> From: Nathan Eric Hampton <[log in to unmask]>
>
> I've said before that medical research is so ridiculous, that they should be
> embarassed. Here is more from today's InfoBeat:
>
> THE SCIENCE OF PENALTIES: Dr. John Walker, an emergency room
>   doctor who is part of the Texas Youth Commission, did a little
>   research into whether playing rough helps a team win the Stanley
>   Cup and he's found that it pays to be passive. Nine of the 10 NHL
>   champions between 1988-97 committed fewer penalties. From
>   1980-97, 13 of the 18 Cup winners were the teams that spent less
>   time in the penalty box. So far, this series is bucking the
>   trend. Buffalo won Game 1 despite having 10 penalties to Dallas'
>   four; the Stars won Game 2 despite having two more infractions
>   (6-4) than the Sabres. Walker's prepared his report for the 1998
>   Ice Hockey World Championship International Symposium on Medicine
>   and Science after noticing how many kids were being injured in
>   hockey games.
 
> #1 -- playing rough and being in the penalty box are two different things.
 
        Can you prove that?
        Do you have an objective metric for the roughness of play by a team?
        To what extent are samples of that metric correlated with
                corresponding penalty time metrics?
 
> #2 -- if you are in the penalty box more often, you lose more often.  What
> stupid aXXhole has to ask that question?
 
        Have you done any correlation studies to validate that assertion?
 
> Nathan Eric Hampton
 
I hope nathan knows me well enough to understand that i'm not dissing him.
However, while the doctor in question has made an unproven assertion, a
proper critique of his results would necessarily have to offer proof of
either the invalidity of at least one premise or that the conclusion
follows logically from the premises ad the empirical data.
 
Unfortunately, there are people involved in career paths that require a
"publish or perish" philosophy.  One might be absolutely amazed at the
amount of pure unadulterated garbage that is in print.  You probably don't
want to get me started on the issue of quality of publications.
 
Once you get cynical enough, you can view the article in question as a
consequence of "publish or perish" instead of an accurate study of ice
hockey.
 
 
         charlie shub   University of Colorado at Colorado Springs
[log in to unmask]  -or-  [log in to unmask]  -or-  [log in to unmask]
(719) 262-3492      (fax) 262-3369          http://www.cs.uccs.edu/~cdash
 
HOCKEY-L is for discussion of college ice hockey;  send information to
[log in to unmask], The College Hockey Information List.