Quote:
Originally Posted by ricardodw
You need to stop you have absolutely no credibility....
Brodie as a top 5-10 D in the world?
This year there was 150 people that follow the NHL for a living that the NHL gets to vote for the Norris Trophy. Not 1 considered him in the top 5... Out of that group there were 24 other defensemen that at least 1 of the 150 voters thought was in the top 5. 150-0 say that Brodie is not a top 5 defenseman.
In 2015... when the Flames were a playoff team and IMO Brodie/Russell and Wideman carried the team into the playoffs Brodie had 1 vote for being in the top-5.
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Sigh. I am going to preface this with "I think that 5v5 play is more valuable when comparing elite players, especially centers and defensemen, than special teams play, because there are some bottom pair defensemen who can absolutely destroy on the power play and penalty kill, and different coaches distribute special teams minutes differently. So when I say Brodie is a top five defenseman in the world, I'm focused on his 5v5 play both offensively and defensively. I admit he's maybe not elite on the power play, though playing on the same team as Giordano and Hamilton and Wideman also doesn't do him many favours in terms of opportunity.
Among 49 defensemen with 1300+ 5v5 minutes played:
TJ Brodie was 14th in defensive zone start percentage and 25th in offensive zone start percentage. He was pushed into a pure two-way role skewing toward defensive.
Doughty - 47th and 4th. He got the luxury of playing a predominantly offensive role.
Karlsson - 45th and 7th. He got the luxury of playing a predominantly offensive role.
Burns - 32nd and 20th. He was used in a balanced role.
TJ Brodie was 7th in TOI%. He played 39.81% of the available 5v5 minutes while healthy. Karlsson was 2nd, Doughty was 3rd, and Burns was 9th.
TJ Brodie was 7th in Quality of Competition by TOI. He was matched up against the biggest minute players on opposing teams. Burns was 28th, Doughty was 34th, and Karlsson was 36th. Brodie was regularily facing tougher competition (as measured by coaches' gut feelings, and skewed towards top defensive pairs) than the three top Norris vote getters.
TJ Brodie was 8th in Quality of Competition by Expected Goals For (players who get the most dangerous types of scoring chances, probably skewed towards top forward lines). Karlsson was 20th, Doughty was 39th. Burns, who played on his team's second pairing while Vlasic handled the tough matchups, was 47th.
TJ Brodie was 38th in Quality of Teammate by Expected Goals For. Karlsson was 47th, so actually played with worst on-ice teammates than Brodie. Doughty was 14th, so got to play with some pretty dominant players. And Burns? He was 2nd. He was regularly out on the ice with players expected to score a lot of goals.
Now that we've established some context - that Brodie was being used more defensively and against higher quality competition than all three top 3 Norris vote getters, as well as playing with lower quality teammates (other than Karlsson), how did he actually
perform?
TJ Brodie was
fifth in penalty differential (penalties drawn minus penalties taken), and one of only five players among the 49 to have a
positive penalty differential. Doughty was 34th, Karlsson was 39th, and Burns was 36th.
TJ Brodie was
third in points rate at 5v5. Doughty, who is one of my favorite defensemen of all time, and who won that Norris Trophy, was way down at 36th. Karlsson was first, and placed second in Norris voting. Burns was second, and placed third in Norris voting.
Adjusted for Score, Venue, and Zone Start, TJ Brodie's expected relative goals
against was sixteenth best (quality of chances his team gave up with him on the ice vs off). Karlsson's was fifteenth best, Doughty's was 26th best, and Burns' was 45th best. Basically Burns was a tire fire defensively, yet placed third in Norris Voting. Go Figure.
Adjusted for Score, Venue, and Zone Start, TJ Brodie's expected relative goals
for was 12th best. Burns was tenth, Karlsson was eighth, and Doughty, the winner of the Norris Trophy, was 34th. His team didn't get appreciably better offensively with him on the ice or off.
There are a ton of factors that are fluid any time you're talking stats. No one is pretending the eye test does not have value. The quality of the second pair (or in Burns' case, the first pair) can obviously influence "team relative" stats. The coach's system can affect absolute stats. Special teams have their value too. But I am not embarrassed to say I think Brodie is top 5 in the league. The Norris voters were all wrong to not include Brodie. All 150 of them. The Norris Trophy is one of two things:
A) A Most Points Award
B) A Lifetime Acheivement Award (Even if the player is not playing at the level they've played in past years when they actually deserved the Norris)
Doughty got his well-deserved lifetime achievement award this year. Karlsson had taken home the Most Points award the prior year. But the award itself is far from proof of where to rank individuals. Heck, Brodie might have damn well been the best 200 foot defenseman in the NHL last season. I don't care how much of a homer that makes me sound like.
