Hockey Prophets

Prospects: The Defensemen Backtesting Results

August 14, 2017 by Brian Fogarty

The Hockey Prophets process for ranking top prospects has two primary components, an objective score based on statistical modelling, and a subject adjustment of the objective results based on non-modelled aspects of each player.

The subject component arises from watching games, noting things that the statistics might not recognize, and other qualatative factors that the objective, quantitative model cannot account for. The objective model, on the other hand, looks at several qualitative factors that have predictive power in the probability of a player's future NHL success.

The Hockey Prophets are dedicated to continual improvement of analysis methods and transparency, pointing out our forecast misses remains a crucial component towards that end. As such, we recently backtested our current Top Defensemen model by looking at defensemen from the perspective of the summer of 2012. Players who would have been eligible for prospect status based on age were included in the study, so defensemen born between Sept 1988 and September 1994 (draft year to 24 years) were tossed into the model, and the results compared to a basic assessment of the current NHL success to date. There were 250 defenseman used in the retrospective study, and as with all things ranked, there can be arguments made about whether the criteria are correct, and so on. In this case, the players were rated by the number of NHL games they have played per year since their draft year, and the number of points they have scored per year since their draft year. Below are the top 30 defenseman ranked by their basic "NHL Success" assessment:

Read more: Top Prospects: The Defensemen Backtesting Results

Top Prospects: The Defensemen, Summer 2017

July 18, 2017 by Brian Fogarty

Every year, players graduate from top prospects lists either by becoming NHL players, aging out or simply leaving the game altogether. The NHL draft, of course, replenishes the pool every summer, and where top prospects leave to the NHL, top draft picks fill in the gaps. This year, in fact, a 2017 draft pick has gone directly to the top of the list, and three others bracket the top ten by assuming the final three slots in that group. At the same time, there are several 2016 blueliners who look poised to make their own run at graduating via a step up into the NHL.

Follow this link to view the recently published Top Prospects: The Forwards

 The Top Three (Four, Actually)

Miro Heiskanen, taken third overall by Dallas in the 2017 NHL Draft and the first defender selected, vaults straight to the head of the Top Prospects: The Defensemen ranks. Although the number of 18-year-old defensemen who have stepped straight into the NHL have always been limited as patrolling the blue line against NHL forwards is a job that typically takes years of the training, experience and mental toughness, Miro Heiskanen could be one of the rare exceptions. In the last quarter century, only nine Under-18 defenders have played at least 20 games in a Liiga season. On a points-per-game basis, Heiskanen out-performed them all (in fact, he is fourth overall in Liiga history). After a full-time year in Finland's top league, Heiskanen has already shown that he has the speed, smarts and knoweldge of the positional game to make an impact at the NHL level as soon as this fall. As stated in NHL Draft 2017 - The Hockey Prophets' Top Ten, his "poise with the puck and sound positional awareness made him a reliable defender in his own end, and his ability to move the puck or carry it up ice makes Heiskanen a near-perfect prototype for the modern two-way defenseman."

Read more: Top Prospects: The Defensemen, Summer 2017

Top Prospects: The Forwards, Summer 2017

July 7, 2017 by Brian Fogarty

The 2017 NHL Draft added an entire new class of prospects into the Top Prospects: The Forwards player pool and the total combined list this summer is above 700 players. There are ten new prospects in the top twenty forwards from the recent draft, including three of the top five. However, even with all of the new talent to consider, Dylan Strome retains the top overall spot following a dominant OHL performance after his truncated NHL start. 

The Top Three

After struggling to adjust to NHL speed at the beginning of the 2016-2017 season in Arizona, Strome was returned to the OHL's Erie Otters, where he posted a league-best 2.14 points-per-game production rate (the third-best production rate in the last decade), with almost one (0.97) primary assists per game and two-thirds of his points scored while at even strength. Strome often looked overwhelmed by the speed of the NHL game during his brief professional debut last fall, but he has shown a strengthening of his game since then. He captained the Canadian team at the 2017 World Junior Championship (where he scored ten points in seven games), led his Otter team to the playoffs and Memorial Cup (where he was awarded the Stafford Smythe Trophy as the Memorical Cup MVP and earned the Ed Chynoweth Award as the tournaments top scorer). Strome will get an extended look in the NHL this fall, and he is the Hockey Prophets leading pre-season contender for the NHL Calder Trophy as the league's top rookie. 

Read more: Top Prospects: The Forwards, Summer 2017