How to build a hockey-team?

This is a very often discussed question and I read a lot about team-chemistry, about players who can play within a certain system and fit to other players, fit to a coach, fit to certain philosophies. Fair enough, I guess all these aspects are true a little bit but... just a little bit.

Basically I have a very simple answer to this question. You have to find the very best player to all different positions in hockey. If you have all the best players you most probably will win. I’m a very strong believer in this very simple strategy. Actually this strategy is very simple just on first sight, but more on this later. Of course I do know all these Cynderella-Stories like „Miracle on Ice“, smaller teams win Championships here and there – and all these stories are true and not just theses or fantasies. But... I do stand to it... if you have the best players you most probably will win. Let’s turn the page to Soccer: In the most famous European leagues always dominate the clubs with the most money. And in this European Club-Soccer-System it’s as simple as that: If you have the most money you can buy the best players. Unfortunately this system didn’t copy the great North American Pro-Sports with their draft-, trade, and some sort of salary-cap-system. The richest teams (Barcelona, Real Madrid, Chelsea, Manchester United, Milan, Inter, Bayern München)...these teams are the richest (forgive me if I did forget the one or the other) and by far the most succesful. We have thousands of other teams competing with much better team-chemistry, much better game-strategies, much better atmosphere and much more disciplined workers on the field... but they never will have a chance vs these most rich teams with the very best players. Wins vs these teams were and always will be exceptions. In the European hockey-leagues it’s the same story, at least in the tendency. The richer teams have basically the better players and are more succesful, again... always with exceptions...but as the word exception tells...there are exceptions.

In NHL-Hockey it’s not so obvious because of the great system with the yearly draft, trades and salary-cap. This is a absolutely clever and exciting pro-sport-system, I admire it. It makes this business so much more interesting! But in the very end....I come to the same simple conclusion: If you have the best players, you most probably will win! Earlier I did tell that this simple strategy is just simple on first sight because you have never endless money and you have the draft. So all your decisions will show you another side of the coin. You pay a price for everything you do and all this means that you have to be very clever – and be lucky - to build a winner!

So what would I do to try to build a winner within budget-restrictions – such as salary-caps – or working within a European team with just small money because I just can’t take the best players? First of all I would ask myself critical questions?

1  Shall I spend multimillions for star-players and then have less money compared to other teams to spend for complementary-players?

2.   What positions are the most important ones? For what positions I shall spend most money?

3.   How important is experience? Shall I pay players for what they did achieve in the past? Do they bring this extra to the team? How valuable is it to have this experience compared to the sometimes lack of energy when they are older?

4.   How important is the coaching-staff? Means, how much money is it worth to spend for coaches?

My answers:

I would start with a nucleus of 9 really good players. If you have 9 really good players you can survive as a hockey-team. So I would concentrate to spend my money fully on these nine players in the following priority:

1.1 Most important for me are the No1. and No.2 defensemen! I

      would spend most money for them.

1.2 You need two very good centermen and at least one very good,

      productive winger

    1.3 Then again I would go for a d-man (No. 3).

    1.4 It’s time now for the No.1-goalie. To survive you need decent

          goaltending.

    1.5 I would go for another two wingers who bring something

          special to the table (e.g. speed or strength or shooting, or excellent two-
          way-play).

After that you have to fill your basket with complementary-players. Personally I would have just very small money left for these complementary-players. Even in Europe – where people are much more sensitive to big differencies in salaries – I wouldn’t care about – and I would try to find players who don’t care about too much – who will be just proud to play with certain star-players and are more or less free of jealousy. My complementary-players would be either very strong character-players and/or young or even very young players. I don’t see a big enough quality-difference between an average skilled player and a below-average skilled player with great character. I don’t see a big enough quality-difference between an experienced average skilled player and a promising young or very young player who has a good character. Of course – as I told earlier – it’s always a question of compromises and in the very end – I would definitely loose some quality with my players 10-22. But the key-question is: Would I lose more than I did theoretically win with my 1-9 strategy?

I guess I did answer already the questions 1 and 2. What is my answer to the question No. 3?

Experience is slightly overrated in my eyes and what I absolutely don’t like about experience is to pay a player for what he did achieve in his career before. I don’t want to pay for what a player did do in the past, maybe even for another team. I would be prepared to pay good or even very good money for the present performance and even extra bonuses if something unexpected positive will happen. Examples what support my theses that experience is slightly overrated: The Pittsburgh Penguins did win the Stanley Cup with extremely young key-players and you actually can tell the same about the Chicago Blackhawks.

