Martin Fehervary is asked to play a big role for the Capitals. Maybe too big?

By the Numbers

For on-ice percentages, 50 percent means even: both teams possess the puck evenly. Higher is better, lower is worse.

Isolated Impact by HockeyViz

 

About this visualization: This series of charts made by Micah Blake McCurdy of hockeyviz.com shows how the player has impacted play when on the ice. At the top of the image is the team’s offense (even strength at left, power play at right) and at bottom is the team’s defense (with penalty kill at bottom right). In each case, red/orange blobs mean teams shoot for more from that location on the ice, and blue/purple means less. In general, a good player should have red/orange blobs near the opponent’s net at top, and blue/purple bobs near their own team’s net at bottom. The distributions in middle show how the player compares to league average at individual finishing, setting up teammates to score, and taking and drawing penalties.

Player Card by Evolving Hockey

About this player card: This image from Evolving Hockey shows an overview of the player across different parts of their game. At top right are the players percentile rank (1 is worst; 100 best), overall and on offense and defense separately. Higher numbers are in blue. Below are the player’s contributions in different compartments of the game using the goals-above-replacement or GAR metric. Higher numbers (again in blue) mean the player adds value compared to an average AHL call-up player.

Player Card by Corey Sznajder

About this player card: This image from All Three Zones shows how the player compares to league averages in different microstats, especially ones regarding entering and entering zones. Blue bars mean the player has a higher rate of the statistic compared to league average, and orange means a lower rate. The numbers are Z-scores, also known as standard deviations, indicating how far the number is from league average, where two standard deviations means the player is on the extreme edge of the league.

Fan Happiness Survey

About this visualization: At three times during the season, RMNB shared an open survey with fans, asking the following question for each player:

On a scale from 1 to 5, how HAPPY are you to have this player on the team?

1 means VERY UNHAPPY TO HAVE THEM ON THE TEAM
2 means UNHAPPY
3 means NEITHER HAPPY NOR UNHAPPY
4 means HAPPY
5 means VERY HAPPY TO HAVE THEM ON THE TEAM

The numbers above show the average score for the player in each survey period.

Exit Interview

Peter’s Take

For the first few months of his NHL career, I thought Martin Fehervary was going to be a natural top-pairing defender. I now think that impression was a mirage, and I’m still coming to terms with exactly what we can expect from the player. He’s a pace-slowing defender with unimpressive microstats (look at all the orange in Corey’s visualization above), and he’s been an apparent drag on his main partner, John Carlson. Across two seasons, here’s how those players have performed in expected-goal percentage when together or apart:

• Fehervary and Carlson together: 47.1 percent
• Fehervary without Carlson: 47.2 percent
• Carlson without Fehervary: 55.3 percent

I don’t like that Washington’s most productive defender sees the Caps control play eight percentage points less when with his most common partner. That’s a roster problem — unless there’s a true, secret Martin Fehervary hiding from us, which is totally possible. His rookie season was marred by illness, and maybe his sophomore got hit with the Bad Year Tax, considering that injury in December. I hope that’s the case, but that’s faith, and you shouldn’t build a hockey team on faith.

Marty on RMNB

• Milan Lucic lit Fehervary up in December. He was seen in a sling after the game and went on injured reserve.
• He returned on New Year’s Eve after missing 12 games.
• Fehervary Fever!
• He scored a header goal.
• He got hurt again in March. God, this season.
• He came back ten days later.

Your Turn

What’s the ceiling on Fehervary? Middle pair? Higher?

This article would not be possible with HockeyViz, Evolving Hockey, Natural Stat Trick, and All Three Zones. Please consider joining us in supporting them. For people interested in learning more from those resources, we recently published video walkthroughs.