Inside the Numbers: The Anaheim Ducks’ Young Blueliners Are Better Than You Thought (And You Thought They Were Good!)
I put aside my disdain for statistics to try and grasp just how good the young studs manning Anaheim’s blueline really are!
The other day, I was inspired by a piece over at Bleacher Report entitled, “Every NHL Team’s Biggest Question Mark for the 2015-2016 Season.” Since the article labeled the defense of the Anaheim Ducks as the team’s biggest question mark, an argument I found fault with as detailed here, I decided to look at the numbers of Anaheim’s defenseman to get a feel for where the blueliners stand in relation to opposing defenses; specifically, the team’s four members of the “24 or under” club.
The results . . . were pretty ******* impressive.
Obviously, I am aware that statistics are just numbers. I’m not much for advanced statistical analysis, although I appreciate the work that goes into compiling them, and I understand there are a lot of intangible effects a player may have – just check out Griffin’s piece of what Los Angeles Kings goaltender Jonathan Quick had to say about the impact that Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry have whenever the Kings and Ducks square off.
Still, if I’m trying to cement the status of Anaheim’s defense, as opposed to those of other teams in the NHL, referring to statistics is the only way to provide a context with which we can all agree with (in theory). So damn it, it’s numbers time!
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Man, that’s a lot of information to digest – where should I start? (See why I hate statistics?!?) I probably should start with an area we already knew was a strength of Anaheim’s young defensemen: offense. Despite their age, three of Anaheim’s four “24 and under” blueliners rank in the top 50 of the league’s defenseman when it comes to helping put the puck in the back of the net. Only Nashville, Calgary, Detroit, and the New York Islanders can share Anaheim’s boast of having three of the top-50 scoring defensemen in the NHL in 2014-2015 – and all of the Ducks in that group are still developing their game.
That’s scary . . . but even scarier is the fact that Anaheim’s defense was even better at scoring once the playoffs started. Vatanen (11), Fowler (10), Lindholm (10) and Despres (7) combined to score 38 points in the 2015 Stanley Cup Playoffs – compare that to the 43 points that Chicago’s far-more seasoned defensive corps of Duncan Keith, Brent Seabrook, Niklas Hjalmarsson, and Johnny Oduya put up. Better yet, take Keith’s 21 points out of the mix, and it’s not even a contest: Anaheim’s young blueliners take Chicago’s defense behind the woodshed for an absolute thrashing.
Aside from Chicago, there was not a team in the 2015 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs whose top-four defensemen equaled the scoring of Anaheim’s youngest four blueliners. Come back after you have fact-checked this and taken the time to let what that means fully sink in.
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And as good as the scoring of the Anaheim Ducks’ young defensemen was in 2014-2015, it turns out they are not too shabby at, well, playing defense. Granted, +/- is one of those stats that is affected by a number of variables, so it is not a great measuring stick – but as long as sites keep track of it, I will use it. Obviously, the first thing that jumps out at us is Hampus Lindholm‘s ridiculous +25 rating over 78 games, tied for 2nd among all NHL defensemen with only Hjalmarsson. But the fact that all four of these guys sport positive +/- ratings is nothing to sneeze at – remember, the Ducks as a team only posted a +7 goal differential last season.
If you really want to tire me out, we can start looking at Corsi and Fenwick numbers – please don’t ask me to do this! – but hopefully you see my point. The Anaheim Ducks suit up three of the top 50 scoring defensemen in the league, and none of them have hit the age of 25 yet. That alone should scare the hell out of every other team in the NHL for years to come, but the fact that these kids combine a nose for scoring with high hockey IQs and the ability to quickly pass or skate the puck out of their zone is truly the stuff of nightmares.
You still convinced the biggest question mark for the Anaheim Ducks next season is defense, Bleacher Report?
All stats courtesy of NHL.com and Yahoo! Sports.