Sunday, November 20, 2011

Sidney Crosby’s Back (Tomorrow is for Cheering & Celebration)

Hockey Consultant had all sorts of consultant-type things she wanted to write about today.   But then she clicked the Twitter application on her smartphone and—

Sidney Crosby is going to play against the Islanders tomorrow night.     He hasn’t played in almost a year (10 months and counting as this point), but the Penguins managed to sustain a winning record in his absence, etcetera, etcetera.

The only things Hockey Consultant wanted to write, or say, today, were:
·         Welcome back, Sidney Crosby.
·         It’s time to cheer and celebrate.

Fundamentally, Hockey Consultant analyzes hockey because, at heart, she’s a fan of the game.   And she loves the game in its purest form; she loves the sport the way it’s “supposed” to be.  In Hockey Consultant’s fantasy world, superstars never get hurt (in this fantasy world, Mario Lemieux broke 200 points several times in his career and scored more points than anyone ever )  or leave town (Jaromir Jagr was always, only, a player for Hockey Consultant’s hometown team, the Penguins, and the second leading scorer of  all-time).     Players with potential always achieve it (Aleksey Morozov tortured every NHL goaltender, not just Martin Brodeur, in Hockey Consultant’s fictional fantasy world).   And suffice to say Hockey Consultant’s hometown Penguins have won more than three Stanley Cup in her fantasy world.

But Hockey Consultant was ten years old when David Volek (ugh, how the name even to this day provokes a visceral reaction of “Ugh” and “Ew” and “Ick” and “Really, how’d that happen?!”) taught her the first truth of hockey:  That what so often should be never happens the way it’s “supposed to” or “should” happen.   That dynasties that are supposed to materialize sometimes end with two championships, rather than a half-dozen.   That superstars don’t stay always healthy for the long haul or even if they do manage to stay healthy they don’t by default belong to your city forever.

Tomorrow night, though, against the Islanders, Sidney Crosby is playing hockey.  Doing what he’s supposed to be doing.  Playing for the team that drafted him, where he won a Cup.  Playing with the talented playmates—otherwise known as the “core” of the team—that fans envisioned him winning multiple championships with.
 
So, Hockey Consultant is taking off her consulting hat, for a moment.   She’s just going to be a fan of her team.   She’s just going to be a fan of the game.

And she’s like to encourage you to cheer and celebrate, no matter the outcome of the game.    Because Sidney Crosby is going to be playing hockey again—doing what he’s supposed to be doing.   And that sight, so expected, and yet one that didn’t happen for so long, is glorious to behold.

So behold the wonder.    Behold watching what was supposed to be all along, and what you didn’t get to see for months on end.

Watch Sid and his teammates play hockey.

And, then, return to normality—for Hockey Consultant, that will likely involve analyzing such fun things as her belief the Penguins need a deeper defensive core and why it’s important not to assume even young,  experienced players have already reached their highest ceiling—

But right now?   But tomorrow?

Tomorrow is for cheering.   Tomorrow is for celebrating.    Tomorrow is for watching Sidney Crosby play NHL hockey.

So enjoy what you now know is no guarantee:   Crosby playing NHL hockey.   Enjoy it, revel in it, and yes—even if you’re harshly analytical and want to scream about line combinations and special teams configurations and all sorts of other things—remember how you got into the sport in the first place (you were a fan first) and watch this beautiful sight:   

An NHL superstar, healed, returning to the place where he belongs, an NHL ice surface.

And when you see that sight?

Just cheer and celebrate, for one moment, something that is as it is supposed to be—a kid who wanted nothing more than to be the best hockey player in the world returning to play the sport he loves, a sport he trained his entire life to play.

And—not just tomorrow—will you remember that the chances you’ll once again have to celebrate and cheer or complain and critique as you watch Sidney Crosby and the Penguins play NHL hockey are not guaranteed?   

How about you take the moment when Crosby takes to the Consol Energy ice for warm-ups to enjoy what is supposed to be even as you remember that all the things that are supposed to be so often aren't what actually transpires in the real world of hockey and life?  How about simply celebrating and cheering when that moment where everything is as it supposed to be comes to life as, for the first time in nearly a year, the captain of the Pittsburgh Penguins plays in an NHL game?

