Defending Rasmus Ristolainen Against the Analytics

Now that most have calmed down about Ristolainen and the majority have been celebrating rejoicement over the Jakub Voracek trade, I figured now would be a good time to post my reaction to Ristolainen.

Making the positive case for Rasmus Ristolainen especially when most data would have you believe that he is one of the worst 5v5 defensemen in the league is not an advantageous one. Yet, I am going to do it anyways. Draw the artillery. I’m storming the beaches.

When evaluating analytics something to keep in mind is that context matters. Situation Matters. Environment Matters.

Just because you were the best brick-layer on a project with a failed blue-print, doesn’t mean you were responsible for the house falling down. You blame the architect or the engineer for the blue-print. Just because you were the best defenseman on the worst team, doesn’t mean you’re responsible for the team doing poorly. Responsibility should be directed towards Buffalo senior management.

You might be asking yourself why I am pinning it all on his situation in Buffalo? I am certainly not. However, it should absolutely be considered.

Ristolainen was rushed into the league at age 19 and during the last 5 seasons the other best player on Buffalo’s defensive core was subjectively Zach Bogosian or a budding Rasmus Dahlin. Make your pick. Who else are you throwing out there to face Landeskog-Mackinnon-Rantanen?

It’s also important to factor in where a defenseman is starting on the ice when looking at specific statistics to determine if they’re starting a play on the attack/versus on the resistance.

As you can see, except for one season in 2018, Ristolainen has had more defensive zone starts than offensive zone starts every year in his career. That in itself, is a disadvantage.

Not to mention the Buffalo Sabres organization as a whole has been absolute unrested chaos. In his 8 seasons in Buffalo, Ristolainen was a constant. But was he THE constant? Was he THE common denominator you can attribute to the lack of team success? If you ask an analytics-driven mind, then yes.

That fails to recognize the other 19 individuals who lace up the skates at a given time or the combined brain-power of the 12 individuals (6 head coaches, 4 GMs and the Pegula’s) who have set the team up to fail over his 8 years there.

Still don’t think it helps to leave a bad situation? You don’t think a lesser responsibility helps? Enter Taylor Hall with the Boston Bruins or Ryan O’Reilly with the St. Louis Blues. Upon entry to their new teams both were inserted on the second lines as opposed to the first line in Buffalo. Better match-ups. Better results.

Not to mention, O’Reilly went to win the Selke Trophy, Conn Smythe Trophy and Stanley Cup the following year.

For those that argue that Philadelphia is not a better situation than Buffalo, you have talked yourself into a narrative that is simply untrue and predicated on emotion instead of logic. Philadelphia has a stronger and more experienced coaching staff accompanied by experienced veteran defenseman that will lighten the load for Ristolainen.

Over Ristolainen’s 8 years with the Sabres,  the 6 Buffalo coaches had combined for 1424 career games and 648 career wins. Alain Vigneault alone, has 1341 games and 714 wins, Therrien has 814 games and Yeo has 482 games. You can also argue the likes of Ryan Ellis, Ivan Provorov and Travis Sanheim are FAR superior than that of the company of Josh Gorges, Zach Bogosian, and rookie Rasmus Dahlin. Not to mention a positive leadership turnover (Ryan Ellis/Cam Atkinson added and Jakub Voracek traded). So yes, a better situation.

FOR MY ANALYTICS FANS (A few arguments from me):

Your RAPM (Regularized Adjust Plus-Minus) Model:

Most of you have successfully applied this model and have used it in relativity to compare one player versus another. I am not going after your interpretation of it or application of it. I am going after the direct source of this model. You can argue the data encompassed in the RAPM Model is skewed. Why do I say this? It is not about what it calculates but more-so of what it does not. It fails to encompass important factors that are essential in developing a certain play on the ice and therefore impacting a certain player’s value. It’s not all-encompassing. It’s selective. It avoids nuances. Its fabricated.

It’s the equivalent of using the DuPont Model to calculate Return on Equity and you forget to add a stream of Revenue to your Net Income so your Profit Margin is lower than it should be, therefore materially affecting ROE.

Additionally, the notion that you can specifically quantify subjective qualities and independent variables and assign a numerical to things like hockey sense, positioning, % of facing a team’s top line night in and night out and looking to your left and seeing a top 2 AHL defenseman as your defense partner or a turnover that wasn’t their fault, seems obscure in itself.

However, thats not the point. The point is if you are going to encompass independent variables (teammate quality, competition, zone starts), you cannot be selective and avoid other factors that are essential to the game or a development of a play.

RAPM is reliant on Corsi. Corsi is on record as assigning value on a holistic standpoint as opposed to an individual standpoint, for example, if a teammate has a turnover that causes a goal, everyone on the ice is given a negative Corsi rating for the shot against or say if a teammate has a bad line change and you just step on the ice when a goal is scored. It’s flawed. It’s not perfect. If RAPM takes this into consideration you can argue that individual nuances and factors that are important to a development of a play for or against, are not accounted for in either metric.

