Carolina Hurricanes and Advanced Stats
By Zeke Lukow
Though the NHL isn’t on the same level as the MLB with advanced metrics, advanced metrics are on the rise in the NHL community. There are a couple of metrics that are being widely used by teams like the Carolina Hurricanes and can be very useful in evaluating players performance.
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These numbers come into play to fill in the gaps that traditional stats may leave. For instance, PIMS do not give an adequate depiction of defense or grit. Plus/Minus doesn’t tell the whole story about a player’s end to end performance. Lastly as someone living in DC total points don’t tell the story of someone’s performance, aka Ovechkin’s defense.
These kinds of stats allow management to make decisions on who should make the roster. With many position battles going into camp these stats will help coaches make difficult decisions on who makes the Carolina Hurricanes opening day roster.
Corsi
This stat is named after goaltender coach Jim Corsi, the man who developed the stat, to show the amount of total shots that a team has per 60 minutes. The main differentiation with corsi is that it includes all shots (shots on goal, shots that missed the net or hit the post, and shots blocked by the opponent) at even strength.
Carolina Hurricanes
When a player is out for a shot for, he gets a plus; when he is out for a shot against, he gets a minus. Essentially what this does is measures time in each zone. If a player is out for more shots for, he must be possessing the puck in the offensive zone. If he is out for more shots against, he must be playing in the defensive zone. This is how Corsi measures a player’s impact on useful possession.
To show the percentage of Corsi actions that a player is on the ice that are positive, there is Corsi For Percentage or CF%. This stat is a percentage of total Corsi actions that a player is on the ice for, which allows you to be able to compare CF% regardless of TOI.
The Hurricanes players that exhibited the most useful possession were the Staal brothers, Jordan (59.4%) and Eric (57.3%). This means that 59.4% of the actions taken while Jordan was on the ice were Corsi for actions, which means that 59.4% of Jordan’s possession was in the offensive zone.
Fenwick
Fenwick is exactly like Corsi except it does not include shots that were blocked by the opposition, only shots for, and shots missed/hit the post. The theory behind Fenwick is that a team should not be rewarded for getting their shots blocked, because blocking a shot takes skill.
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To show how Fenwick and Corsi differ, you can look at the Carolina Hurricanes top performers. Jordan Staal remains at the top, his Fenwick For Percentage (FF%) is 57.3%, however Eric Staal falls to fourth place with 55.9%. Fenwick does not count blocked shots, so this shows that Eric’s shots are being blocked at a high rate.
Fenwick and Corsi go hand in hand, but when you take out blocked shots, you can see that Eric’s shots may not be as useful as they first appeared. Another problem with blocked shots is that they often lead to turnovers and/or breakaways.
Goals for Percentage (GF%)
GF% is measured by goals for while the player is on the ice/(goals for + goals against) during 5 on 5 play. This is important for players evaluation because it shows the percentage of goals that a player in on the ice for that are goals for. A higher percentage means that a player is out for more goals for than goals against.
Another way to look at this stat is a better version of plus/minus. Plus/minus can be skewed by more time on ice, or the player’s role that he plays on the ice. GF% makes everything relative to the percentage of goals a player is on the ice for. As an example is a player is out for 2 goals for and 2 goals against (50%) would be better than being out for 40 goals for and 80 goals against (33%).
Stats Adjusted for Time on Ice
Other stats you may see G/60, A/60, and P/60 which represent goals, assists, and primary points adjusted for time on ice respectively. Most often Corsi will be adjusted for time on ice. For instance, CF60 means corsi adjusted for time on ice.
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These are all important stats because they standardize players so that you can measure their output on a normalized scale. for instance a player playing four minutes and scoring 1 goal is more impressive than a player scoring 1 goal in 20 minutes.
As an example, the top two Hurricanes players for CF60 are Jordan Staal(67.05) and Justin Faulk(66.01). Jordan Staal missed significant time with a broken leg and only played 695 minutes this year and Justin Faulk led the team in TOI with 1,478 minutes. This means that Jordan averaged 67.05 Corsi For actions per 60 minutes of play and Faulk averaged 66.01 Corsi For actions per 60 minutes of play.
This shows how players can be evaluated on a level playing field based on time and not on an absolute scale. It allows for players that have drastically different TOI to be effectively compared to each other.
A great site to go to to visualize a player’s advanced metrics, and to see how players stack up against the league go to ownthepuck.blogspot.com. They have multiple ways to visualize players performances and allow users to compare players performances through different advanced metrics.
If there are any other stats that you find confusing let us know below.
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