close to equal it's probably not going to hurt, especially if you're basing it more on actual play than on pure stats. Howard .vs Mrazek, probably not going to hurt. Howard .vs Price, I don't care if Howard has 5 straight shutouts and Price sucks for 5 games...you start Price (assuming he's healthy). Tatar gets "hot", sure, move him ahead of Nyquist. But Glendening gets hot he stays put.

So bottom line, recent play should at most be only a small part of the decision of who to play. 

 

 

[PavelValerievichDatsyuk 1,935]

Buppy, that seems like a lot of work so I definitely respect that. That's a lot of data to look at and make sense of.

Edit: responded before I really thought it through.

...Okay, my head hurts, but I think I got a handle on those results. I think that's a really convoluted way analyzing it. I'm not even sure it says that much on the hot hand topic, since I think it requires more than 1 good game to be considered as such. I guess you were responding to my comment on a player being comparable in a game following after a good game. Maybe that my fault for mispeaking, since that isn't a player on a hot streak - that's just a good game.

I think you would have to consider the timeline beyond pairs of games. I think a good method would be to chart GAA game-by-game. If you just look at the chart on Howard last year from Wiim. You can clearly see when he was on positive streaks. Between game 20 and 30, for instance you'd feel pretty confident about the type of game you'd get from him. A good coach would judge considering those general trend and peaks of good play.

Anyway, the only reason you got push back was the "gambler fallacy" comment and then comparing playing the hot hand to superstition. That rhetoric seems much more severe than what I think your actually belief is, though. I don't think anyone was saying you should only consider streaks. If you said that they should measure that thinking with the general caliber of player, that's something I think everyone would get behind. And as you acknowledge that Howard and Mrazek are somewhat close, then that really seems like a time when you should consider hot and cool streaks.

Anyway, Mrazek's back in tomorrow and it looks like he has 52.63% chance of having a good game so Let's Go Wings!!!!

Edited November 15, 2016 by PavelValerievichDatsyuk

[Buppy 1,720]

19 hours ago, PavelValerievichDatsyuk said:

Buppy, that seems like a lot of work so I definitely respect that. That's a lot of data to look at and make sense of.

Edit: responded before I really thought it through.

...Okay, my head hurts, but I think I got a handle on those results. I think that's a really convoluted way analyzing it. I'm not even sure it says that much on the hot hand topic, since I think it requires more than 1 good game to be considered as such. I guess you were responding to my comment on a player being comparable in a game following after a good game. Maybe that my fault for mispeaking, since that isn't a player on a hot streak - that's just a good game.

I think you would have to consider the timeline beyond pairs of games. I think a good method would be to chart GAA game-by-game. If you just look at the chart on Howard last year from Wiim. You can clearly see when he was on positive streaks. Between game 20 and 30, for instance you'd feel pretty confident about the type of game you'd get from him. A good coach would judge considering those general trend and peaks of good play...

It's a simple analysis for sure. I considered doing a rolling sv% as well, to see if it was more predictive. I still might, but it's a bit of work. I suspect it will actually show a tendency towards worse performance following "hot" streaks (and vice versa), since few streaks last more than a few games. But that's fallacious logic as well. 

I think there's maybe two different arguments going on. Whether or not hot/cold streaks exist, and whether or not identifying one is actually useful in predicting the future.

Streaks certainly exist. They're probably not the result of pure randomness. But there doesn't seem to be any evidence to support using a streak as a predictive tool. Things just change too rapidly. By the time you figure out that player is on a streak, it's likely to change.

Maybe my initial comment was just too provocative.

[PavelValerievichDatsyuk 1,935]

That's all good, except I wasn't just arguing that hot streaks exist. If you recognize a guys strung together a few really good games I think it's a good guide for how you could expect him to play. Or any level of consisent games strung together would be a good guide.

You can see on that Wiim there's a pretty consistent GAA in Howie's first 30 games (or at least a general trend) except for 2 really bad games and a few shutouts. After a few of the consistently good games, as a coach you would say "hey he's been playing well and been consisently good, I can trust to put him." You might get one of the 2 bad games, but that gamble is always there even if you were using a policy to just play the best goalie.

Alternately, if you look at the last 20 games on that chart, you can see that Howie was up and down and it looks like he strung 2 similarly good games only once or twice, A coach - whether looking at a graph or just the score sheets from his past few games - shouldn't consider him on a hot streak and he wouldn't get the special consideration that a hot (consistently good) goalie should get.

