The early season has some curious winners and losers. Despite preseason predictions, the Philadelphia Flyers are looking hot, the Colorado Avalanche can’t buy a goal, and the Washington Capitals are somewhere in between. We know in our guts this can’t be right. We now some teams are overperforming their talent, and other teams are seeing success despite their flaws. Enter the Westerberg-Musk evaluation rubric, invented by me, just now, to precisely measure undeserved outcomes.
Paul Westerberg was the lead singer and songwriter for the Replacements, a tremendously talented band that blew every opportunity to get popular. Elon Musk is the billionaire son of an emerald mine owner who was the money guy for some tech companies with dubious products. One was a dismal failure despite undeniable virtue; the other the opposite. They represent the outer extremes, between which we will place the most interesting NHL teams.
New Jersey Devils
Record: 6-3-0
It’s bananas what’s happening with Jersey. They are controlling play at levels we don’t often see sustained for nine games. They attempt 64 percent of the shots and control 69 percent of the expected goals. They should be close to undefeated, but their goaltending has been trash– a league worst 87.5 percent during five-on-five play.
If they can get better goaltending (i.e. a long-term replacement for the currently injured Mackenzie Blackwood) while keeping their skaters humming, the Devils could edge the Caps out of the playoffs.
Colorado Avalanche
Record: 4-4-1
The defending champion are having trouble finding the back of the net during even strength. Mikko Rantanen is pretty much the only one converting there, and the team as a whole is shooting a league-worst 4.8 percent. The team is doing fine on the rest of the ice, and they’re still converting their power play (first in the league at 39.3 percent conversion). No one thinks they’ll struggle for long.
Boston Bruins
Record: 8-1-0
The Bs have earned 16 of 18 available standings points so far. Patrice Bergeron still seems to be elite at age 37. They got Marchand back from injury ahead of schedule. Pastrnak is on a 150-point pace. This is a very good team, but I’m gonna go out on a limb and say they will not get 145 standings points this season. Their shooting (10.1 percent, third best) has drop off a bit, and I don’t think they’ll be able to lean on goalie Linus Ullmark (.945 all situations) as much as they want.
But they’re still going to be very, very good.
Washington Capitals
Record: 5-4-0
The Capitals are very lucky to be above .500 given how bad their process stats are. They’re in the bottom ten of the league in the percentage of expected goals they control (45.1 percent). For a team supposed to build their offense through the defenders, they’re on their heels too much on the attack even less. But they’re shooting 10.4 percent during five-on-five (behind only the Islanders), saving in the top ten, and killing penalties the same.
They’re going to need real improvements among their skaters plus continuing good goaltending if they want to make the playoffs, which Moneypuck thinks they’ve got only a one-in-three chance of doing.
Philadelphia Flyers
Record: 5-2-1
I know a bunch of Flyers fans, and none of them thinks this is real. I doubt John Tortorella really believes he’s got a playoff team on his hands. They control 38.6 percent of shot attempts and 38.9 percent of expected goals — meaning it’s like they play against the Devils every night. Their goal differential during five-on-five is plus-one. Both their special-teams units are in the dead center of the league. They’re shooting hot (9.2 percent, 8th place) and saving even better (93.3 percent, 7th place) thanks to Carter Hart’s bounceback year (9 goals saved above expected according to Moneypuck).
So they’re finishing strong on a weak underlying process and getting those goals at the best possible moments to win games. It’s not going to last.
Although agreement on the above is mandatory, there are obviously nuances between. The Islanders and Sabres are doing too well, the Kraken and Penguins too poorly. The details are insignificant; the important thing is that we agree my Paul Westerberg / Elon Musk bit was a good one.
Headline images: @PaulWesterberg, Debbie Rowe via Creative Commons
