A Winning Habit » Josh Gorges

Habs News and Notes: September 25, 2012

Stephan Cooper — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 01:20:53 +0000

March 17th, 2012; Montreal, QC, CAN; Montreal Canadiens forward Max Pacioretty (67) carries the puck into the New York Islanders zone during the 2nd period at the Bell Centre. Mandatory Credit: Eric Bolte-US PRESSWIRE

- Max Pacioretty is going to Switzerland. The young forward has signed with the NLA team Ambri-Piotta. Pacioretty has no particular ties to Switzerland, if anything he’s tied to Russia through his wife Katia. Ambri is considered a weak sister in the top Swiss league (league A), playing in a tiny market of two nearby villages in the Swiss Alps. The best to be said about them is that they have always avoided relegation to the B league.

Pacioretty seems to doing what many North Americans did in the last lockout, with an absence of ties to a particular European league many choose to play in Switzerland. The NLA isn’t the best league in Europe but they are respectable and some of their top teams are amongst the best on the continent. The big advantage is they offer some of Europe’s best player salaries, are pretty open to North American talent and are the one top league that plays in Western Europe rather than Scandinavia or the former Eastern Bloc.

- Brendan Gallagher to room with Josh Gorges. The young veteran defenseman apparently has opened his home to the Canadiens’ top new professional forward who is also from Western Canada, with an eye to show him how to live the day to day life of a pro hockey player (including feeding yourself). Gorges said he was paying forward the same curtesy extended to him in San Jose by veteran defenseman Scott Hannen.

- Bob MacKenzie releases that Galchenyuk will be the only CHL junior player Montreal is interested in recalling this season.

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/TSNBobMcKenzie/status/250722505323593728"]

Apparently NHL teams must submit a short list of players they had an interest in recalling to try-out for training camps if they did not open on schedule. Given the status of most of the Habs CHLers, it should come as no surprise that Galchenyuk is the only one on the list even though they could have added more. There is no reason to believe that anyone but him is even close to ready for the professional game and disrupting their junior seasons would serve no purpose.

Components of Offense: Canadiens Defensemen

Stephan Cooper — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 03:02:53 +0000

Mar 12, 2012; Buffalo, NY, USA; Montreal Canadiens defenseman Tomas Kaberle (22) brings the puck up the ice as Buffalo Sabres center Derek Roy (9) defends during the first period at the First Niagara Center. Mandatory Credit: Kevin Hoffman-US PRESSWIRE

We finish our look at even strength offense with the defensemen. As we saw in the first article, defensemen have very little direct effect on goals scored from their own goals scored. Average shooting percentage for defensemen on 5 on5 is 4.01%, average shot proportion is 13.4%. With such a low proportion of the shots and a shooting percentage that is less then half then that of their forward compatriots, the average defenseman is scoring about 1 in 20 of his teams goals he’ll be on ice for. Unless they are at the very top of defensemen scoring they just don’t accomplish it enough to have a significant effect. Their effect on goals scored for their team should be through their forwards scoring.

	Personal shots per 60	Shooting%	Goals Scored per 60	Teammate Shots per 60	Teamate Shooting%	Team On Ice Shots per 60	Team Goals per 60	Percentage of Team Shots
Subban	5.12	2.23	0.11	25.69	9.01	30.81	2.43	16.62
Markov	3.88	4.79	0.19	27.11	9.57	30.99	2.78	12.52
Kaberle	3.56	3.90	0.14	26.80	8.51	30.36	2.42	11.73
Gorges	1.92	3.40	0.07	24.72	7.91	26.64	2.02	7.21
Emelin	3.00	3.90	0.12	24.30	7.58	27.30	1.96	10.99
Diaz	3.04	6.98	0.21	23.66	6.33	26.70	1.71	11.39

Subban is the clear king of shots, but suffered from the worst shooting percentage. His first year he was above average there so I think his 2011-12 lack of goals was an abberation. I recall Dion Phaneuf went through a similar slump one season and rebounded solidly. Long term expect Subban to be clearly the best even strength goal scorer from the group. Subban combines a solid amount of team-mate shots with his own strong rate is a pretty good basis for team offensive performance. Normally a large amount of shots from a defensemen would be a recipe for weak team shot conversion rate, but Subban has generally played with a low shot defense partner in Gill or Gorges. Subban takes a large amount and proportion of shots but he seems to be making up for his defense partner’s lack of shooting opportunities rather than taking shots instead of his forwards.

Markov and Kaberle are pretty similar on offense. Both have solid shot producing and goal scoring rates but their most important contribution is how many scoring opportunities his team-mates are getting. Markov seems to be generally a bit superior to Kaberle but both look like quality offensive defensemen over these 3 seasons.

Diaz and Emelin have widely divergent goal scoring rates but that looks like a sample size issue, just a difference of 1 goal scored in a single season on even strength. Their shot rates are pretty much identical, its likely they are pretty much the same in goal-scoring terms going forward. The same process in reverse works for their team mates. Basically the same shot rates but Emelin had the better shooting percentage and thus goals scored. Long term unless one improves drastically expect pretty similar results.

Gorges is a fine defenseman overall but on the offensive side he seems to be clearly the weakest guy of the 6. Obviously the lowest shooter and goal-scorer with not particularly great team offense.

	Goals per 82	On Ice Goals per 82
Subban	2.5	53.1
Markov	4.1	60.8
Kaberle	3.0	52.9
Gorges	1.4	44.2
Emelin	2.6	42.9
Diaz	4.6	37.4

Looking at expected offense on even strength over 82 games and 16 minutes per game given team and individual goal scoring rates we see a clear separation between the top and bottom 3 defenders. Markov is the clear class of the field in terms of results and Subban and Kaberle are close. Diaz and Emelin’s results are divergent but they are based on a single season of data. Shot rates should be more reliable over that time frame and they show them to be virtually identical.

