Friday, October 31, 2008

Lots of Pluses for Zherdev

Ryan Dixon at The Hockey News looks at some absurdities of this early NHL season including this one about the Rangers Nikolai Zherdev...

"Nikolai Zherdev, minus-52 for his career entering this season, has the best plus/minus in the NHL at plus-9. (Tied with Carolina’s Niclas Wallin.)"

...make that leading the league with plus-11 after last night.

...i think plus/minus is an over-rated stat in the NHL. Remember the gaudy plus/minus numbers Marek Malik put up as a Ranger which had nothing to do with his talent (or lack of it) and everything to do with him playing with Jagr.

...obviously Zherdev's plus/minus in Columbus were awful. He was a young player on a bad team. He's now on a successful team with a defined defensive system that he's bought into. Oh yeah and he's offensive skills are limitless.

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