Guest Post: @StefanWolejszo looks at Cody Ceci’s contract situation
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OTTAWA, ON – APRIL 26: Cody Ceci #5 of the Ottawa Senators looks on prior to a face-off in Game Six of the Eastern Conference Quarterfinals against the Montreal Canadiens during the 2015 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs at Canadian Tire Centre on April 26, 2015 in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. The Montreal Canadiens eliminated the Ottawa Senators by defeating them 2-0 and move to the next round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images)
Over the past few months, I’ve received a few guest post submissions from the criminally underrated and underfollowed Stefan Wolejszo (@StefanWolejszo). I don’t know why you wouldn’t be, but if you’re a Sens fan (or even if you’re not), give him a follow on Twitter.
Like the blog title states, in his latest piece, Stef examines the Cody Ceci contract situation and makes a case for what kind of terms Ceci should be in line for. It’s a great read that encapsulates the problems that Ceci’s next contract present to the organization.
So without further ado, here’s Stefan:
The Ottawa Senators were faced with two major RFA contract negotiations this summer, and when Mike Hoffman and the team agreed to a new four year deal attention immediately shifted to Cody Ceci.
The Senators are rumored to have had several offers on the table along the way, but the team now appears to be favoring a two year bridge deal with a reasonable dollar figure attached to it. For their part, Ceci’s camp
reportedly proposed a six-year deal with an AAV around $4.25M.
As is always the case with RFA negotiations, teams can opt to pay a higher price now to lock a key part of their team in to a favorable deal now, or they can pay less now and risk having to pay through the nose in the next deal. There are plenty of examples of both good and bad RFA decisions. For example, Senators fans will remember how locking Jared Cowen in to a deal with term worked out (and
it could have been much worse), while Montreal’s decision to bridge PK Subban led them to open up the vault two years later. The trick is identifying players the team should build around, and are worth long term investments, while avoiding long and expensive contracts on marginal talent.
Although he will never be as polarizing a figure as Patrick Wiercioch, who was the analytics versus eye test poster child, it is clear that there is some disagreement about what Ceci is actually worth. Fans into hockey analytics often point to Ceci’s underwhelming metrics (particularly his “Rel” numbers) and cite this as evidence that Ceci has far from established himself as a legitimate second pairing defender. On the other hand, Ottawa Senators management seem to have a much higher opinion of Ceci, and based on the fact that his name came up as a key piece that Tampa Bay was asking for in return in a rumored Jonathan Drouin trade last season it appears that other teams also regard him highly.
I think the truth is in somewhere in between these two positions.
The issue is that in order to accurately assess his value all of our numbers have to be put in the right context so that we avoid punishing or rewarding him for things that out of his control. With the end goal of highlighting contextual factors that can lead to over- or under-valuing Ceci, this article will be broken down into three components. The first will focus on the larger context of Ceci getting his opportunity to stick with the big club, the second will look at numbers that suggest Ceci is very valuable, and the third will focus on metrics that highlight red flags in Ceci’s play.
When everything is put into context it seems that establishing Ceci’s actual value is far from a cut-and-dried process.
Cody Ceci Gets his Chance
Things seemed to look bright for the Senators following the 2012-13 lockout-shortened season. In that campaign the team battled through key injuries and adversity to make the playoffs and oust the Montreal Canadiens in the first round. Those were heady days for Senators fans, and the team looked as though it was on the brink of something special.
In the victory over their hated rivals fans witnessed clutch goaltending by Craig Anderson, stellar play from Erik Karlsson (who is still better when he is on one leg than 99% of the D playing in the league), and Paul MacLean’s epic trolling of the Montreal players, coaching staff, and fans. Sure Daniel Alfredsson’s “
probably not” response when asked whether the Sens could come back in the second round series against Pittsburg rankled a few fans, but in the end that comment could easily be dismissed as stoic realism.
That optimism ultimately fell like a house of cards that was built outside on a windy day. In the summer of 2013 Daniel Alfredsson opted to sign with the Detroit Red Wings amid rumors that the Senators presented low-balled a contract proposal to their long-serving captain. The Senators brought in Bobby Ryan hot on the heels of Alfie’s departure, but his 23 goal 48 point injury plagued season underwhelmed some fans. Jason Spezza became the captain after Alfie left, only to find that the barbs many fans reserved for him throughout his career became especially sharp after he took on this new role. A wildly inconsistent start to the season led to a portion of the fanbase to loudly call for Robin Lehner to assume the role of starting goaltender, but the team continued to pile up losses when he had the net following an injury to Craig Anderson.