	Average corsiRel QoC	Average Zone Start Ratio
Subban	0.824	47.0
Markov	0.440	52.8
Kaberle	-0.421	53.6
Gorges	0.837	46.3
Emelin	-0.107	48.1
Diaz	0.101	47.0

The roles of the defensemen are clearly divergent. Gorges and Subban have clearly been leaned on hard to play the tough minutes. That they generally get some of the stronger results are a good sign of just how good these two are. Markov is clearly been used as a a stronger second pair defender. Emelin and Diaz have about the same role as lesser 2nd pairing guys. Kaberle’s good offensive results are during generally soft minute usage over the last 3 years, which brings some context to why a lesser talent is keeping pace with Subban and Markov who had real defensive responsibilities.

Thanks to behindthenet.ca and stats.hockey.analysis.com for the databases to make this work possible.

Montreal Canadiens Depth Chart: Indefinite Defensemen (1)

Stephan Cooper — Fri, 14 Sep 2012 08:06:07 +0000

March 17th, 2012; Montreal, QC, CAN; Montreal Canadiens defenseman Andrei Markov (79) before the game against the New York Islanders at the Bell Centre. Mandatory Credit: Eric Bolte-US PRESSWIRE

Our two part series on the Habs 2011-12 defensive pairings should have you well informed about how the defensive corp worked last season. Now we can take a look at how the group shapes up for the foreseeable future. Today we look at the established NHL players in the system, while tomorrow we look at the emerging defenseman and the Canadiens crop of defenseman prospects as well as how it could all fit together in the future.

The Top Three:

A hockey club’s top 4 on defense is often discussed, but in many cases its the best three blueliners a team can ice that are the difference makers. A top three would usually represent a team’s primary shutdown pair and the guy carrying the second pairing. For spots 4-6 its more important to have relative competence while its the top half of the group that really decides if the defense succeeds or fails.

For the current Habs, the elite group starts with PK Subban. Any way the results get broken down he’s the key guy in critical situations and the main driver of results on even strength and a critical component of both the power play and penalty kill. As I’ve discussed before, he is one of the top young defensemen in the league, and he and Josh Gorges very much looked like a top notch shutdown pairing the year before. At 23 years old he is the teams top young player and the keystone of the defense for the years to come. Defensemen tend to be their best in their late 20′s, so we can probably expect a lot more from PK in the future.

Gorges took a large step forward last season. In the previous three years he was either a passenger of Andrei Markov or the guy barely holding an inadequate 2nd pairing together saddled with Hal Gill. Last year he began to be a significant player in his own right, where he went, good things happened. Gorges is very limited offensively although he is competent at getting the puck out and moving forward. Its his solid defensive abilities that make him valuable, as one of the league’s premier shotblockers and a reliable defensive presence against top forwards. Gorges lacks the all-round game to be a top defenseman in his own right but he’s a solid compliment to star defensemen, the Jackman or Mitchell to Subban’s Doughty or Pietrangelo. At 27, he has a long prime as a defensive defenseman to look forward to, Montreal should be fine with him as a number 3 defender for the next 5 years or so.

Markov is the wild-card. Formerly a number one defenseman, one of the top offensively defensemen in the league and arguably the league’s best playmaker on defense. Markov hasn’t played significant time for 2 years and only a half season then. If he’s back to form next time the Canadiens play, the Hab’s 1-2 on defense will be the best in the conference. If he gets injured again Montreal won’t have anything resembling a 2nd pair to work with. Its anyone’s guess what the Habs will get from Markov. For long-term, if Markov has made a full recovery the team probably has a number of good seasons left in Markov, even though he’s 33. Top defensemen generally age gracefully, remaining effective towards 35-36 and being good in their 37-40 years is not uncommon. His knee is a concern, but on the other hand he’s avoided 3 years of the NHL grind on his body. Loosing seasons might have extended his career. If the Habs have good fortune they’ll have a top 3 defenseman in Markov for the next 3-5 years. If not they need to fill that whole as soon as possible.

The Veteran Depth:

The Habs have two other veterans under contract, Tomas Kaberle and Francis Boullion.

Kaberle is an interesting case. Like the little girl, at what he’s good at he’s very good, at what he’s bad at he’s horrid. Kaberle is a fine offensive defenseman, excellent at moving the puck and setting up plays. He’s also horrid at anything related to keeping the puck in the net. Under both Martin and Cunneyworth he was part of the team’s best regular powerplay defense pairing with Subban and he’s got a solid record as a powerplay quarterback. The main problem is that the Habs aren’t lacking for offensive blueliners and don’t have the quality depth to shelter him. Kaberle should be pretty good as a 5th defenseman next year for Montreal but in general the Habs probably will look to move him at first opportunity.

The only outside addition to the team’s defense is ex-Hab Francis Boullion. In general Boullion has played a fair amount of ES minutes in Nashville behind the shutdown behemoth that is the Weber-Suter pairing. His results are middling to bad during that time but he at least is NHL level. Next year he should be 3rd pairing or press box with no special teams time in Montreal. Boullion should only be a stopgap on depth until the club can find better internally or externally. The main reason to have him seemed to be that Coach Therrien liked him.

Projected Defensive Depth Chart in 2 years (Established Players)

Left Defense	Right Defense
Markov	Subban
?	Gorges
?	?
?	?

In pretty much any scenario, two years from now Subban is the teams top right D. Markov is a pretty decent bet to remain the team’s best left sider. Gorges remains in the top six, likely as a right side/left side swing man, playing with one of Markov or Subban. Kaberle and Boullion are since jettisoned.

Tomorrow we continue this feature by looking at the team’s emerging talent on defense.