12 ways to fix the NHL's draft lottery

With the playoff race coming down to the wire and the battle for top seeding in each conference raging on, the most anticipated game on last night’s schedule may have been the one between the two worst teams in the league. The Coyotes and Sabres met in a rematch of last week’s showdown, one that ended with Sabres fans cheering an overtime goal against their own team.

All of that is ridiculous, and it’s a situation the NHL had to know was coming. By going with a draft lottery system that guarantees the last-place team a top-two pick in a draft with two franchise players, the league all but guaranteed that things would get silly as we came down to the wire. The Sabres have been widely accused of tanking their entire season to ensure they get one of those two picks, and the Coyotes have given them a run for their money by trading away just about everyone with a pulse as the season wore on. Meanwhile, fans of other miserable teams like the Oilers and Maple Leafs watch with envy, wishing their teams could drop into the race for dead last. The whole thing is a mess, and the league should be embarrassed.

But while it’s easy enough to second-guess the NHL’s handling of the situation, I’m going to invoke my long-standing rule of hockey criticism: You don’t get to complain unless you can offer up a better idea. Luckily, when it comes to assigning draft order, there are plenty of other options available to the league. Some of those involve tweaks to the current way of doing things, others offer more radical changes, and still others discard the existing system entirely and come at the problem from a whole new angle.

You won’t like every idea below, but you’ll probably think at least a few of them would be improvements over what we’re stuck with now. So here are a dozen ways the NHL could go about the business of handing out draft picks, ranked in order from the least to most disruptive.

Option 1: Just keep things the way they are

We’ll start with the status quo. As a reminder, here’s how the system works today: All 14 teams that miss the playoffs are entered into a lottery, with the worst team getting the best shot at winning (20 percent) and the odds dropping from there. Whichever team wins moves up to the first overall pick, with everyone else slotted in based on the reverse of the final standings (meaning nobody can drop more than one spot).

And maybe that’s fine. After all, not everyone thinks the current system is a disaster. And even those who’d agree that this year’s silliness is a bad look for the league might argue that that’s mainly a result of a fairly unique set of circumstances — i.e., two blue-chip franchise players in the same draft. That’s a reasonably rare situation — the last time we’ve seen this sort of top two was probably back in 2004, when Alexander Ovechkin and Evgeni Malkin came in — so maybe there’s no need to panic over a problem that won’t be anywhere near as pronounced most seasons.

Biggest advantage: It would certainly be the easiest solution.

Biggest objection: The league has already decided against this approach, as we’ll see in the next section.

Option 2: The same basic system, but we draw more than one winner

What if we kept the same general idea behind the current system — a weighted lottery involving all the non-playoff teams, with the same set of odds tilted in favor of those that finished further down in the standings — but drew more than one winning number? Like, purely for the sake of argument, three?

That would mean you’d have three lottery winners, and they’d get the first three picks in the draft. Other teams could drop as many as three spots, so the team that finished in last place overall could end up picking as far down as fourth.

A system like that wouldn’t eliminate tanking, and it wouldn’t discourage fans from rooting against their own team to get better odds. But it would at least reduce the incentive to mount an all-out campaign to finish dead last, and it would prevent a situation like this year, when the reward for being terrible is a guaranteed chance to draft a franchise player.

Biggest advantage: The NHL has already decided to do it. The system I just described was approved last summer, and will go into effect next season.

Biggest objection: Other than not going far enough, the biggest problem with the league’s new system is that the NHL didn’t implement it for this season. That was understandable — you could argue that it’s unfair to shift the odds around on short notice — but in hindsight, the league should have pushed to get the change done before the offseason started. Don’t like it, bad teams? Make some moves and don’t finish dead last.

Option 3: Keep the weighted lottery, but establish a floor

This is a relatively new idea; I saw it for the first time a few weeks ago in a post on a Coyotes blog. Essentially, you’d keep the existing system, but establish a minimum points threshold that teams would have to hit to be eligible for the draft lottery. Maybe it’s a firm number, or maybe it shifts based on how the league as a whole is performing, but the core idea remains the same: If a team can’t meet that minimum threshold of on-ice respectability, then it loses its eligibility for the lottery.

Biggest advantage: Teams couldn’t blatantly tank if they knew they had to maintain some minimal degree of competitiveness. And you’d occasionally get late-season situations in which bad teams had to win their way into the lottery, which would be fun to watch.

Biggest objection: We’d probably spend the entire offseason arguing over what exactly the cutoff should be. And while we all hate tankers, sometimes a team finishes last because it really did get hit by a massive wave of bad luck; those teams could end up missing the cutoff even though they weren’t trying to tank.

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Weekend wrap: The letters have arrived

A look back at the biggest games and emerging story lines of the NHL weekend.

Theme of the Week: X Marks the Spot

This weekend marked a big milestone in the NHL season, one that fans look forward to every year: the day the X starts showing up on the league’s standings page.

