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Rookie Of The Year Race
by PuckStopsHere on 03/07/10 at 01:01 PM ET
Comments (13)
In early January, I picked Tyler Myers of the Buffalo Sabres as the Calder trophy leader. He has not kept up that pace. In fact in his last ten games, Myers has only one point and -6 +/- rating. Those are not Calder Trophy numbers. Hence it is time to pick a new leader.
The leader at this point is Detroit Red Wings goaltender Jimmy Howard. He is the clear Detroit number one goalie (due in part to Chris Osgood’s failures). Howard has a .925 saves percentage, which is good enough for fifth in the NHL and a 2.33 goals against average (8th in the league). Among the NHL’s successful rookie goalies this year (Howard, Tuukka Rask and Antti Niemi) Howard has been the only one who has played the majority of his team’s games.
The recent example of a goaltender winning the Calder Trophy is Steve Mason of the Columbus Blue Jackets, who won it last year. Mason has a .916 saves percentage in his rookie year (Howard is well above that level) a a 2.29 GAA (which is approximately the same as Mason - which shows that Detroit is allowing more shots this year than Columbus did last year). Howard must play in most of the remaining games this season to reach Mason’s games played total (which seems likely as Osgood has only appeared in four games in 2010 - and two were only partial games).
There is a group that would consider Jimmy Howard for Calder if and only if Detroit makes the playoffs. This is wrong. Jimmy Howard (or any other player) is the Calder Trophy winner if he earns the most “Bill James win shares” - basically if he gives his team more wins than any other rookie. I think he has done so during the season so far. For a large part, Detroit making or not making playoffs depends upon the play of the whole team and Howard is only one player.
Jimmy Howard is the current leader for the rookie of the year. It took a slump by Tyler Myers to get Howard the lead. Although he is not a consensus leader now (though I think he should be), Howard could become a consensus Calder Trophy winner if his strong play is a significant reason Detroit qualifies for the playoffs.
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Tags: Detroit+Red+Wings, Jimmy+Howard, Tyler+Myers,
Comments
The argument for Duchene is basically that he is the top scoring rookie so far. He is on pace for 56 or 57 points. Not too impressive for a top scoring rookie forward. The last time a forward won the Calder with that low a point total it was Chris Drury in 1998/99 (the league was lower scoring overall at that time). Duchene’s totals are only Calder worthy in a very weak year.
Posted by PuckStopsHere on 03/07/10 at 01:24 PM ET
Not too…ugh. Jimmy better step his game back up a notch…the last 4 games…he’s been a bit shaky.
Posted by mrfluffy from Long Beach on 03/07/10 at 03:17 PM ET
Half the NHL Media don’t even know that Howards a rookie, so i say he’s got no chance tbh
Posted by Pharazon from England on 03/07/10 at 03:31 PM ET
You know what the problem is with TPSH? It’s his arrogance. He NOW considers Sidney Crosby a Hall of Famer. HE picks who will win trophies. Every hockey fan has an opinion, and the right to express it, fine. But who is TPSH to declare so boldly that HE considers someone a HOFer, or a trophy winner? Really, who cares what TPSH considers, it’s just one of many opinions, but he seems to think it’s big news that HE considers someone something. It’s not. It’d be another thing if he made a simple argument without such ridiculous pronouncements, of course…
Posted by Harrald on 03/07/10 at 07:05 PM ET
“who is TPSH to declare so boldly that HE considers someone a HOFer”
B/c it’s like…just his opinion, man.
Posted by Shane from Saskatoon on 03/07/10 at 09:07 PM ET
The argument for Duchene is basically that he is the top scoring rookie so far.
No, the argument for Duchesne is that he’s visibly the most impressive rookie. It’s not how many points he has—it’s how he’s getting them. There are probably less than 10 NHL players that can consistently make something happen 1 on 3 (maybe even less than 5), but Duchesne’s one of them. Not to take anything away from Myers, Howard, Tavares (etc.) but those guys look like they’re turning into key components. Duchesne looks like he’s turning into an engine—a bonafide franchise center along the lines of a Malkin or a Thornton.
