Name: Jake Gardiner

Height: 6’02

Weight: 184 lbs

Experience: 4th Pro Season

Cap Hit: $4,050,000

Stats: 69GP, 3G, 18A, 20PIM, -22

See below for all advanced stats formulas. It helps!

Corsi Relative: 11.8

– A Corsi relative score of 11.8 indicates that the Toronto Maple Leafs get 11.8 MORE shot attempts than their opponents when he is on the ice (60 minute measurement) as opposed to when he is off the ice.

– This number ranks Jake Gardiner first among Maple Leafs defenceman. The knock on Gardiner for the past few years is that he has been sheltered and thus is able to put up quality possession numbers. This logic will prove to be somewhat false as we look at his quality of competition and zone starts.

PDO: 981

– The average PDO for an NHL player should hover somewhere around 1000 (or 100%).

– This metric is derived from the fact that the on-ice shooting percentage of your team, added to the sv% of the opposing goalie, should equal to 1.000 (.920 sv% + 0.08 sh%).

– Jake Gardiner’s shooting percentage is sitting at 3.3% for the season, almost half of his career average of 6.3%, which indicates that his PDO is suffering due to some poor luck in the offensive zone. If Gardiner had put up a similar number to his 7.4% last season, we could be talking about a double digit goal scorer.

Relative Quality of Competition: -0.162

– Jake Gardiner has the fourth highest QoC Rel among Maple Leafs defenceman, indicating that he is playing against the opposing teams second best line. We should note that Korbinian Holzer has only played 33 games, so if we remove him from the analysis Gardiner moves to third among Leafs dmen.

– This helps to somewhat quiet the argument that Gardiner only plays against the oppositions weakest lines. Gardiner would no doubt see some regression on his Corsi Rel if he were to be deployed as a #2 dman but he fits in quite nicely as a #3 and a power play quarterback, with the potential to grow in the coming seasons.

– It should be noted that the Leafs are a -41 on the season (as a team) so Gardiner’s poor +/- is somewhat a result of that. The other reason is that he plays a high risk/reward game and his turnovers can often prove to be very costly for the Leafs.



On/Off Ice +/-: -0.10

On Ice +/- per 60 Minutes: -0.62

Off Ice +/- per 60 Minutes: -0.52

– The Toronto Maple Leafs even strength +/- worsened by 0.10 goals per 60 minutes when Jake Gardiner was on the ice as opposed to when he was not.

– It is becoming quite clear that despite possessing the ability to control the puck, Gardiner is playing far too much reckless abandon and needs to take care of his own end before worrying about scoring.

Face-Off Zone Starts:

Offensive Zone Start: 48.9% of the time. (Finishes there 48.6%)

– Jake Gardiner is used in a relatively even split between offensive and defensive zone starts.

– This number jumped by 5% year-over-year mainly due to the fact that the Leafs, as a team, have started more plays with an offensive zone face-off.

Top Linemate: James Van Riemsdyk

– I kid you not, Jake Gardiner plays 30.1% of his shifts with JVR (at 5 on 5) which further validates the fact that Tyler Bozak’s line is regularly being deployed against the other teams second line.

– The top defensive pairing for Gardiner was himself and Korbinian Holzer at just over 20% of his 5 on 5 shifts.

NEW: Relative Performance Analysis

– A new feature in the advanced stats series will be analyzing the performance of a player relative to his peers at his position. The chart below provides ice-time, goals, assists, possession and more, relative to the other NHL players.

– Gardiner’s tableau seems to validate a lot of what we have seen in his advanced stats analysis, he plays as the Leafs third defenceman, his possession statistics are off the charts and his points are struggling due to some bad luck with this shooting %.

Conclusion:

– What’s apparent from this analysis is that Jake Gardiner possesses a natural ability to carry and possess the puck.

– The theory that he is playing against weaker competition seems to fly in the face of what his advanced analytics and quality of competition say. He is regularly deployed as the team’s #3 dman and he possesses the puck like that of a top pairing player.

– With a little more offensive zone luck Gardiner would be on track for a much better offensive season but we can still look at the positives of his play with the puck.

– What is becoming abundantly clear is that Ron Wilson was not far off when he indicated that Gardiner played a game resembling something like pond hockey. His -22 rating on the season needs to be improved next season and whether that comes from a commitment to defensive hockey or just turning the puck over less (Gardiner is a team worst -31 in giveaway/takeaway this season) it is quite that something needs to change in order for him to take the next step and become a top pairing dman.

FUTURE: Should be part of the core group going forward. Contract is reasonable and he clearly has the opportunity to take an additional step forward in his career.

Stay tuned for the next installment of Maple Leafs Advanced Stats Analysis featuring Leafs forward Peter Holland.

– Brandon Finley

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Thanks to Behind The Net for compiling the Advanced Stats.

Thank you to Own The Puck for the tableau visuals.

Legend:

Corsi Number = (Shots on Target For + Missed Shots For + Blocked Shots Against ) – (Shots on Target Against + Missed Shots Against + Blocked Shots For)

Corsi Relative = (Corsi Number of Player X) – (Corsi of Team with player X not on the ice)

On/Off Ice +/- = (On Ice +/- per 60 minutes) – (Off Ice +/- per 60 minutes)

Corsi Relative QoC = The weighted relative corsi of a player’s opposition