Halfway through the season, the Canucks are still on a historic PDO tear

[Miss Korea]

 

 

So after 41 games, we are sitting at a 105.2 PDO.  Madness.  Unsustainable my ass.  At the midway point, 5th highest PDO in NHL history, just barely behind the dynasty Oilers/Islanders and the 95-96 Penguins. 

 

For anyone who really hasn't followed the Canucks this season, PDO combines the shooting percentage and the save percentage.  The league average is always going to be 100, and any team above or below that number should be expected to regress to the mean.  The only teams that don't regress are either historically good or historically bad.  As an example, last year's Bruins finished at 103.5.  Currently San Jose has a PDO of 96.42.  

 

But Vancouver.  Holy jesus.  How many games have we watched where we get shelled by opponents and beat them 5-2?  Opposing goalies are literally averaging a .862 SV% against us.  In terms of expected goals for/against, we are just average, right around 50%.  And... our team just doesn't give a shit and scores 5 goals per game anyway.  They can't stop scoring.  We are the deadliest team in even strength situations by far.  And like Darrel from Save-on-Foods says, "The best teams don't just score goals, they make saves too!"  Demko is having his best season.  DeSmith is having his best season.

 

The Christmas projection was indeed correct... so far.  Let's see how high this team can fly.

 

 

  

[Strawbone]

So we're as good as the 80's Oilers... sounds about right to me!

[Jess]

Turns out, we just have really freakin' good shooting and really freakin' good goaltending. Otherwise known as "getting lucky".

[footsteps]

Just now, -AJ- said:

Turns out, we just have really freakin' good shooting and really freakin' good goaltending. Otherwise known as "really freakin' good".

ftfy 

[Jess]

Just now, footsteps said:

ftfy 

 

Haha well that was the point. Poking fun at those who use PDO purely as an indicator for luck.

[Alflives]

1 minute ago, -AJ- said:

Turns out, we just have really freakin' good shooting and really freakin' good goaltending. Otherwise known as "getting lucky".

We get guys in layered screens. Our guys are making the sacrifice to get to these difficult areas. Plus we have Hughes and Hronek who are brilliant at moving pucks up ice very quickly so we are getting a lot of odd man rushes or at least rushes where we force the opponents’ D to back off allowing for cross ice play. Screens (layered) and cross ice plays are the most difficult for goalies. 
We are great!

M-5 is great!

The empties are great! 

[Miss Korea]

16 minutes ago, -AJ- said:

 

Haha well that was the point. Poking fun at those who use PDO purely as an indicator for luck.

 

PDO is supposed to be pure probability.  Sorta.  If you roll a pair of dice, you'll always regress to the mean of 7.

 

Unless your dice are loaded.  Then you'll hit double sixes all day.  And our dice are loaded with IKEA and bald eagles.   

Edited January 12 by Miss Korea

[Jess]

1 minute ago, Miss Korea said:

 

PDO is pure probability.  If you roll a pair of dice, you'll always regress to the mean of 7.

 

Unless your dice are loaded.  Then you'll hit double sixes all day.  And our dice are loaded with IKEA and bald eagles.   

 

Yep, the idea that PDO regresses to the mean is generally true, but not absolutely. It would only be absolutely true in a world with entirely equal teams across the board. Because teams are different from one another, it makes sense that for some teams, the value to which they'd regress might be higher or lower than 100.

[Miss Korea]

Just now, -AJ- said:

 

Yep, the idea that PDO regresses to the mean is generally true, but not absolutely. It would only be absolutely true in a world with entirely equal teams across the board. Because teams are different from one another, it makes sense that for some teams, the value to which they'd regress might be higher or lower than 100.

I rephrased my reply a bit.  It didn't look right after I posted it.  You are right.

 

Also, 82 games isn't enough of a regression.  Playoffs are eve more unpredictable.  1000 games in a season, then yes.

[Satchmo]

Even the Athletic has finally opened their eyes to the Canuck's successes and have begun to poke fun at their own fixation on PDO.  Today's power rankings:

 

1. Vancouver Canucks, 28-11-3

Last week: 6
Sean’s ranking: 1
Dom’s ranking: 1

One of us accepted the Canucks into our hearts months ago. The other is Dom. He’s late to the party, but he’s arrived. Welcome him with open arms. All it took was a week’s worth of stomping on the Metropolitan Division (eight out of eight points against Pittsburgh, New Jersey, the Rangers and the Islanders.)

