IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/orinte/v42y2012i2p131-145.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Quantifying the Contribution of NHL Player Types to Team Performance

Author

Listed:
  • Timothy C. Y. Chan

    (Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5S 3G8, Canada)

  • Justin A. Cho

    (Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5S 3G8, Canada)

  • David C. Novati

    (Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5S 3G8, Canada)

Abstract

In this paper, we use k -means clustering to define distinct player types for each of the three positions on a National Hockey League (NHL) team and then use regression to determine a quantitative relationship between team performance and the player types identified in the clustering. Using NHL regular-season data from 2005–2010, we identify four forward types, four defensemen types, and three goalie types. Goalies tend to contribute the most to team performance, followed by forwards and then defensemen. We also show that once we account for salary cap and playing-time information, the value of different player types may become similar. Lastly, we illustrate how to use the regression results to analyze trades and their impact on team performance.

Suggested Citation

  • Timothy C. Y. Chan & Justin A. Cho & David C. Novati, 2012. "Quantifying the Contribution of NHL Player Types to Team Performance," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 42(2), pages 131-145, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:orinte:v:42:y:2012:i:2:p:131-145
    DOI: 10.1287/inte.1110.0612
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/inte.1110.0612
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/inte.1110.0612?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Martin B. Schmidt & David J. Berri, 2001. "Competitive Balance and Attendance," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 2(2), pages 145-167, May.
    2. repec:ucp:bkecon:9780226253268 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Cochran James J & Blackstock Rob, 2009. "Pythagoras and the National Hockey League," Journal of Quantitative Analysis in Sports, De Gruyter, vol. 5(2), pages 1-13, May.
    4. Armann Ingolfsson, 2004. "Simulating NHL Games to Motivate Student Interest in OR/MS," INFORMS Transactions on Education, INFORMS, vol. 5(1), pages 37-46, September.
    5. Claudio Lucifora & Rob Simmons, 2003. "Superstar Effects in Sport," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 4(1), pages 35-55, February.
    6. Donald G. Morrison & Rita D. Wheat, 1986. "Misapplications Reviews: Pulling the Goalie Revisited," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 16(6), pages 28-34, December.
    7. Thomas Andrew C, 2006. "The Impact of Puck Possession and Location on Ice Hockey Strategy," Journal of Quantitative Analysis in Sports, De Gruyter, vol. 2(1), pages 1-19, January.
    8. Charles Fleurent & Jacques A. Ferland, 1993. "Allocating Games for the NHL Using Integer Programming," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 41(4), pages 649-654, August.
    9. John D. Burger & Stephen J. K. Walters, 2003. "Market Size, Pay, and Performance," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 4(2), pages 108-125, May.
    10. J. Colin & H. Jones & Serge Nadeau & William Walsh, 1999. "Ethnicity, productivity and salary: player compensation and discrimination in the National Hockey League," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 31(5), pages 593-608.
    11. Beaudoin, David & Swartz, Tim B., 2010. "Strategies for Pulling the Goalie in Hockey," The American Statistician, American Statistical Association, vol. 64(3), pages 197-204.
    12. Alan Washburn, 1991. "Still More on Pulling the Goalie," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 21(2), pages 59-64, April.
    13. J. Jones & S. Nadeau & W. Walsh, 1997. "The wages of sin: Employment and salary effects of violence in the national hockey league," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 25(2), pages 191-206, June.
    14. Vincent Claude B & Eastman Byron, 2009. "Defining the Style of Play in the NHL: An Application of Cluster Analysis," Journal of Quantitative Analysis in Sports, De Gruyter, vol. 5(1), pages 1-23, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Justin J. Boutilier & Timothy C. Y. Chan, 2023. "Introducing and Integrating Machine Learning in an Operations Research Curriculum: An Application-Driven Course," INFORMS Transactions on Education, INFORMS, vol. 23(2), pages 64-83, January.
    2. Miquel Carreras-Simó & Jaume García, 2022. "Offensive/Defensive Talent and Sporting Success in Football: Evidence From the Big Five European Leagues," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 23(3), pages 251-276, April.
    3. Derek Lanoue, 2015. "Does it pay to win the Stanley Cup?," Working Papers 1502, University of Windsor, Department of Economics.
