Are the Jets a paper tiger and what do they need?
Are the Jets a paper tiger and what do they need?
Using advanced statistical models to measure up the Jets
The Winnipeg Jets are doing pretty well right now. That’s a fact.
The team currently sits first in the Western Conference. That can’t be bad, right???
No, no, no. Don’t worry; I’m not going to say the team actually sucks, or the success is unsustainable, or they are going to crash. The Jets are not a paper tiger (jeeze spoiling the article already) but there are holes in the roster, if they want to truly compete for the Stanley Cup.
How good are the Jets, really?
The 2022-23 Winnipeg Jets are pretty solid, and they keep getting better as the season goes on. The team started out being around-or-slightly-below average in shot volume, shot quality, and finishing, while elite in goaltending. All those average performances are improving, especially after the injection of Nikolaj Ehlers to the roster.
You can see above the current Jets compared to the previous few seasons, plus what I would suggest are the two best overall Jets 2.0 rosters (2017-18 and 2014-15), courtesy of Evolving-Hockey.
This rendition is the 3rd best Jets 2.0 in shot quantity/volume (ie: rates) and third best ever shot quality. The team has been average in finishing, but elite in goaltending. Heck, their goaltending is on pace for a top 10 performance from any team since 2007-08.
Long story short: The current Jets outside of goaltending are a team that are good enough to make the playoffs, but probably wouldn’t normally get home advantage or be favorites… but with goaltending, they are a force to be reckoned with.
So all's good, just stand pat?
Not exactly.
Not all regular season performance translates equally well to play offs. The work of Micah Blake McCurdy has previously shown that regular season offense translates best to play off performance, followed by defense, then followed by goaltending. Aside: sorry to burst the bubble to those that believed defense wins championships.
Of the four factors, shot quantity is the one teams are the most consistent with, then quality, then shooting, then goaltending. In a small sample like a best-of-seven series, a good shot quantity team will likely out shoot more often than a good goaltending team will get good goaltending.
Connor Hellebuyck is the Jets best weapon, but even he is human. Just look at last season; despite Hellebuyck being in the conversation for best goaltender of his generation, he was merely a top 10 performer last season… and that’s over 66 games, not between 4-7.
Cover your bases, and get as good as you can get.
Also, I have no crystal ball, but the Jets are on a timer with Hellebuyck, Scheifele, and Dubois. All are soon unrestricted free agents, and who knows if they re-sign with Winnipeg. While they still have those players, the window is open… but they need the right team around them to truly compete.
What do we got?
Above you can see each Jet’s 2022-23 performance in two (well, technically three) models.
I’ve taken the components of the Evolving Hockey’s GAR and xGAR models, and weighted them each differently to create a new model (wGAR). This new model has so far done better than each in terms of predicting both team and player performance, so it should hopefully better define how good a player truly is.
The other model is Dom Luszczyszyn’s GSVA model (although some of the players I estimated due to delays between the two of us conversing… also sorry for the extra A typo in GSVA).
(Note: in the future I’ll add a third model with Patrick Bacon’s WAR, but that wasn’t ready yet)
There are some obvious notes and things to discuss…
Forwards:
Given the number of players and teams, it works out almost perfectly that the top 20 percentile (81-100) is “first line” performance. Thus 61-80 is 2nd line, 41-60 third, 21-40 fourth, and the last 20 percent are depth players and call ups.
The Jets’ success has been strongly driven by the top four forwards of Connor, Dubois, Scheifele, and Ehlers
FYI: wGAR is an aggregate statistic, while the GSVA is per game. This is why you get such a large discrepancy with Ehlers’ results.
That said, that makes Ehlers’ wGAR that much more impressive! He’s already provided the Jets’ with top six value. His wGAR pace is on the 99th percentile.
Perfetti has been on a stark up swing. Don’t worry about him.
Note that models distribute value, but they don’t make up value. Example: You can’t just believe wGAR is right for Scheifele but GSVA is right for Perfetti. The two different models differ on those players in large part due to them distributing the same value differently. The only way for both players to go up (or even one to go up and the other stay the same) is for the team to do overall better.
The Jets depth issues lie in the bottom 2/3rds of their roster. I’m not worried about Perfetti, as his trajectory has been on a massive upswing (which is to be expected as a rookie). It’s mostly Wheeler, and everyone after that’s the issue.
The Jets could use 1-2 really good middle six forwards.
The optimal choice would be to find a winger to push Wheeler into a third line role, and then sit Kuhlman. And no, the solution is not a healthy Appleton, who has struggled for multiple seasons.
An alternative choice would be to to find two very solid third line wingers. Barron-Stenlund-Appleton/Gagner makes an excellent fourth line, and you get a surplus value from your bottom six. We’re talking Perreault-Lowry-Stempniak or Copp-Lowry-Tanev/Armia good… so really undervalued third line forwards.
Defense:
There are fewer defenders to play regular games, but there are also fewer roles to play. It works out just under 25 percentile for each roster depth position, but we’ll round to 25 for simplicity.
While the Jets have 4 top line forwards, they only have one that consistently looks to be a top pairing defender: Josh Morrissey. He’s having a Noris caliber season.
DeMelo is the next best Jet defender. I will point out that I know Patrick Bacon’s WAR model also views DeMelo as a fringe 1st pair defender, like wGAR. His WAR values aren’t public yet though, so we kept it to just 2 sources until later (perhaps before trade deadline).
In general, wGAR is kinder on defensive defenders, while GSVA prefers offense.
The issue on defense is pretty obvious; it’s Neal Pionk. After a solid year in the Canadian only division, Pionk has been dreadful. What once looked like an upward trend, looks now as a consistent pattern with one outlier season. Pionk was hard on himself last year, and he said he would do better this year… but so far, no luck.
There are those who have made excuses of playing through injuries or sickness, but honestly it’s been every season but one.
The Jets have one first pairing quality defender, and three second pairing. The best case scenario would be somehow trading for another first pairing quality defender and putting him in the Pionk spot. Easier said than done though, and that would cost a lot. Probably talking Perfetti and a first or more, a lot. That’s a price the Jets likely don’t want to pay.
Honestly, the Jets should just play Dillon-Heinola as a third pair. Samberg-Schmidt have been strong enough on the third pair that they would likely handle an elevated role, and Dillon-Heinola have been equal to Pionk, and Heinola (like Perfetti, except being interrupted) was very much on an upward trend in performance.
Goaltending:
Hellebuyck has been great. We know that. Rittich has been fine, but the Jets are a team that will live and die by Hellebuyck so doesn’t matter as much how he does.
I should note that the percentiles for depth positions don’t work as pretty for goalies as the forwards and defenders. There are very few third string goalie games. I guess you could say that starter performance is around 60-100, while back ups are 20-40… sort of?
Goalies are weird… and don’t ask what position I played.
FYI: I have a post for paid subscribers coming out tomorrow on the Jets’ transition numbers and what I’ve been tracking. I will start pumping those out ever 1-2 weeks. If you’re not a paid subscriber, obviously I would biasly suggest the upgrade… but I think you will like that content (and other things planned).