Flames' Advanced Statistics

[Makarov]

I haven't seen a lot of discussion regarding the Flames advanced statistics this season. I think they're interesting. The Flames rank 7th in the league for CF%, 7th in the league for xGF%, and 8th in the league for SCF%. Those are the advanced statistics of a team solidly in the playoffs (likely with home ice advantage in at least the first round.)

So... why weren't the Flames able to translate those statistics into wins?

[Itse]

Because that's not how that works.

[Roof-Daddy]

I'm guessing one reason will be the very poor goaltending they received for a large portion of the season after Markstrom came back from his injury.

[TurdFerguson]

NSFW!

[jlh2640]

They can’t finish and can’t score consistently. They also are very fragile in tight games. What those stats tell you is that they should be much better than they are. But my above 2 points is who they really are.

[Hoop27]

Because the game isn't played on a spreadsheet.

[dino7c]

They don't finish their chances

No it's not the .905 goal tending of Markstrom holding them back. He has been .930 and under 2 goals against in his last 12 yet the Flames only have six wins.

[bubbsy]

Raw numbers like that are a bit misleading for me. Corsi, when game situation isn't considered (ie. when game is tied, trailing, with lead) can be misconstrued, for example, if a team that gives up early leads and gets behind often (which the flames did for most of the year) where the element of "garbage time" or the opposition team taking their foot off the gas offensively, makes the corsi number look good, but not really reflective of how the game(s) played out.

The only real stat I like to look at are score adjusted scoring and high danger chances for/against at 5/5, and high level special team %s, usually can help tell you how a team is truly doing, if you want to look beyond W/Ls.

[Makarov]

Originally Posted by bubbsy

Raw numbers like that are a bit misleading for me. Corsi, when game situation isn't considered (ie. when game is tied, trailing, with lead) can be misconstrued, for example, if a team that gives up early leads and gets behind often (which the flames did for most of the year) where the element of "garbage time" or the opposition team taking their foot off the gas offensively, makes the corsi number look good, but not really reflective of how the game(s) played out.

The only real stat I like to look at are score adjusted scoring and high danger chances for/against at 5/5, and high level special team %s, usually can help tell you how a team is truly doing, if you want to look beyond W/Ls.

Fair point. But the 5-on-5 statistics look pretty similar when score- and venue-adjusted: 8th in CF%, 9th in xGF%, and 9th in SCF%.

[GranteedEV]

Originally Posted by Makarov

I haven't seen a lot of discussion regarding the Flames advanced statistics this season. I think they're interesting. The Flames rank 7th in the league for CF%, 7th in the league for xGF%, and 8th in the league for SCF%. Those are the advanced statistics of a team solidly in the playoffs (likely with home ice advantage in at least the first round.)

So... why weren't the Flames able to translate those statistics into wins?

For starters, it's a tale of two seasons.

Flames under Ward:
24 GP
50.26% CF
51.02% xGF
8.12% SH%
92.47% SV%


Flames under Sutter:
26 GP
54.78% CF
54.24% xGF
8.11% SH%
90.56% SV%

So basically, since Sutter took over, we've played much better hockey... but have not gotten the goaltending needed to win the games in which we outplayed the opponents.

Had Sutter been the coach over the full season, he would have benefited from the solid goaltending we got early on, before the Sigalet Effect took over. Had they been playing Sutter hockey with early season goaltending, they're probably sitting in a playoff spot right now.

I also think Sutter shot himself in the foot early on with his short-lived #1RW Brett Ritchie infatuation. He'd probably like a mulligan on that.

The crazy thing is though, now under both coaches, the shooting percentages are pretty respectable. It's really just the SV% under Sutter and the shot volume under Ward that tanked the season.

[Patek23]

Been said numerous times. But advanced stats are meaningless without context. If the winner were decided by your Corsi/Fenwick then I'd probably put more weight in it but too me their just as flawed as being indicators of anything as +/-.

[ForeverFlameFan]

Need a scoring RWer.

Wish we had known Mantha was available. But that seemed like a secret deal between DET/TBL.

We couldn’t score for crap this season. Also, line combinations were atrocious at the start of the season. The Gaudreau - Lindholm - Tkachuk line has been solid.

[dammage79]

Unsustainable?

