Individual Scoring Chances Through Seven Games
With a little bit of down time before the New York Rangers go on a 19 games in 34 days stretch, I thought it would be a good time to take a look at the individual chances for the first 7 games of the season. Thus far the team has registered 123 scoring chances, or 17.6 chances per game. Of those chances, the forwards have registered 106 in total. Here's the breakdown of those chances:
| Name | Total | ES | PP | SH | ES Time | PP Time | SH Time | ES/15 | PP/15 | SH/15 | Total/15 |
| Callahan | 20 | 14 | 5 | 1 | 99.12 | 25.77 | 21.62 | 2.119 | 2.911 | 0.694 | 2.048 |
| Avery | 11 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 90.05 | 6.77 | 0.00 | 1.832 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 1.704 |
| Anisimov | 17 | 10 | 6 | 1 | 93.43 | 22.92 | 13.23 | 1.605 | 3.927 | 1.134 | 1.968 |
| Christensen | 8 | 6 | 2 | 0 | 64.80 | 16.15 | 0.00 | 1.389 | 1.858 | 0.000 | 1.482 |
| Boyle | 5 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 57.90 | 1.18 | 11.55 | 1.295 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 1.062 |
| Stepan | 11 | 8 | 3 | 0 | 94.87 | 21.52 | 2.67 | 1.265 | 2.091 | 0.000 | 1.386 |
| Boogaard | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 24.42 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.229 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 1.229 |
| Gaborik | 4 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 37.38 | 7.12 | 1.52 | 1.204 | 2.108 | 0.000 | 1.304 |
| Fedotenko | 7 | 7 | 0 | 0 | 89.32 | 7.37 | 11.62 | 1.176 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.970 |
| Dubinsky | 11 | 8 | 3 | 0 | 102.40 | 26.68 | 20.68 | 1.172 | 1.686 | 0.000 | 1.102 |
| Prust | 5 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 65.95 | 2.45 | 9.07 | 1.137 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.968 |
| Frolov | 5 | 3 | 2 | 0 | 93.53 | 21.23 | 0.23 | 0.481 | 1.413 | 0.000 | 0.652 |
| Drury | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 7.27 | 1.30 | 0.62 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| White | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 15.83 | 2.90 | 1.80 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Williams | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3.72 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 |
The table is sortable by clicking the headers
The initial sort here is by ES/15, which is the amount of chances generated per 15 minutes of ice time. This is a deviation from the typical 60 minute standard used by behindthenet.ca, but is more reflective of what the forwards are providing on a game by game basis. Clearly, players like Brian Boyle, who is averaging a hair over 8 minutes of ES time per game, are not going to get 15 minutes of ice time barring an epidemic, but it's a good enough standard.
As you can see, the standout of the list is Ryan Callahan. He's generating more than 2 chances per 15 minutes, leading the team. Now, we understand that with all of those chances, Ryan has still not registered an ES goal, but given the ample opportunities, it should be a matter of time before a couple of his chances start being cashed in. The other standout, though not nearly in the same way, is Alex Frolov. Brought in to be a second offensive star for opposing teams to match up with, he has been mostly invisible to date, generating only 1 chance every 30 minutes, easily the worst total of the regular forwards in the lineup. To his credit, he has pulled off the quite interesting feat of scoring twice from in close without actually getting his shot on net. In the short term, those 2 goals, compared to Callahan's one, are what fans will point to. The long term goals of this team, however, will require Frolov to get higher quality shots than he has.
After the jump, more thoughts on the offense, and a look at the defense.
On special teams, only six of the fifteen forwards have seen anything that can remotely be considered a large enough sample of minutes. Nevertheless, we see one player who has been clearly dominating in the chances department. That is 22 year old Artem Anisimov. WIth 6 total chances in just 22 minutes of ice time, he has been easily the most effective forward. This is not surprising considering Double A's PP role has been to camp out in front of the opposing goalies, but he's making use of his 6'4" frame to get shots off from the dangerous areas.
Now on to the defense:
| Name | Total | ES | PP | SH | ES Time | PP Time | SH Time | ES/20 | PP/20 | SH/20 | Total/20 |
| Gilroy | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 49.18 | 8.32 | 0.00 | 0.813 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.696 |
| Girardi | 4 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 119.52 | 15.40 | 30.90 | 0.502 | 1.299 | 0.000 | 0.482 |
| Del Zotto | 7 | 1 | 6 | 0 | 116.38 | 43.03 | 11.65 | 0.172 | 2.789 | 0.000 | 0.818 |
| Rozsival | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 125.18 | 34.08 | 15.65 | 0.160 | 0.000 | 1.278 | 0.229 |
| Staal | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 130.00 | 5.37 | 27.82 | 0.154 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.123 |
| Eminger | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 51.90 | 1.65 | 6.32 | 0.000 | 12.121 | 0.000 | 0.334 |
| Sauer | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 41.67 | 0.13 | 3.43 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 |
You'll note that this time around, I have gone with rates based on 20 minutes, instead of the 15 minutes. This is to keep the standard of the approximate single game length we can expect from a defenseman, all things created equal.
As the defense's primary function is more to prevent chances than to take them, this does not tell us all that much about their general effectiveness. It does instead give us some insight as to the relative frequency of each defenseman getting shots from jumping in on the offense.
Not surprisingly, our offensive dynamo, Michael Del Zotto, has 7 of the 17 chances among the defensemen, including 6 of the 8 on the power play chances. This is expected, but you'll also note that neither he, nor his first pair counterparts (Marc Staal and Michael Rozsival), have generated more than 1 chance thus far at ES. Instead, it is Matt Gilroy and Dan Girardi that are most often getting shots off in the scoring chance defined area. Gilroy does not come as much a surprise, as he has certainly exhibited the mentality of a forward to the casual observer. Girardi, on the other hand, comes as a pleasant surprise.
There are many other factors at play here, starting in the offensive zone, difficulty of the opposition, and others, that are contributing to the raw data. For those who want a 'matter of fact' look at the shots being taken, then this should help shed more light on how the team has performed thus far.
Thanks again to Vic Ferrari for making this data so much easier to assemble.
