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As time passes, more and more teams seem to be embracing analytics as something to help make decisions, and the dinosaurs who believe there's no room for them are being pushed out of the game.

We saw a perfect example of that recently when the Leafs canned Dave Poulin and Claude Loiselle, two executives who didn't seem interested in analytics, and brought in analytical-savvy 28-year-old Kyle Dubas, who used analytics to help build an excellent OHL program in the Soo Greyhounds.

Jarmo Kekalainen and the Blue Jackets seem to be embracing analytics, too, which will give them a competitive advantage (if used properly) over teams that deny their worth.

Via Aaron Portzline:

“You’re always looking for more information,” Blue Jackets general manager Jarmo Kekalainen said. “And you’re always trying to keep up with what other clubs are doing, make sure that you’re the team with the advantage.

“It’s something we’ve looked at more and more. It’s something we talk about now whenever we’re looking at players, not just within our organization but players who are free agents or trades that we may have discussed.”

I find that last quote interesting, as the R.J. Umberger for Scott Hartnell trade was one that the analytic community in the blogosphere certainly was on board with.

Free agent signee Brian Gibbons is another player the Blue Jackets added that drew praise from the analytics community, so a number of recent moves suggest Kekalainen and his staff are indeed using advanced stats to help make decisions.

Oddly enough, some of the possession metrics (Corsi, Fenwick, etc.) that suggest Hartnell and Gibbons have more value than meets the eye, knock possession anchor Jack Johnson, which Kekalainen was having none of.

For instance, Blue Jackets defenseman Jack Johnson is a frequent target of the hockey analytics crowd. His 47.9 Corsi rating last season — meaning the Jackets took 47.9 percent of the shots when he was on the ice — was 13th on the Jackets and 317th in the league.

“Give me a break with that,” Kekalainen said.

Despite 11 of the 12 players Johnson spent at least 225 minutes playing with last season - including his four most frequent defense partners - posting better possession numbers without him than with him (Cam Atkinson the lone exception) the Blue Jackets seem to view Johnson invaluable.



To me using the analytics when the numbers show what they want to see, and turning a blind eye to the numbers when they don't is a flawed logic, but I'm not the one calling the shots.

Maybe Kekalainen and co. know something I don't, but the love affair for Jack Johnson seems out of place.

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