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Dustin Byfuglien’s statistical importance to the Winnipeg Jets

Since www.timeonice.com is still down, I went through the NHL logs and gathered the Fenwick (goals, shots & misses or Corsi less blocked shots) data to date. The first thing I wanted to look at was our defences numbers for the last two games with everyone’s favourite rover, Dustin Byfuglien, out of the line-up.

Player

Season

First 6 Games

Last 2 Games

Paul Postma

8.06

5.00

14.89

Mark Stuart

-5.14

-13.63

26.60

Ron Hainsey

-9.79

-9.43

-11.04

Grant Clitsome

-1.94

-3.52

2.45

Zach Redmond

20.55

0.00

20.55

Dustin Byfuglien

-6.41

-6.41

Tobias Enstrom

1.54

3.98

-6.85

5 on 5 Fenwick / 60 for the Winnipeg Jets Defenseman

With Big Buff gone, Ron Hainsey slid up on the top pairing, Zach Redmond parachuted in with Mark Stuart, and Grant Clitsome/Paul Postma stayed the same.

So what happened?

Tobias Enstrom’s numbers fell from the sky.

– Stuart's take off in the opposite direction.

– Postma and Clitsome both see modest growth.

– And Zach Redmond? Well, somewhere in Wisconsin Ben's got a shit eating grin on his face.

One last point. While it's easy to point the finger at Ron Hainsey, I think that misses the point. Hainsey took a mere two minutes in penalties during Byfuglien's absence. He was still a big part of the penalty kill outside the state of Florida. And Hainsey didn't fail to stop 25% of all shots on goal.

But it's still evident that the team misses Byfuglien in their line-up, if only for his ability to insulate others by amassing huge TOI numbers.

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