With every passing season, statistical analysis is playing an ever-increasing role in how hockey is played and covered. Knowledge of the underlying numbers can help fans stretch their enjoyment of the game. Acting as an invaluable supplement to traditional analysis, Stat Shot: A Fan’s Guide to Hockey Analytics can be used to test the validity of conventional wisdom and to gain insight into what teams are doing behind the scenes — or maybe what they should be doing! Inspired by Bill James’s Baseball Abstract, Rob Vollman has written a timeless reference of the mainstream applications and limitations of hockey analytics. With over 300 pages of fresh analysis, it includes a guide to the basics, how to place stats into context, how to translate data from one league to another, the most comprehensive glossary of hockey statistics, and more. Whether A Fan’s Guide to Hockey Analytics is used as a primer for today’s new statistics, as a reference for leading edge research and hard-to-find statistical data, or read for its passionate and engaging storytelling, it belongs on every serious fan’s bookshelf. A Fan’s Guide to Hockey Analytics makes advanced stats simple, practical, and fun.

Making advanced stats simple, practical, and fun for hockey fans Advanced stats give hockeyÍs powerbrokers an edge, and now fans can get in on the action. Stat Shot is a fun and informative guide hockey fans can use to understand and enjoy what analytics says about team building, a playerÍs junior numbers, measuring faceoff success, recording save percentage, the most one-sided trades in history, and everything you ever wanted to know about shot-based metrics. Acting as an invaluable supplement to traditional analysis, Stat Shot can be used to test the validity of conventional wisdom, and to gain insight into what teams are doing behind the scenes „ or maybe what they should be doing. Whether looking for a reference for leading-edge research and hard-to-find statistical data, or for passionate and engaging storytelling, Stat Shot belongs on every serious hockey fanÍs bookshelf.

"Slap shot science is an under-the-hood, behind-the-scenes, action-packed romp through special moments in the game as seen from the perspective of science and explained in a way everyone can understand"--Back cover.

Best known for Player Usage Charts and his record-breaking ESPN Insider contributions, Rob Vollman was first published in the fall 2001 issue of the Hockey Research Journal and has since co-authored 10 books in the Hockey Abstract, Hockey Prospectus, and McKeen's magazine series. He writes for NHL.com, and lives in Calgary, Alberta. Tom Awad is a Montreal-based electrical engineer who loves applying numbers to his job, hockey, and anything else he can get his hands on. He has co-authored six previous books on hockey analytics. Iain Fyffe created Hockeythink (originally Puckerings), the first dedicated hockey analytics site, in 2001. He has served as editor of the Hockey Research Journal and was a co-author of the books Hockey Prospectus 2011 and 2012 and Hockey Abstract 2014, as well as the author of On His Own Side of the Puck. He lives in Fredericton, New Brunswick

A follow-up to the 2014 national bestseller Hockey Card Stories, Ken Reid’s new offering presents 59 more stories about your favorite hockey cards from the players themselves. Hockey Card Stories 2 will take you all the way back to the 1960s and right up to the Hockey Card Boom of the 1990s. How did Eric Lindros handle being at the center of the 1990s rookie-card craze? Ever wonder why one tough guy’s Upper Deck card looks more like a High School yearbook picture than a sports card? Of course, once again, there are glorious mullets, errors, and broken noses. There’s even the story of how a rhinoceros and a Hall of Famer ended up on a card together. And as a special bonus, Ken Reid reveals the story behind the chase for his greatest hockey card.

A fraction of a second can be the difference between a one-timer finding the back of the net and a blocked shot that starts transition the other way. In the fast and fluid game of hockey, time and space drive success. But hockey analytics hasn't appreciated these two most important factors. It hasn't respected the complexity of the game...until now. Backed by the findings of an original study never before released to the public, Hockey Analytics demonstrates that-whether it is a failed pinch in the offensive zone, a missed rotation in the defensive zone or other blunder-the vast majority of goals are scored when the defense's positioning is compromised. The authors identify the actions that give players the time and space to read, react and execute. Their findings will shock even the most experienced hockey minds and call into question strategies regularly employed by the game's best coaches. It is simple, actionable and nothing like you've seen before. Whether you're a fan, player or coach, Hockey Analytics will change how you experience hockey.

Terry Ryan was poised to take the hockey world by storm when he was selected eighth overall by the Montreal Canadiens in the 1995 NHL draft, their highest draft pick in a decade. Expected to go on to become a hockey star, Ryan played a total of eight NHL games for the Canadiens, scoring no goals and no assists: not exactly the career he, or anyone else, was expecting. Though Terry's NHL career wasn't long, he experienced a lot and has no shortage of hilarious and fascinating revelations about life in pro hockey on and off the ice. In Tales of a First-Round Nothing, he recounts fighting with Tie Domi, partying with rock stars, and everything in between. Ryan tells it like it is, detailing his rocky relationship with Michel Therrien, head coach of the Canadiens, and explaining what life is like for a man who was unprepared to have his career over so soon.

Iconic baseball writer Bill James, in 1987, frustrated with MLB’s labor stoppages and the decline of the minor leagues, wrote that the minors “were an abomination … if you’re selling a sport and the players don’t care about winning, that’s not a sport. That’s a fraud … an exhibition masquerading as a contest.” Bill imagined a better model and proposed that, as opposed to limiting the number of teams in MLB to protect parity, a free market was capable of sustaining many more franchises — hundreds, even — if we would just allow it to sort out the level at which those cities might best compete. Cap in Hand goes a step further, arguing that a free market in sports teams and athletes once existed and could work again if the monopolists of MLB, NFL, NBA, and NHL would simply relent from salary-restraint schemes and reserve-clause models that result in elite talent being spread as thinly as possible and mediocrity being rewarded via amateur drafts and equalization payments. In fact, the model for this exists and may be the most wildly popular and monetarily successful of all professional sports: European football. Cap In Hand asks: what if the four major North American pro sports move beyond the restrictive covenants of the franchise model? The product sold to fans today is a pale copy of what it might be if the market could guide the best players to the best teams, whose ingenuity and innovation would inspire everyone to do better and put on a better show.

This is the eBook of the printed book and may not include any media, website access codes, or print supplements that may come packaged with the bound book. This up-to-the-minute reference will help you master all three facets of sports analytics — and use it to win! Sports Analytics and Data Science is the most accessible and practical guide to sports analytics for everyone who cares about winning and everyone who is interested in data science. You’ll discover how successful sports analytics blends business and sports savvy, modern information technology, and sophisticated modeling techniques. You’ll master the discipline through realistic sports vignettes and intuitive data visualizations–not complex math. Every chapter focuses on one key sports analytics application. Miller guides you through assessing players and teams, predicting scores and making game-day decisions, crafting brands and marketing messages, increasing revenue and profitability, and much more. Step by step, you’ll learn how analysts transform raw data and analytical models into wins: both on the field and in any sports business.

The speed and skill of a new hockey generation Ñ in photos and stories From the incredible debut of Auston Matthews to the unparalleled speed of Connor McDavid, the NHL is experiencing a rebirth that is based on speed and skill, not size, fighting, or intimidation. Fast Ice: Superstars of the New NHL features profiles of more than 50 of todayÕs greatest stars. Included are veterans like Sidney Crosby and arch-rival Alexander Ovechkin, but the heart of the book is the youth movement that has given fans new optimism for an exciting future. Written by bestselling author Andrew Podnieks and featuring dozens of full-colour photographs, this is sure to be a compelling addition to the hockey loverÕs library.