Oracle of North York almost predicts Canada's Men Olympic Hockey Team

Earlier this year I wrote an article predicting the outcomes of the NHL season and discussed the folly of prediction.  My point was that making predictions is pretty useless, but we all enjoy making predictions. It makes for good TV (or radio.)  However, key to all predictions is going back and comparing your result to actual.  Were you right?  Were you even close?  Are you better than the average.  Well I bothered to compare my prediction and the prediction of professional hockey analysts to the actual result.

Picture from Hockey Canada Website

Back on Thursday, December 12, I wrote a blog with my prediction for the Men's 2014 Olympic Hockey Roster.  Highlighted in yellow are the players I wrongly predicted.

My Prediction:

Forwards:	Left Winger	Center	Right Winger
Line 1:	Chris Kunitz	Sydney Crosby	Steve Stamkos
Line 2:	Patrick Sharp	Jonathan Toews	Logan Couture
Line 3:	Rick Nash	Ryan Getzlaf	Corey Perry
Line 4:	Martin St. Louis	John Tavares	Patrice Bergeron
Defencemen:	Left Side	Right Side
Pairing 1:	Duncan Keith	Brent Seabrook
Pairing 2:	Shea Weber	Drew Doughty
Pairing 3:	Jay Bouwmeester	Alex Pietranagelo
Goaltenders:	Roberto Luongo	Spare:	Jamie Benn (F)
	Carey Price	Matt Duchene	PK Subban (D)
	Mike Smith		Kris Letang (D)

I picked a 23 man roster.  At the time that was accurate, but they subsequently announced that the rosters will be 25 players.  So, I was one defencemen and one forward short.  Looking at my notes (chicken scratch on a now crumpled ruled paper) I predicted Kris Letang would be the 8th defencemen and Matt Duchene as next after Jamie Benn for forwards.  

Actual Result:

Forwards:	Left Winger	Center	Right Winger
Line 1:	Chris Kunitz	Sydney Crosby	Steve Stamkos
Line 2:	Patrick Sharp	Jonathan Toews	Patrick Marleau
Line 3:	Rick Nash	Ryan Getzlaf	Corey Perry
Line 4:	Jeff Carter	John Tavares	Patrice Bergeron
Defencemen:	Left Side	Right Side
Pairing 1:	Duncan Keith	PK Subban
Pairing 2:	Shea Weber	Drew Doughty
Pairing 3:	Jay Bouwmeester	Alex Pietranagelo
Goaltenders:	Roberto Luongo	Spare:	Jamie Benn (F)
	Carey Price	Matt Duchene (F)	Dan Hamhuis (D)
	Mike Smith		M.E. Vlasic (D)

My accuracy as compared to the Professionals:

Kieran - Forwards (12/14), Defencemen (6/8) and Goalies (3/3) - Overall (21/25 or 84% accuracy)

The Globe and Mail Writers:

Eric Duhatshek - Forwards (10/14), Defencemen (6/8) and Goalies (3/3) - Overall (19/25 or 76% accuracy)

James Mirtle - Forwards (10/14), Defencemen( 6/8) and Goalies (2/3) - Overall (19/25 or 76% accuracy)

Sean Gordon - Forwards (10/14), Defencemen (6/8) and Goalies (2/3) - Overall (19/25 or 76% accuracy)

The Hockey News: 

Rory Boylen (THN Editor) -  Forwards (9/14), Defencemen (5/8) and Goalies (2/3) - Overall (16/25 or 64% accuracy)

The Toronto Star:

Damian Cox - Forwards (10/14), Defencemen (7/8) and Goalies (3/3) - Overall (20/25 or 64% accuracy)

Sportsnet:

Nick Kypreos - Forwards (11/14), Defencemen (6/8) and Goalies (3/3) - Overall (20/25 or 80% accuracy)

Doug Maclean - Forwards (12/14), Defencemen (6/8) and Goalies (3/3 Overall or 84% accuracy)

The Sports News (TSN):

Darren Dreger - Forwards (11/14), Defencemen (7/8) and Goalies (3/3 or 80% accuracy)

In Review:

Well I beat the pundits on average by two correct picks. It seemes like the majority of pundits made the same mistakes.  On forwards the majority of pundits predicted Logan Couture (including me) who did not make the team.  He is also going for hand surgery tomorrow (Jan 8, 2014) and it is unknown when he'll return per the Globe and Mail.  Steve Yzerman and company likely knew this and had him out of the the running. Few people predicted Jeff Carter to picked as well as to be a forward.  On defence everyone predicted that Brent Seabrook would be selected because of his strong play this season and him being Duncan Keith's defensive partner.  Dan Hamhuis was not on anyone's final roster from the lists I looked at as well.  Otherwise it was small group of players on the bubble.  What I learned really is that everyone pretty much predicted 75% of the team and it was the same players.   What is more telling is how many of these pundits will publicly compare how accurate they actually were.  Will they own up to being wrong?  Furthermore, almost all of them hedged there bets in their original article.  Giving them some wiggle room.

Closing Comments:

In conclusion... To quote Ralph Wiggum: "I beat the smart kids, I beat the smart kids!"   Well me and Doug Maclean... I gave myself a pat on the back.  Now lets see if Steve Yzerman and his team put together the right guys to get the job done in Sochi. Also props to the Globe and Mail for having the only article published clearly showing their prediction as compared to actual.  

Your thoughts? Did Steve Yzerman and Team make the right choices?