Link: CanucksCorner.com :: Tom Benjamin's NHL Weblog.
Tom Benjamin asks a few questions after having run some numbers about the strengths and weaknesses of the 6 NHL divisions. He doesn't like the results, which I guess, obfuscate the meaning of accumulated points on a team for team basis. And, of course, what starts out as a cursory look at the routine differences in quality amongst the six 5 team groupings that make up the NHL turns into a rant about how the NHL is badly run and stupidly organized. I'll take his question that end his article one at a time (my responses in italics):
Who is the best team in the league? Whichever one you think is the best, no other definition can possibly be calculated because everyones criteria vis a vis 'bestness' are different.
How should the teams be seeded? The eternal question that has no 'right' answer. Any seeding system will be 'unfair' to someone, so any system is as good as any other because they are all arbitrary.
Who should be in the playoffs? Whichever teams fulfill the requirements of the rulebook. The fact is the schedule has a huge impact on how teams play and prepare for individual games, which affects the outcomes of those games. Hence changing the schedule (or the division structure) changes the definition of 'playoff worthy." It's impossible to make the case that, for example, if Atlanta finishes 8th in the East they should not make the playoffs because San Jose is a better team, even though San Jose wound up 9th in the West.
Who can tell? I can and anyone who can't is being purposefully obtuse. The rules are very clearly stated. Though Tom's analysis will certainly be of help when handicapping individual playoff series.
If every race car was timed on a different track could we determine which one was fastest? No. The last time I checked, hockey was not a race.... so what's the point of the analogy?
What is the point of the regular season again?
To sell tickets and advertising and allow 16 of the teams to do the same during the playoffs. Or am I missing something?
And, finally, why is it that the professional league with the best game has to be the worst run sports league in history? Wow! Is your barn empty Tom? Because that's one damn big straw man you just built!
I think Tom's implication with the last question was an attempt to say that because the division/conference/playoff seeding system doesn't 1) necessarily pick the 'best' teams to make the playoffs and 2) normalize the difficulty to make the playoffs for each team means that the NHL is badly-run and amateurish. I won't even go into how much he is deriving from a little more than 1/2 a season's worth of data. To draw such conclusions from such a small data set is statistically specious. A more valid approach would be to look at the results from the last time the system was changed up to, but not including, this year and see what the results were. Then, those data should be compared with the NHL's stated desires for the system and a comparison made.
I think there's a misconception between what it is that Tom Benjamin (and some of the commenters) wants the NHL to be and what the NHL is. To be generous to Tom. I think he wants to see an NHL that has a purity to its competition. That the games be played and the Stanley Cup awarded in such a way that is optimal in a competitive and, for lack of a better term, artistic sense. A noble desire, certainly, and part of me agrees with him on this. The problem with that kind of thinking is that there is no good way to know beforehand what the skill level of each team will be and therefore achieve the kind of normality (in the statistical sense of the word) that would maximize the probability of that outcome.
Personally, I used to care about such things, and make similar arguments, when I was more trustful of rules and laws to manage/manipulate systems. I don't any longer. No schedule is fair in that sense. All groupings of teams into divisions/conferences are arbitrary in some way. Even games between common opponents have external factors that affect the outcome. In short, there's no way to normalize the hardship that the teams go through from October to April. Once you come to understand that fretting about these differences becomes nothing more than a childish exercise in self-promotion.
The NHL does not exist to satisfy my, James Mirtle's, Tom Benjamin's or anyone else's view of what a hockey league should look like. It exists primarily (and I think this is the thing that galls Tom more than anything else) to make money for those associated with it; owners, players and advertisers. And, while the league doesn't exist without an audience, that's true, the feedback from the fans matters only insofar as they are not willing to pay attention to it. For all of the complaining Tom does about the NHL, he's one of their best customers... that's the biggest irony of all.
Hockey may, at times, approach art, or, at least, have moments that transcend the motives stated above. But, the NHL, is not hockey. It is simply an organization that puts on games of it. There are dozens of them around the world. Find one that does the best job of satisfying your needs and patronize it. Do they always make the right decisions? Of course not. But, obviously they're doing enough things right because we keep tuning in, posting in our blogs and spending our limited amount of time on this planet, above-ground, thinking about it.
I don't know about you, but I have better things to do with my life than argue over the value of 5 or the redness of red. Is San Jose better than Atlanta? Who's 52 points (as of this writing) should be worth more? It's a fun debate, but the existance of which is not a bad thing. Actually, it more probably works in the NHL's favor. After all, if not for their 'mistakes', what would we have to talk about?
Ta,
Edited on 1/30/06 to clarfiy points and clean up errors.
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