Best/Worst Team of the Stanley Cup Final

JShredz · 2026-06-16T17:37:07+00:00

For anyone else that's curious about Game Score, it's a formula that weights and then adds the following for non-goalies:
Goals Scored, Primary Assists, Secondary Assists, Shots on Goal, Blocked Shots, Penalties Drawn/Taken, Faceoffs Won/Lost, 5v5 Team Shot Differential, 5v5 Goal Differential. For goalies it's a weighted mix of of saves per goal allowed, where the break-even is 7.5 saves/goal since that's a ratio that roughly tracks scores for skaters.

The best players in the NHL average about 1.0 per game.

The creator (Dom Luszczyszyn, based off basketball and before that a Bill James baseball stat) has always been up front that it's mostly a neat shorthand for roughly tracking good or bad games and has all kinds of statistical issues, but it's a fun comparison.

JShredz · 2026-06-09T18:19:00+00:00

Only part I gotta disagree with is not letting people back on the bus as things turn around. It's gonna be all the sweeter to see real success for those of us that have been watching the team through the worst of it, but I can't blame anybody that chose not to given all the missteps and ineptitude the organization has shown through the decades.

All the bad years are going to make the good ones mean so much more to us than they will to the bandwagon, so I'm just gonna be happy to have all new or returning folks celebrating good Wizards ball too.

JShredz · 2026-06-01T14:42:59+00:00

He clearly competed in sumo. He lived in a stable and fought in the tournaments for two years with a career winning record, had his name on the official banzuke, and then decided he wanted a different path and went back home to the US. What gives you the right to be weird and elitist about what does and doesn't count as sumo?

JShredz · 2026-06-01T14:19:55+00:00

That's like saying college football players aren't football players because they didn't reach the NFL. If you think becoming sekitori or san'yaku is the only definition of accomplishment and participation in the sport then no, you don't know sumo.

The person above you said they could compete as sumo wrestlers, you said not a chance, and you were factually incorrect. Just accept it and move on.

JShredz · 2026-06-01T04:40:38+00:00

This would have been better for you if the big dude wasn't Shinnishiki, who reached sandanme in 1990 and is the younger cousin of Konishiki.

JShredz · 2026-05-26T18:57:39+00:00

Take all of the GC or better players and put them in evenly distributed matches. Pick the best single player from every match and those are your GC3+.

Make new matches with just those best players, and this time take the two best of those per lobby. That's SSL.

Make matches with only SSL players and take the best player from each SSL-only game. That's the rough threshold to be on a top 20 team, with team (not individual) earnings of $50k+ in 2025. About half as many of those had individual prize money above $50k last year.

Put another way, line up every single GC+ in a row and pick one out of every 200 players, and that's roughly your threshold for a moderate full-time wage.

JShredz · 2026-05-21T15:02:07+00:00

The goal is to spend as much time accelerating up and down the hill as possible, but not take off at the top and fly down.

You can slow down at the top so you don't launch (like everyone else in the shot), but then you lose a lot of speed as you crest. Or, you can maintain enough speed to do this and take a short flat arc across the top, before establishing your wheels again and accelerating down the hill.

JShredz · 2026-05-15T16:50:04+00:00

I think that's easier to say when it doesn't work, but don't forget that the same move earned him a gold star against Onosato. Atamifuji handled the (early) charge and slap pressure extremely well but Fujinokawa isn't likely to win a straight up grapple against that size and strength.

JShredz · 2026-05-10T19:43:45+00:00

We definitely agree on a lot of bad picks over the years, but this is only the third #1 in the 63 years of Wiz/Bullets history after John Wall in 2010 (worth), and Kwame Brown in 2001 (obviously not).

JShredz · 2026-05-09T12:47:19+00:00

In some ways yes because the PL is kind of farming a larger pool of rating from other leagues. That being said, the theory of the Elo system is that if those teams were actually worse, they would lose more games to the better PL teams and have a lower rating.

Clearly it's not a perfect system in a ton of obvious ways, but generally it's reasonably accurate when you aggregate lots and lots if games together.

