On the Prowl: Week of 7/28

It's been quite a while since we've had one of these, but now that the true dull days of the NHL offseason have hit us, OTP is back. This week, there's just an immense amount of articles, due to the fact that I've had a couple editions stockpiled and they happen to still be relevant. Hopefully work goes a little quicker today, eh?

THINGS WE'VE MISSED

• Driving the bus in terms of Corsi is something that some players are good at, and some players are not. In this four part series, we get to see a team by team, position by position breakdown that shows us just who drove the bus in the NHL last season (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4)
• The growth of hockey analytics is something that has both been hoped for and against. Where will analytics stand in the NHL not only next season, but in the future?
• When the NHL schedule was released, certain teams gained automatic advantages over the rest of the league.
• Was the 2013-2014 NHL season fun? The players seem to think so. (Which is good; this is a game. An over glorified game of fetch. Players should never stop playing for love of the game.)
• How not to rebuild, courtesy of the Edmonton Oilers.
• The NHL is an interesting business; Tanner Glass, a big man with little hockey talent, makes more than Lee Stempniak, a smaller man with decent hockey talent. Maybe GM's need to start spending smarter?
• Why is the use of statistics in the NHL today so hard to pinpoint?

ANALYTICS

• This comes from a conversation I had with SashaSaves16 on a previous comment board. He had mentioned something about how certain players can free up other players in a way that benefits the overall possession and skill of the team. A deeper look into all the stats show that it's possible, and that possession needs perspective as well as straight up analysis.
• Speaking of which, there's a great new stat out that measures some of that perspective; it's not perfect, but it works pretty well and it's the best we've got.
• Maybe there is such a thing as "clutch", and maybe there isn't. I tend to believe that lucky is a better word for clutch, and the statistics seem to say so as well.
• To say that the hockey world has been shaken by the hiring of Theo Epstein comparable "whiz kid" Kyle Dubas is an understatement; but he's not just a "stats guy".
• On that note, the so-called statistical revolution that is occurring in hockey is being blown out of proportion, says a baseball expert who went through the moneyball era.
• Hits are good, right? A player who consistently grinds the opposition into oblivion is a guy I want on my team, right? Ehhhh.... Not necessarilly... /

AROUND THE LEAGUE

• Uh, yeah. The Dallas Stars are starting to look pretty good.
• Oh, WIkipedia, how you manage to both educate and entertain us at the same time truly is a marvel of modern technology. Each NHL team's Wikipedia page provides us with some delightfully humorous information about the franchise.
• Bargain signings are every GM's dream, especially when the risk pays off. Are they really all that meaningful, though?
• Global warming spells out a dark future for the sport of hockey if it's allowed to go on unchecked.
• General managers love players who win, and here is proof of that.
• Hockey is a perfect game, but the rules that players have to follow on the ice could sometimes use tweaking. Which parts of the NHL rulebook could really use a makeover?
• I really could not agree more./

PANTHERS NEWS

• A piece of news that legitimately starts to throw some fire into the relocation rumors; Viola's company "Virtu Financial" is under investigation by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, specifically in relation to high frequency trading strategies.
• Rocco Grimaldi and Vincent Trocheck really make a great pair; smaller, skilled forwards who hail from the U.S. of A. and have battled adversity to give themselves a shot at the NHL.
• A quick review of Panthers prospects in the OHL; is Juho Lammikko going to move from Europe to the CHL?