Shortly after the season ended Paul MacLean, who had awarded the Jack Adams (coach of the year) Trophy the previous summer, was held out to dry as management accused him of not listening to his players and losing the room. Many fans also turned on MacLean due to frustration and bitterness as a result of being fed a steady dose of the Greening-Smith-Neil (GSN) line. The 2013-14 had many lowlights and precious few highlights.
In the midst of that winter of discontent, with Mark Methot sick and Jared Cowen serving a suspension, Cody Ceci was called up from Binghamton and given his first opportunity to show what he can do in the big leagues. Ceci provided one of the most memorable moments of the season when he scored his first NHL goal in OT versus the St Louis Blues on December 16:
Within a short amount of time the team started to float out that Ceci “stabilized the defense,” which was puzzling to some. Leading up to Ceci’s promotion the team was actively shopping for a defenceman that could help turn the tide after a sluggish start to the season. At that point in time questions surrounding the team’s internal budget dogged the Senators.
Fans, who were still feeling the sting of Alfie’s departure, were left swearing under their breath when respected hockey figures like Bob McKenzie publically discussed how any move the Senators made would have to be “dollar in – dollar out” because the team could not afford to add salary
despite being near the bottom of the league in spending. Fans were left wondering whether Ceci was objectively good, or if he was simply good enough so long as he was playing under a cheap entry level contract.
The Argument that Ceci is Very Valuable
Cody Ceci was selected in the first found, 15th overall, in the 2012 NHL Entry Draft. Although he was the 9th of 13 defensemen taken in the first round, his 205 games played ranks 4th most among defensemen in his draft class behind only Morgan Rielly (236), HampusLindholm (236), and Jacob Trouba (211). Rielly is currently on a 6 year $30M deal, Lindholm is unsigned but his contract is
expected to be in the $5M per year range, while a leaked contract demand showed Trouba initially
asked for an eight-year deal valued over $56M. Given that Ceci has played almost as many games as the players it seems likely that he would see himself just under that category of value, so his initial ask for what works out to an AAV of about $4.25M over a six year term makes sense.
“
Games played” is an interesting stat because it can be both a measure of skill and a measure of a team not having better options in their system. One approached to figuring out whether he earned his games played is to look at his production.
Production of Defencemen from 2012 (>100 GP)
Draft Position Drafted By Player GP G A Pts PIM PPG
6 Anaheim Hampus Lindholm 236 23 69 92 108 0.3898
5 Toronto Morgan Rielly 236 19 73 92 54 0.3898
9 Winnipeg Jacob Trouba 211 23 49 72 151 0.3412
22 Pittsburgh Olli Maatta 165 16 41 57 46 0.3455
15 Ottawa Cody Ceci 205 18 38 56 38 0.2732
2 Columbus Ryan Murray 160 9 40 49 58 0.3063
7 Minnesota Mathew Dumba 152 19 25 44 63 0.2895
60 New Jersey Damon Severson 123 6 32 38 54 0.3089
The above table shows the production of defensemen from the 2012 draft class who have played in more than 100 NHL to date.
Ceci’s 56 points is ranked 5th in this list behind Lindholm, Rielly, Trouba, and Olli Maatta. There appears to be a gap between the group that includes Lindholm, Rielly, and Trouba and the next tier has Maatta, Ceci, and possibly Ryan Murray.
In terms of contract Maatta signed a six deal with an AAV of $4.083M while Murray signed a two year bridge deal with a $2.825M AAV. For the sake of keeping apples and oranges separate, it is important to note that UFA years are more expensive than RFA years, so long term contracts that buy UFA years will typically cost more than bridge deals where players are still in the RFA years at the conclusion of the deal. Based on raw point output it appears that Ceci should command a shade over $3M per season on a bridge deal or an AAV just under $4M on a long term deal.
The Argument that Ceci is Not Very Valuable
The problem with using raw numbers is that external factors sometimes cloud the analysis.