If you choose to use this metric despite it’s deficiencies you are choosing to believe in an incomplete illustration.

Your Corsi Model:

I have already went about explaining the deficiencies with the Corsi model in my previous argument. Additionally, when comparing Corsi’s between players, it’s ineffective and misleading to compare those of a different position (i.e. forwards and defensemen). Why is this the case?

Well for example, taking a “bad angle shot” contributes toward a negative Corsi score for a forward. By WHY did they take a bad angle shot? The defenseman who could be actively using their stick, angling the forward to the outside might have something to do with that. However, this is not incorporated into Corsi. If anything this should lead to a positive Corsi rating for a defenseman but ultimately it has no effect on the Corsi rating. It doesn’t favor defense. It is unevenly favors offense (taking a shot) as opposed to defense (preventing a shot). It does not account for takeaways and turnovers or nuances that lead to goals against. It only assumes that shots against lead to goals as opposed to what led to the shot against.

In response to comparing Skinner, Eichel, or Reinhart’s Corsi to Ristolainen’s Corsi, this is a part of the problem. Not to mention, I imagine that those choosing to compare those names to Ristolainen is because they’re the only other notable names on the roster.

In response to the results that Skinner, Eichel, and Reinhart’s corsi’s are higher playing without Ristolainen than playing with him: wouldn’t that be what you’d expect when using an analytic like Corsi? Since they weren’t playing w Ristolainen, that means Ristolainen was playing with 2nd, 3rd, 4th forward lines where Buffalo’s forward depth was arguably one of the worst in the NHL.

“But doesn’t that go both ways? Why weren’t Eichel,Reinhart,Skinner’s affected by playing with worse Defensemen?”

Well, when you look at Corsi and the fact that it’s driving factor is shots (shot creation/differential, etc.), it makes sense to me that playing with weaker forwards who are primarily responsible for ‘Shots For’ would cause a Corsi to be lower. ‘Shots For’ is more heavily weighted, and as I’ve said before “Shots Prevented” (a defenseman’s primary job) is not considered. It doesn’t affect forwards as much as defensemen for that reason. Think of defensemen as the dependent variable and forwards as the independent variable.

If anything, this feeds into the point where there wasn’t another name-brand guy on defense besides Ristolainen. However, if you were to compare the Corsi ratings of other Buffalo defensemen, he would always be considered the constant on the top line. Ristolainen has always played those first pair minutes (23:53 TOI career average). What does this mean? Tougher match-ups. Higher-caliber talent against. Does Corsi incorporate this? No. Does RAPM incorporate Corsi? Yes. So does RAPM include these factors in its ENTIRETY? No, not to the extent that you think it does.

Corsi Model Comparisons:

Let’s look at how Ristolainen has matched up in the past versus Flyers fan favorite, Matt Niskanen.

From 2016-2020 Ristolainen’s advanced metrics are marginally on-par with that of Matt Niskanen. Matt Niskanen played for the Stanley Cup Champion Washington Capitals. Rasmus Ristolainen played with the last place Buffalo Sabres.

Still don’t believe me? This will open your eyes. Everyone saw the 2021 Stanley Cup Playoffs and the polarizing play of Tampa Bay’s star defenseman, Ryan McDonagh, correct? Take a look at his career Corsi/60 metrics, accompanied by his Corsi/60 rating from the past two playoffs.

How can an all-star caliber defenseman score so poorly?

Still not convinced? How about this, we look at two blind comparisons side-by-side.

In both instances you can see that player Y is the more offensively-driven player. Want to know how I know that? Because the Corsi model favors offense. It favors scoring chances and goal creation as opposed to goal prevention.

In comparison #1, Player X is Victor Hedman and Player Y is Shayne Gostisbehere

In comparison #2, Player X is Chris Pronger and Player Y is Brian Campbell

Cleary this isn’t a metric for accurately illustrating if a defenseman can actually play his position in the defensive zone. As I’ve mentioned, shot creation is not a defenseman’s prime responsibility and is no indication on if they can play their position.

But let’s continue to unfold layers and dissect the Buffalo Sabres more specifically. Let’s ignore a COVID-19 2021 season and see how Buffalo defensemen fared from 2016-2020.

Now for you analytic guys, what seems to be the common denominator here using YOUR statistic? They all played in Buffalo. 6 out of the 8 defenseman have negative Corsi scores and the 2 with positive scores are not the most convincing. I can most certainly say that players like Cody Franson (17:43 average TOI) were not going up against opposition top lines night in and night out compared to Ristolainen (23:53 average TOI).

Let’s illustrate what I like to call “The Buffalo Difference” using Brandon Montour’s 2021 season split from playing in Buffalo versus playing with the Florida Panthers.

The player didn’t change. The situation changed.

