Jakob Chychrun was a top NHL defender in 2025-26 and a bright spot on an otherwise uneven Washington Capitals team. On-ice impact visualizations show how his presence affected shot generation and suppression across even strength, power play, and penalty kill situations. The charts use color distributions to indicate where teams shoot more or less when he is on the ice, with favorable patterns near the opponent’s net and reduced chances near his own net. Additional player cards compare his performance to league averages using goals above replacement and xGAR, including offense and defense percentile ranks. NHL Edge metrics further quantify skating and shot speed, shot location tendencies, and zone time.
"This image by Micah Blake McCurdy of hockeyviz.com shows how the player has impacted play when on the ice. At the top of the image is the team's offense (even strength at left, power play at right) and at bottom is the team's defense (with penalty kill at bottom right). In each case, red/orange blobs mean teams shoot for more from that location on the ice, and blue/purple means less. In general, a good player should have red/orange blobs near the opponent's net at top, and blue/purple blobs near their own team's net at bottom."
"The distributions in middle show how the player compares to league average at individual finishing, setting up teammates to score, and taking and drawing penalties. The number at center is Synthetic Goals: a catch-all number for the player's impact."
"This card from Josh and Luke of Evolving Hockey compares the player to league averages based on their impact on on-ice statistics. GAR means “goals above replacement,” where “replacement” means an average player called up from the AHL. xGAR is the same figure but assuming league-average goaltending. The numbers at top are the player's percentile ranks overall and then for offense and defense alone."
"The NHL's advanced statistics program, Edge, tracks player and puck movement. The player's shot speed, skating speed, and skating distance are at top along with percentile rank. At bottom left is a shot location map, and at bottom right is zone time per zone."
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