Best of the West
No fans, no media, no scouts. The Best of the West voting is done by the insiders -- players, management and broadcasters from the 10 clubs in the Western Conference of the Western Hockey League.
To prevent ballot-box stuffing, voters were not permitted to select anyone from their own organization. Teams with key players moved at the trade deadline were asked to vote on rosters as of mid-January. Votes ranked the Top 4 in each category, resulting in a 4-3-2-1 point system. The figures listed are the percentage of points possible.
For example, Seattle's Calvin Pickard received 32 of a possible 41 first-place votes in the Best Goaltender category. (Herald)
Sure enough Everett wins "Best Fans" yet again. What exactly determines best fans? Loudness of cowbells? Overall attendance? Some explanation would be nice on that one.
Jim Hiller received the 3rd most votes for Top Coach, behind Don Hay and Marc Habscheid, Bob Tory also 3rd for Top Executive.
2nd most votes for Best Stay-at-Home Defenseman went to Tyler Schmidt, 3rd most votes to Shinnimin for Best Faceoff Man. Johnny Lazo got the 2nd most votes for Best Overager, Kruise Reddick was 4th on the list for Best Defensive Forward.
Johnny takes 2nd most votes for both Best Skater and Most Underrated Player. Drew Owsley received 2nd most votes for Best Goaltender, behind only Calvin Pickard.
The only category where an Americans player received the most votes was for Most Improved Player and that honor goes to Brendan Shinnimin.
What I don't understand is how the percentages work. I mean I know the explanation is there, that it's a percentage of the total points, but it makes it confusing because percentages are way over 100%. If it's scored by points, show the totals in points. That would make sense to me, but what do I know? We've established I'm no GM, no coach, and I am not a reporter OR a mathematician. So there ya have it.
Boys back home for their 5th game in 6 nights against the Kamloops Blazers. Not an easy opponent (not that any of them are, really). Blazers are a good team, and very hard working. Just gotta hope the fatigue, mental and physical, isn't a huge factor, but that's probably a pipe dream.
And who will be in net? Red-hot Owsley or From Russia With Guhhh? Doesn't sound like Kruise will be back, they don't want to rush him back, especially at this time of the season. Need him completely healed for playoffs. Not sure if Mike Brown will be back from suspension, not sure if it matters.
On a final note, it's February 14th so I just wanted to wish my sweet Scotty Wazz a very Happy Valentine's Day, I love you so much!
4 comments:
Use Pickard as the example.
45 ballots, they said he could get 41 possible first-place votes, which would imply that 4 ballots came from Seattle (can't vote for your team).
So if Pickard got first place on all 41 ballots, that's 164 points. They credit him with 89.2%, so he should have gotten about 146 points. Which...still doesn't come out right--146 points is only 89.0%. Maybe there's an error somewhere in the reporting (I'm almost certain Portland is only 3.2% in best fans).
Can't use total points because apparently some teams turn in more ballots than others, and you can't vote for your own team.
Percentages don't have to add up to 100%. There are 10 points per vote, but one player can only get 4. Everyone's percentages should add up to about 250% (10 divided by 4), but again that doesn't quite work because you can't vote for your own team.
"Can't use total points because apparently some teams turn in more ballots than others, and you can't vote for your own team."
But aren't all the ballots the same? So it shouldn't matter which team turns in more ballots. As long as no team votes for themselves, why not use total points?
And now I'm wondering what the ballots look like? Do they get to just write in their votes? Or is there a list of specific players to choose from and they have to pick from that list?
AND THEN, if it is a list, which it kind of sounds like if they're doing 4-3-2-1 points, it (in theory) would add up to 100% IF they only picked one per category. But it sounds like they're ranking them, 4 = best, 3 = next best and so on.
I'm now even more confused.
"AND THEN, if it is a list, which it kind of sounds like if they're doing 4-3-2-1 points, it (in theory) would add up to 100% IF they only picked one per category. But it sounds like they're ranking them, 4 = best, 3 = next best and so on."
I'm sure that's how they do it (and that they write in their votes). Which is why the percentages should add up to about 250%.
"But aren't all the ballots the same? So it shouldn't matter which team turns in more ballots. As long as no team votes for themselves, why not use total points?"
Say TC turned in 10 ballots and all the other teams turned in 1. Also assume Owsley is the clear #1 goalie, Pickard is the clear #2 goalie, there's no question about this, and TC didn't cheat on their ballots. Owsley would get 36 points, the first-place vote on the other nine teams' ballots. Pickard would get all ten first-place votes on TC's ballots (as he's the top goalie they can vote for), as well as the second-place votes on the eight teams that can vote for him. Pickard wins, 64 to 36, even though every team in the conference regards Owsley as the conference's top goalie [well, maybe not Bob Tory].
Using percentages, Owsley gets 36 votes out of 36 possible (100%), and Pickard gets 64 votes out of 72 possible (89%).
An extreme case, but it illustrates why they do it this way.
ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
I'm catching on now.
still seems there ought to be an easier way, but perhaps there's not or they'd use it.
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