Coming to my question No. 4: How important is the coaching-staff? It’s very important in my eyes but not so much as it seems to be e.g. in European Soccer and in Swiss hockey where coaches are sometimes even better payed than the best players. An excellent head-coach has in my eyes an approx. value of a decent second or very good third-line-player. So, of course, it’s very important to choose the right coach, you can’t take this decision serious enough but on the other hand don’t let yourself get fooled by unrealistic expectations if you have a good coach. It’s more important to have the best players than to have the best coach. Various studies from American pro-sports support this theses. The questions and answers about what is a good coach will be the subject of one my next blogs. In the tendency underrated is the value of a good assistant-coach. I guess the coaching-package (combination of head-coach and assistant-coach) is very important. The assistant-coach basically should complement the head-coach and brings everything to the table what a head-coach is missing. E.g. if the headcoach is a extroverted, impulsive, emotional guy it’s important that the assistant is more introverted, analytical and the other way round. If a head-coach has very good knowledge about forwards it’s a good idea to hire an assistant who is specialized about defensemen and so on.

Another aspect is hiring of players, trading for players and drafting for players. There are two theories about this: Always drafting, trading or hiring players for what you actually need in terms of position - what your team is lacking - or do the same with the philosophy „best player available“. I’m a strong believer in the theory „best player available“ because all your players, especially your best players are always also assets on the trade-market. Of course it’s a complicated way to get just indirectly what you actually need, it takes time and energy but if you want to be best you have to pay this price. So I would always go for the best player available, either in the draft or in trades. I might end up with having three No.1-centermen and just one of them can fill this role in my team. So what? I will trade them and I will have an excellent return on invest if I’m a good trader. If I’m actually looking for a reliable and steady defensive d-man and a good one is on the market but at the same time a very good centerman is on the market for a comparable price, I definitely would go for the centerman and then would try to turn him into not only a reliable/steady defensive-defenseman but into an excellent defensive defenseman. This strategy needs time and will cause some pain on the way down the road but in the end, in my eyes, it will be the more succesful strategy in the big picture.

So, all this is my theory what you should think of if you try to build a succesful hockey-team. Yes, it’s theory, I do know very well from my life-experience – but I also don’t overrate my life-experience...smile... – that theory and what happens in reality are not always the same pair of shoes and we all have to be flexible in our minds and react sometimes fast to unexpected happenings. But still, you should have a certain strategy and I tried to paint mine. Looking forward to discuss this!


Thomas Roost / Central Scouting Europe, NHL

Positive thinking makes me feel sick!

Summer-time is always the time when GMs and coaches never stop to talk about how much better the team will be in the next season, how moch harder they did work in summer and in case of lacking spectacular transfers – how much better the team-chemistry is in this „new“ team. If a key-player suffers a serious-injury this is not bad at all it just means that other players have the chance to step up. If an old veteran is leaving it means this team has now more energy because of younger players. If an old veteran is new in a team it means that this transfer brings much needed experience to the team. If last season the team was not succesful with an extroverted, outspoken, active and rhetoric coach the same team has now an introverted analytical coach who is very good in developping young players. The very same coach was fired from a team who then did hire a more loud, active, motivational coach who will bring more energy to the bench and to the locker-room. If you talk behind closed doors with GMs they sometimes make jokes about another team who did offer their player „X“ a very good contract and signed him. „How stupid they are to offer player „X“ so much money“. If I talk to the other GM who „stupidly“ signed player „X“, he is making jokes about the other GM who did sign player „Y“ from their team. „How stupid they are to offer  „Y“ so much money...

In summer everybody did do just everything perfect. Everybody could realise their „dream-transfers“ – „we did follow this player since many years“... is an often heard sentence when presenting new import-player „Z“. If you then start to discuss a little bit more about this player you not very seldom will find out that they don’t know much more about this player than the stats and the selling-rhetorics of his agent“. Similar things happen in the NHL. Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke advertises his latest big trade – what did bring hard-nosed defenseman Dion Phaneuf from Calgary to Toronto – as a franchise-player with superstar-abilities. At the same time some discret voices in Calgary celebrate the excellent return on invest for Phaneuf because they think that Phaneuf is one of the most overrated players in the league... In summer everybody is with everything always happy and for everybody just good things are ahead.

