I know I've got a project plan to work on, modification specs to approve, and invoices to review, but on a cold, drizzly afternoon like this I find myself wallowing in the rhetorical mud with Pudge, over the recent anti-Harold Ford ad that's been airing here in Tennessee. What a waste of time! Some people just can't seem to see things from another perspective.

Really, I should go back to working on something productive, like more hockey stats...

With a nod to my beloved 1980 Detroit Lions, Another pound bites the dust... Another pound bites the dust...

Progress So Far
9/8/06: 209
9/15/06: 204.5
9/22/06: 206
9/29/06: 201
10/6/06: 197
10/13/06: 195
10/20/06: 194
10/27/06: 193

Just posted another entry over at the blog, and thought I would share.

Basically, I assembled data from the 2005-6 NHL regular season, and summarized by team the number of hits, giveaways, and takeaways, whereupon I ranked them in those categories and ran the numbers up against their regular season point totals, looking for any correlation.

The interesting bit? The level of Giveaways (coughing up the puck) turned out to be mildly correlated (0.28) to the regular season standings. More Giveaways tended to mean more points, which is counterintuitive at first glance. I would guess this is the result of good teams having the puck more often, and thus having more opportunities for Giveaways. The Takeaway data were more straightforward - a slightly stronger correlation (0.30), which aligns with common sense. Interestingly, the number of Hits had no correlation with success. That's nothing to say it didn't hold entertainment value, though...

While paid access to game video or audio has been available from Major League Baseball for a couple years now, the National Hockey League has taken the next step forward, offering selected game broadcasts available via Yahoo for free this season. Tonight's offering has the San Jose Sharks visiting the Detroit Red Wings, utilizing the feed from TSN (the ESPN of Canada).

For some reason our hockey team has had a lot of roster changes over the last couple weeks, and the end result is that we've got an uphill battle to fight the rest of this season. First, the zoomer who scored a ton of goals for us one night moved to New Jersey, then our top player (who's also the commish) decided he no longer needed to play on our team as he'd filled out our roster.

The problem is that we've only got one new guy who's good, along a couple ankle-benders who really belong in the beginner league.

Last night, we got beat 6-1 by a very mediocre team, and I'd be surprised if we got more than 8 shots all game. In the 1st, our forwards just didn't put any pressure on their puck carriers, so it was just wave after wave coming across our blue line and leaving us D-men to scramble as best we could. At one point, I had one guy tied up in front, while two other opponents were wide open in the slot waiting for a pass, and my forwards were nowhere to be found. Somehow, our goalie stood his ground well enough to get us out of the 1st down only 1-0.

Our best new player and I moved up to wing for the 2nd and 3rd, which helped at least get us some chances in their end, but we couldn't cash in - I in particular screwed up two good chances, whiffing on a centering pass from the high slot and deflecting a pass a foot wide of the net inside of hitting the far side.

I'm not worried about a lack of talent on our team, but rather a lack of hustle. When getting close to opposing players, they tend to stop moving their feet and hoping for a turnover, rather than moving in quickly and creating one. Our only goal came when our center fell down while trying to handle the puck, and swiped at it in frustration, which got it to a man in the low slot who was able to score. I tried to get the message through that keeping at it like that is what creates scoring chances, but it'll take a while to sink in.

I know back in my early days of playing rec hockey, we had friends videotape some of our games, which was both comical and instructive at the same time. It's funny to think how hard you're working out there, then you see yourself on video and realize you're coasting half the time, and that just putting out a tougher effort can completely change the game.

Ah well, at least we have a fun bunch that gets along well, which is nice, and I'm picking up more speed as the pounds drop off. At this point I'm 16 pounds lighter than the start of the season, and am really looking forward to the second half...

Weighed in at 194 this morning, which means I've lost 15 pounds so far, so that's nice. The wife and kids were up in Indiana last week, and in their absense I went off diet a couple times and went over my recommended daily caloric intake - not by a huge amount, but enough to slow things down a bit.

The funny thing is that I've taken up drinking ice water at work and light lemonade at home, with the result that the other day when I took a sip of some Pepsi (which had previously been my beverage of choice), I nearly gagged at how overly sweet it tasted.

Time to finish breakfast and hit the gym for a while before work...

Progress So Far
9/8/06: 209
9/15/06: 204.5
9/22/06: 206
9/29/06: 201
10/6/06: 197
10/13/06: 195
10/20/06: 194

Things are starting to cook now over at the blog. I've posted about half a dozen articles over the last week which are truly breaking new ground in the realm of hockey stats, and the traffic and feedback are starting to climb. Daily traffic is about 10x what it was previously when I was merely posting commentary, and I hope to grow that number by another order of magnitude over the next few weeks.

What I really need is to commercialize this information - either for NHL general managers or player agents, both of which could greatly use what I'm coming up with...

