Fogghorn wrote:
Game well under way but Nucks are dominating possession but tied 1:1
I've been trying for awhile now to understand David Booth. He's like a bull in a china shop, great speed and power and able to plow through the defense but it does not result in goals. Then I realized a bull has actual intent, it's happy to gore you. DB is more like a force of nature, a tornado perhaps, a great power but with no real purpose. He lacks the wrist shot/slapshot (finish) or the meaness to really make the opposition fear him. Nice piece to the team but just always leaves me feeling that he could/should be so much more than he is. If he had the attitude he'd be as good as Hartnell or Neal instead he's just meh!
Seems I'm not the only one concerned about Booth, every where I look today there is more on David Booth. Good article on PITB with the best bit here
Quote:
It’s harder when you look at the underlying numbers. Booth’s Corsi rate is at Sedin levels. He’s currently third on the team in Corsi with a rate of 26.30, right behind Daniel (27.32) and Henrik (26.51). The next highest player is Burrows at 15.03. But it’s more than that. Booth is managing to push puck possession into the offensive zone at the same rate as the Sedins while starting the majority of his shifts in the defensive zone. Booth’s Offensive Zone Start Percentage is 45.3%; the Sedins are at 70.5% and 68.3%, respectively.
That is insanely good. The reason that hasn’t resulted in more points for Booth is his On-Ice Shooting Percentage. When Booth is on the ice, the Canucks have scored on only 2.33% of their shots on goal, the lowest percentage of any player on the team. Even if Booth is the type of player that drives down shooting percentages, as some argue, that is ridiculously and unsustainably low.
Everyone seems pretty excited about how the Nucks are playing, survey says on 1040 that 61% want to fire AV. Personally I can't believe they are as bad as they look right now. A bit of bad luck, poor gaoling, and a PP that needs readjustment. I think the team is about to go on a serious tear. From CArmy
Quote:
The possession data that we rely on so much here at the Army is stellar; at even strength they're third in the league, a notch above Chicago who remains without a regulation loss over halfway through the season. When trailing, they're second in the league, this time a notch below Chicago but still controlling over 60% of Corsi events. That said, I think we can all see that there's something missing. Jeff Angus alluded to it in his great piece on David Booth: there was a cohesion to this team in 2010-11 that we haven't seen since. It's not something we can measure, but this just doesn't feel like the team it was that year, even though in many ways they have a better roster. I'd love for them to prove me wrong.
Although they do go lame in the last sentence, if the model is correct then the Canuck's will return to form, if they don't return to form but the stats remain strong then the Corsi/Fenwick modeling has serious holes. Don't treat the inexplicable as if it is magic, it's just means that it's data that's not yet understood and the model needs revision. That's really a hard thing for so many to accept when they first jump onto analytics and think they have found the grail.