ANALYSIS OF THE 2004 NHL LOCKOUT’S EFFECT ON PLAYER HEIGHT AND WEIGHT A THESIS Presented to The Faculty of the Department of Economics and Business The Colorado College In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Bachelor of Arts By Andrew Farny February 2019 i ANALYSIS OF THE 2004 NHL LOCKOUT’S EFFECT ON PLAYER HEIGHT AND WEIGHT Andrew Farny February 2019 Mathematical Economics Abstract This paper analyzes the effects of the 2004 lockout on the current playing style of the National Hockey League (NHL). Using NHL data from before and after the 2004-2005 lockout season, this paper examines the impact a player’s height and weight has on their point share value. Through the use of Newey-West and quantile regression analysis, this paper finds that the league is shifting from heavier, more massive players to smaller and stronger players. The findings from this paper advance the current field of hockey analytics and provide new insights into future NHL player personnel decisions. KEYWORDS: (National Hockey League, NHL Lockout, Player Value, Player Size, Height, Weight) JEL CODES: (J24, J44, J52, Z20, Z21, Z29) ii ON MY HONOR, I HAVE NEITHER GIVEN NOR RECEIVED UNAUTHORIZED AID ON THIS THESIS Signature iii Acknowledgments I would like to say a special thank you to a couple of people for the work on this thesis. First, to Professor Aju Fenn for his guidance throughout the research process. Additionally, his knowledge and edits were extremely helpful during the writing process. Next, to my parents for providing me the opportunity to attend Colorado College. And finally, to my teammates for making my time at Colorado College so enjoyable. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iv 1 INTRODUCTION 1 2 LITERATURE REVIEW 5 3 THEORY 12 4 DATA AND METHODOLOGY 15 5 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 18 6 CONCLUSION 25 7 REFERENCES 27 8 APPENDICES 28 v Introduction On September 16, 2004, the National Hockey League (NHL) entered into negotiations with the NHL Players Association over the disputed terms of the next Collective Bargaining Agreement. Unable to reach an agreement, the NHL lockout began and resulted in the cancellation of the entire NHL season, which amounted to 1,230 missed games. The lockout marked the first time for a major sports league in North America to cancel an entire season. Although the driving force behind the lockout of the 2004-2005 season was a labor dispute, the negotiating sides addressed many other issues. These issues focused on the lack of offense in the league. Hockey fans, and most sports fans in general, are drawn to the game because of the excitement of a goal being scored. However, the NHL was experiencing a scoring drought. As Figure 1 shows, the league’s average goals per game was at an all-time low. Figure 1 1 Furthermore, in the ten seasons leading up to the 2004-2005 lockout, the league only saw one goal scoring leader with over 60 goals and experienced four seasons with the league leading scorer having less than 50 goals, which hadn’t occurred since the 1969-1970 season. As the goals dried up, so did the NHL’s viewership. To change the trajectory of the league, rules were altered to favor the offensive side of the game. For example, the neutral zone became smaller, the size of leg pads for goalies decreased, no substitutions were allowed for the team that iced the puck, and the clutch and grab rule was abolished which lead to more interference calls. Additionally, the NHL began decreasing the number of fights by ruling it illegal to remove helmets prior to a fight. When looking at the league statistics comparing recent years with the years leading up to the lockout, the NHL has been successful in both increasing the number of goals scored as well as decreasing the number of fights. According to NHL.com, in the 2003-2004 season there were 6,318 total goals scored, with fights in 41.14% of all games (789 total bouts). In contrast, the 2013-2014 season produced 6,573 total goals, with fights in only 29.76% of all games (469 total bouts). Clearly, this shows a shift in playing style in the NHL. The purpose of this thesis will be to investigate the changing style of play in the NHL. In the pre-lockout era, taller, more physical players were prized amongst the league. However, the league seems to be shifting to smaller, more skilled players in the post-lockout era. When looking at the average height and weight of NHL players shown in Figure 2 and Figure 3, it is apparent that there is a peak around the 2004-2005 season. 