All these rhetorics come from the completey overrated „positive-thinking-theories“ . They tell that if you just think positive strong enough you never will lose. In the end everybody is thinking just positive – and not just this – in summer in hockey everybody is just thinking naivly, unbelievable positive, just to find out three or four weeks later that they didn’t think positive enough... These theories even go so far that e.g. Lance Armstrong tells that the best thing happened in his life to him was that he got cancer.... PLEASE???? This is so sick! What a slap in the face of millions of people who did lose the fight with cancer. They did lose it because they didn’t think positive enough....common...please stop it!!! If you get a diagnose of a very serious illness this is NOT positive, it’s VERY bad! If in the Swiss league Biel’s key-player Emanuel Peter suffers a serious knee-injury this is not a chance for other players to step up, this is VERY bad for Biel and for their coaches! If you lose key-players because other teams offer more money – this is not the chance to bring more energy to the team with younger players – this is a serious loss of quality in your team! If the Pittsburgh Penguins lose Sidney Crosby because of a serious groin-tear it means that the Pens are in deep trouble to catch a playoff-spot. Why we don’t want to see the reality?

Please don’t get me wrong: I am a strong supporter of judging a glass of water half-full in stead of half-empty. But if the glass is not only empty but even broken on the floor – so we have to name it, loud and clear. There is nothing positive about a broken glass on the floor. We have to learn that the opposite of positive thinking is not pessimism. It’s the ability, to judge situations realistically and to ask critical questions. But especially in some cheap manager rhetoric-educations you learn that people who ask critical questions and put question-marks to new strategies or ideas are not the employees you need. These people are in danger to get fired sooner or later. The same cheap rhetoric is invading sports-franchises more and more. When will we find out that we just got trapped by trivial psychological theories?

Thomas Roost, Central Scouting Europe, NHL

NHL-Draft 2010 / Goalies

To my surprise two goalies were drafted in the first round. While Jack CAMPBELL was not a surprise at all - in my eyes he is a "high-end" prospect and already VERY close to be NHL-ready - the Phoenix Coyotes' pick Mark VISENTIN (27th overall) came with quite a big surprise, for me at least. Also in the second round two goaltenders were picked - so we have four goalies in the top60 in this draft and all this in a year I really did believe it will be not a good draft for goalies.  Thanks to "Goalies World" I have some interesting statistical facts: In 2009 the first four goalies picked in the NHL-Entry-draft were from Europe. This year it's more than the opposite: The first seven goalies picked in the 2010 NHL-entry-draft are all from North America! 21 goalies did get picked overall and only one of them is under 6 feet tall (Cody ROSEN, New York Islanders, he is "only" 5.11). 9 of the mentioned 21 goalies are 6.02 or taller! All this means that the trend of selecting big, tall goalies is ongoing. Personally I do agree with the tendency of counting on taller goalies, good size is definitely an advantage because nowadays a lot of tall goalies are quick, fast and mobile at the same time. However... I also think that the latest drafting-trend towards goalies is a bit exaggerated, I guess the "being taller means being better goalie-wisdom" is slightly overrated. What's on the horizon for 2011? Again I personally think it's a bad draft-year in terms of goalies but maybe again I will be surprised in June 2011.

Stats-desert and stats-heaven

Living in a country with healthy looking cows, juicy green grass, tidy roads, a pitoresque landscape and a great life-quality in general...  I still feel like living in a desert, I’m hungry and thirsty. I’m a hockey-man and compared to living in other hockey-countries I feel like a beggar in terms of hockey-stats. I can follow Swedish and other junior-league-games online and get informed by the minute about all the ongoing stats including plus/minus of all junior-players....hmm.... in Switzerland?

So I turn my head to North America and find my huge steak with a splendid smell of a great barbecue with a tasty and cosy glass of red-wine. I start to analyse the real stats what really helps me to discuss the real player performances.

In the NHL I did find my favourite stats. They tell us how much time a player needs to score a point. It more or less takes away the argument of not having enough ice-time and shows a relatively fair mirror of player-productivity.

Here we go: Who were the real best players in terms of point-production in the season 2009/2010:

1.     Alex OVECHKIN, WAS / he in average did need just 14.2 minutes on the ice to score a point.

2.     Daniel SEDIN, VAN / also 14.2

3.     Henrik SEDIN, VAN / 14.4

4.     Nicklas BACKSTROM, WAS / 16.4

5.     Alexander SEMIN, WAS / 16.6

6.     Sidney CROSBY, PIT / 16.9

7.     Steven STAMKOS, TB / 17.7

8.     Patrick KANE, CHI / 17.9

9.     Brad RICHARDS, DAL / 18.3

10. Marian GABORIK, NYR / 18.5

In terms of goalie-performance I did find this interesting, stats-based ranking of the season 2009/2010:

1.     Ryan MILLER, BUF / Save-Percentage 92.9% / 53 hot games, 10 ok games, 6 bad games (ratio 8-1-1), 4 steals, 5 shutouts and a shootout-percentage of 64.5%.