 

Edited November 16, 2016 by PavelValerievichDatsyuk

[wings_fanatic 677]

This is why Ken Holland needed to get rid of Howard this past summer. This controversy is ridiculous. Mrazek was playing fine until the game after St. Louis. He had arguably his best game, and then had to sit out the next game so Howard could play and then Petr started the 2nd half of back to back (which back ups NEVER do). Ever since then, Petr has looked off. I totally put that on Blashill for poor management. WE needed to move on from this stupid debate after every game, but by having Howard here still, we are still having this debate. And now, instead of having a designated starter, Blashill is just going to play a guy until they lose, and then play another guy, never letting Mrazek get into a routine. 

It is hard to continue cheering for a team whose management is stuck in the past and is too afraid to let go of pieces that will never succeed for us, like Howard. It is not just Howard mind you. Probably could have packaged up Tatar or Nyquist in a deal for a dman, but hey lets stick with having too many average players who end up losing any value that they have. 

[kliq 3,755]

1 minute ago, wings_fanatic said:

This is why Ken Holland needed to get rid of Howard this past summer. This controversy is ridiculous. Mrazek was playing fine until the game after St. Louis. He had arguably his best game, and then had to sit out the next game so Howard could play and then Petr started the 2nd half of back to back (which back ups NEVER do). Ever since then, Petr has looked off. I totally put that on Blashill for poor management. WE needed to move on from this stupid debate after every game, but by having Howard here still, we are still having this debate. And now, instead of having a designated starter, Blashill is just going to play a guy until they lose, and then play another guy, never letting Mrazek get into a routine. 

It is hard to continue cheering for a team whose management is stuck in the past and is too afraid to let go of pieces that will never succeed for us, like Howard. It is not just Howard mind you. Probably could have packaged up Tatar or Nyquist in a deal for a dman, but hey lets stick with having too many average players who end up losing any value that they have. 

These guys are not children, if starting the second game of a back to back instead of the first game was enough to throw him into a funk, the guy should not be starting. I get why people are upset with ownership/management/coaching, but this is a reach if there ever was one.

[wings_fanatic 677]

10 minutes ago, kliq said:

These guys are not children, if starting the second game of a back to back instead of the first game was enough to throw him into a funk, the guy should not be starting. I get why people are upset with ownership/management/coaching, but this is a reach if there ever was one.

No it is not. Why was Jimmy getting starts he should not have got at the start of the season? He got a start in New York which was not a back to back. Petr was playing good, had just come off a win, so why did Blashill play a backup goalie in that situation? Then again in the back to back situation that I alluded to. As far as I am concerned, Blashill created this goaltending controversy. Any other team in the league plays their starter in these games, especially at the beginning of the season. I don't care what anyone says. He is a terrible coach for so many different reasons, but this one especially. 

[joesuffP 1,746]

You're delusional if you think there isn't huge question marks if Mrazek is going to be a quality number one in the NHL going further, much less a star. He hasn't proved anything more than the 'average at best' Jimmy Howard did early in his career. Being this bad when it's your chance to reclaim your #1 spot leads me to believe he has all the tools but lacks the mental aspect to be great... De Ja Vu eh

These Mrazek homers are really just Jimmy bashers. Feels great to be able to watch a game without having invested stock into certain players so I can make unbiased criticism

[kliq 3,755]

12 minutes ago, wings_fanatic said:

No it is not. Why was Jimmy getting starts he should not have got at the start of the season? He got a start in New York which was not a back to back. Petr was playing good, had just come off a win, so why did Blashill play a backup goalie in that situation? Then again in the back to back situation that I alluded to. As far as I am concerned, Blashill created this goaltending controversy. Any other team in the league plays their starter in these games, especially at the beginning of the season. I don't care what anyone says. He is a terrible coach for so many different reasons, but this one especially. 

Mrazek wants to be the starter, outplay Jimmy. It's simple. No different then what Price had to do in Montreal when Halak was there.

[wings_fanatic 677]

Halak wasn't there when it was Price originally. It was actully Huet ,so check your facts. And another thing, Halak DID outplay price that season and in the offseason, Montreal traded away Halak. So your thinking proves absolutely nothing. 

What is clear is that by the start of next season, Jimmy Howard will not be on this team. He will either be traded during the season (ideally) or he will be picked up by Vegas. Either way, I do not care, I will just be happy when he is gone. Look how much better Price played once Halak was gone and the net was clearly his. The same will happen with Mrazek. Blashill has totally screwed this up by not playing Petr like an number 1 at the start of the season. I am right about this.

[chaps80 1,591]

1 hour ago, wings_fanatic said:

No it is not. Why was Jimmy getting starts he should not have got at the start of the season? He got a start in New York which was not a back to back. Petr was playing good, had just come off a win, so why did Blashill play a backup goalie in that situation? Then again in the back to back situation that I alluded to. As far as I am concerned, Blashill created this goaltending controversy. Any other team in the league plays their starter in these games, especially at the beginning of the season. I don't care what anyone says. He is a terrible coach for so many different reasons, but this one especially. 

