This is the 2022-23 edition — an archived read. Read the 2024-25 report →
Jon Merrill
Minnesota Wild Defense
Twenty points with none on the power play, the 2nd-percentile ground covered, and sixteen goals of finishing above the model on his ice.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013-14 | NJD | 52 | 2 | 9 | 11 | -3 | 12 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 45 | 4.4 | 19:14 |
| 2014-15 | NJD | 66 | 2 | 12 | 14 | -14 | 24 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 47 | 4.3 | 20:33 |
| 2015-16 | NJD | 47 | 1 | 4 | 5 | -15 | 28 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 30 | 3.3 | 16:54 |
| 2016-17 | NJD | 51 | 1 | 5 | 6 | -9 | 24 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 48 | 2.1 | 18:34 |
| 2017-18 | VGK | 34 | 1 | 2 | 3 | +7 | 22 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 30 | 3.3 | 16:05 |
| 2018-19 | VGK | 57 | 3 | 12 | 15 | +16 | 53 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 72 | 4.2 | 17:53 |
| 2019-20 | VGK | 49 | 2 | 5 | 7 | +9 | 32 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 37 | 5.4 | 18:09 |
| 2020-21 | DET/MTL | 49 | 0 | 5 | 5 | -9 | 16 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 41 | 0.0 | 18:15 |
| 2021-22 | MIN | 69 | 4 | 16 | 20 | +15 | 22 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 59 | 6.8 | 17:07 |
| 2022-23 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 474 | 16 | 70 | 86 | -3 | 233 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 409 | 3.9 | 18:12 |
This Season So Far
The 2022-23 season has not started. The empty row above is his, and both it and this paragraph fill in on their own from the morning after he first plays: what he has done, what it is worth against his own last season, and the run he is on when the two disagree.
Last Season
4 goals and 16 assists in sixty-nine games at 17:07 a night, plus-15, twenty-two penalty minutes. Thirty-eighth overall in 2010, nine seasons, 474 games, 86 points.
Not one of his twenty points came on the power play — he played no meaningful time there.
The Finesse Game
1.15 even-strength points per 60 is the 73rd percentile, which for a man with 86 career points in 474 games is well above his own history and is the first sign that this season needs discounting.
3.00 shots per 60 is the 10th percentile at 6.8 per cent, from a 53-foot median with six per cent of them from the slot — the 13th percentile. He shoots rarely, from the point, and four went in.
50.7 per cent of the expected goals is the 56th percentile and 48.5 per cent of the attempts the 37th — an ordinary third-pair share. His ice then went 56-44 against an expectation of 39.53-38.40, sixteen goals of finishing surplus. The plus-15 is that gap and nothing else.
0.30 takeaways per 60 is the 1st percentile against 1.07 giveaways at the 8th. He touches the puck as little as any defenceman in the league in either direction.
With Dmitry Kulikov across 978 attempts he was at 51.9 per cent and 49.5 apart; Kulikov apart from him read 54.5.
The Physical Game
5.69 blocks per 60 is the 87th percentile, and it is the one column in which he is clearly above his position. 2.34 hits per 60 is the 22nd percentile at 6-3 and 204 — he blocks rather than hits, which is a real and useful distinction.
0.15 penalties drawn per 60 is the 8th percentile and 0.56 taken the 41st.
The Intangibles
7.80 miles per 60 is the 2nd percentile among defencemen and 0.5 bursts over 20 mph per 60 is the 11th. Only Mathew Dumba on this roster covered less ground, and nobody in the league covered much less than either.
He is 30 and this was comfortably the best season of his career by results and an ordinary one by process. A third-pair defenceman who blocks shots and does not carry the puck is what the record describes — the twenty points and the plus-15 are what the club in front of him produced.
What kind of player
The searchable half of the report. The first group is computed from the season's own data; the rest are read out of the prose above, and each one carries the sentence that produced it. A subject the report never raised is simply absent.
- a strengthread out of the prose, and claimed
Each computed tag also says how well its measure holds up from one season to the next, because a tag describes a season that has finished and a reader will assume it predicts the one coming. Some do and some do not, and the gap is wide: five-on-five workload repeats well, scoring late does not repeat at all.
“5.69 blocks per 60 is the 87th percentile, and it is the one column in which he is clearly above his position.”
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2021-22 · 1,058 minutes
- Expected goals
- 50.7%
- 61st pct
- Shot attempts
- 48.5%
- 41st pct
share of the chances while he was out there
share of the attempts while he was out there
Goals while he was on the ice: 56 for, 44 against. Expected: 39.5 and 38.4.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe numbers rank him 52 points above where the report does. It was written for a back edition, with the seasons that followed already known. Neither the agreement nor the gap says anything about the eye, and this report is excluded from the club-level comparison for the same reason. Why the numbers land there sets out the club he did it on, the minutes he played and the men he played them with.
Both bars are percentiles among the 649 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 50 on their own scale — against every other report's mean. The numbers bar ranks his share of expected goals. A gap is a disagreement about where he belongs, not two scales talking past each other.
Tracked
NHL Edge, 2021-22 · 69 games
- Top speed
- 22.4 mph
- 82nd pct
- Bursts over 20 mph
- 0.14 a game
- Distance
- 2.22 miles a game
- Hardest shot
- 92.2 mph
- 49th pct
fastest he was clocked all season; the league's average best is 21.5
how often he reaches that speed, not how fast he goes
skated, all strengths
one shot; the league's average best is 90.4
A top speed is a season's best, and a man who takes more shifts gets more tries at one; the percentile is the feed's own, against every skater, and says less between a top-pair defenceman and a fourth-line wing than it does between two men in the same job. The counts are shown per game for the same reason.
Usual linemates
2021-22 · 1058 minutes at five-on-five
- Calen Addison12%
Share of his five-on-five ice time spent alongside each player, measured from shift charts. Special teams are excluded: a power-play unit is not a line.
Why the numbers land there
Five-on-five, 2021-22
- The club
- MIN took 53.7% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 50.7% — 3.0 below the club he did it on.
- The role
- Second pair, 1,058 minutes at five-on-five — 69th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dmitry Kulikov | 51.9% | 49.5% | 54.5% |
| Kevin Fiala | 53.9% | 49.4% | 57.0% |
| Ryan Hartman | 55.2% | 49.0% | 55.0% |
51.9% together, 49.5% for him apart and 54.5% for Kulikov apart. Splitting them up moved neither man. Whatever is driving the share, it is not this pairing.
Expected-goal share while both were on the ice, and for each man in the minutes he played without the other. Apart is the pair subtracted from his own totals. It does not settle who was carrying whom — apart from each other, both were still playing with somebody — but it does say whether the share travelled when the pairing broke up.
Where he shoots from
goal on goal missed
81 unblocked shots in 2021-22, 4 of them goals. His median goal came from 45 feet. 4% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 79% from beyond forty.