It’s time for the annual mc79hockey.com team previews. They come with a twist - I’m a busy guy and will run out of time to do them them before the season starts. Also, I might not have anything interesting to say about a team. While the lack of anything interesting to say isn’t necessarily a bar to me writing something, the point I’m trying to make here is that just because I’m doing previews, there won’t necessarily be a preview of your favourite team - I didn’t get around to doing the Oilers last year, oddly enough. In this regard, I refer you to the original motto of Larry Mahnken’s Replacement Level Yankees Weblog: “Hey, it’s free!”. Oh, and these aren’t so much “previews” as “musings about statistical oddities that caught my eye”. Again: “Hey, it’s free!” If you’re wondering about the acronyms or stats that I refer to, take a look at the glossary, which I’ll create and then update as necessary. The position noted at the top is a divisional thing; I’ll throw up my estimate for the conference standings before the year starts.I saw John Muckler at tonight’s most recent Eric Gagne demonstration of Conklinesque suck. I was like “Is that John Muckler?” and had my suspicions confirmed by the haircut which hasn’t changed since he first came to my attention when he was involved with the Oilers. It seemed like a message to write about Buffalo and Ottawa, since he worked for both of them. Also I saw Pierre McGuire the other day in downtown Toronto. If you want the inside tip on hockey’s next Domi-Stronach scandal, get this - he was holding hands with a woman who was not Dion Phaneuf. Shocking.
Anyway, I don’t think that any Buffalo fans happening across this will agree with my thinking. As I’ve previously noted, Buffalo fans are passionate in their support of the Sabres - passionate, drunk and moustachioed. Also, they don’t take kindly to people who support other teams, let alone people who support other teams who don’t really think much of the Sabres.
As I see it, the Sabres are looking at a double whammy next year: their success last year was, in a lot of ways, driven by what was probably an unsustainable shooting percentage and they’ve lost two of the guys who were driving the bus in Daniel Briere and Chris Drury. I’m probably not going to do a comment on the Ottawa Senators - there’s not much to say other than “Best Of A Bad Lot” so I’ll throw up their numbers from last year here as well, just to give some contrast to this:
There’s a fairly large difference in the shot differential at ES between the two that favours the Senators. Ottawa’s slight edge in save percentage is obliterated by the Sabres edge in shooting percentage. By the way, about 16% of Buffalo’s ES shots came from Briere and Drury, who shot a combined 13.6%. Although they ended up finishing 1-2 in the NHL in ES goal differential, I’m a lot more comfortable betting on Ottawa’s circumstances at ES to repeat than I am betting on the Sabres at ES.
The PP is more of the same. The Sabres fell off considerably from their ridiculous S% numbers in 2005-06, as did the Sens. I suspect that if I looked more closely, some of that could be attributed to the drop on 5 on 3’s. The difference is, while the Senators went from elite to poor in terms of shooting percentage, the Sabres stayed at the elite end of the spectrum. Buffalo gets so few shots though - a problem that carried over from 2005-06 - that they fell off by a lot in PP effectiveness. I would think that their problems are only going to be exacerbated by the losses of Drury and Briere, who gave the Sabres a combined 725.85 minutes of PP TOI wherein they scored at the rate of 2.1 PPG/60, 2.5 PPA/60 and 4.6 PPP/60. Those are respectable numbers and, in my submission, not easily replaced. I’m aware that the Sabres have oodles and oodles of prospects just waiting for a chance but, given the difficulty that young players generally have with the PP, it strikes me as unlikely that they’re going to step in at this stage and make up those minutes. It wouldn’t suprise me if the Sabres ended up with a PPGD that ranks somewhere between 20th and 25th next season.
Buffalo’s best chance at making some of that up probably lies in Ryan Miller having a big year against the PK. While that could happen, hope isn’t really a plan, no matter what the Oilers would have you believe.
I don’t really think that there’s much point talking about Buffalo v. Ottawa; the Sens win that hands down. The really interesting comparison, to my way of thinking, lies between the Maple Leafs and the Sabres. Last year, the difference between them was 68 goal differential. It seems like a lot but I’m not convinced that it’s really that large. The difference between the Sabres 1855 shots at ES at their 11.4% shooting percentage and the 8.3% shooting percentage is nearly 60 goals all by itself. I don’t think that it will all come from there but there are enough other trouble spots for the Senators and areas in which I think that the Leafs will improve that I see Toronto sneaking past Buffalo. Living in Buffalo is going to be even less fun than it usually is because the Sabres are going to be struggling to make the playoffs, a pretty dramatic falloff from their fantastic past two years.
I quickly took a look at my Shot Quality spreadsheet, and by my calculations, Buffalo scored about 45 more goals than Expected in 2006-7, so you’re right, it could be a pretty steep fall back to earth for the Slugs’ offensive attack.
How much does a healthy Connoly affect this team? Does he score 80 points and drive the PP? Just asking, I know very little about him and I hate the Sabres so much that I don’t care to look it up.
“hope isn’t really a plan, no matter what the Oilers would have you believe.”
Oh yes, that is so, SO, apt.
A healthy Connolly can add maybe 30 goals if he plays out of his mind. Being a Sabres fan, I never actually thought about looking at it this way, but it makes sense.
I appreciate your site, but your analysis is flawed. You are treating hockey shooting % as though it is a controlled statistic (ie foul shots in basketball). There are way too many lurking variables at work for you to make those kind of assumptions. Among other things, it does not take into account the quality of the shot, something that would be extremely difficult to quantify in a sport like hockey. (I looked at The Forechecker’s “Shot Quality” spreadsheet, and has more issues than the New York Times. I think it’s a step in the right direction, but way too simple.)