So this past weekend I was playing around with behindthenet.ca and came onto something pretty neat. If you click “view more rows” at the bottom of the screen and have the settings to “all teams”, you can view every player in the league in a given year. You can then copy and paste whichever stats you want (I like looking at Corsi Rel QoC, Corsi Rel QoT, OZS%, G+A1, CRel---to get a good look at the situations the player was deployed in and how he performed in those situations in both possession and scoring metrics adjusted for time on ice) to excel. You can then do this for every year since 2007-08 for both forwards and defenders and have a serious database.

Using my “Defensive Database” I wanted to find players deployed in situations similar to Kimmo Timonen and compare how Kimmo was holding up against those players. Below are the seven players who have had seasons with 1.0-1.5 CRel QoC, 1.35+ CRel QoT, and O-Zone Start % of 51.1 or higher (2.5% below Kimmo’s 53.6%):

Below is another guy who has been stealing some headlines with his retirement as of late. The only reason he didn’t fit into the original group is because he played with not only better teammates, but also a substantially higher zone start %:

As you can see, Kimmo’s G+A1/60 was higher than everyone in BOTH tables at .65 (the average of only the top group’s G+A1 is only .43). His Corsi Rel is third behind Jason Garrison’s 2011-12 year (which was very impressive) and Nicklas Lidstrom’s 2009-2010 season. Yes, Kimmo is only playing 13.3 minutes/60, but his numbers are clearly the best of any of the all stars on the list. He’s also playing big PK and PP minutes.

If you want to take into account playing under 14 even strength minutes/60, the numbers are just as impressive, although the names on the list are not as impressive. The below table is including players who play less than 14 ESTOI/60, have above average CRel QoC, and are within 2.5% of Kimmo’s 53.6 OZS% or higher:

Of the 19 guys on the list, Kimmo ranks 4th in Corsi Rel at 8.2, well above the average of .37, and 3rd in G+A1 at .65 with the average of .25. Of the three guys with better Corsi scores than Kimmo, he has roughly double all of their G+A1’s, and the two guys who do have better G+A1’s have Corsi scores of 3.5 and -1.3.

Lastly, lets take a look at his past five years:

Over .5 CRQoC every year with OZS% ranging from 47-54%, winning the possession battle four of five years (the only year his Corsi was below 0, his CRQoT was -1.1) and averaging .4 G+A1.

On to the “Offensive Database” to take a look at Claude Giroux’s season and who we can compare his numbers to. Four players had CRQoC of .8-.85, CRQoT above 2.0, and OZS% from 46.6-50.6:

With four more guys with similar metrics except they had slightly worse teammates:

Oddly enough, Giroux’s 2010-11 situtaions were nearly identical to his 2011-12’s situations. Richie pops up on that list also. Although his 2011-12 Corsi Rel was slightly below the group’s 9.78 average, his 2.0 G+A1 for both years are substantially the best numbers of either group.

(Side: Those who don’t think CRQoT is important, the average CRel and G+A1 of the group with 2.0+ teammates was 1.66 G+A1 and 9.78 CRel. The group with teammates from 0-2.0: 1.41 G+A1 and a CRel of 9.78.)

His G+A1 numbers were so impressive I decided to see how they ranked against everyone who played competition greater than +.5 and had an OZS% less than 50%. Claude, yet again, stood out:

Only eight players since the 2007-08 season generated more offence than Claude Giroux. He was number 9 and 10, the only player to show up twice in the top-10. Yes his CRQoT is better than the majority of the rest of the top-10, his CRQoC score’s are 2nd and 3rd highest. Claude’s Corsi scores also stand out. The average Corsi Rel of players ranking 1-8 was 3.74, Claude was 14.1 last year and 6.9 this year, good for 2nd and 4th respectively among the top-10.

Here are his career numbers:

Ever since his 2009-10 post season, Claude Giroux has been simply fantastic in any metric you can find. He’s dominating top competition and is showing no signs of stopping.

What do you guys think?