In case you’re not familiar, Fire Joe Morgan was the blog that set the highest standard for hilarious sports criticism by taking some of the worst baseball columns written and proceeding to rip them apart paragraph by paragraph.
Like countless others, I’ve ripped off their successful formula numerous times. It feels like it has been ages since I’ve taken the time to do a FJM inspired post, especially since I hate giving undeserving work more attention than it deserves, but after reading an article in the Metro News today, I just couldn’t help myself.
If you’re not familiar with the FJM format, the original work will appear as normal text and my thoughts will be in bold.
Here we go…
An advanced hockey statistician is predicting that the Ottawa Senators will finish the season with 86 points, just shy of a trip to the NHL playoffs.
Capitalizing on the fact that hockey analytics has developed into an oversaturated talking point because of the well documented hirings by the Toronto Maple Leafs, Edmonton Oilers, New Jersey Devils and Washington Capitals, I suppose that because an analytics “expert” projected the Senators to finish out of the playoffs, I should feel the greater sense of doubt that my favorite hockey team will reach the postseason.
The thing is, the overwhelming consensus opinion was that the Ottawa Senators were a playoff bubble team. Case in point, another analyst, Rob Vollman – whose work I respect and enjoy – took a look at a “mix of magazines, mainstream experts, and bloggers across the league” (92 of them to be exact), and found that “13% of analysts have the Senators in fourth, and another 19% in fifth” while “seventh place (in the Atlantic Division) was the most common prediction”.
And the problem according to PowerScout Hockey President and senior analyst Marc Appleby is that the Senators are building the team around the wrong player: Bobby Ryan.
Oh, this will be good.
“One of the biggest challenges with the Senators is if they try to build the offence through Bobby Ryan on the wing, it will be problematic for long-term success,” said Appleby.
Okay, just to be clear, the Senators will not make the playoffs this year because they won’t have long-term success building around Bobby Ryan?
How does this statement help one reach the conclusion outlined in the lede?
He says his advanced stat-based research, which analyzes 14,000 NHL hockey games dating back to 1997, suggests that wingers don’t have as much of an impact on a hockey game as centres or offensive defenseman do.
“A lot of teams think that having a scoring winger is the same as having a scoring centre and it’s not. You really want strength down the middle,” said Appleby.
Kyle Turris, Mika Zibanejad, Curtis Lazar, David Legwand, Zack Smith and Jean-Gabriel Pageau agree.
“Look at teams that have tried to build through the wing and not have a lot of success like Toronto, like Washington with Ovechkin, like Calgary with Iginla. The teams that try to throw the puck to the outside all the time to feed their superstar player on the wing, generally have a harder time.”
The thing is, the Calgary Flames were a controversial Martin Gelinas no-goal away from beating the Tampa Bay Lightning in the 2004 Stanley Cup Final and teams like Toronto and Washington have failed not because of Phil Kessel or Alex Ovechkin, but because of poor amateur and professional personnel decisions. Hockey isn’t s a sport like basketball or even baseball in which one player can take over and completely dominant a game from start to finish. The best players only play one-third to two-fifths of a game, meaning that a team’s roster has to have equal parts depth and talent to have any chance of sustained success and with that in mind, both organizations have proven completely incapable of surrounding either player with enough talent.
The other thing is that Appleby’s acting like Bobby Ryan is Ottawa’s best forward. Truth is, their best forward is a center and I don’t anticipate that changing anytime soon. Kyle Turris is Ottawa’s best forward and it’s not even close.
If Appleby wants to advance the argument that it would have been in Ottawa’s best interests to refrain from making the Bobby Ryan trade because of the opportunity cost involved or because a low budget team like the Senators might have benefitted from a slower rebuilding approach that would have seen the team stockpile young players and prospects in hopes that they could grow up and develop into a formidable core, then fine. I have all the time in the world to listen to someone advance that argument, especially since I have my own reservations about whether Ryan will be able to live up to the contract extension that he recently signed.
Now with that being said, no one can pretend that that a slowed rebuilding approach isn’t rife with risk or unknown variables either. A reminder of the Edmonton Oilers’ situation will tell you that you need more than just a handful of high draft selections. Even model rebuild scenarios like Pittsburgh and Chicago — where years of shittacular play were rewarded with generational talents at the top of the draft – required a great deal of luck too. Where would the Blackhawks be if Pittsburgh drafted Jonathan Toews with the second overall selection instead of Jordan Staal?
Truth is, ownership has given management a mandate to put short-term success ahead of everything, emphasizing the need to compete for a playoff under strict financial constraints.
Suggesting, as the author does, that the Senators will not win because they’re “building the team around the wrong player, Bobby Ryan” because an analytics guy has skepticism over the Senators long-term outlook is reductive nonsense. Reductive nonsense that lends itself to why some hockey fans have their own reservations about relying heavily upon “advanced analytics” in the first place.
So with that in mind, yes, the Senators are better off in the short-term with Bobby Ryan than they probably would have been had they kept the combination of Jakob Silfverberg, Stefan Noesen and last year’s first round pick.
Appleby’s research looks at 14 different skills from goals and assists to penalty minutes and puck possession recorded from every single NHL game dating back to 1997. The data, which has been used by several NHL teams, analyzes patterns from both winning a losing teams and the Senators don’t seem to have the winning recipe this year.
His data suggests that the most important player on a hockey team is its goalie, ahead of an offensive defenceman and a shooting centreman.
With the goaltending duo of Craig Anderson and Robin Lehner being “above average” and Eric Karlsson being arguably the league’s best offensive defenseman, the team’s back end is solid. The question is whether Kyle Turris can become the No. 1 centre he needs to be with Jason Spezza gone.
If the Senators don’t have the winning recipe, that hangs on the general manager who assembles the roster. Should the Senators fall short of the expectations put on them, it won’t be because of Bobby Ryan. It will be because the team lacks talent on the blue line beyond Erik Karlsson (despite the author’s report that it is solid) and its goaltending cannot sustain the high-event hockey that has characterized the Paul MacLean era.
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