This is EXACTLY what I was trying to say earlier in this thread. Howard getting starts he never should have. If you designate a #1, you play him as your #1 unless he is struggling badly, and even then,you play your backup for a game or two, then get your starter right back in there. This whole playing the "hot hand" backup is bad coaching. Jimmy Howard needs to be moved. This situation kinda reminds me of the Cujo/Hasek debacle. Not as bad, but along those lines. Mrazek needs to have complete control of the crease so he can deal with his highs and lows and figure them out for himself with the coaching staff standing behind him 100%. Not have the goalie he replaced getting played in his place when he does have have a bad couple games. You can say "oh these guys aren't kids, deal with it". But it's not all that simple.

This team isn't winning a cup soon anyway. It's the perfect time to let Mrazek learn whatever he needs to without blocking his way. He'll be much better from it.

Edited November 16, 2016 by chaps80

[kliq 3,755]

21 minutes ago, wings_fanatic said:

Halak wasn't there when it was Price originally. It was actully Huet ,so check your facts. And another thing, Halak DID outplay price that season and in the offseason, Montreal traded away Halak. So your thinking proves absolutely nothing. 

What is clear is that by the start of next season, Jimmy Howard will not be on this team. He will either be traded during the season (ideally) or he will be picked up by Vegas. Either way, I do not care, I will just be happy when he is gone. Look how much better Price played once Halak was gone and the net was clearly his. The same will happen with Mrazek. Blashill has totally screwed this up by not playing Petr like an number 1 at the start of the season. I am right about this.

I am very aware that Huet was there in Price's first year in 2008 but Price started more games, then in 2009 Price became the bona fide starter with Halak as the backup. It was then in 2010 when Price lost the starting gig to Halak (though it was closer to 50/50). Then after a year of being challenged Price showed management that he had what it took and snagged the starting job and they traded away Halak and signed Auld. I actually went into detail about this earlier in this thread, no facts needed to be checked lol.

In 2010 Halak outplayed Price, it challenged Price and made him a better goaltender. When you are a goaltender in the NHL, the mental side of the game is extremely hard. You need to be able to get through a lot, and if we want Mrazek to be the guy that leads this team into becoming a contender one day, the guy who is going to start game 7's, the guy that is going to be "the guy" then having Jimmy Howard as an obstacle is one that he need to learn to overcome. If this is too much for him, then he's not the guy we are all hoping.

For the record, I am not against trading Howard, but not because I am worried about Mrazek, I believe Mrazek is going to shine, its just a matter of when. My reason for wanting to trade Howard, is because of his 5.3 mil cap-hit. If we could have Howard at 1.5mil I would love to have him here.  

You are right, Montreal did trade Halak in the off-season, and I believe that if given a good return Holland would not hesitate to trade Howard. The problem is in the off-season, all reports indicated that teams wanted Detroit to retain salary as Howard is a hard player to trade with his track record/cap-hit. 

Mrazek is going to get a chance to play, have some faith in him. You can't coddle players. 

Edited November 16, 2016 by kliq

[chaps80 1,591]

20 minutes ago, wings_fanatic said:

Halak wasn't there when it was Price originally. It was actully Huet ,so check your facts. And another thing, Halak DID outplay price that season and in the offseason, Montreal traded away Halak. So your thinking proves absolutely nothing. 

 

I was going to post the same thing. Price wasn't near the goalie he is now when Halak was on the team. Halak outplayed him, but it was Halak who was traded. I remember Habs fans making a HUGE uproar about it. They wanted Price gone. That decision to keep Price didn't pay off right away, he had ups and downs while he learned the ropes, but look at him now. They have arguably the best goalie in the world who is the backbone of their franchise. 

Edited November 16, 2016 by chaps80

[marcaractac 3,963]

In the end, it took Price 6 years to become the goalie he is now. I'm kind of willing to cut Mrazek some slack in just his second full season.  

[The Secret 304]

No spot is owed to any player and so I think you play the hot hand and if there is no clear cut #1 then play both in hope to spur each other on to play better. A good tandem is a safer bet then putting all your eggs in a basket that hasnt showed it can handle all the eggs.

[chaps80 1,591]

3 hours ago, The Secret said:

No spot is owed to any player and so I think you play the hot hand and if there is no clear cut #1 then play both in hope to spur each other on to play better. A good tandem is a safer bet then putting all your eggs in a basket that hasnt showed it can handle all the eggs.

