Wanna blog? Start your own hockey blog with My HockeyBuzz. Register for free today!
 

How Good of a Second Line Center is Mike Richards?

August 18, 2013, 5:42 PM ET [42 Comments]
Jason Lewis
Los Angeles Kings Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
Simple question right? Seems like it. Kings won a cup with Richards playing a key role, they gave up a lot to get him, he plays in almost every situation. So that must mean he’s pretty good right?

Yea in essence that is a good way to look at things. Sometimes when going through statistics, splits, and game logs you can lose the basic essence of hockey, which is watching every night and just getting a feel for a player.

Maybe I’m late to the party but I’ve started to really get into looking at advanced statistics like Corsi rating, QoC (Quality of competition), on and off ice goals against/for, and I have to say some of it is pretty interesting. How much can we really gage from it though? Is there really a secret Billy Bean approach to this game that we’ve all been missing? I have to say...I learned a valuable lesson while researching this article:

EVERYTHING IS JUST AS IT SEEMS.

I pulled four centers from four different teams who play in a partial second line centerman role for the most part. My selections were completely random except for Mike Richards. Who I came up with was Ryan Kesler of the Vancouver Canucks, Dave Bolland, formerly of the Blackhawks and now the Toronto Maple Leafs, and Tyler Ennis from Buffalo.

What ensued was somewhat confusing but no less interesting. I pulled a few statistical categories for each: Relative Corsi QoC, Corsi Relative, On-ice Corsi, Goals against and goals for on ice, and offensive and defensive zone start percentage. I also took into account regular statistics like PK minutes, blocked shots, and of course points. All of these statistics are also very subjective and should be taken with a grain of salt and applied situationally. Without taking into consideration other statistics you could really jump to some bold and downright incorrect conclusions.

When laid out bare bones which of those centers would you take? You could make a case for any I suppose, but I’d say the majority of people would take Ryan Kesler or Mike Richards. Bolland has struggled recently and Ennis is viewed as a rather one-dimensional center who is still finding himself and his role. He’s a bit of wild card as well just due to his shifting from the center to wing position at times. Nonetheless he played a majority of games at center so he fell into the proper caveats and brought a different skill set to the table than the other three. Also, to be fair I pulled Ryan Kesler’s numbers from 2011-12 because it wouldn’t be prudent to evaluate his numbers from last season given injuries and such.

Breaking down statistics, who plays the toughest competition on average (which would be the Relative Corsi QoC)? Without question according to the numbers, Dave Bolland. Bolland is in fact in the top 20 in the league amongst the centers who play the toughest competition on average. Who tops that list? Martin Hanzal and David Backes. In our four it ranked Bolland, Ennis, Richards, and Kesler. Now bring in the On-ice Corsi, which is basically an all-inclusive shot differential (Goals, saves, missed shots, blocked shots). The results make so much sense I had to look twice. In almost reverse order, Bolland has by far the worst differential followed by Ennis, Richards and Kesler. Bolland plays the toughest competition and he pays for it. Bolland also finishes his shifts with the lowest amount of offensive zone time. Most the time he is hemmed in it would seem AND to top it all off his goals against average over 60 minutes has the widest differential to his goals for over a 60 minute average of the four players sampled.

So it took me a while to sit down stare at the stats of Dave Bolland and say, “Wow, so Bolland plays against the toughest competition on a regular basis, he gets scored on a lot, and he’s constantly in his own zone.” How disappointingly obvious when you think about it.

And here is where all the contextual stuff comes flying in. Bolland is a shell of his former self. He was battling all year with Shaw and Handzus for 2C duty and often times played a 3C. He was traded for a reason. Everything is just as it seems. It was at this point that I stepped back from breaking down these advanced stats and realized a bigger picture.

When you look at some of these numbers from Bolland they’re egregious honestly. That’s the key to these stats to me. When I look at Mike Richards and Kesler it’s very calm stuff. No gigantic positive or negative numbers. No huge fluctuation, just steady play. Same with Ennis. He has a low scoring output but that’s based on the fact that he played on a team that struggled offensively all year. His linemates of Stafford and Foligno struggled mightily. Nonetheless Ennis seemed to be a steady player in a volatile situation, he’s maybe not a great 2C but he’s a good one.

Richards has come very far from the 80 point player he was in 2008-09, but he’s still a steady, top drawer option as a 2C. Looking at all of his stats it’s pretty boring in the advanced statistic realm, which I’ve found is a good thing. He plays against decent competition on a regular basis. The goals against while he was on the ice were pretty heavy this year, but the goals for from his line were great. You get an average of around 50 points, 17 minutes a night, a penalty killer, hits, faceoff wins (although his totals are below 50%), and a leader. He logs a lot of time in opposing zones and he is a tremendous teammate in terms of dropping the gloves and leading on ice. Name another second line center that does what Richards does? I think Ryan Kesler is definitely up there, along with Patrice Bergeron, and Logan Couture. All of those players have a similar mold to them as well and when you look at all the Corsi ratings and advanced stats. While maybe not a top three 2nd line center I’d stand firmly behind Richards being in the top 5.

My list would probably look something like this: Bergeron, Couture, Richards, Kesler and then a dog fight of a number five spot between any of Kadri, Lacavalier, Weiss, Staal, O’Reiley etc. etc. (NO not Malkin.) And yes I still believe enough in Kesler next season even though he has had a tumultuous couple of months here with injuries.

I’d like to see Richards get his goals for/goals against split into that ridiculous range like Bergeron and Couture (3.38/1.29, 2.70/1.86) but for the most part what he brings behind Kopitar is some of the best stuff out there. Center depth is a tremendous asset in this game every good second line center seems to have a good first line center in front of him. Kesler/Sedin, Couture/Thornton, Richards/Kopitar, Bergeron/Krejci etc. etc. That one-two punch is what makes all of these teams a real threat.

As Kings fans and hockey fans do you believe in Mike Richards being one of the top 2C’s out there? Am I completely off with this? Who would be your five best? Let’s hear it.

(Also for those who have maybe been onto these stats a lot longer what are some of the ones that you like to look at when analyzing a player?)

I followed Jason on twitter @SirJDL and all I got was this lousy T-shirt.
Join the Discussion: » 42 Comments » Post New Comment
More from Jason Lewis
» Kings recall/send down Scuderi after Brayden McNabb injury (UPDATE)
» From Denmark to the Ontario Reign, Patrick Bjorkstrand's roots stay strong
» Home opening Ontario Reign weekend recap
» Zatkoff injured, Jack Campbell up, what now?
» Kings finally getting on the right track