2.     Evgeni NABOKOV, SJ / Save-Percentage 92.2% / 46 hot games, 10 ok games, 11 bad games (ratio 6-2-2), 7 steals, 3 shutouts and a shootout-percentage of 74.0%.

3.     Tomas VOKOUN, FLA / Save-Percentage 92.5% / 44 hot games, 13 ok games, 11 bad games (ratio 7-2-1), 6 steals, 7 shutouts and a shootout-percentage of 61.2%.

4.     Henrik LUNDQVIST, NYR / Save-Percentage 92.1% / 50 hot games, 12 ok games, 11 bad games (ratio 7-2-2), 4 steals, 3 shutouts and a shootout-percentage of 68.2%.

5.     Miikka KIPRUSOFF, CGY / Save-Percentage 92.0% / 51 hot games, 13 ok games, 9 bad games (ratio 7-2-1), 8 steals, 4 shutouts and a shootout-percentage of 44.4%.

Explanation:

A hot game is a game with a save-percentage of 90% or more.

An ok game is a game with a save-percentage of 85-89.9%.

A bad game is a game with a save-percentage of < 85%.

A steal is a win in a game with at least 90% save-percentage and the team is outshot by the opponent by 10 shots or more.

Would be great to have hockey-discussions based on such analyses in my country, Switzerland. How long I do have to wait for this?

Thomas Roost, Central Scouting Europe, NHL

Assessing talent in a child

The perfect talent is a combination of a lot of things:
Size and strength: You have to be just big and strong enough, means not the bigger the better or the stronger the better, you just have to be big enough, let's say in modern and future hockey, if you are a forward you are big enough if you are 5.11 or bigger and you should have a frame with the potential filling out of 190 or more. If you are a d-man or a goalie you should be 6.00 or bigger, maybe as a goalie and a shut-down-dman 6.01 or even 6.02 or bigger. It doesn't mean that you won't become a hockey-player if you are smaller or not as strong, but it means it will be a disadvantage. 

In addition one of the most important abilities in prospects is the ability to learn to improve, to adapt what teachers tell. So it's a good thing as a scout to try to know the young players already when they are 14 or 15, judge and rank them and then follow their progress until their draft-year and then judge and rank them again. This result is always very interesting and it's not very often that the best 15 year old will be also the best 18 year old. Further on you need to have the possibilities to have more ice than others and to have the best possible teachers, worldclass teachers/coaches. The more you practice (quantity) and the better you practice (quality) and the faster you learn - the better player you will be. Very important is passion. If you just like to play hockey...this is not enough, you have to really love the game, you have to love to study the game, to watch the game, to play the game. If you just like the game and you like also a lot of other things...fair enough, you are a well-rounded person with an interesting life...but you most probably won't become a world-class-hockey-player. Mentally you should have a relaxed personality, composed and calm even in pressure-situations and at the same time you should have a certain positive aggression, competitive, love to compete and keen on winning. In the very end...if we are talking about world-class...it helps if you have the one or the other outstanding asset, you have to be top10 in the world in either stickhandling, using the body, skating, shooting, hockeysense, vision or whatever. It helps to have this one or two outstanding assets compared to a player who is good in everything but misses the one or the other really excellent, outstanding asset. Personality-wise it also helps if you have a certain level of egoism. If you have an altruistic personality like Mother Theresa you won't become a world-class hockey-player. YOU have to improve and YOU have to do everything that helps YOU improving. I don't mean that you have to have a highly egoistic personality - because this will not help you overall - but a bit more egoistic than the average would be just perfect. 


