A whole lot of numbers

Numbers post. Header out front shoulda warned ya.

Going into Friday, Bridgeport ranked 22nd in the AHL in goals for (117). (And let’s right there specify that all these numbers and ordinals are accurate only through Thursday’s games. I don’t think anything was going to change dramatically.)

That 117 includes four shootout-win goals, but take them out and it doesn’t change the ordinal. The Sound Tigers were 23rd in goals against (135), and the same without their three shootout-loss goals.

When have those goals come? It all depends on manpower.

The Sound Tigers were, in pure counting numbers, ninth in power-play goals against with only 30*. (Those 30 also happen to have come in bunches.) The Sound Tigers were fifth in power-play goals with 41.

Now, take out their special teams. The Sound Tigers are 27th in even-strength goals for (69, ahead of only Syracuse (63), Abbotsford (58) and abysmal-early-competitive-lately Adirondack (55, plus three more Friday in a win over the Penguins)). They’re 28th in even-strength defense (101, ahead of only Charlotte (104, which has scored 103 to balance it out) and Adirondack (107)).

In even-strength goal differential, at minus-32, only Syracuse (minus-33, 63-96) and Adirondack (minus-52) fall below Bridgeport. Worse, no one else is close to those three**.

Bridgeport has scored only 61 percent of its goals at even strength. Adirondack was worse (60), and Oklahoma City was right behind (61.6) in part because it had scored eight short-handed goals, which are sometimes fluky (there’s skill and system involved, but still). On the other side, only Manitoba (77 percent) and Charlotte (78) had given up a greater percentage of their goals at even strength than has Bridgeport (76.5).

….

Let’s come at this a different way. Special-teams data doesn’t always necessarily reflect the time played at those odd manpowers. For Bridgeport, I’ve got it reasonably handy, though. A little cutting, pasting and putting the right formula into a spreadsheet, and we get this: Bridgeport’s goals-against average while short-handed is 5.94. That doesn’t sound great, but, you know, they’re down a man.****

Bridgeport’s goals-for average right now — its opponents’ GAA, basically — while the Sound Tigers are on a power play? 8.12.

Over the weekend, Jamie Palatini half-joked that the Sound Tigers should call up their opponents and offer to take the 60-minute game and just give each team 30 minutes on the power play. If they actually did that, the Sound Tigers average out to win 4-3 every night.

The trouble is even strength, like we saw above. Per 60 minutes of even-strength hockey, opponents are scoring 2.99 goals, and the Sound Tigers are scoring 1.58. There’s more than three times as much even-strength play as there is power-play time, so that doubled-up difference gets magnified.*****

Tomorrow’s story tried to get at all that. I think the numbers are more stark, but then I’m a numbers geek.

….

Why? Tricky question. They had that power play clicking for a while when Bailey was here… but then again, it has continued to score without him, so it wasn’t just him. Injuries and call-ups deplete your depth, but special teams relies more on the top players… but then again, this never looked like a team that was going to light it up, and they’ve managed to find ways with the advantage. The PK is kind of a hallmark around here, something they’ve always taken pride in, as Micheal Haley said… but is there any way to carry that to even strength?

It’ll be a battle.

*-It’s actually a five-way tie for sixth, but they have the second-fewest games played of those five teams.
**-If you’re curious, the leaders are Wilkes-Barre (plus-36), Norfolk (plus-32) and Hershey (plus-25)***, with Manchester (plus-19) the only other team better than plus-15. The more I play with numbers like this, the more I think the Bears are due for a good second half.
***-The leaders in pythagorean expected winning percentage (shootouts removed) are the same three: WBS (.669), Hershey (.655) and Norfolk (.635). That division has four of the top eight (Binghamton) and five of the top 11 (Charlotte) as well as three of the bottom four (Providence sneaks in among them at 28th). Bridgeport is 24th… but Worcester is 23rd, and Springfield is 22nd.
****-The grand exception: The record-setting 2003-04 PK, which had a goals-against average of 3.27. Seriously: 31 goals in a tick under 570 minutes. That year, St. John’s, 28th of 28 teams defensively, had a 3.27 goals-against average overall. There was a stretch in the unbeaten streak where the Sound Tigers’ short-handed GAA was better than their even-strength and power-play GAA, because they gave up a goal or two while they were up a man. Sick.)
*****-I was going to do a comparison of those figures to those of the past couple of years. Then I realized it wouldn’t take long to do this instead:

t-through Friday. All figures per 60 minutes of play: ESGFA: Even-strength goals for; ESGAA: Even-strength goals-against; PPGFA: Power-play goals for; PKGAA: Power-play goals against.

And yes, now I do wish I’d done that last night.