For example, in the table I used in the last section Ceci was shown to have the 5th highest point total of the defensemen in his draft class. However, his high point total may simply reflect the fact that he played a lot more games than many of the players we are using as comparables, and the fact that he played many more games than most of his cohort may simply be a function of the Senators having limited options to fix their porous defense within a fixed budget.
So how can we assess the extent to which Ceci has earned his spot and games played? A good place to start is with points per game (PPG), which is in the last column in the previous section. Although Ceci is 5th in total points among defensemen in his cohort who have played more than 100 games, he is dead last in that group of eight players in PPG. Players like Lindholm and Rielly have set themselves apart from the crowd, while Trouba and Maatta form the next rung in the quality ladder. Ceci’s PPG is a bit below Mathew Dumba, who just signed a two-year bridge deal with an AAV of $2.55M.
Getting contracts right is really a matter of using the right metric.
If Ceci’s point total is used the team would be ok with giving him just above $3M, but if a standardized production rate is used the team should limit their offer to Ceci to and AAV of $2.5M or less on a two-year bridge deal.
Of course other factors are at play, and being a good defensemen is not exclusively about putting up points.
Sometimes toughness is valued among defensemen and teams are willing to pay for big players who like to rough it up on the ice. Trouba’s value, for example, is based in part on his physical presence. Considering the Penalty Minute totals from the table in the previous section it is safe to assume Ceci is not that type of player. Another way to look at quality of defensemen is to look at possession and goal differentials to see if they are helping or hurting the team when they are on the ice. Based on data from
hockeyanlaysis.com, in his career to date when Ceci has been on the ice the Senators have produced 47.8% of even strength shot attempts (CF%) and 48.6% of even strength goals (GF%).
This is not stellar.
Ideally you want your top pairing to be above 50% in those numbers, and you understand that your bottom pairing is likely to get buried now and again (otherwise they would be top-four instead of bottom pairing). The middle pairing should be around 50% or just above in both shot attempts and goals.
Ceci’s underlying metrics appear to be damning.
In fact, his Rel numbers are commonly much worse. However, a note of caution has to be made here because some of Ceci’s metrics take a bigger hit than most players in the league due to contextual factors that have nothing to do with his play.
In particular, Ceci has (from an analytics perspective) had the misfortune to play on the right side behind Eric Karlsson. The fact that they play on defense and on the same side leads to an important contextual factor that has to be taken into account.
In his career Ceci has logged over 3000 minutes, but only 71.26 of those minutes have been with Karlsson.
In fact, since he came into the league Ceci has logged more minutes with Ryan Dzingel, Cory Conacher, and Nick Paul, than he has with Karlsson.
So why does this matter?
It matters because Karlsson’s metrics are all through the roof, and Ceci has the disadvantage of not being able to pad his stats by being on the ice with the best defensemen on the team. Also, when players are not playing with Ceci they are most often going to be playing with Karlsson, who often plays more than 30 minutes a night, so the “drag” Ceci appears to be having on players is somewhat exaggerated.
We should know up front that players will do better with Karlsson, and that should not be an indictment of Ceci’s skill. For this reason I think the fairest way to interpret how Ceci is doing is to stick with CF% and GF% and set aside trying to drill down deeper into relative numbers unless you have some way in mind that is fair to Ceci (David Johnson, founder of Hockey Analysis and Puckalytics, is an excellent resource for this type of question).
Conclusion
The Ottawa Senators are in a tough spot with Cody Ceci.
Based on his numbers it appears he was rushed into the league, and playing a lot of games has potentially influenced his contract demands. There is something to be said for expecting to get paid like a $4M defensemen if you are asked to play, and have played, the type of role associated with this level of pay. But at the end of the day Cody Ceci is not a $4M defenseman.
In fact, a compelling case can be made that he not even a $3M defenceman.
The end result in the ongoing contract negotiations will leave us with two competing factors that need to be pulled apart and debated. The first is it will provide some insight into the types of numbers the team is using to assess player value. The second is the contract will shed light into the premium the Senators were forced to pay to keep Ceci in the fold because there is currently a lack of great options behind him.
As I see it the over/under for evaluating how good a deal this will be is $2.5M (assuming a two-year term). I am guessing the deal will be bigger than that and shake down at about $6.25M total over two years. Even at that rate it would not be a horrible deal because at 22 years old Ceci is
in his statistical prime.
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