[Since1984]

Originally Posted by GranteedEV

For starters, it's a tale of two seasons.

Flames under Ward:
24 GP
50.26% CF
51.02% xGF
8.12% SH%
92.47% SV%


Flames under Sutter:
26 GP
54.78% CF
54.24% xGF
8.11% SH%
90.56% SV%

So basically, since Sutter took over, we've played much better hockey... but have not gotten the goaltending needed to win the games in which we outplayed the opponents.

Had Sutter been the coach over the full season, he would have benefited from the solid goaltending we got early on, before the Sigalet Effect took over. Had they been playing Sutter hockey with early season goaltending, they're probably sitting in a playoff spot right now.

I also think Sutter shot himself in the foot early on with his short-lived #1RW Brett Ritchie infatuation. He'd probably like a mulligan on that.

The crazy thing is though, now under both coaches, the shooting percentages are pretty respectable. It's really just the SV% under Sutter and the shot volume under Ward that tanked the season.

Yeah this isn't what happened....Markstrom got blown the #### up and injured. He then returned from said injury, like many players returning from an injury, he was not nearly as good as he was before the injury.

[Bingo]

Originally Posted by Makarov

I haven't seen a lot of discussion regarding the Flames advanced statistics this season. I think they're interesting. The Flames rank 7th in the league for CF%, 7th in the league for xGF%, and 8th in the league for SCF%. Those are the advanced statistics of a team solidly in the playoffs (likely with home ice advantage in at least the first round.)

So... why weren't the Flames able to translate those statistics into wins?

A few theories.

1) What we do know:
- Flames haven't finished, most of their key players are having down years for shooting percentage and on ice shooting percentage (Flames 16th five on five in shooting percentage as a team, 18th with the powerplay)
- Markstrom injury left a big chunk of the season where the Flames weren't getting the save (Flames 19th five on five in save percentage as a team, 25th when killing penalties).

2) The evolution of stats:
- Flames may be the poster team for how much a stat like high danger chances needs more shades of gray. Perhaps they do just enough to trigger an occurrence of a high danger event, but don't have the other elements to truly be dangerous.

3) Murphy's Law:
- Pretty much any and everything that could go wrong has gone wrong this season. Some bad luck is certainly in play.

[Classic_Sniper]

Haven't the Flames always had really good advanced statistics since the start of the GG era? The Flames are the Corsi Kings of the NHL, they're basically top 5 or top 10 every year. But they've been a failure of a team because Treliving has constantly chased after elite analytics players who can put up high shot volumes but have zero finish. The sample size and data sets are quite large at this point and I think it's a more than fair conclusion to draw.

Based on what I've seen over the Treliving era, very few players on this team have one shot scoring capability or the talent to create their own high quality shot. Until this organization starts looking at things differently, they won't be doing anything differently.

[GordonBlue]

Originally Posted by Makarov

I haven't seen a lot of discussion regarding the Flames advanced statistics this season. I think they're interesting. The Flames rank 7th in the league for CF%, 7th in the league for xGF%, and 8th in the league for SCF%. Those are the advanced statistics of a team solidly in the playoffs (likely with home ice advantage in at least the first round.)

So... why weren't the Flames able to translate those statistics into wins?

It's Stephen Harper's fault

[united]

Via SportLoqiq:




When you're a team that struggles to generate off the rush and plays low event hockey to begin with, you can ill afford to have streaky or poor goaltending because you have few opportunities to score your way back into games.

The Flames have being playing about as expected given the construction of the roster, and have improved under Sutter, but goaltending has been a struggle.

[GranteedEV]

Originally Posted by Since1984

Yeah this isn't what happened....Markstrom got blown the #### up and injured. He then returned from said injury, like many players returning from an injury, he was not nearly as good as he was before the injury.

Your narrative is no more "what happened" than mine. He missed a handful of games, but there's no evidence that the upper body injury affected his play.

[SuperMatt18]

Looking at all situations they have:

8.80 Shooting Percentage - 26th
.900 Save Percentage - 20th

If you are below 20th in the league in both of those categories you aren't going to have much success in this league.

Flames are top 10 in Corsi For, High Danger Corsi For, and expected goals for BUT if you're lacking the talent to finish, and if they aren't getting saves (which there was a good 30 game stretch where they didn't), then you aren't going to win very much.