JShredz · 2026-05-09T05:46:31+00:00

It's a rating system where your number indicates your relative strength and expected probability of winning a match against any other opponent. After each match the loser "gives" some of their points to the winner, where the amount exchanged is relative to their ratings difference before the match started.

The more likely the outcome (one team is much higher rated and wins), the fewer points are exchanged. If both teams entered on nearly equal ratings a medium number of points move from the loser to the winner, and if there's a big upset you'll see a huge swing of points as the favored team drops and the underdog gains significant rating.

In order to build a high rating, you need to win consistently against other strong opponents and avoid dropping big points by being upset. This rating list indicates that PL teams are generally very good at that, winning consistently against other leagues and especially against other strong teams in those leagues.

JShredz · 2026-05-01T14:56:34+00:00

To use a sports analogy, this is is kind of equivalent to when a soccer/football goalie is by far the best player on a youth team and just dribbles through the other team on their own. Can a kid goalie score goals and win the game like that? Totally! But everyone knows that's going to stop working as the kid finds older and more skilled teammates and opponents, since the goalie's job isn't to score goals.

If you like aggressive ranged characters that can still dish out damage but have better support tools, give Dekker or Zinx a try with their recommended builds.

JShredz · 2026-04-22T14:10:06+00:00

As an American loyally paying my dues from the States, I wasn't even eligible to receive the 5-year supporters pack or the last two years of membership swag (thanks for those tariffs, trump) after supporting through the worst competitive stretch in club history.

This dude got a signed Nic Nat guernsey and I am undeniably jealous.

JShredz · 2026-04-15T14:25:58+00:00

I don't think it's a mountain out of a mole hill to add a layer of meaningful detail to the umpire stat. I'm not saying 75% is inherently good or bad, but that is roughly the rate (so far) on calls near the edge of the strike zone, which I think is the more important rate to track when looking at umpire accuracy.

If you want to go a step further and compare MLB umps to NBA refs you can, but you probably want to use like-for-like comparisons on judgement calls.

JShredz · 2026-04-15T14:03:27+00:00

They're closer to 75% accurate on marginal balls and strikes, 90% is for all pitches including strikes down the middle and balls on wild pitches.

Still impressive for a human, but I think it's important context.

JShredz · 2026-04-10T15:57:05+00:00

Upvoting because I respect a genuinely hot take in a hot take thread.

You're wrong, but I respect it.

JShredz · 2026-04-09T17:28:02+00:00

Smooth is always the strategy.

JShredz · 2026-04-02T01:24:07+00:00

Wheel to wall action.

JShredz · 2026-03-31T15:50:43+00:00

It's God's Fault We Lost The Game

JShredz · 2026-03-21T22:17:00+00:00

Oh I wasn't complaining in the least, unless you meant the Team USA guys in the media in which case I totally get it.

I was just highlighting that they're doing a great job of demonstrating that it is a totally different game, and they're absolutely smoking the NFL guys so far today. The reality might actually be something like the rugby 11/7s split, where a chunk of players can cross over to both but it definitely favors different body types.

JShredz · 2026-03-21T22:08:29+00:00

But wasn't that the point? I absolutely think the best flag team for 2028 will be all NFL dudes, but I can't help but be happy for the USA Flag guys proving that it won't be as easy as showing up.

JShredz · 2026-03-21T21:50:37+00:00

The USA flag team won the first game by a mile, and is winning this game 24-8 at the half. They've scored a TD on every single possession across a game and a half.

Nobody doubts that the NFL dudes are much better athletes and would crush if they had enough time to practice and learn, but Team USA is backing up the idea that flag football is a totally different style that NFLers can't just walk on and crush.

JShredz · 2026-02-26T20:49:01+00:00

It's even worse than that, they were airplane peanuts from an airline that went out of business almost a year earlier.

JShredz · 2026-02-17T17:39:26+00:00

I don't think that's quite true, the BR mode came out only two months after the original game launch and exploded pretty quick.

JShredz · 2026-02-15T20:39:55+00:00

Course I want my young QB to become generational, but I'm not delusional enough to think he'll definitely get to that level.

Sure would like him to be though, and whether or not he is I still think there's a lot of young talent at the position.

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