EVERETT – On the surface, hockey and mathematics wouldn’t seem to have much correlation. But a quick glance at the statistic sheet shows a smattering of plus and minus signs scattered up and down one column.
What are those things?
Those are the players’ plus/minus ratings, a stat unique to hockey that is both an intriguing and confounding concept.
“It’s pretty big, even moreso for a defenseman,” Everett Silvertips defenseman Cody Thoring, who is a -3, said. “If your plus/minus isn’t very good it means you’re on for lots of goals against, so it’s pretty important. It shows a lot about how hard you work at keeping goals out of the net.”
The concept behind plus/minus is simple. If a player is on the ice when his team scores a goal five-on-five or short-handed, he receives a +1. If he’s on the ice when his team surrenders a goal five-on-five or on the power play, he receives a -1. Those numbers are compiled throughout the season, giving the player his plus/minus rating.
The theory behind the stat is that it provides another form of player evaluation. Goals and assists are one indication of a player’s ability, but what if those goals and assists come at the expense of goals also going in at the other end? And what about stay-at-home defensemen, whose point totals are always miniscule? The plus/minus stat provides a player evaluation independent of goals and assists, using the assumption that a player who is on the ice more often for goals scored than for goals against is more effective. Plus/minus is thus designed to take into account a player’s game in its entirety.
According to the plus/minus ratings, Everett’s most-effective players this season have been centers Zach Hamill and Zack Dailey, who lead the team with a +9. By the same reasoning, Everett’s least-effective player has been defenseman Zach Sim, who’s a -10.
And those numbers are something the players take notice of.
“I pay quite a bit of attention to it,” Hamill said. “It shows your five-on-five play and that’s important to me. You can’t just do it on the power play. If players don’t score goals five-on-five you’re not going to win hockey games and plus/minus shows that.”
There’s a small amount of banter thrown around the locker room regarding players’ plus/minus ratings, but for the most part the players focus on their own number.
“If somebody’s got a real bad plus/minus they’ll hear about it,” Thoring said. “But it’s not a huge deal. It’s more a personal thing than a team thing.”
But how accurate are the plus/minus ratings? Dailey has been a revelation as a 16-year-old this season, but has he really been better than leading scorer John Lammers, who rates a +5? And is it realistic to think that veteran forwards Karel Hromas (-5) and Mark Kress (-6) are among Everett’s least-effective players?
And it’s not just this season. Among Everett’s worst-rated players in past seasons were former captain Bryan Nathe, who was a -15 in 2003-04, and current member of the American Hockey League’s Hartford Wolfpack Ivan Baranka, who was a -15 last season.
So what’s one to believe, one’s eyes or the stat sheet?
“It’s a tricky statistic,” Everett coach Kevin Constantine said. “Plus/minus is supposed to tell you when you’re on the ice for more goals than the other team. It should tell you something, but what?”
There’s a number of issues with plus/minus. For example, it doesn’t take into account a player’s effectiveness on the power play, despite the fact a large percentage of goals are scored on the power play. Everett, which has played well on the power play this season, has scored 65 of its 153 goals with the advantage. Therefore a power-play standout like Mueller, who has 20 of his 43 points on the power play, doesn’t receive plus/minus credit for a significant portion of his game.
Then there’s the chance factor. A player can have absolutely nothing to do with goal on either end and wind up having his plus/minus affected. What about the defenseman who jumps onto the ice for a change behind the play just as the team scores a goal? Or how about the forward who is forced to watch helplessly when a defenseman slips and an opponent goes on to score a breakaway goal?
For players like Nathe two seasons ago and Baranka last season, the argument can be made that their poor plus/minus ratings have more to do with logging large amounts of ice time for teams that didn’t score many goals, rather than the quality of their play.
“I think the league’s plus/minus stats are often not the right people being put down,” Constantine said. “So we pay almost no attention to the league’s plus/minus.”
Instead, the Silvertips have devised their own plus/minus rating, limiting the stat to even-strength evaluations and attempting to eliminate many of the problems associated with the stat.
“When we look at our own plus/minus, it gives a good indication of how players do during even-strength play,” said Constantine, who declined to divulge the team’s adjusted plus/minus ratings other than to say they were generally similar to the league’s numbers. “We eliminate all the pulled-goalie situations, which are unique and would distort the stats, and we eliminate all the specialty teams situations, which would distort what the stat is actually telling you.
“We put down the five people who were part of the play,” Constantine added. “Those people get credit for the plus/minus, even if right as the goal was scored two new people are stepping out.”
Ultimately, plus/minus is just like any other stat. It’s a tool for evaluating player, but not a complete evaluation in itself.
“It’s a stat and people look at stats all the time, so I think it’s pretty important,” Hamill said. “It’s good motivation to see where you’re going.”
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