Picking the 2019-20 NHL Awards Using Analytics - Part 2: GM of the Year (Patreon)

GM of the Year is a weird award. While all the other awards are for work done within a season (although someone should tell Norris voters that), building a team is inherently a multiyear process. It can be hard to differentiate between the job that a GM did in one year and the overall work he has done to build a contending team. Which is why I'm going to try to get around that issue.

The task of the GM of a contending team is to make his team better. Another way to phrase that is that a GM tries to add wins. Now, I could just look over the players that each GM has acquired and traded away since the end of the 2018-19 season and draw a conclusion based on the analytical profiles of the big names involved. But that's not nearly sociopathic enough. So instead, every player involved will be entirely reduced to their Wins Above Replacement number - with the team that traded them, and the team that acquired them. 

For example, let's say that the Edmonton Oilers traded Milan Lucic to Calgary for James Neal. That means they added James Neal's 2019-20 wins (0 WAR) and lost Milan Lucic's 2019-20 wins (1.4 WAR). If this is the only trade the Oilers make this season, their net wins added will be -1.4. 

The circumstances surrounding this season mean that trades made at the deadline have hardly had any impact. This is an unfortunate reality, and I won't give credit for hypothetical wins added. So while Ilya Kovalchuk might have done well down the stretch, the Capitals only added the WAR he accrued in his brief stint with them (which happens to be 0). 

Finally, the price in terms of future assets traded for wins is not factored in. If the Golden Knights paid 17 first-round picks to get Chandler Stephenson, all I care about is the Knights getting Stephenson. That's because we don't know how much those futures are worth and they have no bearing on the events of the 2019-20 season.

This was a very time-consuming and manual task, so I limited the scope to GMs whose teams made the playoffs (by points %). 

(The model used here is EvolvingHockey's Wins Above Replacement model, available to their Patrons at evolving-hockey.com)

Wins Added 

Joe Sakic had plenty of cap space to work with this season, and he made it count. While some of his big name acquisitions like Kadri and Burakovsky paid off, it's the signing of Stars castoff Valeri Nichushkin for less than a million dollars that added the most to his already strong roster. Pens GM Jim Rutherford added nine new NHL players in 2019-20, none more impactful than defenceman John Marino who accounts for more than half of the team's wins added. Brian McLellan did not add a single negative WAR player, with Garnet Hathaway, Radko Gudas, and Richard Panik each contributing ~1 win.

Interestingly, the three lowest teams are three of the 2019 conference finalists. Boston's big move, the acquisition of Ondrej Kase, will likely pay dividends next season, but with the regular season cut off only 4th line centre Par Lindholm provided positive value for the team this year. Aside from a few great games from Marco Scandella, Cup champion GM Doug Armstrong only added negative value players such as the disappointing Justin Faulk. Finally, a series of disastrous blueline pickups left the Hurricanes looking a lot worse, with the struggles of Joel Edmundson and Jake Gardiner weighing the heaviest.

Wins Lost

Nashville traded away one regular NHL player this season: PK Subban. And that move was enough to place them at number one on the list of fewest wins traded away (sometimes restraint pays off). Vancouver and St. Louis only traded away fringe roster players like Alex Biega and Joel Edmundson respectively, Boston moved a struggling Danton Heinen, and Tampa Bay counteracted the loss of J.T. Miller by unloading the dreadful duo of Adam Erne and Louis Domingue. These teams' GMs practiced the crucial art of addition by subtraction.

Toronto and Colorado unsurprisingly end up near the bottom due in large part to their July blockbuster (Kerfoot and Kadri being the main pieces), as well as the loss of Connor Brown and Carl Soderberg respectively. Finally, while they did not acquire anyone with negative value, the Capitals also did not trade anyone with negative value either. The surprising performance of Chandler Stephenson in Vegas combined with Matt Niskanen and Burakovsky finding success in their new homes meant that Brian McLellan gave up a lot of value this season.

Net Wins Added

This leads up to our final ranking, which takes the number of wins added minus the number of wins traded away. So we now have three nominees and a trophy winner.

#3: David Poile - Nashville Predators

Poile wasn't the most active general manager in 2019-20, but the few moves he made made a big impact. Despite the big price tag attached, signing Matt Duchene paid off as he earned his cap hit almost exactly in terms of wins added. But getting out of the PK Subban contract - evidently at just the right moment - was the decisive variable that puts him near the top of the league.

#2: Jim Rutherford - Pittsburgh Penguins

Unlike Poile, Rutherford did a lot. He traded a first line winger, he acquired a first line winger, he subtracted a top four defenceman, he added a top pairing defenceman, and he once again rebuilt his bottom six. In classic JR fashion, one of his best acquisitions of the year, Dominik Kahun, found himself traded to Buffalo for some reason. But finding Marino, trading away the rapidly declining Phil Kessel, and adding decent depth players like Brandon Tanev put him out ahead after these moves - and that's ignoring the future value that Jason Zucker will presumably provide. 

WINNER: Joe Sakic - Colorado Avalanche

With cap space burning a hole in his pocket and a team looking ready to contend, Sakic could have made some costly mistakes. Instead, he identified players like Nichushkin, Burakovsky, and Kadri who could contribute up and down the lineup. Depth additions like Bellemare and Namestnikov also contributed positively to the Avalanches' success. To get some of these players, the Avs had to give up talent, but the amount of value that Joe Sakic was able to add in a calendar year is the reason that he deserves the Jim Gregory Award for GM of the Year.