Your xG (Expected Goals) Model:

xG is a little more advanced than Corsi as it adds weight to a specific shot attempt based on the severity of the scoring chance. For example a rebound shot would be given a score of .25, an odd-man rush (depending on distance from the net) would be given a .15 or a shot from the point would be given a 0.05. So does it still account for a shot prevented or the importance of the positioning for defenseman? No, it doesn’t.

Not to mention, a statistic, like xG, has it’s highest-weighted shot against as a rebound/scoring chance in front of the net which would result in a ~-.25~ ‘Shot Against’ for a defenseman. This ultimately means that your xG score is highly dependent on your goaltender and his ability to manage his rebounds or play his position properly a la save selection, angles, square to pucks, tracking, recovery, and so on.

Let’s attribute those qualities to a goalie’s save percentage. When you look at Buffalo’s goaltenders over the past 8 seasons, Jhonas Enroth (.910 sv %), Michal Neuvirth (.921 sv %), Chad Johnson (.907 sv %), Robin Lehner (.916 sv %), Carter Hutton (.902 sv %), Linus Ullmark (.912 sv %). The average sv% in the NHL since 2015 has been .912. Only 2 of their goalies surpass that threshold.

If we were to isolate 2 scenarios and take a great defender on a team with poor goaltending and take an average/below-average defender on a team with great goaltending, what would we find?

Burns has a higher xGoalsAgainst due to his scenario, not because he’s any less of a defender. Surely not worse than Scott Mayfield. If you were to isolate that statistic and use it comparatively, you might think otherwise, however, you have to take the surrounding factors into account.

Situation matters. Teammates matter.

Let’s look at David Savard, who was moved at the trade deadline from Columbus to Tampa Bay.

I’m almost certain that he didn’t become a different player when he changed teams, so we have a case of a player benefiting from a new and more advantageous scenario.

The Trade Compensation Itself:

I’ll keep this part short. A large portion of people’s frustration with this trade isn’t because of Ristolainen himself. He IS a qualified top 4 right-handed defenseman in NHL. He DOES fill an essential need for the Flyers. Why aren’t people happy with it? Because of something that is completely out of the player’s control.

You can hate the trade. It is an overpayment, no doubt. Even I don’t like the trade that much, HOWEVER, you don’t use that as leverage to hate the player. That’s a slippery slope of thinking where you’re essentially using a General Manager’s evaluation and value of a player, and using that against the player. That’s out of the player’s control. That’s on Chuck Fletcher and his evaluation staff. That is not an indictment on the player himself.

Positives and Application:

If you have made it this far, I thank you for hearing me out, at least. Everyone has heard people say that Ristolainen is “big, physical, mean, tough, aggressive” or that “Oskar doesn’t have to fight anyone now” or “We have someone to stand up for teammates”.

Those things are true.

I think those comments dis-merit a lot of what Ristolainen does well and brings to the table.

One thing I will say is that he is NOT Andrew MacDonald, a “Buffalo Robert Hagg” or “another Shayne Gostisbehere.” The easy stat is that Andrew MacDonald never touched 40+ points like Ristolainen. Or that Ristolainen has four 40+ point seasons. That’s easy to say. Let’s avoid that argument.

The truth about Andrew MacDonald is he was slow in transition, weak in net-front coverage, constantly out-performed below the red line, he defended odd-man rushes like a drunk college kid on a slip and slide, and as far as I remember, he never laid a finger on anyone. He wasn’t physical or physically-gifted.

If anything, Ristolainen is diametric to MacDonald. He’s big, has a larger wingspan and his reach can slow down the expedited offensive-counter attack while taking up space on the ice in transition (think of Ben Chiarot or Joel Edmundson and their effectiveness in Montreal). Ristolainen is also strong in net-front coverage. He’s powerful, has an effective stick and is strong enough to tie up larger forwards in the slot. Additionally, he frequently out-battles and dominates below the red lines which was a frequent issue of Flyers defense last season.

Ristolainen brings an overall intangible upgrade to a defense core who struggled to brand themselves with any form of identity last season. He’s a contributing new voice in the locker room that brings leadership experience. He adds more resistance to the sandpaper. He’s documented as someone who cares a lot about his job. He takes responsibility and holds himself accountable.

“But Andrew MacDonald and Rasmus Ristolainen have similar advanced analytics”

Well hopefully I’ve done a decent job of dis-meriting some of those comparable analytics.

In Closing:

I’m not saying Ristolainen is perfect. I am not even saying that this will work out. But for those who aggressively and actively pick apart a trade before said player even steps on the ice based on his advanced analytics is unfathomable.

A lot of responses to some of these arguments have been “we will just have to wait and see”. But why can’t that be the case for everything? Why crush this guy with analytics before he’s placed in a new situation? Place Ristolainen in a new situation. Give him a chance. Don’t believe everything you read. Be happy. Smile. Voracek is gone. The Flyers are becoming competitive again and it’s a beautiful thing to take in. Let’s go Flyers.

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