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Dart Boards, Hogwash, and ‘Buzz’
by Mike Chen on 02/25/09 at 05:50 PM ET
Comments (18)
Like many of you, I found the site HockeyBuzz Hogwash to be a pretty jolly laugh. Longtime readers know that I’m no fan of Dwayne “Eklund” Klessel, and I still shake my head in wonder when I see people pay money for his “rumors.” Still, someone paid Miss Cleo money, so there’s a sucker born every minute.
One of the neat things about HockeyBuzz Hogwash is their success tracker. As the Forechecker pointed out, even a broken clock is right twice a day; the Hogwash tracker shows that Dwayne’s accuracy rating is about 3%.
Now, let’s think about this logically:
-There are 30 teams in the league, so one team has 29 trading partners. If all things were equal, that means there’s a 3.4% chance that a player can get moved to any of the other 29 teams.
-There’s also the possibility that said player could stay with his current team. 29 options + 1 no-move option = 3.3% equal chance of any team.
You don’t have to be a stats major to figure out the obvious: that literally means that Eklund’s success rating is slightly less than picking a team out of a hat. I mean, you really have to try to be that bad, kind of like bowling a 20 when bumper lanes are on.
Here’s the other thing. We know that usually about 22-23 teams are in playoff contention around this time of year. So let’s say that there are on average seven sellers and 27 buyers. Well, that means if all teams were equal, the chance of going to any buyer would be 3.7%. Now, you factor logic (who needs what), cap space, division/conference movement, no-trade clauses, and tradeable assets, and really, couldn’t just about any hockey fan come up with 5-6 logical destinations for a moveable player on a non-playoff team?
Let’s look at last year, shall we? We knew that Brian Campbell and Marian Hossa were available. We knew that the Sharks needed a puck-moving defenseman and the Penguins needed a winger for Sidney Crosby. On anyone’s list of logical destinations, San Jose and Pittsburgh would have been on the short list of 10 or so teams that would land those respective players.
If you put a dartboard up and listed the 10 teams that you think would make the short list for Brian Campbell, when you threw a dart, you’d have a 10% chance of landing on any of those. So you toss the dart, it hits San Jose, and it makes sense, then you post a rumor that says, “San Jose is heavily pursuing Brian Campbell to fit their puck-moving defenseman need”.
So even if you’re just using a teeny tiny bit of logic and then throwing things at the wall, couldn’t you come up with at least a 10% success rate? I’d think so, and if anyone with a dart board and too much time on their hands wants to try (Forechecker is doing something similar with a random generator), let’s see if you could do better than Dwayne’s 3% success rate.
Filed in: Rumors | Mike Chen's Hockey Blog | Permalink
Tags: Dwayne, Trade+Deadline,
Comments
the only good thing about that site is the other bloggers… otherwise, it’s useless
the 3% is hilarious
Posted by Jon from DC on 02/25/09 at 07:10 PM ET
Most interesting thing about HockeybuzzHogwash is their possible connection to some of the bloggers on KK’s own site.
Posted by Hogger from Porkville on 02/26/09 at 09:41 AM ET
Hogger, there is no connection other than bloggers pointing to it, which is normal in the blogging world.
Posted by Paul from Motown Area on 02/26/09 at 09:44 AM ET
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’m pretty sure no one from KK is involved other than going there and chuckling. Even if they were, what’s the problem in that? All the site is doing is tracking what’s right and what’s wrong. If Dwayne had a better track record or offered up some transparency, I don’t think such a site would even exist!
Posted by Mike Chen on 02/26/09 at 11:19 AM ET
If you guys wanted to know Eklund’s percentage of accuracy you could have just asked him. He’s always said that it’s probably about 3%. That shouldn’t be shocking to anyone who comprehends what exactly a rumor is.
Posted by degroat on 02/26/09 at 02:18 PM ET
DeGroat….you are one of Eklunds Moderators of course…I know this because I have received emails from you,
Please read the blog again and then repost your comment, because essentially you are saying that Eklund will outright admit that we might as well pick out of a hat, becuase that 3.4% is better than listening to his 2.8% (as of today)
You don’t have to be a stats major to figure out the obvious: that literally means that Eklund’s success rating is slightly less than picking a team out of a hat. I mean, you really have to try to be that bad, kind of like bowling a 20 when bumper lanes are on.
