Adam Wodom writes:
 
>I'm sick of this argument -- if you guys want to continue to find
>meaning in penalty stats, go ahead -- I think you are all barking up the
>wrong tree.  As has been pointed out, a list of penalties can often be
>more misleading than actually helpful.
 
Since the penalty list can "often" (not always) be misleading, then
sometimes (or perhaps more often than not) they can be helpful, correct?
To use your logic, why list all the goals scored in an 11-1 rout since only
the first few give an indication of how the game was played and the rest
were probably just scored in garbage time.
 
 
>Second - to think for a second refs are homers, is another beauty I just
>love hearing.
 
If you don't thing that some refs are swayed by home crowds, or the home
team's coach, you're not living in the real world.
>
>And how does an even amount of penalties assume there were calls made
>just to even things up.  Seems like an incredible assumption if you
>weren't at the game.
 
An even number of penalties do not necessarily indicate "make-up call",
however, there are cases where a team will go on a power play and then have
it negated within a minute.  Or sometimes you will see simultaneous
penalties which are not matching - one guy gets a penalty for holding, the
other for roughing, etc.  Refs have been known to "even things up" in this
fashion.
 
>> I also believe firmly that you can get a
>> pretty good idea who the aggressive players are for each team via this stat.
>
>Or maybe just guys who take dumb penalties.
 
Yes, there are guys who consistently take dumb penalties.  Perhaps you
can't tell by the box how bad it is.  However, back in the late'70's, BC
had a player - Paul Barrett (who wound up being the captain his senior year
and, in real life, was director of the Boston Redevelopment Authority for
several years) - who always seemed to have a knack of taking a penalty late
in a game when his team was either nursing a lead or attempting to score
the tying goal.  After seeing a lot of BC games at the time, it became so
routine that my friends and I started giving out the "Paul Barrett Award"
to the player in each game who took the dumbest penalty.  Some guys just
have the knack for doing this and, if you peruse the box scores, you can
find out (at least sometimes) who they are.
 
Adam, I think your argument is  basically that, since a listing of
penalties doesn't always help indicate how a game is played, they are
irrelevant.  I, on the other hand, feel that often times they can give you
a feel for the game and, as a result, deserve to be included in a box
score.  The bottom line in all this is that penalties are neither 100%
relevant or 100% irrelevant.  And since they reside in this grey area, I do
believe they warrant inclusion in a box.
 
Greg Ambrose
 
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