Yeah that's a good way to go about it IF you haven't just resigned an RFA goalie and told him that he's your starter going forward. Howard ideally should have been gone before the season started so there wouldn't end up being some battle between him and Mrazek for playing time, but Holland couldn't get any team to touch his contract. Probably still can't. Mrazek was playing just fine, and all of a sudden Blash throws Howard in a game he had no reason to other than he typically played well against NYR. Howard had a great game, and all of a sudden the chatter starts up, Howard gets more starts, etc. Howard had 100 chances to keep his starter job over the past 2-3 years and screwed them all up. Now all of a sudden that he's finally lost it for good he decides to play like we all knew he was capable of, and he gets rewarded with more starts? What a joke.

[frankgrimes 1,836]

It's far from a joke Mrazek hasn't shown the consistency needed to be the number 1, period. As soon as other teams started to figure him and his overly aggressive style out his performances dropped of.

Howard has been the better goalie this season so if Brazen wants to be the started he has to show it simple as that.

[LeftWinger 4,963]

we got a new goalie named Brazen...is he any good? (autocorrect I know)

2 hours ago, frankgrimes said:

It's far from a joke Mrazek hasn't shown the consistency needed to be the number 1, period. As soon as other teams started to figure him and his overly aggressive style out his performances dropped of.

Howard has been the better goalie this season so if Brazen wants to be the started he has to show it simple as that.

 

[Euro_Twins 4,477]

On 02/11/2016 at 10:42 PM, Buppy said:

He was not "off his game for 1-1.5 months".

Got lit up by Boston and Pittsburgh, then had solid games against Ott and CBJ, not too bad against Col, poor against Chi, then gave up a couple early in the next Chi game and got pulled, then 4 straight solid games, not good in relief of Jimmy against TB, not too bad against Mon, worse against Pit and got pulled (and Jimmy did even worse in relief), then again pulled early after two early goals. 

That is not being bad for 1-1.5 months straight. He was good at times, bad at times. Considering that Jimmy wasn't faring much better over that same time, I have to think it was mostly the result of the team play overall. Which is not to say Mrazek (or Jimmy) were perfect, just probably not as bad as the stats suggest. Maybe if I was a coach, and being paid to analyze video, I'd do that... but considering I'm not getting paid and it probably wouldn't do any good, I'm not going to. Because again, it doesn't matter. Go ahead and call those games bad. Still doesn't mean he was bad for a month+, nor is it particularly uncommon for goalies to have several bad games in a relatively short period.

And now, just as I predicted, you're starting to use Mrazek to define what consistent means. Now instead of it being 'consistent goalies don't have that many bad games, or bad stretches of games', it's 'well, regular bad games don't count, only <.800 bad games'. And not just that, but apparently you're saying that 2 such games is Vezina-worthy consistency, but 3 makes you "one of the most inconsistent goalies in recent Red Wings history".

I'll grant you, games under .800 are rare, especially full games. Mrazek has only one of those in his career. Really about the only times it happens is when a goalie is pulled pretty early. So the crux of your argument seems to be falling on the two games in which he gave up two early goals and got pulled, resulting in very poor stats.

I'm going to speculate a little here, but given that there were 1787 goals scored in 1st periods last year, I think it's safe to assume "2 early goals" is not all that uncommon. But I'd assume (speculating again, but I'm not going to dig through a ton of game logs) that a goalie being pulled after just 2 goals is pretty rare, especially for an established goalie. I think you're giving undue weight to a coach's decision.

Now, there's no way to know what would have happened if Petr had been allowed to finish those two games, but going by the rest of his career, I'd say it's highly likely he would have finished above .800. Maybe you disagree. Not really important either way, being that it was only two games.

So you're mad that our starter goalie was shook because his backup played in a game and played very good. and then our starter s*** the bed continuously after and yet kept getting starts and then finally they witched to the goalie who was actually playing good? should we not play the players who give us the best chance to win? players need to be held accountable or they won't have any reason to play well. or is it you're just mad cause you love mrazek that much?

[Echolalia 2,961]

Lol now it's Blashill's fault that Mrazek can't stop a puck.

Edited November 17, 2016 by Echolalia

[kickazz 5,459]

I bet Dominic Hasek out of retirement would play better.

[Echolalia 2,961]

Shocky have you had a chance to read the forum rules?  You're obviously a very smart guy but just in case you forgot I'll just leave this here.  Even the smartest of us can forget things sometimes:

· DON'T personally attack other members. This includes name-calling, flame-baiting, etc.. If you can't discuss your point with maturity then don't discuss it. People that violate this rule will be dealt with swiftly.

Of course I'm not a mod so I personally have no jurisdiction on the matter, but I'd hate for the forums to lose a very smart poster because of a ban.