There's a big difference between the 4th, 5th and 6th seeds in the West this season. It's obvious. 6th is the place to be, right? Any idiot knows this.

Some historical facts, Cup winners since the current format began in 1994...

1st seed: 6
2nd seed: 5
3rd seed: 3
4th seed: 2
5th seed: 1

If you exclude the Devils who won in 1995 as the 5th seed in a lockout shortened 48 games season which probably skewed the standings, no 5 thru 8 seed has won the Cup:

#1 seed - 6/32 = 18.8%
#2 seed - 5/32 = 15.6%
#3 seed - 3/32 = 9.38%
#4 seed - 2/32 = 6.3%
#5-8 seed - 0/128 = 0.0%

Or another way of looking at it, Cups won:

1-4 - 100%
5-8 - 0%

And yet more. No 6th-8th seed has ever won the Cup since the 1967 expansion.

Here's another interesting tidbit. Historically, the 4th seed is almost as successful at the 1st seed.

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And one of those is a world of suck.

We all know the memes flying around this season regarding the Blackhawks, especially during the current 7-game 8 game skid. In a nutshell "EVERYTHING sucks" and the team, as constructed, has no chance to succeed. A tweak here or there will solve nothing. But is that true?

I broke down some basic numbers from the first 7 games of the losing streak in an attempt to see what's really been happening. Is it all on the goaltending? Is the PK costing the Hawks all of these games? Is it the PP? Do the Hawks suck even at 5on5? Is it the system, and therefore by extension, the coaching? Maybe it's a bit of everything?

By taking a closer look at the numbers, I believe we can narrow it down to what is hyperbole and what is likely fact.

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WTF happened here?? Version 1: I was bored and decided to take all the photos from the CBJ's game and use them in an attempt to tell a "different" story. Kind of a creative exercise. That went off tangent. A few times. FYI, I started this prior to Wiz getting injured, but that provided an all too fitting conclusion.

Version 2: Since the Blackhawks were off for a handful of days, they weren't able to celebrate Festivus like the rest of us until their game against the lowly Columbus BJ's and even lower life form James Wisniewski.

And since I know many of you watch the games via online feeds or from the 300 section, you probably don't catch all of what really happens on the ice, at least not the stuff the MSM doesn't want you to know. But because I'm such an altruistic guy (and in the spirit of the holidays), using my command center technology, I bring it to you now.

First off, in case you're a "typical bandwagon Hawks fan", you need to understand the man known as Wiz.

Why we* don't like Wiz: Very simple. He was an overrated, useless POS meathead when he played for Chicago. (* I know there's some of you who feel otherwise - and silently cheer when you see John Scott's name in the starting lineup)

Why we hate Wiz: That's quite simple too. Who doesn't? It definitely has nothing to do with that headshot back in 2010 that Wiz laid on a certain friend of his, who was coincidentally supposed to stand up in his upcoming wedding.

(I originally had the wrong video embedded, so now Step Brothers might make more sense)

I'm sure they've put that all behind them. And you should too.

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Ah, good to have CNS back looking up all the stats we can't be bothered to...

Ah, the FanPost section. Home sweet home. I haven't done this in a while...

There's been just an eensy weensy teeny tiny bit of talk about how bad the Hawks defense has been this year and that the Blackhawks are giving up higher quality shots. So I decided to look into the percentages of goals given up by the Hawks from different areas of the ice this season and compare that to the percentages of other teams and to last year's team.

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I was going to edit this video to include clips of different Canucks antics during these playoffs, but I wanted to get this posted before tonight's game.

If the Bruins win, possibly I'll update the video, but probably not since this took longer than expected. Still, I hope you get a chuckle. Maybe even two.

The subtitles move quickly, so you might need to watch it twice.

Actually, as you all know, I'm needy and just want to increase my number of views on YouTube.

Enjoy.

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In today's thread there was a conversation about whether or not FO% was really that important to a team's success. Knowing that FO% has an effect on scoring chances, zone finishes, etc, I was definitely curious. So I threw together some graphs comparing FO% to various team stats.

Based on the distribution, the relationship is loose, but based on the trend-lines a definite relationship does exist - and in every instance it points in the direct one would expect.

I was personally most curious about the relationship of FO% and Team Corsi since Corsi is a large sample size and reduces some of the noise (ex: SV% effect on GF/G and GA/G). So that one is at the end.

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...always should be someone you really love.

Putmeinthemadhouse had asked in the Canucks-Sharks game thread what teams had "chased" the most goalies. Since I already had that raw data (for a goalie "Quality Starts" post I'll put up at a later date), I re-sorted it to answer that question. I'm always curious about these things anyways.

I also sorted the data by goalie, to show which goalies were pulled the most and least.

The first two columns (<45M) are based on the number of times or percentage a starting goalie was pulled with less than 45 minutes TOI. The second two columns (<45M3+G) are based on the number of times or percentage a starting goalie was pulled with less than 45 minutes TOI and had given up 3 or more goals. I went with 45 minutes over 40 minutes since a goalie will sometimes start the 3rd, quickly give up another goal and get pulled.

