Kevin Hayes is a Legit Second Line Center

[text_output]A conversation that dominated the offseason for the Rangers was if Mika Zibanejad and Kevin Hayes could both take the leaps being asked of them to become true first and second line centers this season. Everyone agrees that Zibanejad has easily been one of the best Rangers so far this season, and most concede the fact that he has established himself as a first line center. However, the discussion around Kevin Hayes has been far more polarizing. Hayes has not filled up the box score in the manner that Zibanejad has, or even in the manner that you would want from an average second line center, and there has been much argument amongst Ranger fans regarding his play so far . I have seen comments about Hayes ranging from declaring him a 1b to Zibanejad’s 1a on the high end, to calling him a “a third line center at best,” on the low end.

After the Rangers blanked the Senators on Sunday night, I started digging around Corsica to see if anything jumped out to me enough to warrant writing about. I came to find that, statistically speaking at least, there is a strong argument to be made that Kevin Hayes has been the third best forward on the Rangers so far this year, behind the two obvious guys in Zibanejad and Buchnevich. Hayes’ surprisingly strong analytics combined with his excellent performance against Ottawa on Sunday night were enough to convince me to write this article that you are currently reading, to highlight just how good of a season Hayes is having so far; relative to his teammates at least.

To be completely honest, when I started my research for this article, I was still on the fence about exactly how I felt about Hayes in the 2C role. The original title of the article was something to the effect of, “Kevin Hayes has been Better than You Think,” and I was just simply going to provide some supporting analysis to that claim. However, I decided to go back and re-watch a handful of the games to specifically focus on Hayes because I wanted to write up a section on what my eyes tell me about his play. Once I completed all of my statistical and eye test research and began writing this article I was convinced; Kevin Hayes is indeed a fine second line center in today’s NHL.[/text_output][custom_headline type=”left” level=”h5″ looks_like=”h5″ accent=”true” id=”” class=”” style=””]The Eye Test[/custom_headline][text_output]While Hayes does not jump off the screen the way Zibanejad or Buchnevich do, I realized while re-watching the games that quietly, Hayes has become a very well-rounded player, and has made tremendous improvement in the defensive zone. As far as my personal eye test is concerned, I feel that Hayes has had an up and down season, with him having some significant struggles towards the end of the team’s early season plummet to the bottom of the standings. However, with the exception of his brutal turnover that lead to the Panarin power play goal in Columbus last week, I felt that Hayes has played much better of late, particularly in his own zone. I’ve noticed that he has become quite a strong stick defender, using his length to get his stick in an area to prevent the opponent from shooting, passing or handling, causing them to have to alter their original plan often.

Further, him and Nash have seemed to developed some real chemistry on the penalty kill together. Multiple times recently we have seen one jump the play and cause a stop, while the other immediately breaks out of the zone to help create a shorthanded odd-man rush. This gif, courtesy of Blueshirt Banter’s Shayna Goldman, shows one such instance from Sunday night’s game against the Senators.[/text_output]

[text_output]And then of course, Hayes also will flash the high-end skill that he possesses, which was on full display when he ripped this shot past Anderson to make it 1-0 against Ottawa.[/text_output] [text_output]Obviously I’m cherry picking examples from the Ottawa game for the gifs, but I have seen flashes of this high level of play throughout the season. As is the case with many Rangers players, the key to how favorably we will eventually look back at Hayes 2017-2018 season will largely hinge on how consistently he can perform the way he did against Ottawa. Obviously there are other factors that will help, such as how he is deployed, with whom he will be deployed with, and if he will get any power play time as the year progresses. But by and large, I believe Hayes has performed to the level of a defense-first 2C, and efforts like we saw on Sunday night will go a long way to helping him accomplish this goal that the Rangers placed upon him this year.[/text_output][custom_headline type=”left” level=”h5″ looks_like=”h5″ accent=”true” id=”” class=”” style=””]The Analytics [/custom_headline][text_output]As I mentioned at the beginning of this article, I was pleasantly surprised to see how highly Hayes ranks amongst his teammates across a variety of key metrics during 5v5 play. It should be noted that Hayes has only logged 5.5 minutes all season on the power play and leads all Rangers forwards with 47.3 minutes on the penalty kill. Special teams deployment such as that will have a significant negative effect on a player’s numbers across all situations compared to guys who get a heavy power play workload. Because of this, it is even more important than usual to specifically examine the 5v5 production when comparing Hayes to his teammates this year, in order to get a true (or at least more true) apples to apples comparison.

All of the data in the table below, courtesy of Corsica, is exclusively for 5v5 play and it is score adjusted. As a reminder, score adjusting can be applied to possession and expected goals analytic data as a way to account for the fact that a team that is trailing is likely pressing, while a team that is leading (particularly the Rangers) is likely playing more conservative, which will have a significant impact on shot attempts. Score adjusting does not affect the standard statistics. The data includes all Rangers players that have logged at least 100 total minutes on the ice so far this season, leaving us a sample size of 11 forwards and 18 total skaters.