 

We’re contractually obligated to note that their PDO, somehow, has gone up — it was 105.1 before the break and the Canucks have been running at 108.4 since. That’s part of the fun, though … right?

 

 

[Jess]

11 minutes ago, Miss Korea said:

I rephrased my reply a bit.  It didn't look right after I posted it.  You are right.

 

Also, 82 games isn't enough of a regression.  Playoffs are eve more unpredictable.  1000 games in a season, then yes.

 

Agreed, it's likely that over extremely long periods of time, all teams will regress very close to 100 PDO, but a single season isn't enough.

[PhillipBlunt]

51 minutes ago, Miss Korea said:

 

 

So after 41 games, we are sitting at a 105.2 PDO.  Madness.  Unsustainable my ass.  At the midway point, 5th highest PDO in NHL history, just barely behind the dynasty Oilers/Islanders and the 95-96 Penguins. 

 

For anyone who really hasn't followed the Canucks this season, PDO combines the shooting percentage and the save percentage.  The league average is always going to be 100, and any team above or below that number should be expected to regress to the mean.  The only teams that don't regress are either historically good or historically bad.  As an example, last year's Bruins finished at 103.5.  Currently San Jose has a PDO of 96.42.  

 

But Vancouver.  Holy jesus.  How many games have we watched where we get shelled by opponents and beat them 5-2?  Opposing goalies are literally averaging a .862 SV% against us.  In terms of expected goals for/against, we are just average, right around 50%.  And... our team just doesn't give a shit and scores 5 goals per game anyway.  They can't stop scoring.  We are the deadliest team in even strength situations by far.  And like Darrel from Save-on-Foods says, "The best teams don't just score goals, they make saves too!"  Demko is having his best season.  DeSmith is having his best season.

 

The Christmas projection was indeed correct... so far.  Let's see how high this team can fly.

 

 

  

You should write articles. Both entertaining AND educational. 

Edited January 12 by PhillipBlunt

[Miss Korea]

2 minutes ago, Satchmo said:

Even the Athletic has finally opened their eyes to the Canuck's successes and have begun to poke fun at their own fixation on PDO.  Today's power rankings:

 

1. Vancouver Canucks, 28-11-3

Last week: 6
Sean’s ranking: 1
Dom’s ranking: 1

One of us accepted the Canucks into our hearts months ago. The other is Dom. He’s late to the party, but he’s arrived. Welcome him with open arms. All it took was a week’s worth of stomping on the Metropolitan Division (eight out of eight points against Pittsburgh, New Jersey, the Rangers and the Islanders.)

 

We’re contractually obligated to note that their PDO, somehow, has gone up — it was 105.1 before the break and the Canucks have been running at 108.4 since. That’s part of the fun, though … right?

 

 

Ah, Dom Luszczyszyn... Canucks fans will never let him live down this mistake...

 

 

 

[D.B Cooper]

We play a different style of game that fucks with Pdo.  
We pass up on great chances just to make sure we have proper screening in front.  We make that extra pass, but have the folks to convert on it.  
It’s awesome and frustrating and great but hard to watch. 

[kettlevalley]

Sustainable enough to get us 5 players at the all star game.  Just saying.  

[stawns]

[DSVII]

Let's hope this continues to the last game in June

[John.Tallhouse]

Canucks are PDO

Pretty Damn Outrageous 

[Kragar]

I hate it when people say something in sports is not sustainable. Sure, most of the time they're right. But not always, and all too often it's just a hater's way of ripping on a player or team.

 

Don't worry about whether it's sustainable... just enjoy the ride.

[coolboarder]

42 minutes ago, Kragar said:

I hate it when people say something in sports is not sustainable. Sure, most of the time they're right. But not always, and all too often it's just a hater's way of ripping on a player or team.

 

Don't worry about whether it's sustainable... just enjoy the ride.

I agree.  We have so many elite talents on this team.  It is sustainable for this season only but not sure about next season as we still need to sign so many and might as well having other ELC coming to replace them.  Might as well enjoy them while we can.  

[OldFaithfulcap]

Didn't mean much for Boston or quite a few others in the playoffs. I'm happier to see us take hits without calls and avoid injuries. 
 

Team is doing well, some areas need some improvement. 

[Provost]

On 1/12/2024 at 1:34 PM, -AJ- said:

 

Yep, the idea that PDO regresses to the mean is generally true, but not absolutely. It would only be absolutely true in a world with entirely equal teams across the board. Because teams are different from one another, it makes sense that for some teams, the value to which they'd regress might be higher or lower than 100.

