rakish

People come to different conclusions based upon the same facts all the time, I think disbelief in someone else's writing in normal.

Bennett had a very good PPG this season. Players move around too much to care about total points, I only can care about PPG As far as who I should have picked Liger? I think Reinhart will be fine, Bennett a bit better on style points, Nylander will score a little more. So Liger, what's the appeal to this defenseman you love at 21?

I succumed to peer pressure, I feel so ashamed

With Reinhart, What I was trying to convey that his WJC was good, his season, not as good. If I judged prospects by WJC, then Reinhart would rank much better. Unfortunately, not everyone plays WJC and it's only a few games, therefore I don't use it. Regarding foolish: Actually I did the same thing last year, I ranked each player in relation to those selected around him, then compiled each teams score for real good pick, and good pick. For the most part, I got the same answers. Will I get more or less the same answers next year? I expect so, more or less. Though check next year, and keep me in line.

You also championed Larkin, who my model didn't like last year. I haven't solved the valuation problem when someone plays with a great player (Eichel) on a different line (which I think he was)

Finally, the reranking mentioned above is done. I send you to the website, not only to make Ghost roll his eyes, but so you can see the rankings at different ages because I don't have javascript here. The rankings at age 15 and 16 are a bit rough. I only used the previous regular season not the WJC, and didn't average age 17 and 18, which really bites Reinhart, since his WHL year was not great. For Sabres fans, in their post-draft regular seasons, I have Martin and Oloffson as having good years relative to their draft position, Lemieux was OK I believe that the good teams draft better than the bad teams because they are using a better process to value prospects. In my re-rank of the 2014 draft, there are 4 Predators in the top 50, 3 Sharks, 3 Ducks, 3 Lightning, 3 Leafs, 3 Red Wings, 3 Jets, 3 Coyotes (?), none of those eight teams had a top seven pick, but I believe each improved more from the 2014 draft than most of those in the top seven. (I exclude the Canucks, Virtanen was hurt and the Sabres, Reinhart will be fine) I'll be back with my top 50 for the 2015 draft, hopefully before it happens. I'm encouraging people to put out their own top 50, so when WJC comes around, we can see how you did.

Regarding no goaltenders, I think they meant Cal Petersen (a goaltender) not Judd Peterson (a centre)

I was a gaffer (the lighting guy) before I got old. Now I write d3.js for people, basically it's taking their data and making a chart out of it. This is the d3.js page to give you an idea of what you can do.

I didn't need to read the article to know what was up with Stafford, he needs to get to the net. These are 3 charts that I've posted a few times now. It demonstrates that you can't tell a player 'Shoot more', fortunately he found a coach that told him not to maximize shots on goal.

Regarding http://www.sportsnet...hl-draft-picks/ The regression lines are much too long to come to the conclusions the writer makes. If they were shorter, I think he would see that there are other factors involved in the relationship between draft slot and productivity. Look at the second round, if we group picks into 10's, by my eye, picks 31-40 are worse than 41 to 50. My theory is that since bad teams pick 31 to 40, and their inability to access value at 17 is a major reason they are bad, picks 31-40 is worth less than picking 41 to 50 where better teams pick, even though they get first choice. Additionally, you got to account for the space in each team's pipeline. By my eye picks 51-60 are much worse, now it could be that good teams have less space in their pipeline, or it could be that many of these picks are traded to bad teams, who cannot access the value of 17 year olds. I'm too busy to try to figure out which. As dStebb says, no one would trade 35 for 45, yet the 45th pick will probably be more productive. This tells you something is really wrong with his approach.

19? No he's not 19, he's 22

Why do we love tall men

So Patty, without dishing, because I think that will get you tossed from this board, are said players generally traded or kept around?

for me the operative question is do you want Crosby or Toews? I think that's a difficult question. How would Pittsburgh be with Toews and Malkin? Chicago with Crosby and Kane? If I had to choose one, I'm not sure. I think Crosby will win more MVP's, I think Toews will win more cups, I would probably go with Toews. McDavid's going to be like Crosby, and it would be hard to pass that by. Eichel's going to be better than Toews, so I wouldn't let that go by. So for entertainment value, you draft McDavid. For me, In game 6 of the ECF, I want Teddy sending Eichel over the boards. That's my vision on how you win cups. Trading up? Trading down? They're both going to be great, be happy with who you get.

