Quote:
Originally Posted by GGG
It's part of the fake every team is in the playoff race narrative the NHL tries to sell. Real .500 has meaning in that assuming you pick up an average share of loser points (in the past this has been random) you will make the playoffs with a real .500. That has value and meaning. At real .500 you are better than half the teams.
For the pro fake .500 people what is the meaning of that number. When a team reaches a point percentage of .500 and someone tells me this what information am I supposed to be receiving?
Currently the only meaning I used to see was that you were a lottery team that could be the number 1 pick if you were less than 500. And not with everyone in the lottery for number 1 that meaning is gone.
500 needs to imply some meaning. In Baseball it means you had an okay season. NFL its a meaningless stat so you don't here it much. College football it gets you to a bowl game. In the NBA it more or less gets you to the playoffs. In sports where its talked about it has meaning.
In the NHL a points % of 500 its just trying to sell faux parity. For playoffs you need to be 10 games above 500.
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Real .500 has nothing to do with being better than half the teams. Why do people think that being .500 means there is an equal number of teams above and below? It has never meant that. I just means you have won more than you lost, other than that it has no relevance.
2015-16 There were 13 teams above, 3 teams at and 14 teams below real .500
2014-2015 There were 17 above, 2 at and only 11 below.
Saying you were over .500 gives no meaning to how you will finish in comparison at all, in fact in 2014-2015 Columbus was 2 games over real .500 and finished 23rd (behind 6 teams with a worse real .500 record). The Flames were 8 games over real .500 and barely made it into the playoffs, Washington was 8 games over and 9th overall in the league.
Unlike other sports where .500 helps identify position in the standings it doesn't work for hockey because of the loser point.
Fake .500 tells me the team will finish with 82 points. No enough for the playoffs, more work to do, but it does provide a benchmark.
Real .500 tells me the team will finish with anywhere from 82-123 points. No relevant information at all. I can't use this to compare to how other teams will finish or even to how well the same team did in a previous season.
Real .500 is only good for saying my team won more than they lost, yay us! Fake .500 provides a statistically significant number for comparing competitiveness.