Having said that, I don’t have any problem with anybody thinking Howard or Myers should be rookie of the year. They’re all good choices.
Posted by steve on 03/08/10 at 06:50 AM ET
Like Pbgh w/ Crosby, Duchene stands out so well because of a lack of supporting cast. He’s a good hockey player - no question. However, since he’s called on to carry the team more than he would be if he were with a better staffed club, he looks even more impressive. If Duchene were with this year’s Blackhawks, Sharks, Caps or Devils, he’d be a solid player but not a superstar.
Posted by redxblack from Akron Ohio on 03/08/10 at 07:43 AM ET
If Duchene were with this year’s Blackhawks, Sharks, Caps or Devils, he’d be a solid player but not a superstar.
Stamkos flopped last year and Tavares is doing so-so in similar situations as Duchesne’s, and Alex Tanguay, as a rookie, was greatly, greatly magnified by a better supporting cast, but I do see what you’re saying and could see Duchesne go either way with a better supporting cast.
Posted by steve on 03/08/10 at 09:08 AM ET
I couldn’t find any information about calder voting and bill james win shares. TPSH, can you point me in the right direction?
Posted by Steve Strowbridge from St. John's, NL, CA on 03/08/10 at 10:46 AM ET
Steve
Here is what you need to know about Bill James and his win share method. It is a concept from baseball sabremetrics. Bill James has done a very good job of assigning wins of baseball teams to individual players. The basic idea is that runs scored or prevented have a predictable relationship with expected wins (the so called Pythagorean relation - which is not to be confused with the stuff you learned about right angle triangles in school). These expected wins have better predictive value than actual wins in determining future events.
Now a baseball player can have his contribution - hits, outs produced when batting, his defensive performance etc., turned into the expected number of runs this scores (and prevents) and hence related to expected wins. Thus the win shares for individual players can be calculated. These correlate very strongly with team`s actual win totals and hence have strong predictive value.
The logical conclusion is that the player with the most win shares in a given season is MVP, the top rookie in terms of win shares is rookie of the year etc.
Now hockey does not have as strong a sabermetric theory has baseball (and for many reasons probably cannot have one), but this gives us a way to think about things. In this case the rookie who produced the most win shares should be rookie of the year. Because we do not have theory to calculate this we must give our best guess at who this might be. We can make an educated guess and we can debate about why our guess is better than another person`s guess, but I think this provides the most solid framework for the determination of who should be leading for a given award. Whenever I give my picks, that is the framework that I am using.
If this interests you, I urge you to get your hands on the Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, which spells out the baseball system and might give you an understanding of the framework from which I make my picks.
Posted by PuckStopsHere on 03/08/10 at 11:40 AM ET
I think it’s easier to evaluate a goalie for the Calder than a skater. a goalie’s personal stats are a little more personal than those of a skater. looking simply at save percentage is a good gauge that allows you to ignore team wins, IMO. yes, there are “quality shots” and “easy saves” but I think over the course of a season the number of total shots flattens out those nuances.
there are two things I think will cost Jimmy the Calder this year - he is not a “flashy” goalie. he is a positional goalie. I can’t remember seeing any of his saves this year on highlight shows…and there were some dandies. but they weren’t wild flopping-around or quick-glove kind of saves so nobody seems to notice outside Detroit. the other thing is that (maybe because of the first reason) the media seems not to have noticed Jimmy much at all this season.
but that’s OK. we all know Jimmy, the team, the fans….we all only care about ONE piece of hardware.
Posted by PaulinMiamiBeach on 03/08/10 at 02:15 PM ET
So, who is leading rookies amongst Bill James win shares? Where are these stats available?
Posted by Steve Strowbridge from St. John's, NL, CA on 03/09/10 at 10:25 AM ET
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Posted by Mike on 03/07/10 at 01:17 PM ET