TOP PAIRING
HOW DO TEAMS USE THEIR TOP DEFENSEMEN
Other than the goalie, a team’s top defensemen are arguably the most important players on the teams.
Great ones like Nicklas Lidstrom, Scott Niedermayer and Chris Pronger can completely alter the outcome of an entire season almost single-handedly. Who were the top pairing defensemen this year, how will they used, and how effective were their teams when they were on the ice?
What can all of this tell us about how teams were using their top pairing defensemen?
1. Essentially balanced usage (11/30).
They generally play together (7 or 8 out of 11), take only a slightly larger share of shutdown duties against top lines, and play in both zones. It appears to be an effective deployment more often than not.
2. Split up between one shutdown and one scoring-focused defenseman (6/30)
The second most common deployment is to split up the top two defensemen with one anchoring the top shutdown line and one being used in a more scoring-focused role.
I’m not convinced of this being an effective deployment, especially when the shutdown defenseman isn’t an ideal choice for the role, like Dion Phaneuf or Jack Johnson.
Even in the other cases you have to wonder if the team would have done a lot better either by assigning the shutdown defenseman a stronger partner, or by spreading out the tough minutes a little more.
3. Both together as the top shutdown pairing (5/30)
Almost as frequently teams use both of their top defensemen together and on the top pairing.
The beauty of this approach is the room it makes for the team’s defensemen further down the depth chart, which was a virtual necessity in at least the first three cases. I’m surprised this approach isn’t embraced more extensively.
4. Both together as a scoring-focused pairing (3/30)
Despite this being the deployment that has won the Norris trophy the past three years, only three teams deploy their top two defensemen together and in a scoring-focused role, Chicago, Los Angeles and Ottawa.
This obviously requires someone else to take on the shutdown minutes, much as Niklas Hjalmarsson and Johnny Oduya do in Chicago, or for the duties of facing the top lines to be spread out largely evenly, as in the other two cases. The risk here is that in all three cases the weaknesses of those other pairings did tend to get exposed by top opposing lines.
5. Hard to classify (5/30)
There are five teams whose precise deployment of their top two defensemen are harder to classify. This is either because their number two defenseman is hard to identify, like Boston and Detroit (who use their top defenseman in a shut down role), due to injuries and the extensive use of rookies, like Pittsburgh and Tampa Bay, or because it’s just that hard to make sense of their player usage, like Philadelphia.
Ultimately the way a team deploys its top defensemen depends greatly on not only their own talents, but on the remaining defensemen at their disposal.
While the most common approach is to use the top two defensemen in a largely balanced fashion, some teams put them together onto a top shutdown line, and as many split them up between a top shutdown pairing and a more scoring-focused partnership.
In my view the former appears to work far better than the latter.
Finally, a few select teams are fortunate enough to have elite talent capable of sufficiently dominating opponents in a scoring-focused role as to warrant the risk of placing more difficult duties on the rest of their blue line.
HANDEDNESS DEBATE
Most goals are scored on the right side of the goalie.
This is because the goaltender stick and blocker are on that side. It's one reason why the few left-handed goalies (catch with right hand) tend to have an advantage. They use their glove to catch those shots.
In the same way, most players shoot from their left side (their right hand is at the top of the stick). Thus right-handed shooters (chiefly left-handed people) are desired by teams, especially on defence.
Hockey players who shoot "left" tend to send the puck to the left - the blocker/stick side of the goaltender. To a left-handed goalie, they shoot into his strength. That's why they tend to have higher save percentages and lower goals-against averages.
Defencemen who "shoot right" are desired chiefly because when near the boards on the goalie's right side, their stick will lie toward the middle of the ice, not against the boards. That way, they can block more passes.
DO DEFENSEMEN PLAY WORSE ON THEIR OFF HAND
Opposite handed pairs do seem to have a slight-advantage in both shot attempt and goal generation: they’re on the ice for more Corsi and Fenwick events for per 60 minutes of ice time, and they also recorded a higher GF/60 rate (Some of the deltas don’t match up exactly, but that’s just due to rounding). That 0.04 GF/60 advantage works out to around 2.97 extra goals over the course of an entire season, although that’s only in the most extreme scenario (all opposite-handed vs. all same-handed pairs).
playing on your off-hand isn’t necessarily that much of a detriment. Over the course of a short tournament like the Olympics, I think it’s far more important to select the best set of defensemen possible, rather than worrying about finding players to fill certain roles or maintaining “balance” throughout a lineup.
OFF-HAND DEFENSEMEN
That study, however, only focussed on offensive play, and didn’t look at how well defencemen performed in their own end. While that made sense when looking at whether Subban, one of the greatest offensive players in the league, would struggle on his off-hand, if we want to make broader decisions about lineup construction we need to know what’s happening at both ends of the ice.
If we have an up-and-coming left-handed defenceman that we want to get more minutes by moving him to his off-hand on the first pairing we need to know what kind of a drop in performance (if any) we expect to see in order to properly weigh the cost and benefits of the change.
64% of all shots from defensemen come from a L/R pair, and 32.1% come from L/L. R/R is 3.5%.
in aggregate the opposite handed pairs perform better from a possession point of view than the same-handed pairs
So if opposite handed pairings are outperforming same handed pairings, what’s driving it? Are off-hand defencemen having trouble preventing shots in their own end, or is it something else that’s holding them back possession wise?
There isn’t really a difference between the opposite or same-handed pairs when it comes to defending one side of the ice or the other. If a left-defenceman playing on the right side of the ice is hampering his team defensively, it certainly doesn’t show up when we look at where the shots against are coming from when he’s on the ice.
