Quote:
Originally Posted by AustinL_NHL
As someone who absolutely hated the Tanev signing and was praying Seattle would take his horrible contract off our hands, there is absolutely no way we can expose him after the dominant season he had.
He was by far our best defenseman and very possibly the best defensive defenseman in the entire NHL.
He dominated every time he was on the ice and that was despite playing with broken ribs and a torn pectoral for the last months of the season.
Based on the horrible division they're in and with a full season of Darryl Sutter behind the bench, there's actually a better chance the Flames get home ice advantage in the first round of the Playoffs rather than missing the Playoffs altogether.
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And what is looking like a very interesting case example on the importance of where a player plays and who he plays with when it comes to underlying stats.
Everyone had Tanev heavily on the decline and the Flames crazy for giving him four years.
Instead he "fixed" Hanifin, turned Giordano's season around while his old partner in Vancouver cratered completely.
xGA60 last year ...
Quinn Hugues 19th worst at 2.50 (out of 156 defensemen that played at least 600 minutes).
Tanev ... 1st at 1.47
I'm a big fan of analytics, love the way we can drill into players and get a better understanding. For the most part they seem to fit what I see ... but every once in a while we get a case in point where they don't have all of it figured out.
Reminds me of a few years ago when everyone was drooling over the shrewd Islanders robbing the Senators of Shane Prince ... analytics community had him as a hidden gem. Out of the league in four years.
Or Kris Russell. Warrior for blocking shots at the rate he does, but is he creating the need to block the shot? Kind of like calling a guy a hero for putting out a house fire when in actuality he's the arsonist.