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The NHL's Best (Even-Strength) Shooters, 2005-09

I put together a stats sheet at the beginning of the year looking at individual player shooting. I estimated the expected number of goals that each player should have scored each year based on the locations of the shots he took - because rebounds are high-percentage shots, I only looked at initial shots to assess pure shooting. Here's the sum of goal scoring relative to expectations over the last four seasons:

Player Extra Goals
Ilya Kovalchuk 51.5
Nathan Horton 32.6
Marian Gaborik 32.5
Dany Heatley 32.4
Jarome Iginla 29.0
Daniel Alfredsson 28.6
Alexander Ovechkin 27.2
Alex Tanguay 25.9
Rick Nash 23.8
Jason Spezza 23.6
Brad Boyes 20.5
Alexander Semin 19.4
Sidney Crosby 18.9
Martin Havlat 18.7
Marian Hossa 18.1

Most of these players are "known good snipers," other than Boyes and Horton, who play in minor markets and haven't had many opportunities to show off in the playoffs, and Crosby, who is so good at everything else that he must be a bad goal-scorer! Kovalchuk's lead over 2nd-place Horton is amazing - he's almost as good a shooter as Tanguay (who led the 2000s in shooting percentage) and he is 11th overall in total even-strength shots since the lockout.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, the league's worst shooter - among frequent shooters - is Tyler Arnason at 20 goals below average. That goes a long way to explain Arnason spending this season in the AHL and the KHL.

Poll
Who's the best shooter in the NHL?
Kovalchuk
136 votes
Ovechkin
165 votes
Gaborik
53 votes
Heatley
21 votes
Iginla
8 votes
Alfredsson
10 votes
Tanguay
83 votes
Brad Boyes or Nathan Horton? Are you crazy?
7 votes
One of these other guys
19 votes
Someone I completely haven't thought about
26 votes

528 votes | Poll has closed

Comment 10 comments  |  0 recs  | 

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Arny’s ice-precense makes him the best shooter EVER.
If you don’t believe it, look into his uncaring eyes of doom:

by Tommelot on Jan 14, 2010 10:10 AM EST reply actions   1 recs

How did you off-set the loss of goal-scoring from removing rebound shots?

Bettman's Nightmare: A Blog Where Hockey Aficionados Dismantle That Mighty Empire, One Balsillie at a Time

http://bettmansnightmare.blogspot.com/

by Bettman's Nightmare on Jan 14, 2010 11:42 AM EST reply actions  

I removed shots during the period following an initial shot where save percentage is low.

by Hawerchuk on Jan 14, 2010 11:57 AM EST up reply actions  

Nice article Gabe! Two quick questions:

1. How much time did there need to be between shots for it to be considered a non-rebound?
2. What is the “baseline” that was used (i.e. what numbers would constitute 0 “extra goals”) and is this supposed to indicate average performance or replacement level performance?

Thanks!

by Scott Reynolds on Jan 14, 2010 2:02 PM EST reply actions  

Scott -

I used four seconds. Two or three are also valid and give the same general results.

The data is relative to average. I didn’t want to get into it with the folks who don’t think replacement exists.

by Hawerchuk on Jan 14, 2010 4:18 PM EST up reply actions  

Cool. Thanks Gabe. If I may, are you using a shot location matrix with an x-y axis or simply shot distance? Also, do you know what the average shooting percentage is for EV non-rebound shots as a whole? That would be interesting. Finally, Ilya Kovalchuk is pretty darn good! That’s just a huge gap. If they had him with a couple of guys who consistently had the puck in the OZ…

by Scott Reynolds on Jan 15, 2010 12:50 PM EST up reply actions  

I use x-y coordinates, but others find the same results with shot distance. Shooting percentage is 6.1% (including missed shots but not blocked shots)

by Hawerchuk on Jan 15, 2010 1:23 PM EST up reply actions  

I don’t believe Horton’s got the best “shot” per se, but it is realistically wicked. He’s only now beginning to use it.

by Donny Rivette on Jan 14, 2010 5:02 PM EST reply actions  

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