So if the drag on possession numbers isn’t being driven by defencemen having trouble defending their side of the ice on their off-hand, where is it coming from? One suggestion that was brought up at the conference was that
defencemen on their off-hand have trouble both exiting their own zone and setting up controlled entries into the offensive zone,
and I think in the context of this data it makes a lot of sense. After all,
playing on your on-hand is going to significantly increase the ease at which you can make or take a pass in the neutral zone, which should translate into more opportunities for controlled entries. Similarly a pressured player on their off-hand is probably more likely to dump the puck in than attempt to make a backhand pass through a tight opening.
What we see when we dig into the data is that while coaches appear to favour opposite-handed first-pairings slightly more than 2nd or 3rd pairings, the difference isn’t significant at all, and
it certainly doesn’t appear as if coaches are avoiding playing same handed pairs as their first unit.
Opposite handed pairs still outperform same-handed pairs in every grouping, so it appears as if playing on your off-hand for a defencemen does have a detrimental effect on puck possession, even after we’ve controlled for differences in talent level (or at least coaches views of talent level).
Picking up pucks on your forehand and picking pucks off the boards is much easier if you are on your proper side.
One thing to keep in mind (as I’ll go over in more detail in part 3) is that
players playing on their off-hand do tend to post higher shooting percentages than those shooting primarily from their on-hand.
The advantage comes in shooting off-handed in the offensive zone.
So while a defenceman playing on their off-hand may be giving up some ground on the possession front, they’re getting at least part of that back by having more of their shots get past the keeper. Whether this trade-off is worthwhile obviously depends on the team and player, there are certainly circumstances where the shooting benefits outweigh the costs, but
all else being equal most teams would be better off taking the possession boost rather than the shooting boost since most defencemen tend to shoot the puck relatively infrequently and at lower overall percentages than forwards.
No coach wants to see back-handed passes of any distance.
The other factor that needs to be mentioned is that ultimately teams should look to play their best players most, regardless of structural factors like this.
As we’ve seen here, lineup balance is obviously important, but not so much so that you should put your best players out for less time (or your worst players out for more) just to maintain the balance.
QUANTIFYING THE IMPORTANCE OF HANDEDNESS
Consider a defenseman’s true responsibility – to transition from defense to offense and shift pressure onto the opposition.
In this sense, it would almost seem more appropriate to call defensemen transition players than what’s already been established.
Whether or not a dman excels at forcing dumps-ins/turnovers at their own blueline, disrupting the cycle or taking advantage of puck touches and exiting the D-zone with control, they help spark a change in the run of play.
The last of the three aforementioned skills (advancing the puck), is one that would seem to be effected the most by handedness (in theory).
If a left or right handed defenseman plays on their appropriate side of the ice, they will be much better suited to use their body to protect the puck when in possession and also pick up pucks behind the net on their strong hand, allowing them to start the breakout with a forehand pass.
At this point, all we can say is that pairings perform better when both defensemen play their strong side (as expected).
After performing various tests to both validate the importance of handedness with respect to the performance of d-pairings and determine exactly how important it is as a variable, it is safe to conclude that NHL teams are justified in their pursuit of a balanced shooting d-corps.
Correspondingly, handedness definitely warrants a place in the decision making process when identifying ideal pieces to fill a vacant roster spot.
ZONE EXITS AND HANDEDNESS
The data shows that playing on your off-side makes it harder to get the puck out of the zone in any way.
Possession exits, uncontrolled exits and even icings decrease.
Failed exits increase by a whopping five percentage points!
These include defensive zone turnovers, which are often deadly.
Its safe to assume that playing defence on your off-side leads to a statistically significant drop in your ability to get the puck out of the zone, including with possession, and makes it more likely you’ll have a “failed” zone exit.
EMBRACING AN OFF-HANDED DEFENSIVE PAIR
From a tactics standpoint, having an even split of LD and RD is ideal. This puts the player’s forehand on the boards and not up the middle, which is a better position for defensive play in their own zone.
A player on his off-hand would have his forehand up the middle, which can potentially lead to dangerous defensive coverages and clears.
On the flip side, an off-handed defenseman is in a better position offensively.
In the defensive zone, their heads are up the middle and able to see a better picture of the play. In the offensive zone, they are in better positions for one-timers.
All that said, it is ideal to have an even LD/RD split. That, however, does assume that you’re playing your best six defensemen.
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER
THE PERFECT SHIFT
ACTIVE D, F3
What separates the possession stats of lumbering “stay-at-home” defensemen and those of “puck movers” boils down to three things: their ability to pinch (what we see here), their ability to prevent controlled entries against (which we’ll see in a bit) and their ability to create controlled exits. If a defenseman can consistently assume the D1 position above without becoming a defensive liability, he’s well on his way to being a strong play driver.
INTENSE BACK PRESSURE
Any coach would agree that backchecking is a good thing, but it’s important to remember why – to prevent future controlled exits, controlled entries and (down the road) shots and goals against.
TIGHT GAP AT THE BLUE LINE
The ability to play a tight gap across the neutral zone is a key indicator of quality defensemen.
In today’s NHL, it is an absolutely must for a player to be able to respond quickly to the chip, pivot, beat the forward to the puck, and make a clean play to get it moving in the right direction
FINDING THE MIDDLE OF THE ICE ON A BREAKOUT
Good teams own the middle of the ice on the breakout, either by having passing options cross-ice or by skating it out tight to the goal post and distributing toward the boards.
ATTACK THE NET
Get the puck in deep, get some action happening, if nothing happens, throw it back to the points.
Collapsing toward the goal, like the Oilers are doing now, is sometimes a good idea, but being way too passive results in a higher quantity of shots against, and not necessarily a lower quality of shots against. Especially considering that tip-ins and rebounds have the highest expected conversion rates in hockey
· Bodies in front of the goalie
· Fronting to get first shot at the rebound
· Shooter crashes the net to add to the scramble
Comments