Originally posted on 10/12/2011:

regulation


Quote Originally Posted by Inkwell77 View Post
You know the goalies before the game so you can look into those stats. And if you are betting against a team with strong shootout scorers who have a consistent shootout lineup it is likely that the team you are betting on possibly "changing the shooters" is probably going to lose the shootout more often then they win. Taking a quality penalty shot is a unique skill, and the goalies save more penalty shots than they don't so if you have a player or a couple of players that score at a high percentage that is a huge advantage.
Few are consistently good at shootouts. Shootouts are pretty damn random.

http://insider.espn.go.com/insider/b...ter/id/5929566

CRITICS OF THE NHL SHOOTOUT say it lets a narrow set of skills decide hockey games. It's as if the NBA used a free throw competition to choose winners. But that view is wrong. Skill, in fact, has nothing to do with the NHL's system of breaking overtime ties, according to a new study. That means shootout critics are even more right than they realize. Allow me to explain.

Statistician Michael Schuckers analyzed all 5,711 NHL shootout shots from the tiebreaker's debut in 2005-06 through last season. Of 571 different shooters, not one converted at a significantly higher rate than the NHL average. Meanwhile, only one of 112 goalies outperformed the league save average: the not-exactly-immortal Marc Denis, who is now retired. Just 10 shooters were significantly worse than average, roughly what you'd expect if the results of shootouts were driven purely by chance. "Based on this analysis," Schuckers told me, "I conclude that the NHL shootout is a crapshoot."

Why would a few shooters rate as below-average while none is above-average? Imagine you and I are teammates in a coin-flipping contest, and we share the delusional belief that we have the skill to cause the coin to land on heads. Now, if I throw tails a few times in a row, our coach will probably bench me quickly. But if you toss a few heads, you'll stay in the lineup. Of course, over time, you won't be able to do much better than 50-50, because coin flips, like shootouts, are random. So in the long run, I'll end up below-average, you'll be average, and nobody will rate above-average. That's precisely the pattern that Schuckers found NHL shootout percentages take: Marian Gaborik was at 11.1 percent (2-for-18), Alex Ovechkin was at 27.7 percent (13-for-47), the league was at 32.9 percent, and nobody was at 60 percent. Clearly, teams believe some players are better than others, but the numbers don't back them up.

This revelation comes at a time when ties are increasingly common in the NHL, which makes shootouts increasingly important. There are several reasons for this trend. Thanks to a 1999 rule change, the NHL counts OT wins the same as regulation wins -- two points each. But it gives OT losers one point, as opposed to zero points for a regulation loss. That bonus point gives teams an incentive to play to reach OT rather than fight for wins at the risk of suffering a loss. Another factor: Parity is on the rise. Since the 2004-05 lockout, the league has had a salary floor, as well as a cap. According to Forbes, 26 of 30 clubs had payrolls between $46 million and $60 million last season. That relatively narrow band results in lots of teams having similar talent levels, which in turn results in ties. In 2009-10, the number of OT games hit a postlockout high of 301; the number of shootouts soared to an all-time record of 184. And, of course, the final Eastern Conference playoff spot last year was determined by a shootout between the Flyers and the Rangers.

Big deal, you say? Well, if we don't know with confidence from their stats that Sidney Crosby or Roberto Luongo is better or worse on shootouts than Ilya Kovalchuk or Ryan Miller -- and we don't -- then this flood of shootouts is merely introducing more randomness into the season. And the more randomness, the less meaningful the games become. In fact, for the average NHL team, more than a dozen games a year are essentially decided by a roll of dice.

The league itself must feel that's reaching the limits of acceptability. Starting this season, if two teams are tied at the end of the regular season and a playoff spot is on the line, only regulation and OT wins, not shootout victories, will count in breaking the tie. That's a start. But ultimately, there's only one way to fully curb the impact of the shootout's randomness: Kill it altogether.