I also want to call out that I have added a new stat that I have yet to discuss in any prior writing of mine, Game Score. You can read a full breakdown of what Game Score is in this Hockey-Graphs article, but to quickly summarize, it is a model that accounts for a litany of in-game statistics and weights them all based on importance to generate a singular “score” that measures how well a player did in a game. The higher the game score, the better the player performed. The individual statistics included in the model include goals, primary assists, secondary assists, shots on goal, blocked shots, penalties drawn and taken, faceoffs won and lost, Corsi for and against and goals for and against.[/text_output][image type=”circle” float=”none” src=”1034″ alt=”” href=”” title=”” info_content=”” lightbox_caption=”” id=”” class=”aligncenter” style=””][text_output]With all of that out of the way, let’s take a look at Hayes’ raw production and his rank amongst NYR skaters and forwards. The first thing that jumps off the table at me, is that Hayes leads all Rangers skaters in every single per-60 shot suppression metric, which includes Corsi against (all shot attempts), Fenwick against (unblocked shot attempts) and shots against (shots on goal). Hayes also is third on the team in goals against, and second in expected goals against (which considers shot quality and quantity). The translation to this is that Hayes has by far one of the most significant positive impacts on the Rangers in terms of limiting the shot attempts, scoring chances and goals by opponents. In other words, relative to other Rangers players, Hayes has been elite in the defensive zone during 5v5 play.

This is even more impressive when you consider the way AV has been deploying Hayes; he has the highest neutral zone start % on the entire team, fourth highest defensive zone start % amongst forwards, and lowest offensive zone start % amongst forwards. In other words, despite the fact that, relative to his teammates, Hayes is much more frequently deployed in the neutral and defensive zones, he still is allowing the fewest amount of shot attempts against among any NYR skater. Typically, a player who is often deployed in his own zone will have more shot attempts against, simply due to the fact that by being on the ice frequently in your own zone, there is much more opportunity for the opponent to take more shot attempts.

This deployment does however have an impact on Hayes shot generation metrics, as he ranks 5^th in Corsi for, 6^th in Fenwick for, and 6^th in shots for amongst NYR forwards (all per-60). However, despite his mediocre shot generation numbers, Hayes is 2^nd amongst forwards in expected goals for per-60, meaning that the team generates a high percentage of high danger shots while he is on the ice. When you look at his shot and scoring chance ratios, Hayes is 4^th on the team in Corsi and Fenwick for %, 2^nd in shots for %, 2^nd in goals for % and 2^nd in expected goals for % during 5v5 play. He also ranks 3rd on the team in both cumulative game score and game score per-60, a testament to all of the individual things that Hayes does to contribute to the team. In layman’s terms, Kevin Hayes has one of the largest positive impacts on the team in terms of the net shot attempts, scoring chances and goals amongst all New York Rangers forwards.

Hayes does not only impress in terms of the 5v5 advanced metrics however, and he also has impressive standard statistics. Hayes is tied for the team lead in goals and primary points during 5v5 play, and is the sole leader in total points. In terms of per-60 minute production, Hayes still ranks 3^rd on the team in primary points, and 2^nd in total points. He still has some work to do in the faceoff circle, winning only 47.79% of his faceoffs. Hayes is also the team leader in takeaways per-60, and according to this tweet from Mike Murphy of Blueshirt Banter, he is tied for 9^th in the entire NHL in total takeaways during 5v5 play.[/text_output][image type=”thumbnail” float=”none” src=”1035″ alt=”” href=”” title=”” info_content=”” lightbox_caption=”” id=”” class=”aligncenter” style=””][custom_headline type=”left” level=”h5″ looks_like=”h5″ accent=”true” id=”” class=”” style=””]Conclusion[/custom_headline][text_output]Kevin Hayes has been much better this season than many have given him credit for. I think a large reason to this is when you look at his total numbers—5 goals, 4 assists and 9 total points—it does not stack up to what you would hope for from you 2^nd line center on a team within the top half of the league in scoring. However, when you account for the fact that Alain Vigneualt still is deploying Hayes as his primary shut down center and refuses to play him on the power play, his numbers are actually quite impressive relative to his teammates. Sure, the Rangers have been a pretty poor overall team during 5v5 play this year, so that isn’t necessarily the highest bar to clear. But given his deployment, Kevin Hayes has been close to what the Rangers were hoping he would be when they made their offseason moves and decided to rely on Zibanejad and Hayes as their top centers. With a little more development and consistency, and a bit more offensive zone and power play usage, I am confident that his box score numbers will reflect his strong play the way that his analytics do. You can consider me officially sold on the notion that Kevin Hayes is a fine second line center in the NHL.[/text_output]