Drawing penalties a valuable NHL skill If there’s an individual skill that really remains underutilized by analysts and fans right now, it’s the ability of a player to draw penalties for his respective team. TSN analytics writer Travis Yost finds the forwards who have been the best and worst at that part of the game.

If there’s an individual skill that really remains underutilized by analysts and fans right now, it’s the ability of a player to draw penalties for his respective team. While the vast majority of a hockey game is played at even-strength, there is still a swath of goals scored on special teams. Getting your team into that position, of course, has value.

Most importantly, drawing penalties has been identified as something of a repeatable talent, meaning that players who exhibit ability to consistently draw penalties will likely continue to do so. Broad Street Hockey investigated this in great detail in 2013, and concluded that drawing penalties is a “real talent that a player possesses”.

The one caveat to drawing penalties as it pertains to goal differentials (and, ultimately, adding wins to the standings) is that the inverse is also true – players who take a lot of penalties cost their team valuable goals. So, drawing penalties has value, but it’s only valuable to the extent that the player does not give those penalties back in the form of penalties against.

Let’s try and identify some of the league’s best and worst players on this front. For the sake of this article, we’ll limit our focus to the forward position for all regular skaters 2011-Present. We will pull each player’s total number of penalties drawn, and each player’s total number of penalties taken.

Here’s our top-ten, sorted by differential:

FORWARD PENALTY DIFFERENTIAL LEADERS SINCE 2011 PLAYER TEAM PEN. DRAWN PEN. TAKEN DIFFERENTIAL Jeff Skinner Carolina 97 30 +67 Dustin Brown Los Angeles 102 39 +63 Nazem Kadri Toronto 85 34 +51 Matt Duchene Colorado 57 12 +45 Darren Helm Detroit 50 8 +42 Mikkel Boedker Arizona 55 14 +41 Martin St. Louis N.Y. Rangers 54 14 +40 John Tavares N.Y. Islanders 68 30 +38 Vladimir Tarasenko St. Louis 48 11 +37 Patric Hornqvist Pittsburgh 55 18 +37

Those are some massively favourable numbers, even accounting for the fact that the sample spans multiple years. But, maybe there’s a better way to capture the impact the player is having. What if we substituted penalties drawn for goals added (simply by multiplying total number of goals and power-play conversion rate, which sits at 18%), and then doing the same for goals added?

PENALTY DIFFERENTIAL AS GOAL VALUE, 2011-PRESENT PLAYER TEAM EST. GOALS ADDED EST. GOALS AGAINST DIFFERENTIAL Jeff Skinner Carolina 17.5 5.4 +12.1 Dustin Brown Los Angeles 18.4 7.0 +11.3 Nazem Kadri Toronto 15.3 6.1 +9.2 Matt Duchene Colorado 10.3 2.2 +8.1 Darren Helm Detroit 9.0 1.4 +7.6 Mikkel Boedker Arizona 9.9 2.5 +7.4 Martin St. Louis N.Y. Rangers 9.7 2.5 +7.2 John Tavares N.Y. Islanders 12.2 5.4 +6.8 Vladimir Tarasenko St. Louis 8.6 2.0 +6.7 Patric Hornqvist Pittsburgh 9.9 3.2 +6.7

You can see that Jeff Skinner and Dustin Brown (and Nazem Kadri, too) really are the cream of the crop as it pertains to drawing penalties. If you subscribe to the notion that three goals is worth a point in the standings, then they have added four points (or two wins) on just the ability to draw penalties.

Think of this alternatively: if Jeff Skinner or Dustin Brown had no measurable impact (let’s say zero points over the same timespan), they still would have added about four points in the standings from just a penalty point of view.

Let’s look at the other end of the spectrum – the forwards who have hurt their teams the most from a penalty aspect. Again, we will focus on differential as opposed to just penalties taken, as it will give us a better idea as to the larger impact on goals and wins/losses.

FORWARD PENALTY DIFFERENTIAL TRAILERS, 2011-PRESENT PLAYER TEAM PENALTIES DRAWN PENALTIES TAKEN DIFFERENTIAL Chris Neil Ottawa 40 85 -45 Ryan Reaves St. Louis 28 66 -38 Jarret Stoll Los Angeles 27 62 -35 Milan Lucic Boston 42 72 -30 Kyle Clifford Los Angeles 44 72 -28 Matt Hendricks Edmonton 50 78 -28 B.J. Crombeen Arizona 31 55 -24 Todd Bertuzzi None 16 39 -23 Zenon Konopka None 31 53 -22 Cody McLeod Colorado 41 63 -22

A lot of the league’s tough guys can be found on this list, from Chris Neil, to Ryan Reaves, to the notorious Milan Lucic. What’s important to remember is that not all ‘tough guys’ sit at the bottom of the penalty differential lists.

For example, Brandon Prust (+1) and Antoine Roussel (+2) have long played the aggressive agitator role for their respective teams. Yet, neither has hurt his club from a penalty impact. That’s largely because they have been either more effective in reducing bad penalties, or more effective in enticing the opposition to take penalties through said agitation.

How does our top group look from a goal aspect?

PENALTY DIFFERENTIAL AS GOAL VALUE, 2011-PRESENT PLAYER TEAM EST. GOALS ADDED EST. GOALS AGAINST DIFFERENTIAL Chris Neil Ottawa 7.2 15.3 -8.1 Ryan Reaves St. Louis 5.0 11.9 -6.9 Jarret Stoll Los Angeles 4.9 11.2 -6.3 Milan Lucic Boston 7.6 13.0 -5.4 Kyle Clifford Los Angeles 7.9 13.0 -5.0 Matt Hendricks Edmonton 9.0 14.0 -5.0 B.J. Crombeen Arizona 5.6 9.9 -4.3 Todd Bertuzzi None 2.9 7.0 -4.1 Zenon Konopka None 5.6 9.5 -4.0 Cody McLeod Colorado 7.4 11.3 -4.0

So, again, view this through the prism of the impact penalties – and penalties only – have had on outcomes. Chris Neil and Ryan Reaves have cost their respective teams about two to three points in the standings. This, again, is just a sliver of the player’s overall impact (whether it’s been good or bad) on his team’s performance.

From a penalty aspect, this group has had an unfavourable impact on their team’s position in the standings. Combine the penalty differentials to what we know about each player’s multi-year shot-differential and scoring-differentials, and you can get an even stronger idea about the player's impact on the game.