This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Ryan Graves
Pittsburgh Penguins Defense
Six-foot-five, 225 pounds, and 79 per cent of his shot attempts from beyond 40 feet, in the second season of a six-year contract.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018-19 | COL | 26 | 3 | 2 | 5 | +4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 26 | 11.5 | 11:06 |
| 2019-20 | COL | 69 | 9 | 17 | 26 | +40 | 45 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 134 | 6.7 | 18:57 |
| 2020-21 | COL | 54 | 2 | 13 | 15 | +15 | 55 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 101 | 2.0 | 19:03 |
| 2021-22 | NJD | 75 | 6 | 22 | 28 | -9 | 24 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 111 | 5.4 | 20:43 |
| 2022-23 | NJD | 78 | 8 | 18 | 26 | +34 | 28 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 141 | 5.7 | 19:57 |
| 2023-24 | PIT | 70 | 3 | 11 | 14 | +10 | 30 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 77 | 3.9 | 18:23 |
| 2024-25 | PIT | 61 | 1 | 3 | 4 | -15 | 29 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 39 | 2.6 | 14:59 |
| 2025-26 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 433 | 32 | 86 | 118 | +79 | 213 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 629 | 5.1 | 18:20 |
This Season So Far
The 2025-26 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
1 goal and 3 assists in 61 games — 4 points at 14:59 a night, minus-15, with 29 penalty minutes.
49.8 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five, the 51st percentile. His ice went 26-47 against an expectation of 29.26-29.53 — seventeen goals conceded above expectation, which is the largest gap on this blue line and is mostly a goaltending number.
The Finesse Game
39 attempts in 61 games at a median of 54 feet with 79 per cent from beyond 40 and 1 per cent from inside 20, and 1 goal. He does not shoot and he does not join anything.
The puck game is the reason the contract has gone the way it has. He is slow to the puck behind his own net, the first pass is often the safe one off the wall, and under a heavy forecheck the exits stop.
The Physical Game
6-5 and 225 and this is the entire case. He clears the front of his net, he blocks shots, and he is genuinely difficult to move.
29 penalty minutes in 61 games is a moderate rate. He is not an agitator and does not take liberties; the size is used defensively and nothing else.
The Intangibles
A fourth-round pick of the Rangers in 2013 who did not play a full NHL season until he was 24, and had a plus-40 season in Colorado in 2019-20 that produced the contract.
433 games and a career plus-79 that comes almost entirely from three years in Colorado and New Jersey. He is 30, signed through 2029, and the last two seasons have been the worst of his career.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 780 minutes
- Expected goals
- 49.8%
- 52nd pct
- Shot attempts
- 49.6%
- 48th 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: 26 for, 47 against. Expected: 29.3 and 29.5.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe numbers rank him 47 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 637 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 61 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.
Usual linemates
2024-25 · 780 minutes at five-on-five
- Ryan Shea25%
- Jack St. Ivany21%
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, 2024-25
- The club
- PIT took 49.0% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 49.8% — 0.8 above the club he did it on.
- The role
- Third pair, 780 minutes at five-on-five — 35th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Noel Acciari | 43.6% | 52.1% | 43.1% |
| Ryan Shea | 47.5% | 50.5% | 49.0% |
| Jack St. Ivany | 42.7% | 52.0% | 49.1% |
43.6% together, 52.1% for him apart and 43.1% for Acciari apart. He was better away from Acciari, who was no worse away from him — the pairing cost him more than it cost Acciari.
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
72 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 1 of them goals. His median goal came from 63 feet. 1% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 79% from beyond forty.