    4. Pantuso Giovanni, 2017. "The Football Team Composition Problem: a Stochastic Programming approach," Journal of Quantitative Analysis in Sports, De Gruyter, vol. 13(3), pages 113-129, September.
    5. Michael J. Fry & Jeffrey W. Ohlmann, 2012. "Introduction to the Special Issue on Analytics in Sports, Part I: General Sports Applications," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 42(2), pages 105-108, April.
    6. Suzuki, Takahiro & Horita, Masahide, 2024. "Which set of agents plays a key role? An impossibility in transforming binary relations," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 129(C), pages 12-19.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kelly Goossens, 2006. "Competitive balance in european football: comparison by adapting measures: national measure of seasonal imbalance and Top 3," Rivista di Diritto ed Economia dello Sport, Centro di diritto e business dello Sport, vol. 2(2), pages 77-122, Dicembre.
    2. Babatunde Buraimo & David Forrest & Robert Simmons, 2007. "Freedom of Entry, Market Size, and Competitive Outcome: Evidence from English Soccer," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 74(1), pages 204-213, July.
    3. Michal Friesl & Liam J. A. Lenten & Jan Libich & Petr Stehlík, 2017. "In search of goals: increasing ice hockey’s attractiveness by a sides swap," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 68(9), pages 1006-1018, September.
    4. Dennis Coates, 2017. "Returns to Handedness in Professional Hockey," Sports Economics, Management, and Policy, in: Bernd Frick (ed.), Breaking the Ice, pages 41-56, Springer.
    5. Vincent Claude B & Eastman Byron, 2009. "Defining the Style of Play in the NHL: An Application of Cluster Analysis," Journal of Quantitative Analysis in Sports, De Gruyter, vol. 5(1), pages 1-23, January.
    6. M B Wright, 2009. "50 years of OR in sport," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 60(1), pages 161-168, May.
    7. Pelnar, Gregory, 2007. "Antitrust Analysis of Sports Leagues," MPRA Paper 5382, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Stephan Nuesch & Egon Franck, 2009. "The Role of Patriotism in Explaining the TV Audience of National Team Games—Evidence From Four International Tournaments," Journal of Media Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(1), pages 6-19.
    9. Claude Vincent & Byron Eastman, 2009. "Determinants of Pay in the NHL," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 10(3), pages 256-277, June.
    10. Claude Vincent & Byron Eastman, 2012. "Does Player Mobility Lead to Higher Earnings? Evidence from the Nhl," The American Economist, Sage Publications, vol. 57(1), pages 50-64, May.
    11. David J. Berri & Martin B. Schmidt & Stacey L. Brook, 2004. "Stars at the Gate," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 5(1), pages 33-50, February.
    12. John L. Solow & Anthony C. Krautmann, 2007. "Leveling the Playing Field or Just Lowering Salaries? The Effects of Redistribution in Baseball," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 73(4), pages 947-958, April.
    13. B Buraimo & R Simmons, 2006. "Market size and attendance in English Premier League football," Working Papers 574562, Lancaster University Management School, Economics Department.
    14. Timothy C. Y. Chan & Craig Fernandes & Martin L. Puterman, 2021. "Points Gained in Football: Using Markov Process-Based Value Functions to Assess Team Performance," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 69(3), pages 877-894, May.
    15. Leif Brandes & Egon Franck & Stephan Nüesch, 2008. "Local Heroes and Superstars," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 9(3), pages 266-286, June.
    16. Hofmann, Julian & Schnittka, Oliver & Johnen, Marius & Kottemann, Pascal, 2021. "Talent or popularity: What drives market value and brand image for human brands?," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 748-758.
    17. Vecer Jan & Ichiba Tomoyuki & Laudanovic Mladen, 2007. "On Probabilistic Excitement of Sports Games," Journal of Quantitative Analysis in Sports, De Gruyter, vol. 3(3), pages 1-23, July.
    18. Leo Kahane & Neil Longley & Robert Simmons, 2013. "Returns to thuggery in the National Hockey League: the effects of increased enforcement," Chapters, in: Plácido Rodríguez & Stefan Késenne & Jaume García (ed.), The Econometrics of Sport, chapter 5, pages 81-98, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    19. Aniruddha Dutta, 2019. "Capacity Allocation of Game Tickets Using Dynamic Pricing," Data, MDPI, vol. 4(4), pages 1-12, October.
    20. Vincenzo Carrieri & Francesco Principe & Michele Raitano, 2018. "What makes you ‘super-rich’? New evidence from an analysis of football players’ wages," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 70(4), pages 950-973.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inm:orinte:v:42:y:2012:i:2:p:131-145. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.