Sunday, November 13, 2011

The Brief Summary Post—Or, How You Can Know You’ve Arrived as an NHL Star

  • Your name is on the All-Star ballot.
  • No one complains when you're named to the All-Star team.
  • The national broadcasters–and other people in the game–regularly discuss you as a candidate for one of the major awards the NHL hands out in June.
  •  Opposing General Managers mention your name when talking about how one of his elite players stacked up against you. 
  • Opposing teams make it a point to figure out how to get you off your game and take away your time and space. 
  • Your teammates expect you to play key minutes on the special teams units.
  • Nobody really talks about any of the many things you do right or well.   A lot of people talk about every little thing you do wrong or could do better.
  • When your teammates get hurt, you’re the player who’s expected to take on a bigger role and play more minutes at the same high level. 
  • If you’re still young, everyone ticks off a list of all the things you’re not good enough at yet and even when they know you’re working on those things every day practice they still scream because they just know you should already be good enough to do those things.
  • If you’ve previously, oh, dominated the NHL playoffs and led the league in scoring, fans wonder if you’re done and if you’ll ever get back to that level and they’re not satisfied until you’re back to or exceeding that level because you showed you could do it before and things like recovering from surgery or playing through the flu or playing with nagging injury soul have no impact because you are a star player and should be able to be a star no matter what. 
  • Twitter explodes every time you make a mistake with proclamations about how overrated and overpaid you are and if you will ever realize your considerable potential and all the reasons you won’t realize your considerable potential.   Usually this involves talking about your lack of “hockey IQ” or “scoring sense” or some other quality you clearly just don’t have, in spite of the above noted achievements by people actually paid to work in NHL hockey.
  • Your coach expects you to be one of his best players, game in and game out, and when you're not, he's going to let you know in no uncertain terms that you have to be better--even as he still throws you on the ice to protect a 1-goal lead or mount a comeback from a 1-goal deficit in the waning moments of the third period of a 3-2 game.
  • You’re expected to be a plus player every night, not allow any shorthanded goals to be scored, always make tape-to-tape passes, always get each of your shots on the net, and if you’re a goalie, you better never misplay a puck behind your net or go for the pokecheck at the wrong time. 
  • When you go a game without a point or allow more than 2 goals in a game, it's considered a slump.  If you dare to go 2 games sans a point or allow more than 2 goals in 2 consecutive games, people wonder if you're secretly injured/what in the world is wrong.  If such a circumstance would happen for 3 games in a row, it's believed you're on the verge of "major meltdown." 
  • You’re considered a core member of a perennial Stanley Cup contender.



The Brief Letter to the (Right Now  Healthy Enough to Play) Star Penguins:

Dear Marc-Andre Fleury, Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang, Jordan Staal and probably soon enough James Neal:

I’m sure you’ve noticed the price you’ve paid for your play.    You’re STARS in the NHL now!  And you’re expected to be PERFECT!

I am certain you’re happy to be NHL stars, and I’m also sure you actually aspire to perfection (it’s a key reason why you got where you are, no doubt).

So just wanted to send a note of encouragement to remind you that the price you have to pay (perfection is now the standard expectation) is worth it.

But you already know that.    How’s the view up there?

Oh, right.   You’re not worried about the view up there.   You’re back at practice trying to help your team get the only view that matters—the Stanley Cup held aloft their heads— in June.

Anyhow, congratulations on your arrival as NHL stars.   

P.S.  And remember the secret code for NHL stars:  to play as perfectly as you possibly can on the way to the postseason and you play that way even more in the playoffs.

P.P.S.  There’s actually another secret code.   You shouldn’t stop at stardom.  You should be superstars, and do the impossible of improving upon perfection.  

P.P.P.S.    Ah, shucks—you’re already trying to do that, even though you’re not yet perfect because you’re star athletes who are human, too, so I should probably let you do what you’re already doing and enjoy my view that lets me see you guys be stars in the NHL.


The brief address to the screaming masses (sometimes known as pundits, sometimes known as fans, sometimes known, sadly (albeit not in high-performing organizations) as the ones in the game who don’t get it):
They’re star players.   And they’re human beings.    Please let them get better at the things they still have to get better at and be happy that they’re working to get better at those things while still doing lots of other things that make them the core of a perennially contending team.


Signed: 
 A terribly annoying Hockey Consultant who is very easily annoyed when star players are expected to be perfect deities, rather than elite, high-performing athletes who perennially help their teams contend for championships

The Smaller but Still Squiggly Line of Stardom (Stars Remain Human)

If most folks associated with hockey are in a realistic frame of mind (note, of course that there are no guarantees about this one), they expect the performance of young and developing players to mirror that of a quite squiggly line.   Within the same game, an inexperienced young talent can make a horrific, rookie mistake that shows how much he still has to learn while also showcasing precocious skill that shows just how much natural talent he has.     This pattern (precocious brilliance coupled with many “so much still to learn” moments) leads most great organization to set the goal for young players to be an “upward” curve, with the understanding that there are going to be many jagged edges along that road.   Such a chart might look like this:


DEVELOPMENTAL PLAYER CHART NHL GAMES 1-240


(For those who aren’t fans of charts, check out two video clips of a 21-year-old Kris Letang in his first two NHL seasons and note the precocious brilliance and the “WHAT WERE YOU doing, child?” moment at the 35 second mark.) 

