This is the 2024-25 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Martin Pospisil
Calgary Flames Center
A hundred and nine penalty minutes at 173 pounds — the highest total on the club, from the lightest forward on it.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023-24 | CGY | 63 | 8 | 16 | 24 | +14 | 109 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 117 | 6.8 | 12:43 |
| 2024-25 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 63 | 8 | 16 | 24 | +14 | 109 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 117 | 6.8 | 12:43 |
This Season So Far
The 2024-25 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
8 goals and 16 assists in 63 games — 24 points at 12:43 a night, plus-14, with 1 game-winner on 117 shots at 6.84 per cent, and 109 penalty minutes. His first NHL season, at 24.
A hundred and nine penalty minutes is the highest total on the roster and he weighs 173 pounds.
53.8 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 757 minutes, the 81st percentile. His ice went 37-24 against an expectation of 34.73-29.78 — six fewer goals conceded than the chances called for.
The Finesse Game
117 attempts at a median of 26 feet, with 43 per cent from inside 20 and 30 per cent from beyond 40, converting at 6.84 per cent. Eight goals on 117 attempts is a poor rate and there is not much of a shot.
16 assists in 63 games from a fourth line is the useful half. He moves the puck simply and quickly and he does not hold it long enough to lose it.
The Physical Game
6-2 and 173 pounds, and he plays as though he is fifty pounds heavier. He finishes every check, he goes into every corner first, and he will fight anybody — and at that weight it is not obvious how long it lasts.
A hundred and nine penalty minutes in sixty-three games. He is an agitator and he retaliates, and a good share of the total is the second penalty rather than the first. On a club that spent the sixth-fewest minutes shorthanded in hockey, he is most of the fouling.
The Intangibles
A hundred and fifth overall in 2018, out of Zvolen by way of Sioux City, and an NHL regular at 24 after four seasons in the American league.
A 173-pound fourth-round pick who arrives at 24 and immediately leads his club in penalty minutes is a specific and unrepeatable kind of player, and the plus-fourteen says the coaching staff was right to keep sending him out.
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.
- measuredcomputed here from the season's own data
- 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.
- perimeter· shoots from the outside, by choice or because he cannot get in
30.4% of his attempts from 40 feet or beyond, 91st percentile among forwards
Season to season, this measure repeats well (0.66) · 50% keep it
- sheltered· is started in the attacking end
62% of his end-zone starts in the attacking end, 94th percentile among forwards
Season to season, this measure repeats well (0.66) · 47% keep it
“**He finishes every check, he goes into every corner first, and he will fight anybody** — and at that weight it is not obvious how long it lasts.”
“**6-2 and 173 pounds, and he plays as though he is fifty pounds heavier.**”
“**He finishes every check, he goes into every corner first, and he will fight anybody** — and at that weight it is not obvious how long it lasts.”
“**He is an agitator and he retaliates**, and a good share of the total is the second penalty rather than the first.”
“**He is an agitator and he retaliates**, and a good share of the total is the second penalty rather than the first.”
“**A hundred and nine penalty minutes in sixty-three games.**”
“**He moves the puck simply and quickly** and he does not hold it long enough to lose it.”
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2023-24 · 757 minutes
- Expected goals
- 53.8%
- 81st pct
- Shot attempts
- 54.6%
- 88th 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: 37 for, 24 against. Expected: 34.7 and 29.8.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe numbers rank him 34 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 652 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 69 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, 2023-24 · 63 games
- Top speed
- 23.2 mph
- 92nd pct
- Bursts over 20 mph
- 2.43 a game
- Distance
- 2.07 miles a game
- Hardest shot
- 94.7 mph
- 91st pct
fastest he was clocked all season; the league's average best is 22.1
how often he reaches that speed, not how fast he goes
skated, all strengths
one shot; the league's average best is 84.5
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
2023-24 · 757 minutes at five-on-five
- Nazem Kadri85%
- Connor Zary52%
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, 2023-24
- The club
- CGY took 49.9% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 53.8% — 3.9 above the club he did it on.
- The role
- Third line, 757 minutes at five-on-five — 35th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nazem Kadri | 55.4% | 45.2% | 44.6% |
| Connor Zary | 52.8% | 54.8% | 51.4% |
| Rasmus Andersson | 47.1% | 58.0% | 48.9% |
55.4% together, 45.2% for him apart and 44.6% for Kadri apart. Both were worse apart, so whatever the two of them had together was doing real work.
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
161 unblocked shots in 2023-24, 8 of them goals. His median goal came from 8 feet. 43% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 30% from beyond forty.