Yes, some magical force causing teams to “regress to the mean” is misunderstanding/mis-stating things.

 

If you have a great goalie, you are going to save more.  If you have great snipers you are going to score more.  That means your PDO will be higher than terrible teams who have neither.

 

The dice analogy is just not right as that is pure probability.  Good teams have dice weighted to more likely roll higher numbers, and bad teams have dice weighted to roll lower numbers.  A thousand rolls under those conditions mean two different outcomes.

 

When you get to extreme ends like the Canucks are now, you have to explain it somehow.  A stat is just an indicator of something happening, it doesn’t infer a cause.  Is this team really one of the best in history?  Does the coaching staff have a strategy that just makes PDO less effective a measure?  Is it just a matter of pure lucky steaks and not sustainable over a season?

 

The stat doesn’t give an answer, it is just a tool.  We know that Gonchar and Foote have a system where they are perfectly fine bleeding shots against opposition, as long as they are low danger ones they are confident Demko will stop almost every time. 
 

Layer that with a Vezina calibre goalie, and great offensive players who on the offensive side who also have a system to convert on higher numbers of shots…. And add in some luck… you can get a crazy good stat as an outcome.

 

Relying on one stat is a way to look foolish.  In analytics it is almost always a series of different variables/stats that make up a regression equation that “explains” or correlates with success or lack of it.

 

 

 

 

[Strawbone]

1 hour ago, Provost said:

Yes, some magical force causing teams to “regress to the mean” is misunderstanding/mis-stating things.

 

If you have a great goalie, you are going to save more.  If you have great snipers you are going to score more.  That means your PDO will be higher than terrible teams who have neither.

 

The dice analogy is just not right as that is pure probability.  Good teams have dice weighted to more likely roll higher numbers, and bad teams have dice weighted to roll lower numbers.  A thousand rolls under those conditions mean two different outcomes.

 

When you get to extreme ends like the Canucks are now, you have to explain it somehow.  A stat is just an indicator of something happening, it doesn’t infer a cause.  Is this team really one of the best in history?  Does the coaching staff have a strategy that just makes PDO less effective a measure?  Is it just a matter of pure lucky steaks and not sustainable over a season?

 

The stat doesn’t give an answer, it is just a tool.  We know that Gonchar and Foote have a system where they are perfectly fine bleeding shots against opposition, as long as they are low danger ones they are confident Demko will stop almost every time. 
 

Layer that with a Vezina calibre goalie, and great offensive players who on the offensive side who also have a system to convert on higher numbers of shots…. And add in some luck… you can get a crazy good stat as an outcome.

 

Relying on one stat is a way to look foolish.  In analytics it is almost always a series of different variables/stats that make up a regression equation that “explains” or correlates with success or lack of it.

 

 

 

 

 

For me, I see the high PDO number indicating that everything has come together at just the right time for this team, and the high shooting and save percentages may be skewed a bit by luck, but over halfway through the season, that's extremely unlikely to be the major factor. This is a team of really good players, playing cohesively, most near the peak of their abilities, with very good coaching and systems in place. There's no reason this can't continue the rest of the year. I don't see anything unsustainable in the way the team is playing, rather with the more balanced roster and huge bank of points, I feel like they can spread the workload around a bit more to keep players fresh, and don't have to play pedal-to-the-metal like in years past to close out the season. This is just a fantastic year to be a Canucks fan.

[Provost]

2 hours ago, Strawbone said:

 

For me, I see the high PDO number indicating that everything has come together at just the right time for this team, and the high shooting and save percentages may be skewed a bit by luck, but over halfway through the season, that's extremely unlikely to be the major factor. This is a team of really good players, playing cohesively, most near the peak of their abilities, with very good coaching and systems in place. There's no reason this can't continue the rest of the year. I don't see anything unsustainable in the way the team is playing, rather with the more balanced roster and huge bank of points, I feel like they can spread the workload around a bit more to keep players fresh, and don't have to play pedal-to-the-metal like in years past to close out the season. This is just a fantastic year to be a Canucks fan.

it is absolutely possible, PDO doesn’t explain wins all that well as a stat, so I don’t know why folks are all hung up on it more than many other metrics.

 

The PDO could drop to closer to average and out winning % could stay the same.

[gizmo2337]

We score more goals than we let in. GF-GA= +54.

Who would have thought? Score more goals than your opponent and you win.