2 Figure 2 Figure 3 Research examining the changing physical characteristics of NHL players has not yet been conducted. This paper hypothesizes that height and weight will have a more significant impact on performance pre-lockout and that larger players would have had the advantage over smaller players. However, this paper predicts that there will be a shift in 3 preferences to smaller players in the post-lockout era of the NHL. Through investigating the relationship between a player’s height and weight with their respective contributions to the team’s success, this research will provide insight for player personnel decisions such as drafting, trading, and acquiring players from within and outside of the NHL. 4 Literature Review Throughout the 20th century, athletes in many sports have been getting taller and bigger at rates that exceed those of the general population. Norton and Olds (2001) conducted a study which examines twenty-two professional sports, excluding hockey. The results show that athlete morphology is unique to the desired sport and no two sports demand the same player or participant size. Furthermore, positional players within a sport can have differing optimal sizes. This optimal size can be determined by the sport, the coach’s player selection, or the changing landscape of the sport (Norton and Olds, 2001). NHL Player Roles Within the NHL, there are certain team roles that benfit specific body types. Since the acceptance of fighting in the NHL in 1922,1 the role of enforcer has become well known. Rockerbie (2012) states: The new system encouraged each club to carry a few players that would act as ‘enforcers’ on the ice, expected to deal with the other club’s enforcers in a controlled battle of fisticuffs. This established a long-standing code of conduct in the NHL that still exists today. Skilled players are not expected or encouraged to fight in their own defense when rules are ignored, instead, an enforcer comes to the aid of the stricken skilled player, with the expectation of being met by the other club’s enforcer. This system of on-ice détente worked well. The enforcer position benefits players who are relatively taller, stronger, and tougher. 1 In 1922, a five-minute penalty for fighting was established instead of expulsion for the remainder of the game. Thus, making hockey unique in the fact that rules made fist fighting semi-legal. 5 In other sports, such as the NBA and NFL, it has been found that players who are of optimal size have longer, higher-paid, and more successful careers (Norton & Olds, 2001). What separates the NHL from other sports is the mutual offensive and defensive roles of an individual player during a game. This diversity of roles proves to be problematic when measuring overall performance and determining a player’s monetary value (Vincent & Eastman, 2009). To counteract the conditional mean and account for different types of players, Vincent and Eastman (2009) find that using a quantile regression can accurately explain the offensive-defensive dichotomy. Furthermore, Chan, Cho, and Navati (2012) find that implementing different game playing statistics, such as time on ice per game, is an effective way to control for different player roles. The use of quantile regressions allows the researcher to isolate the relationship between earnings and performance for the given player. Consider the example given by Vincent and Eastman (2009) on penalty minutes for star players versus grinders. Players found in the 10% and 25% quantiles have insignificant coefficients for penalty minutes while the coefficients at all other quantiles are both positive and significant. This suggests that higher paid players are rewarded for their intensity and aggressive style of play, while low-paid players are not rewarded for putting their team at a numerical disadvantage. In another example, Haisken-DeNew and Vorell (2008) find that enforcers were paid a premium for fighting. The regression results show that players in the wing position from 1996-2007 were paid a premium of $10,940 for fighting and $18,135 for winning a fight. Furthermore, the results also show that these same wings were only receiving $10,925 for gathering an assist for their team. This suggests that NHL teams value these wings’ fights greater than that player scoring another point. 6 NHL Player Height and Weight When modelling on-ice statistics, some less controllable traits may define the value of a player. While a player has limited control over their weight, there are no practices or exercises that can change a player’s height. In 2012, Pantano studied the size of goaltenders after the NHL lockout during the 2004-2005 season. The lockout produced rule changes that decreased the legal blocking surface for NHL goalies’ pads. Furthermore, Pantano finds that the lockout produced a statistical change in the relationship between save percentage and height. In the pre-lockout period, height has a positive, but insignificant impact on save percentage.