Color coding: Blue is best. Green is good. Yellow is average. Orange is bad. Red is worst. (Don't ask about the specific code coding for the goalies. Just know that those colors still apply.)

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I was browsing the NHL site today when I accidentally clicked on a link that brought to what I believe was supposed to be a restricted area. While browsing the back pages, I discovered a document which may lend credence to the cries of foul play from the Vancouver media and masses - but it also gives a rosy outlook for tonight's game for Hawks fans.

And if you're not familiar with it, you should definitely quickly read Ike's original Message to the Troops on the eve of D-Day that Bettman borrowed from. Hmmm, more scandal.

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Influenced by Sam's OBVIOUS nod to John Scott in his postgame writeup, I was inspired to pull out my recently arrived shipment of remastered Blue Oyster Cult CDs. I was amazed at the clarity and quickly realized that I'd been singing the wrong lyrics my whole life. I feel kind of embarrassed.

But being the stickler for historical accuracy that I am, I listened intently to the words of one of my favorites, (Don't Fear) The Reaper, and wrote what I believe to be the ACTUAL lyrics below.

I highly advise listening to the original while singing the corrected lyrics aloud. Trust me, your neighbors won't mind, but your dog might.

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Following the NHL playoff race can be confusing because teams have "games in hand" and the rankings are by points instead of winning percentage as in most other sports. And while sorting the standings by Points Percentage (PPct) is a good way to help clarify things, it's definitely not the best predictor of future standings.

The more I hear people try to tell me the season is over, the more I want to show that statistics prove otherwise. I also simply refuse to believe that a team like Tampa Bay with a -5 Goal Differential can, over time, continue to win at a .649 PPct pace, while Boston who has a +36 GDiff has only a .605 PPct. Or that the Blackhawks who have a +21 GDiff should end the season tied with Columbus who has a -17 GDiff.

Over the long term can a team that consistently gives up more goals than it scores win a large majority of its games? Or vice versa? In my opinion, there is no stronger determinate of a team's strength and long term success than Goal Differential (GDiff) tempered by Strength of Schedule (SOS). So that brought me back again to one of my favorite stats, the Simple Rating System (SRS).

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Ed note: The work CNS did here merited some serious recognition on the front page, so it's with pride that I bump this up to the forefront on this the most superest of Sundays. It beats looking at the Western Conference standings. --McClure

I noticed a lot of conversation lately about the production of the Hawks' top lines as compared to the bottom lines this season. So I decided to take a closer look at the forward corps. If this generates any interest I'll put together something similar for the defensivemen.

I charted the 1st and 2nd line production from this season compared to last year's based on Plus/Minus and Scoring. Last year had A LOT of line juggling. Instead of going through and figuring out who played on what line during each game of the season, it was much, much easier to use stats from the players who I remember spending the most time on each line during the regular season. I believe the results still paint a fairly accurate picture. 

Second, I also wanted to look deeper into the relationship between a player's stats and the performance of his linemates and to compare each player's individual performance with his performance from last year.

The data for each player from 2011 has been adjusted to equal the number of games that player (or the player in that position, in the case of Ladd and Kopecky) played in 2010. That way it is easier to determine the difference from last year's pace for each player.

Also, the reason Ladd 2010 was used in comparison to Kopecky 2011 is not only because he played a decent chunk of time on the 2nd line, but also because if I took on average of the other players who I recall spent some time on the 2nd line, the resulting average would be almost identical to Ladd's actual season figures. Therefore I felt he was the best measuring stick, my "everyman" so to speak.

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Wind blows cold from the west
I smell coffee, I smell doughnuts for the press...

I've grown quite weary, as I suppose many of you have, of the doomsday talk from some commenters and members of the media, especially after Hawks losses. So after the San Jose loss, I figured I'd put together some statistics to dispel some of the uninformed opinions that have been thrown out there as statements of fact. Comments like "Wake up, folks, unless they get about 70% of the available points in their remaining games, there's no mathematical way this team can recover in time to make the playoffs" are simply untrue. And it's not homerism that makes me say that - it's stats man.

There's nothing mind-blowing here like the stuff put together by Verstig, TMFF and GMH, but I think it achieves its purpose and will put some things in a better light. Also, with the difference in games-in-hand, it can be difficult to judge just where the Hawks are in comparison to their competition. This should make those comparisons much easier. So without delay, let's look at the good, the bad and the ugly...

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Just a quick comic I put together for the LA game since everyone here is so excited to see John Scott back in the lineup tonight. I couldn't make it a FanShot because it got shrunk too small. TWSS?

I'm probably going to turn this into a stats FanPost in the next day or two (yes, believe it or not, nothing mind-blowing though, just looking to dispel a few false statements being thrown around). I'll change the title when I do, although I know that's inviting trouble :P (edit: Never mind. I made a separate post for the stuff that required actual intelligence)

(note the circus trip rookie clown car with the "dead weight" in the trunk)

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