Yet at some point in the careers of star players, (often around the fourth or fifth season), a few special players make the leap from “promising” young and developing talents to bona-fide NHL stars.    Their newfound status as star players brings with it a new expectation, one that was best described recently by the NHL’s ninth all-time leading scorer, Jaromir Jagr.

After Jagr, a once-promising teenage prospect, became the best player in the world, he described the years when he was amassing scoring titles as pressure-filled years.  He encapsulated the feelings of a star player well and thusly, “….When I was in position as ‘the guy’ ... if you feel good, everything is fine because you know you can make the difference. But there are times you don’t feel good and you still have to do it. That’s pressure. That’s when you struggle because you know you’re the guy and you know you don’t feel good but you still have to do it. 

Like it was for Jagr, the newfound expectation for star players is that their games, if charted, should no longer reflect any squiggles.   That they have to be good all the time. 

Where once the squiggles were expected and normal, as in the first chart above, now the expectation becomes this straight line where the vertical axis is Points Per Game and the horizontal axis is a group of games in a season.   Note the expectation that the star player, in each series of games, will average around 1.25 points per game in all games:

STAR PLAYER EXPECTED PPG STRAIGHT LINE CHART



But it’s impossible to score 1.25 points per game.   It is impossible to average +1.3 on the night.   In an actual game, a player could score 1 or 2  or 3 points and be a +2 or a +1 or a -1, but he’ll never a -.5 anything.  Nor will he ever score half a point.

Star players have a higher average line than anyone else, and past precedent suggests that it’s right to hold the expectations for their line of play quite high.

But this is a better picture for the star player:

STAR PLAYER ACTUAL PPG AVERAGE SQUIGGLY CHART




And notice this truth about those PPG averages:

Note if this player ends up playing 82 games, he will score 102 points.  But he has a rough time period in games 51-60 and a really great month of November.   What you don’t see charted, but what could be seen in a scatterplot of game after game and season after season of actual Hall of Fame players, is that even future Hall-of-Famers have nights where they get held scoreless.    That even defensemen widely accepted as the best in the game have a few games a season where they’re on the ice when the opposing team scores a couple of goals.  

The price of stardom?    Whenever your straight line squiggles—not when it squiggles higher than your average of a point per game because, well, you’re good enough to have nights where you produce more than a mere point a game—but whenever that line dips, if there’s a play misread or just a night where a star player is fighting the puck and nothing is going his way—

A chorus of criticism is coming for that star player.   And Jagr’s quote lingers as true for any star player striving to maintain or increase his level of play.   Because of what he’s already shown he can do, there is screaming any time the star’s performance line is not straight as an arrow.

Hockey Consultant would like to offer a truth.  Even that “straight” line of performance for stars has some squiggles in it.   If the squiggles dip too low or become a pattern that results in a much lower line, that’s when a real problem has occurred.

But an otherwise stalwart player having a couple of bad games while fighting a cold or playing with a minor injury (not that anyone outside the team knows) or even a star player having a rough dozen games to start a season—

It’s not wise to press panic buttons or complete reset buttons.

Even for star players—albeit much to their chagrin given their usual tendencies toward harsh self-criticism and internally high expectations for their own play—that line, oh so high, is never going to be a pure straight line.   If it’s not a straight line for players who end up in the Hall of Fame (who usually still manage to put up at least a point in games when they’re otherwise terrible), it’s not going to be straight for mere star players, either.

Now look at the straight line.   If the average is here, that’s why the impatient organization or the average fan will start screaming when the squiggly dip to anything below that 1.25 PPG average occurs.


But look at the squiggly lines again and note what rationality has to say about how star players get to be as good as they are.   (It’s consistently high performance, but there are squiggly outliers here and there because they’re human.) 

A player at this level should expect to be challenged and critiqued every time his performance dips below that line.    That’s the price of being a star.

Guess what?

All fans and all organizations should wish to have such occasional “below-the-star-level” line performances to critique.  Championships are not won without players whose performance when chartered shows a consistently higher, less squiggly line than the performance lines of most other players. 

That high but not quite straight performance line of star players has smaller, fewer squiggles than the performance lines of most other players.    And the average line height is consistently higher than the line of most other players.

But there are still squiggles.   And as much as Jaromir Jagr hated that fact back in the days when he was averaging more than a point per game but not quite two points per game, and as much as every star player hates it when he believes he should be playing at his highest level every night, reality says players at this level—exasperating squiggles and all when you’ve seen them score at the 2 PPG clip for 10 games—are absolutely necessary pieces to the puzzle if your team is serious about winning a championship.