McKenzie!!! McKenzie rocks. I can't find how many of his 2014 picks played WJC because tsn took down all his picks past 15, I found 1-30 somewhere else, but I would need the top 60 or so 2006 24 (Persson) Leland Irving 46 (Enroth) Alexander Vasyunov 57 (Weber) 2007 31 (TJ Brennan) Brett MacLean 59 (Schiestal) Maxim Mayorov 2008 12 (Myers) Myers 26 (Ennis) John Carlson 44 (Adam) Colby Robak 2009 13 (Kassian) Kulikov 2010 23 (Pysyk) Emerson Etem 2011 16 (Armia) Beaulieu 2012 12 (Grigorenko) Teravainen 14 (Girgensons) Maatta 44 (McCabe) 2013 8 (Risto) Nichushkin 16 (Zadorov) Zadorov 35 (Compher) Fucale 38 (Hurley) Hagg 52 (Bailey) 2014 2 (Reinhart) Reinhart 31 (Lemieux) Barbashev 44 (Cornel) McKeown 49 (Karabacek)

In part 3, craigslist is a bit more difficult, I can't find any prospect rankings earlier than 2009. As for 2014, if you take WJC participation as a metric, Button did an awesome job in quantity (7 of Buffalo's 9 picks, to Murray's 2) though they weren't all core players. So overall, a little better than Buffalo, about the same, a little worse? 2009 13 (Kassian) Jacob Josefson 2010 23 (Pysyk) Kirill Kabanov 2011 16 (Armia) Nathan Beaulieu 2012 12 (Grigorenko) Teuvo Teräväinen 14 (Girgensons) Malcolm Subban 44 (McCabe) Gemel Smith 2013 8 (Risto) Valeri Nichushkin 16 (Zadorov) Zachary Fucale 35 (Compher) Nicolas Petan 38 (Hurley) Laurent Dauphin 52 (Bailey) Artturi Lehkonen 2014 2 (Reinhart) Reinhart 31 (Lemieux) Vlad Kamenev 44 (Cornel) Braydon Point 49 (Karabacek) Anton Karlsson 61 (Johannson) Ondrej Kase 74 (Martin) Martin 121 (Willman) Spencer Watson 151 (Brown) Vladislav Gavrikov 181 (Olofsson) Emil Johansson

Does it have value?

Yesterday's post on McKeens created such an overwhelming response, today I decided to look at The Hockey News, since it is sometimes quoted here as an authority. Same rules as yesterday, I went back a year farther, really because I wanted to see how they did with Persson. One list, I think it was 2008, I could only find a March ranking or June mock, I went with the March ranking. Letting THN draft for the Sabres, you get the following team. Gone from the Sabres are Myers, Ennis, Grigensons, Risto, Zadorov, Reinhart. That group is replaced by Ceci, Nichushkin, Bennett and Barbashev. They changed by-line authors a couple years ago, and the new writer, by my eye, isn't as bad as his predecessor. 2006 24 (Persson) Nigel Williams 46 (Enroth) Ryan White 57 (Weber) Mike Forney 2007 31 (TJ Brennan) Maxim Mayorov 59 (Schiestal) Joakim Andersson 2008 12 (Myers) Colten Teubert 26 (Ennis) Colby Robak 44 (Adam) Mikhail Stefanovich 2009 13 (Kassian) Jordan Schroeder 2010 23 (Pysyk) Pysyk 2011 16 (Armia) Zack Phillips 2012 12 (Grigorenko) Grigo 14 (Girgensons) Cody Ceci 44 (McCabe) Dalton Thrower 2013 8 (Risto) Valeri Nichushkin 16 (Zadorov) Hunter Shinkaruk 35 (Compher) Robert Hagg 38 (Hurley) Steve Santini 52 (Bailey) Eric Comrie 2014 2 (Reinhart) Bennett 31 (Lemieux) Barbashev 44 (Cornel) McKeown 49 (Karabacek) Dougherty

