Another look at the numbers and whether the Jets should be concerned

Yesterday we discussed: how concerned the Jets should be with their early defensive numbers?

The Jets last season were one of the most dominant 5-on-5 teams, outscoring opponents (controlling 53.1 per cent of goals) while out-attempting opponents as well (controlling 53.2 per cent of shot attempts).

The Jets this season have outscored (controlling 58.8 per cent of goals) but they have been out attempted (controlling 49.5 per cent of shot attempts).

Let’s talk about this…

Well, the truth is no one has to care about anything. It’s only optional… but there are legitimate reasons why people like myself care about certain numbers.

It is not numbers for the sake of numbers. We don’t care about stats just because we like stats. We like these stats because we like winning.

Yesterday someone commented to the article with the wise words that “W’s and L’s are ALL that counts.”

Which is 100% correct. In the end, the game is about winning.

The reason why we care about these numbers though is we too care about winning. Simply put, these numbers tell you how strong a team is better than a team’s record. We know this because these numbers predict future goals and wins better than past goals (and therefore wins) do.

In other words, the Jets 4-2-0 record is more about how many games they *did* win; the Jets underlying numbers like control of shot attempts is more about how many games they *will* win.

If the Jets are controlling less in shot attempts and useful possession, then some players are obviously not playing as well as they have in the past.

We can see here that there are some fairly large discrepancies, many of which we probably don’t expect to last.

It is incredibly rare for players to exist outside of the 40-60 spread, so already there we expect some bounce back from Adam Lowry and Alex Burmistrov, as well as some recoil from Mark Scheifele and Mathieu Perreault.

The defender numbers are a bit more reasonable, which makes sense since defenders are on the ice more and so have larger sample sizes.

There has been some concern about the play of Jacob Trouba and Tobias Enstrom, and there could be some legitimacy to it. I do expect both to bounce back somewhat though.

The most interesting note though is Tyler Myers. Myers, unlike his compatriot Drew Stafford, has done much better in Winnipeg than how he performed in Buffalo.

While the Jets haven’t done that well and there can be some concern there, it is just to early. It’s not like the Jets have performed this poorly or worse under small spurts.

The graph above shows the Jets rolling five-game average in shot attempt differential.

The Jets have been here before and have been worse before, including the start of last season where they were a dominant even strength team.

It’s still early, so how about we revisit after game #15.