Further on: Watch the surroundings of a player. If his father was a good player and this father cares about the son's career...it definitely helps. If you know that the player takes on his own responsibility additional power-skating-lessons e.g. - it definitely helps. If you know that the prospect is studying games on the video and tries to identify passing-lanes or whatever...shooter-strategies (if you are a goalie) - it definitely helps. If the player has at least an average technical intelligence - it definitely helps. Again...not the more intelligence the better player you will be...it's just good enough if you have an average or better intelligence, average is enough. Don't overrate tactical discipline and disciplined defensive positioning in players who are really young, this is the easiest part to learn when you are older, but if you can't control the puck, if you can't skate...you won't learn this when you are 20. E.g. I have seen a couple of high-end Russian talents becoming great NHLers although they lacked completely tactical discipline when they were 16, 17 or 18. On the other hand I have seen enough young Swiss players who play so disciplined in a system and know already with 15 years how to close passing-lines and how to play the game without the puck - so they are able to compete in games, in terms of results - but in the end, nearly nobody of them did reach the hockey-olymp, the NHL, because they didn't develop the basic-skills enough (handskills, skating, moves, dekes, puckcontrol, physical strength). All this is from my 13 years experience as a scout for Central Scouting Europe. Of course there are other aspects. This is just the beginning of a maybe interesting discussion.


Thomas Roost, Central Scouting Europe, NHL

Maybe some interesting international pre-season-facts

I did put some efforts into researching some statistical comparisons between the most important hockey-countries and the according leagues. The qualifying date for my figures was 1st September 2010.


What countries (except Canada and USA who are lightyears away) do export the most players in the best paying leagues (NHL, KHL, SWE, FIN, SWI, GER, AHL)?


1. Sweden 113 players
2. Czech Republic 95
3. Finland 93
4. Slovakia 56
5. Russia 46
6. Germany 16
7. Switzerland 11




What countries (again without Canada/USA) do export the most players in the very best paying leagues? (NHL, KHL)?


1. Sweden 73 players
2. Czech Republic 66
3. Finland 43
4. Slovakia 39
5. Germany 10
6. Switzerland 7




What is the average size of a hockey-player in what league? (in cm)


1. NHL 185.78 cm
2. AHL 185.48
3. Sweden 183.82
4. Russia 183.76
5. Czech Republic 183.74
6. Germany 183.20
7. Slovakia 183.18
8. Finland 183.15
9. Switzerland 182.40




What is the average weight of a hockey-player in what league? (in kg)


1. NHL 91.40 kg
2. AHL 88.49
3. Russia 87.33
4. Sweden 87.23
5. Germany 86.11
6. Czech Republic 85.99
7. Switzerland 85.59
8. Finland 85.57
9. Slovakia 84.97




What is the average age of a hockey-player in what league?


1. AHL 23.39 years
2. Finland 24.52
3. Sweden 25.59
4. Czech Republic 26.67
5. Switzerland 26.74
6. Russia 26.93
7. NHL 27.07
8. Germany 27.12
9. Slovakia 27.27




Conclusions:
I’m Swiss so I dare to take the focus of these conclusions a bit to Switzerland. The low amount of exported players indicates that the quality of Swiss hockey is still overrated in my home-country. Especially if we take the figures of exported players to the very best paying leagues (significantly better paying leagues than the Swiss league). At least according to these figures It’s also an arrogant and naiv common Swiss view to think that German hockey is worse than Swiss, it’s very close in my eyes with Switzerland having a tiny little small edge in terms of depth but at the very top Germany is right there.


If you take a look at the age-average of the leagues one can easily notice that a player exodus abroad (e.g. Sweden, Finland) leads into a significantly younger home-league and this is probably one of the best instruments to develop younger players. They start to play on a high level already at a young age. Switzerland can’t really tell - with an age-average of close to 27 years - that it has a development-league. This honour goes to the AHL to Finland and to Sweden.


It looks like the Swiss have some problems in terms of height and weight. Yes, could be that the Swiss genetics leads into a little bit smaller people in average than in other hockey-countries but if you really study these figures you will easily find out that these differences are probably overrated: Even the small Swiss will find out that their tallest team, EHC Biel (average size 185.23 cm) would face 6 NHL-teams with a smaller size-average (Minnesota Wild, Montreal Canadiens, Colorado Avalanche, New York Islanders, Detroit Red Wings and the Nashville Predators) – this finding-out was a bit of a surprise for me! So, yes, Switzerland has to try to get a little bit bigger and stronger in average (scientific guided off-ice-training-programs and a little bit different player-recruiting can solve this small problem more or less). In my eyes the main-difference is still in the skill- and skating-department. Especially hand-skills, passing, shooting, puck-control is the main-problem and in terms of skating it’s the stability-part, not really the mobility. We also have some really fast, quick skaters but we don’t have enough players with stable, powerful skating.


So, let’s discuss these figures and my conclusions.


Thomas Roost / Central Scouting Europe, NHL