Criticisms of a Winning Team & Wanting an Understanding of Logic
From October 26, 2019 Dallas Stars vs Pittsburgh Penguins
An interesting conversation that’s popped up recently is about critiquing winning teams. Really it’s fair to say it is a conversation that’s been around forever. I think it should be pointed out that there is a large difference between criticism and insults. You can search on twitter for insults about any team/athlete/sport/league/coach which is generally unfair and unfounded. Criticism, however, is something that shouldn’t be seen as bad, it’s all about wanting to understand.
Specifically the criticism I’m talking about here the Dallas Stars and ice time. While it seems to me that most hockey analysts put a lot of stock into it, the current interim head coach has decided to focus on the number of shifts per game a play gets. To me, that seems like a very narrowed down stat, one that doesn’t really provide any kind of context to the situation unless there are other stats supporting it.
So starting last week, I decided to keep track of ice time and shifts by period and end of game.
If you don’t follow the Stars, one of the biggest critiques lately has been the lack of ice time Denis Gurianov (rookie and team leading goal scorer with 20 goals) and really even Roope Hintz (third in goals for the stars at 18). Gurianov rarely makes it to 15 minutes per game, which isn’t representative of his productivity.
Now I’m not writing this to debate ice time vs number of shifts, I do that enough on twitter in comparing the two for every game now with charts and stats, mostly for my own understanding and comparison.
My point here is that it feels like the conversation has turned into whether or not fans can and should critique a coach and/or team with a winning record. And I think that is an awful idea, not only in general but as a team/sport trying to grow a fan base.
The quickest way to not grow a fan base? Have them stop talking about the game.
Passive fans that are happy when they’re winning and upset when they're losing and have no other emotions in between doesn’t grow the fan base. It doesn’t. And NHL and “non-traditional” markets should always want growth in their fan base.
I can understand if your problem with critiques are obvious in that the fan is complaining about the winning team for the sake of complaining.
However, in the Stars case critiquing head coach Rick Bowness’ logic of shift numbers over ice time is completely fair. Especially considering, recently they have won some games by a lot of luck. They are a really great team that isn’t winning by as much as they should be. They’ve had a number of one goal games and it almost feels like they’re winning by one goal or struggling to score just one.
From Dom Luszczyszyn article for the Athletic, 2019-2020 Playoff Chances and Standings Projections
That luck isn’t going to work in the postseason.
I know this as a person who watched the 2016 Texas Rangers win an alarming amount of one-run games, have a very small run differential (+8 at the end of the season, the last half of the season was -8), and then just crash in the ALDS, getting swept in three games and embarrassingly so.
From Rob Arthur on fivethirtyeight.com, The Texas Rangers Are Making (Unsustainable) History In One-Run Games
Overall the point isn’t just ice time, the point is the Stars are so obviously a better team than they’re playing and to just look at the record and be ok with where they’re at isn’t enough.
And honestly, the takeaway of a fan's critiques shouldn’t be “wow they think they know more than coaches?” it should be that fans care enough to want to see their teams live up to their potential and for coaches to let them.
Fans don’t question a coach because they don’t respect them or their position, it’s a need for understanding of the logic behind the decisions being made that isn’t easily understood.