Hockeymetrics: An Indepth Look At the Stars Defensemen

Following up on our series of posts yesterday about what's ailed the Stars power play, I did a little digging of my own Hockeymetrics spreadsheet that I've maintained throughout the season just for the fun of it.

Here's a few nuggets I think you might find interesting. Starting with the TOI amongst all the defensemen, past and present, who have donned the jersey of the gold star.

Bear in mind the time is in a Hours:Minutes:Seconds format. You'll notice that Stephane Robidas, far and away, has the most ice time of any Dallas Stars defenseman.

A few weeks ago, it was suggested that Robi was starting to slow down a bit because he had been getting minutes like no other season, in part, because Sergei Zubov hasn't been back on the blue line, Philippe Boucher started the season slow and was traded, and Mattias Norstrom retired to go home and become a carpenter in Sweden.

So I went to Hockey Reference and looked up Robidas' TOI stats during his career. The first thing that stood out to me is that Robidas actually had 1693 minutes of ice time last year during the regular season. And with Zubov and Boucher out for much of the playoffs, he got more ice time.

As of now, Robidas has 1667 minutes of ice time, so he should easily surpass his career high from last year, barring any injury.

Part of the reasoning behind giving Robidas so many minutes can be understood for reasons I've already mentioned. But what still boggles my mind is the number under the PPTOI category of 4:28:44. For comparisons sake, Trevor Daley has only had 1:41:17 of PPTOI this year, which is also slightly more than Darryl Sydor's 1:18:13, despite playing 17 more games this season.

And let's also consider this:

SOGA represents shot percentage (Total shots, including Shots on Goal + Missed Shots + Shots Blocked / Shots on Goal)

SOG DIFF represents Shots on Goal - Missed Shots + Blocked Shots

In other words, 46.3% of the shots Stephane Robidas attempts actually make it in on goal. 54.1% of the shots Trevor Daley attempts make it in on goal. And of all the shots that make it in on goal, 23 more of Robidas' shots either miss the mark or are blocked, versus 15 more of Daley's shots making it on goal than getting blocked or missing.

I like Robidas. I like the heart he brings to the ice and he competes every night. But there's no logical explanation for why he's getting the lion's share of PP minutes amongst all the D-men in light of these facts.