As the season wears on you can start to see trends in how a head coach is choosing to utilize his players. The Penguins are seven games into their season and we can start to see a clearer picture on the Penguins defensemen usage.
The reason I wanted to look at this is because there has been a lot of heat on Paul Martin and Christian Ehrhoff to start the season. Many people are pointing out the fact that their possession stats aren't good. That is not totally incorrect. Both Paul Martin and Christian Ehrhoff have a Fenclose percentage of 50%. These two very talented players are certainly capable of higher. In comparison Maatta is at 58.8% and Letang is at 58.2
That said, one of the biggest mistakes I see with people when using possession stats is that they use it as a standalone stat. You should never do that. You need context. The great news is that the internet is full of great ways to find that context/information.
You need to investigate further into the 'why' part of possession. Who are they playing against, who are they playing with, how many offensive zone starts are they getting? Well let's find out.
Letang and Maatta are killing it. They are doing exactly what they should be doing. They are playing against tough competition and are driving possession. They also get a favorable amount of offensive zone starts. This makes sense as they are the most offensively gifted pairing the Penguins currently have.
Martin and Ehrhoff are playing against similarly tough competition, but are being buried in their own end to start their shifts, especially Ehrhoff (only Marcel Goc gets lower OZ start %). Ehrhoff is playing the toughest minutes among Penguins defensemen.
The Scuderi/Despres pairing is being protected, much like how Johnston protects Craig Adams and Zach Sill. Given the fact they are being protected you would probably like to see their bubbles be blue, or at least smaller red ones.
Another dynamic to look at is the quality of the forwards each of these pairing play with:
And here is where we see the real separation of how Johnston has allocated his defense minutes. Letang and Maatta are getting a significantly higher amount of ice time with the Penguins top six forward groupings, I would wager that it is almost exclusively with them. And that isn't criticism, you should play your best with your best. It just helps explain their possession metrics better.
Ehrhoff and Martin might have been playing against similar competition as Letang and Maatta but they do not have anywhere close to the quality of teammates that the #1 pairing has received. If you want to understand why Ehrhoff and Martin's possession is down, this chart explains a lot of it. Facing top competition while not getting the best forward groupings will certainly make for an uphill battle in the possession department. Mike Johnston knows this, which is why he put those two extremely talented players in this position. He feels as though they can handle it. Johnston is intentionally throwing them to the wolves.
One thing to watch moving forward is if the Penguins can get better play out of their bottom pairing. If Johnston could trust them with a bigger role the Ehrhoff Martin pairing wouldn't have to eat up every difficult minute each game. It will be interesting to see if it is Scuderi or Despres who sits when Bortuzzo is ready.
This usage could change as the year goes on but this is how it has looked through seven games. It explains why Letang and Maatta are killing it and why Paul Martin and Christian Ehrhoff are coming under fire from some fans. Context is everything.
Thanks for reading!
Follow me on twitter
Pittsburgh Penguins Blogger • 
Join the Discussion:
»