I looked at who McKeen's would have taken had they been drafting as the Buffalo Sabres. Often times I got this list from a blog that copied their top 30 list that year. How you want to look at 2012 is up to you. Does McKeen's Sabres get Grigo at 14? Since they picked Terravainen at 12, or is Grigo gone because the real Sabres picked him at 12? Either way, McKeen's does OK, they lose out on Myers, Ennis, Girgensons, Risto, and they gain Kulikov, Kuznetov, Nichushkin. In the past I did the same with CSS, taking the top rated NA player, CSS did worse than McKeen's. 2007 31 (TJ Brennan) Bill Sweatt 59 (Schiestal) Mark Katic 2008 12 (Myers) Chet Pickard 26 (Ennis) Jacob Markstrom 44 (Adam) Zach Delpe 2009 13 (Kassian) Kulikov 2010 23 (Pysyk) Kuznetsov 2011 16 (Armia) Rocco Grimaldi 2012 12 (Grigorenko) Teravainen 14 (Girgensons) Grigorenko (Cody Ceci) 44 (McCabe) Colton Scissons 2013 8 (Risto) Nichushkin 16 (Zadorov) Zadorov 35 (Compher) Hagg 38 (Hurley) Vannelli 52 (Bailey) 2014 2 (Reinhart) Reinhart 31 (Lemieux) Dougherty 44 (Cornel) Cornel 49 (Karabacek)

I think you're right, most everyone, but a look at iss's 2014 top 30 board is pretty accurate as far as what actually happened, so I wouldn't be surprised if Crouse goes early. Though, one major difference between the draft and ISS is that at least two teams value high scoring defenseman a lot higher than ISS does, since both Honka and DeAngelo went much higher than ISS expected, so it's reasonable that we'll find teams value low-scoring forwards lower than ISS does.

Absolutely, I think the results from drafting are way more consistent than you do because some teams are using relevant analysis and most teams aren't, but I can measure these things working in the draft, but how much does data matter in the NHL? I have no idea. I don't know what data people are looking at, or any idea how many games are won or lost because of it.

The amount of error in the RTSS reports doesn't bother me as much as it probably should. One thing that would have helped a lot is if they used 'line change' and an event. You end up with 45 seconds between events, different players on the ice, who played those 45 seconds, don't know. As you say, it evens out with enough data. Yeah, you gotta believe each team serious about this stuff has a flock of interns taking notes gathering data. And that why I got out of this as an interest, because my lack of data is insurmountable. How do you know the difference whether a team knows what they are doing or not? How do I know whether my work is any good? I moved on to the draft, nice bright lines.

So I was able to give the tickets away successfully for the Nashville game. I asked my friend for a report for the gang at SS, this was the reply. Rake... dude... Are those your season tickets? If so, there's a couple things you'll want to know before you go back. First of all, kids shouldn't be at hockey games. And once a 12 year old girl starts crying, what was I suppose to do? No one ever tells you that. And once things got weird, it's me that's the ######. I hate people. The other thing about the beer vendor. If you think about it, he's Lucic's teammate, they're both paid by the same people, I think if Miller found out about that scene last night, he would thank me. So thanks for the tickets, I hope they're not your season tickets

Check out behindthenet.ca for this

Thanks X, this is all good. My rule is the metric needs to be more than indicating what you are trying to achieve, it needs to actually represent what you are trying to achieve. If the landowner can manipulate the data, the data isn't very actionable. So, for me, in the end, measuring window space may be accurate regarding your wealth, but it's not an important measurement of wealth because it's not actionable, you can't tax it. So to hockey. Shots are indicative of how you are playing, but they aren't representative. Lets take a look at 3 charts. They are Drew Staffords 10-11 (the contract year), 11-12, and 12-13. In 10-11, he gets to the net. Following the green line, over 6% of his shots are from 9 feet, 5.5% from 10 feet, 5% from 11 feet, 5.5% from 12 feet, 3.3% from 13 feet. This is well over league average, the blue line. If you count up the goals, the green dots, Stafford scored 15 of his 31 goals between 8 and 13 feet from roughly 25% of his shots. In 11-12 his game changes, he is shooting further away from the net. In 12-13 he is even farther. He stops scoring. Now the reasons this happened are probably more complex than my analysis (for instance Stafford had very good results playing with Roy, he has terrible results with Hodgson), but I attribute Stafford's decline in production to him being coached to shoot more. Now if Corsi works for you, fine, but Regier failed while being on the forefront of this mindset.