Ever wonder who's got the top slapshot in the NHL? I've got a new breakdown available over at the blog showing which players score the most off the slapshot, broken down by shooting distance as well.

I went to the hardware store yesterday and loaded up on some steel wool, clear caulk, and aluminum flashing. There are a couple holes underneath our gas fireplace (for wiring and piping that comes in) which had plenty of room for intruders to enter, so those have now been sealed up. Traps have also been set in the crawlspace underneath the house, where I suspect the invasion has come from.

The good news is that last night went well, but of course I'll check the traps at noon today and see what that brings...

Ugh. Last night, a mouse decided to enter our humble abode. After a great deal of effort, we got him out the back door, but tonight, I saw him darting around behind the TV again.

The traps are set, let's just hope for a jackpot in the morning...

This week's result is a bit of a miracle, as last Sunday we took the kids to the Loveless Cafe here in Nashville, which we'd heard plenty about, but hadn't visited yet in our first year here. When taking in a classic Southern joint like this I'm not about to quibble with the diet, so I went right ahead with (reasonable portions of) fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, and some wonderful creamed corn. My daughter went with her usual grilled cheese sandwich, the wife sampled the pulled pork, and the boys confirmed their paternity by devouring some fried chicken. Just as we were putting some leftovers in a to-go box, my oldest boy said "just one more bite..." and in a nonce, another chicken breast went down the hatch. The kid's 4 years old, and he ate more than me, I think.

Anyways, in the couple days afterwards I went back up a couple pounds, and then came back down to 195 this morning.

And to top it off, we didn't have a hockey game this week, so I had to make sure I got some walks in at work. The good news is that by the time we play our game next week, I'll have dropped 15 pounds since the start of the season, which makes a huge difference on the ice.

Progress So Far
9/8/06: 209
9/15/06: 204.5
9/22/06: 206
9/29/06: 201
10/6/06: 197
10/13/06: 195

Fresh data right out of the oven posted over at the blog. All NHL goals from the 2005-2006 regular season (non-empty net), broken down by distance and shot type (slapshot, wrister, etc.), along with a subset view of power play results.

The interesting thing to note here is the increased incidence of medium-range slapshot goals on the power play, as teams work the puck around and get clear shots from the point...

Over the weekend I'll get into the real juicy stuff - save percentage by distance and shot type, and then a further breakdown team by team, and eventually goalie by goalie.

So I've posted my latest entry over at the blog, but now I'm having trouble posting a table there, and could use some advice. I've basically got a table with a dozen or so columns, and posting the text right into Blogger screws it up. So I made a .jpg of it, and tried to post that in the entry, but Blogger trimmed it from 179K down to 30K, rendering the text unreadable, even though I selected Large size. One option would be to post the image to an external site and post a link to it in the post, but does anyone know a good place to post a picture file like this so it can be referred to in my blog???

This is frustrating, because it's actually some interesting data...

At long last, I've got the first article posted over at my hockey blog regarding a new level of statistical analysis for NHL hockey. Baseball is light-years ahead in this area, largely due to the volume of discrete statistical information that the game readily provides. Hockey, being a more fluid game, doesn't consist of such data points... at least until now.

I've been able to gather detailed game information from the NHL covering last season, and the trick has been to structure it in a way that invites analysis. My first sortie into this realm is a look at offensive zone faceoffs. Typically, faceoffs are looked at as a win/loss for the two parties involved, but also of interest is how often a shot directly results from a faceoff win. When I was able to run the numbers on such instances, I came up with some interesting results - guys who are regularly seen as great faceoff men don't produce many shots, whereas some who are seen as less reliable produce shots much more often.

This is a deeper view "within the numbers" that previously was unavailable to hockey fans, and I'm excited about the possibilities here. If you have suggested areas for research, feel free to leave a comment here or over at the blog.

What an unbelievable game tonight - Kenny Rogers dominating "the greatest lineup ever" (how many times does ESPN need to blow smoke up those Yankee skirts?), the Tigers scoring early and often, and best of all, Ernie Harwell doing some play-by-play in the ESPN booth. Hearing "he stood there like the house by the side of the road and watched that one go by," as Jason Balco took a called third strike brought back some great memories.

You also had to love the constant blather about the call at 3rd base when Pudge slid under a K-Rod tag (it looked to me like Pudge's hand was already on the bag when he got tagged on the shoulder). John Miller and Joe Morgan seemed stunned that a call could actually go against the Yankees (err... "the greatest team ever").

Great signs:

1) Pudge sending one down the line on a hit-and-run to score Guillen from 1st,
2) The overall aggressive effort by Tigers hitters, baserunners, and pitchers. They are NOT intimated by "the greatest team ever",
3) The continued disappearing act of K-Rod.

Let's hope some of Rogers' magic rubs off on Jeremy Bonderman for tomorrow's Game Four...

GO TIGERS!