And by the way….as Paul stated above:
Hogger, there is no connection other than bloggers pointing to it, which is normal in the blogging world.
I know this because I run the site 
Posted by prodigy on 02/26/09 at 04:17 PM ET
Hi Paul,
Of course, if I wanted to hide the fact that I was affiliated with HockeyBuzz I probably wouldn’t have used ‘degroat’ as my username.
Isn’t it time you guys just moved on and stop worrying about Ek so much? If he’s such a fraud and has no sources, why do you continue to talk about him?
- Chris
P.S. -
Posted by degroat on 02/26/09 at 04:32 PM ET
Degroat, You really enjoy this?
If you have an issue with me, you know how to contact me. Otherwise, I would suggest you stay on topic of this post.
We all know your game….!
Posted by Paul from Motown Area on 02/26/09 at 04:39 PM ET
Hey DeGroat,
You completely miss the point again….its kinda hard not to talk about Eklund as his stupidity these days speaks for itself my friend.
I just like to keep track of it, thats all….kinda like an encyclopedia
Posted by prodigy on 02/26/09 at 04:52 PM ET
This post is about Eklund. My comment was about Eklund. How was my comment not on topic, Paul?
It’s really unfortunate that you guys continue these immature postings because the hockey community would be better as a whole if we worked together. Of course that would go against your agenda.
Posted by degroat on 02/27/09 at 02:19 PM ET
Before you open your mouth again degroat, you should really talk to Dwayne, When I did all he did is lie, probably doing the same to you.
Again, as always, feel free to email me, readers here don’t care to read about this.
Of course, I could have deleted your comments, but that is not my style!
Posted by Paul from Motown Area on 02/27/09 at 02:24 PM ET
the reason the hockey community doesnt work together, is because of his stupid rumours. Hes an embarassment to all people who follow hockey, and all inside traders. Any one with a 3% success rate, shows that he should just stick to writing fictional novels, because hes pretty good of pulling crap from no where. Now i can see why he wants to remain anonymous, id want to hide my face to when it came to stupidity. For stupidity Eklund is tops there is, only time he’d ever see his name at the top of something in the hockey world.
Posted by Sir Fleury on 02/27/09 at 04:19 PM ET
I think he is the reason that people don’t want bloggers in the press boxes.
One dishonest, lying, cheating,manipulating idiot spoils it for everybody.
Posted by AvsRock from My timeshare in insanity... on 02/27/09 at 04:28 PM ET
degroat, get over yourself already. We get what a rumour is, and as explained above, one clearly does not need access to actual “rumours” from hockey sources in order to acheive a 3% hit rate. In fact, you can do better by starting with a completely random process and applying a little rationale, also explained above.
Dwayne claims his information comes from “sources,” which he claims are at the very least in the hockey business or media, and at the most, general managers or agents directly in on the situation. His definition of a source is extremely loose (and not to typical journalist standards), or he is being lied to a lot, or he is lying (a lot). Evidence coming from his posts, his style (or lack thereof), being caught red-handed by others, indicates that it is a mixture of all 3.
Finally, Dwayne takes his job seriously - he lays claim to being a “journalist” and operating with standards, etc. Yet we get back to his vague and rather shifting “standards,” and the fact that he is not a journalist by any reasonable definition.
It’s annoying, at least. For some, it’s insulting. For others, infuriating.
Posted by InsideEdge on 02/27/09 at 04:30 PM ET
Wow. That might be the worst and weakest understanding of statistics I have ever seen. I Don’t come here very often, but every time I do, I can see why so many people don’t.
Posted by Icecastles on 03/01/09 at 05:25 PM ET
Hey, I only took two stats classes in college, so I’m far from an expert. But if any “experts” want to break down these numbers, feel free—I got nothing to hide.
Posted by Mike Chen on 03/01/09 at 06:25 PM ET
Eklund CTS (CTS stands for ‘Consider The Source”) has shown himself to be a terrible prognosticator. I did my own experiment in a public forum, comparing his free agent picks with a random generator and my own picks…all time stamped, all very public, and all edits are tracked.
Result, he was barely better than a random generator and half as good as I was.
http://forum.calgarypuck.com/showthread.php?t=59268
I think it speaks for itself when a ‘hockey insider’ is half as successful as an average hockey fan.
Posted by cyclone3483 from Calgary on 03/10/09 at 02:35 PM ET
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