The Rasmus Ristolainen Contract is a Mistake for Philadelphia

The first and most basic number I think deserves taking a look at is W.A.R. or Wins Above Replacement. Baseball fans are likely more than familiar with the “catch-all” stat, but for those that may not be familiar, WAR is generally a guide used to determine the overall value of a player to their team, by comparing them to a generally league average player.

WAR as a unit can be difficult to quantify, so by extrapolating it to percentiles, you can compare a specific player to the entire field of the NHL, determining where they rank in comparison. Prior to this season, Rasmus Ristolainen sported a WAR percentile of 3%, which would place him as among the worst 2% of players in the league.

However, surprisingly enough, since joining the Flyers Ristolainen’s WAR has managed to fall from 3% to 1%, showing that compared to the league his play has actually dropped as a member of the Philadelphia Flyers, with him playing worse than he did as a Sabre. Miraculously, Robert Hagg, a player generally regarded as a liability also had a WAR of 3% at the time of the trade, indicating that the deal was more of a hail mary than it may have looked on the surface.

The biggest black eye of Ristolainen’s game is his defensive play. Something that, believe it or not, makes or breaks a defenseman. By similar percentiles to his WAR, Ristolainen is in the bottom 7% of the league defensively among all players, a horrible statistic for a player regarded as more valuable in his own zone.

Sheltered from powerplay minutes, and similarly ineffective on the penalty kill, Ristolainen has actually managed to take massive steps backward in his game from his days in Buffalo. He has become increasingly more undisciplined, played against weaker competition, and played with one of the best partners he has had in his career. And despite this, he still has struggled mightily to make a positive statistical impact while other members of the Flyers defensive corps have.

Despite all of this, the single most indicting statistic that plagues Ristolainen is technically two complementary statistics. Expected Goals For (xGF) and Expected Goals Against (xGA) are a pair of statistics dedicated to determining how many quality scoring chances are being registered while a specific player is on the ice. xGF would be positive chances in favor of the given player’s team, and xGA would be chances against. Both of these numbers are formed by taking into account chances directly created by positive offensive and/or negative defensive plays to indicate whether a player is forcing his team to play more in the offensive or defensive zone.

Ristolainen’s xGF and xGA are fairly unilaterally awful for his entire career. Not once in his nine years in the NHL so far has he contributed more positively than he’s allowed negatively, with some years being massively poor due to missing time throughout the season. This season overall is one of the best seasons of his career by this metric. And despite this, he is holding tight in the company of every other defenseman in the Flyers organization not named Keith Yandle or Travis Sanheim.

The argument of “Ristolainen is one of our best defenders” is technically true so far this season. He’s firmly locked in at third if you discount Kevin Connaughton and Cam York who both played far fewer games. In fact statistically, the Flyer he is closest to this season by this metric is Nick Seeler, which is infinitely more concerning when this version of Ristolainen has been the best version of Ristolainen the league has seen so far.

Defensemen are particularly noteworthy because they, not unlike goaltenders, tend to hit their primes later than forwards. Ristolainen sits currently at the age of 27, an age beyond where a player is expected to develop far more beyond what they are. The best version of Rasmus Ristolainen the league has ever seen came in his age 27 season, and Ristolainen seemingly at his best amounts to essentially a defensively worse Andrew MacDonald.

So overall, it’s been established Rasmus Ristolainen is bad, but now it’s time to begin considering some of the positives he has brought to the Philadelphia Flyers. I believe the most obvious and most notable aspect that Risto brings to Philadelphia is a touch of physicality many believe has been missing, as the team around Giroux’s captaincy has gotten “soft”.

The Giroux’s captaincy argument is a separate discussion, but the belief that the Flyers haven’t had any physicality since the days of Lindros is flat out untrue. Chris Pronger was a massive physical presence for the team from 2009 to 2011 before his injury led to his retirement. Scott Rinaldo took over the physicality role from there until 2015. By the time Rinaldo was being moved by the Flyers, the dedicated goon role had been all but phased out of the game, with the Flyers arguably being late to that trend. By the time Rinaldo was shipped off, Wayne Simmonds had reached his feisty-est and Radko Gudas was doling out the hits hard on the backend, something that continued until Robert Hagg stepped into that position with and later in replacement of Gudas.

All of this is to say that the argument that Ristolainen brings a physical edge to the Flyers that wasn’t there before is untrue. The Flyers have always loved their big-bodied players, often too much, and Ristolainen is just a replacement for an outdated archetype that the Flyers have never been lacking, despite the fanbase’s assertations otherwise.

Going even further with this point, Radko Gudas was actually better overall, both as a Flyer and still today, than Ristolainen has ever been in his career. Yet, Ristolainen’s physicality is regarded as some never-before-seen asset, while Gudas’s style of play received constant criticism even though he unilaterally outplayed Ristolainen despite been hit for suspensions Rasmus has so far avoided.

Now, with the knowledge that Rasmus Ristolainen is, at the very best, a generally poor defenseman, I would like to continue on by addressing a number of the platitudes that are floated out by hardcore Ristolainen supporters to try and prove his value.