That would be the X that signifies that a team has mathematically clinched a playoff spot. It showed up for the first time on Sunday, next to the Canadiens, Rangers, Ducks, and Predators. The Blues and Lightning will get theirs as early as today, and by this time next week, we should have at least half of the 16 playoff teams locked in.

After the X comes the Y, denoting teams that have clinched their division. The Ducks will get one soon, having run away with the surprisingly lackluster Pacific, and the Rangers have started to pull away on the rest of the Metro. The Atlantic and Central are different stories, and we may not see those clinched until the final weekend. We’ll also have to wait on the Z (top seed in the conference) and the P (for the Presidents’ Trophy — more on that one down below).

But in any case, that nice, clean standings page you’ve been looking at all season is gone now, replaced by the annual descent into alphabet soup. And that’s a good thing, because it means the end of the regular season is in sight. And pretty soon, we can ditch the standings altogether and bring on the playoff brackets.

(But sadly, the NHL still won’t give us a badge-of-shame letter for the teams that have been officially eliminated from the playoffs. Wouldn’t fit with the league’s “everyone’s a winner” motif, I suppose. You’ll have to look elsewhere to find those.)

On to this week’s power rankings …

Cup Watch: The League’s Five Best

The five teams that seem most likely to earn the league’s top prize: the Stanley Cup.

5. Anaheim Ducks (49-22-7, plus-8 goals differential) With the Pacific almost clinched, now may be the time to rest up for the postseason. The Ducks have a league-low four games left, and all of those are against non-playoff teams.

4. Montreal Canadiens (47-21-8, plus-28) They’ve cooled off slightly, failing to pick up a regulation win in their last three, and host the Lightning tonight in a game that could determine the top seed in the Atlantic.

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Grab bag: The Goon hits the ring

In this week's grab bag:
- We play our annual round of "Do you actually understand how the wildcard works?"
- An obscure player who boasts a weird post-hockey invention that you see just about everyday
- Introducing a new word to describe the sinking feeling that your team's rivals for the last playoff spot will always play three-point games
- The week's three comedy stars
- And a YouTube review of the time the WWE tried its hand at hockey, as we relive the glory that was The Goon

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17 nights left to go: A detailed ranking of the rest of the NHL schedule

It’s a busy night on the NHL schedule, one of just 17 left in the regular season. With tight playoff races in both conferences and first place in three of the four divisions still up for grabs, there’s going to be compelling action just about every night the rest of the way.

For some of you, that’s great — you can pretty much get comfortable on the couch now and settle in for the next few weeks. But if work, family, or other commitments mean you need to be a little more selective in your hockey viewing, now is the time to plan ahead. And because I’m here to help, I went through every night of the remaining schedule to figure out which games will be must-see TV and which ones you can go ahead and skip. Get out your calendars and a highlighter or two, because here we go.

Thursday, March 26 — 11 games

The can’t-miss matchup: Coyotes at Sabres — It says something about this tank-fest of a season that this is the night’s most intriguing matchup, and that something probably isn’t good, but here we are. The Sabres and Coyotes are going down to the wire for 30th place, and they play twice in the next five nights. Will either team try? Will they both start their backup goalies? Will any Sabre who scores a goal be immediately beaten over the head with a shovel by Tim Murray? I honestly can’t wait.

Other good options: Ducks at Bruins and Rangers at Senators (the two teams fighting for the East’s final wild-card spot both host Presidents’ Trophy candidates); Predators at Lightning (a game that would have passed for a Stanley Cup preview six weeks ago, and might still be); Sharks at Wings (what may be a showdown between the two best available coaches this offseason); Kings at Islanders (L.A.’s tough road trip continues); Canadiens at Jets (yet another Presidents’ Trophy candidate trying to squash a wild-card hopeful).

No thanks: Panthers at Maple Leafs — Is Rob Tallas suiting up again? No? Pass.

Entertainment quotient: 8/10 — Lots going on tonight. We’re off to a good start.

Friday, March 27 — Three games

The can’t-miss matchup: Flames at Wild — Two teams scrambling for the West’s final playoff spots meet, and fans of the teams chasing them know what that means: guaranteed three-point game night!

Other good options: Blue Jackets at Blackhawks (I know, I know, but at least one is a playoff team).

No thanks: Stars at Oilers — Two non-playoff teams makes this one meaningless, although the potential for a 9-8 final is vaguely intriguing.

Entertainment quotient: 2/10 — Welp. They can’t all be winners.

Saturday, March 28 — 13 games

The can’t-miss matchup: Kings at Wild — The defending champs are on shaky ground to get back into the playoffs, and they’ll face one of the wild-card teams they’re chasing during a brutal five-game road trip.

Other good options: Rangers at Bruins (an Original Six matchup between teams headed in opposite directions); Lightning at Red Wings (a possible first-round preview of a series we’d all agree to call the Steve Yzerman Cup); Ducks at Islanders (two very good teams that usually play entertaining games); Predators at Capitals (in which Washington fans spend the whole game wishing they could someday draft a rookie as good as Filip Forsberg).

