Defense is probably the most difficult position to properly rank players, because their impact goes well beyond goals, assists and plus/minus, the simple objective statistics.
The New Jersey Devils, not usually involved in high stakes deals, got themselves one of the most prolific goal scorers of the last decade in Ilya Kovalchuk.
The Final Four is now set, but which players have had the greatest individual success through the first two rounds of the 2009 Stanley Cup Playoffs?
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In the NBA, there is a thin line between scorers and pure shooters. Allen Iverson has made a career as a "volume" scorer while guys like Tony Parker (48.7 shooting percentage) and Steve Nash (48.5%) have scored their points efficiently thanks to good shot selection and aim.
A similar concept can be adapted to the NHL when taking a look at the league's top goal-scorers through the season's first two months.
Through Saturday's action, Philadelphia's Jeff Carter and Buffalo's Thomas Vanek were tied for the league lead in goals with 24, but the Flyers' center had recorded 23 more shots on goal.
The NHL's top-50 goal scorers this season range from Carter and Vanek's 24 to the twelve players tied for 12 goals. That twelve-goal range is nothing when you compare the shots attempted by the players within my data set. Alexander Ovechkin has 195 shots on goal, while Kyle Wellwood has just 37. That's a much larger differential, in case you have difficulty with numbers.
Let's take a deeper look into how efficiently these players have tickled the twine this season.
The Big Four Jeff Carter, PHI: 24 G, 143 SOG 16.8%
Thomas Vanek, BUF: 24 G, 120 SOG 20%
Phil Kessel, BOS: 21 G, 105 SOG 20%
Alexander Ovechkin, WSH: 20 G, 195 SOG 10.3%
Ovechkin has the third-lowest shooting percentage of the fifty players I studied, while Vanek and Kessel both rank in the top-ten. Carter, who scored a career-high 29 goals for the Flyers last season, will likely set a new watermark shortly after the New Year. Ovechkin led the league with 65 goals last year on 446 shots. That was thanks to a 14.6% percentage, more than four points higher than this season's average.
The Puck Is Their Friend Ovechkin, WSH: 195 SOG, 20 G 10.3%
Dustin Brown, LAK: 152 SOG, 13 G 8.6%
Carter, PHI: 143 SOG, 24 G 16.8%
Eric Staal, CAR: 141 SOG, 13 G 9.2%
Marian Hossa, DET: 136 SOG, 17 G 12.5%
It's not surprising to see two of the league's top scorers among the players with the most shot attempts, but Dustin Brown and Eric Staal are in need or either some help on offense, or a keener eye. Brown is on pace for more than 400 shots on goal and about thirty biscuits in the basket. He's on his way to being the Antoine Walker of the NHL.
Wellwood, a four-year veteran, had a 14.0% shooting percentage last season, which was a career-high. He's young enough that growth may have been enjoyed, but he's actually seeing less ice time per game than he did two years ago. Needless to say, it's highly unlikely that he'll maintain such an amazing percentage.
A combination of Gagne's good shot selection and the balanced offense of the Flyers -- they have four players in the league's top-50 -- means that he could very well hover above the 20% mark all season long. However, his previous career high came in 2002 when he converted 16.6% of his shots into goals.
None of the seven players in my "Marksmen" category have ever finished a season with a percentage anywhere near 20%. Only two players with more than a handful of goals (Mike Ribeiro and Brad Boyes) were above that mark last season. Ribeiro netted 27 goals with a 25.2 shot percentage while Boyes had 43 on 20.8% shooting.
Despite the inaccuracy of these six players, only Brown's Kings are under .500 at a respectable 13-14-6 through Saturday's action. Lecavalier (12.9), Zetterberg (13.3), Staal (11.6) and Ovechkin (12.6) all have career percentages considerably higher than their marks this season.
In Need Of A Sharing Lesson Ovechkin: 195 SOG, 1,072 Washington Shots 18%
Brown: 152 SOG, 974 Los Angeles Shots 16%
Carter: 143 SOG, 917 Philadelphia Shots 16%
Staal: 141 SOG, 1,026 Carolina Shots 14%
Zach Parise, NJD: 128 SOG, 946 New Jersey Shots 14%
Evgeni Malkin, PIT: 111 SOG, 882 Pittsburgh Shots 13%
There's a look at what percentage of their team's shots some of the leading goal-scorers have taken. Even with the emergence of some of his Washington teammates, Ovechkin is still taking nearly one-fifth of their shots. I'm not trying to criticize "Alexander The Great" -- honest -- but numbers don't lie.
Active Shooting Leaders 1. Alex Tanguay 19.4%
2. Gary Roberts 18.5%
3. Andrew Brunette 17.9%
4. Mark Parrish 17.5%
5. Tomas Holmstrom 16.8%
6. Brenden Morrow 16%
7. Dany Heatley 16%
8. Thomas Vanek 15.9%
9. Daniel Briere 15.8%
10. Jeremy Roenick 15.7%
I decided to throw in the NHL's top-ten active shooters, and you'll notice that Mr. Vanek ranks eighth. He has found the net on 20% of his shots this season, which ranks him in the top-ten of the league. Despite the gaudy early-season efficiency numbers of guys like Wellwood, Eriksson, Kozlov, Semin and Frolov, it's hard to argue against Vanek as the most efficient offensive player in the league right now.
Andrew Perna is a Senior Writer for RealGM.com and co-host of RealGMs Radio Show. Please feel free to contact him with comments or questions via e-mail: Andrew.Perna@RealGM.com