No thanks: Devils at Hurricanes — Two teams that are bad, but not bad enough to be in contention for 30th. By the way, fair warning: Both teams are going to show up a lot in this section.

Entertainment quotient: 8/10 — Lots of games, some of them excellent, most of them decent. What else were you going to do on a Saturday night?

Sunday, March 29 — Eight games

The can’t-miss matchup: Panthers at Senators — I know, I’m as surprised as you are. But these teams are chasing the East’s final wild-card spot, and there’s only room for one. This is probably as close to a must-win as you can get in March, especially for the Panthers.

Other good options: Red Wings at Islanders (two solid Eastern playoff teams); Blackhawks at Jets (a sneaky important Central matchup); Capitals at Rangers (looking more and more like a first-round preview); Flames at Predators (facing off for the “teams I was most inexcusably wrong about” championship).

No thanks: Ducks at Devils — It’s the awesome team with shaky goaltending versus the shaky team with awesome goaltending. Spoiler alert: The Ducks win a one-goal game.

Entertainment quotient: 7/10 — With eight games, there isn’t a busier Sunday this season.

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The Calgary Flames vs. the numbers

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: There’s an NHL hockey team that’s not all that good according to the numbers, yet somehow keeps winning. The stats guys say that it can’t possibly continue, that we’ve seen this movie before, and that history tells us the ending won’t be happy. But others aren’t so sure, wondering if maybe, just maybe, this is the team that’s figured out a way to beat the system.

Unless you’re brand new to hockey, you have indeed heard this one before, and you’ve heard it more than once. Four years ago, it was the Dallas Stars. The year after that, it was the Minnesota Wild. Last year we had two teams, the Colorado Avalanche and the Toronto Maple Leafs, offering different interpretations of the same role. All of them seemed to be defying the numbers. All of them eventually crashed back down to earth.

This year’s overachiever is the Calgary Flames. Heading into the season, they weren’t expected to be very good. And 73 games in, they haven’t been — at least according to many of today’s most-used stats, which rely on proxies for puck possession to determine which teams are most likely to experience sustained success. The more you have the puck, the more you should win. It doesn’t always work out that way in the short term, as factors like goaltending, special teams, and just plain luck can get in the way. But wait long enough, and your possession numbers catch up to you. They always do. We’ve been down this road before. We know what’s coming. We’ve seen it all before, over and over again, for years.

So why do this year’s Flames seem like they’re different?

Let’s start with the numbers. By now you’re sick to death of hearing about hockey’s new wave of advanced stats, most of which aren’t especially advanced at all. The new thinking has redefined hockey analysis, invaded NHL front offices, and started showing up in even the oldest of old-school media coverage. At a basic level, those numbers tend to focus on possession rates, a relatively new approach that turns out to tell us plenty about a hockey team.

And what it seems to tell us is this: A team’s possession numbers are just about the single best predictor we have of future success. If you woke up from a coma three-quarters into an NHL season and were forced at gunpoint to pick the teams with the best chance at winning the Stanley Cup using only one stat, you’d want a look at the possession numbers. Ideally, you’d want those numbers to be for even strength and in close situations only, or even better, score-adjusted. Those are important distinctions, but to keep things simple, we’re just going to lump everything together as “possession” today. Possession numbers typically predict the future better than anything else — better than goals scored or allowed, better than shooting or save percentages, better even than wins and losses. A big part of that is that possession numbers tend to be much more consistent than other stats, which rely on smaller sample sizes and can fluctuate wildly from game to game and from week to week.

So possession tends to equal wins. Which you’d expect, when you think about it — a hockey team that can maintain a 55 percent–45 percent edge in possession is like a baseball team that gets 11 innings at bat while the other team gets the usual nine. That’s an enormous advantage, and while it wouldn’t translate into a guaranteed win every night, over the course of a long season you’d expect it to add up.

And in most cases, it does. For example, if you’re the sort of fan who looks at possession numbers, you weren’t remotely surprised when the Kings won the Stanley Cup as an 8-seed in 2012, and you barely blinked when they did it again as a 6-seed last year. And you knew that the Stars, Wild, Avalanche, and Leafs were all headed for a fall, even as their fans insisted they were for real. A basic understanding of possession stats is the great spoiler alert of hockey fandom.

All of which brings us to this year’s Flames, one of the worst possession teams in the league. They sit 28th in score-adjusted Corsi, and the only other team in the bottom third that’s even close to a playoff spot is doing it on the back of a goalie who’s probably going to win MVP. And it’s not just the fancy stats that point to the Flames being a bad team. On paper, they don’t have a ton of talent, and their best player and captain, defenseman Mark Giordano, was lost for the season last month.

And yet, numbers be damned, Calgary just keeps winning. A team that everyone expected to contend for last place overall is instead right in the thick of the playoff race in a very tough Western Conference. After one month, it was a cute early-season plotline. After two, it was getting into Cinderella territory, a fun little story that nobody really took seriously. You couldn’t even say the Flames were counted out, because that would imply that anyone had ever counted them in.

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