Iafrate Points

We all know that Al Iafrate does not like empty net goals. The story goes that Iafrate was in clear but elected to shoot the puck in the corner rather than into the open net and when asked about it afterwards was quoted as saying:

"empty net goals are for [sissies/pansies/wussies/losers/and some other terms that are more likely to be the actual quote but I will refrain from posting so I don't get banned]"

(does anyone have the actual video of this game and the interview?)

In any case I also think that in general empty net goals are cheap. Sure there are exceptions and some empty net goals are actually pretty impressive and certainly a goalie scoring an empty net goal is almost always cool (and I certainly wouldn't call Ron Hextall for example a "sissy" or whatever) and also empty net goals may be good indicators that a coach trusts a player to protect a lead at the end of the game but in general I do not think they are a good indicator of offensive performance at all.

So I always remove empty net goals from player stats in my (offensive) evaluations. The NHL website makes this easy in their stats page by having a column for empty net goals in their goals by type report (NHL.com - Stats).

But what about assists on empty net goals? Not every hockey player does the honorable thing like Brett Hull and make sure other players don't get cheap empty net assists. I think these in general are even cheaper than empty net goals and I would expect them to be more common than empty net goals just like assists in general.

Despite these issues I was unaware of empty net assists being tracked anywhere and so it was definitely a goal of mine to ensure I tracked empty net assists when gathering boxscore data. As I continue to work on that project recently I stumbled upon the goal finder from Hockey Reference and noticed it allows you to explicitly search for empty net goals which shows not only the goal scorer but also who assisted on the goal among other information (Goal Finder | Hockey-Reference.com). While the data only goes back to the 1979-1980 season and there is some missing data (for example Mario Lemieux scored 69 goals in 1995-1996 but the Hockey Reference goal finder only has 68 goals for him that season) it is still a good basis for starting on Iafrate points.

Iafrate points are simply points excluding empty net points named in honor of Al Iafrate for his principled stance. Let us refer to empty net points as simply cheap points for the purposes this forum. Please note that I did not attempt to correct for any issues in actually granting cheap points (there is data where a goalie is actually present for a empty net goal and I know from going through the NHL statsapi that there are goals with no goalie but that are still not marked as empty net goals)

There were 6707 empty net goals recorded from 1979-1980 to 2017-2018 and 2270 players had a cheap point in that time frame

Highest career cheap points 1979-1980 to 2017-2018

cheap points	player
85	Wayne Gretzky
60	Marian Hossa
56	Jarome Iginla
55	Joe Thornton
53	Eric Staal
51	Ron Francis
50	Jaromir Jagr
48	Mark Messier
45	Mark Recchi
44	Mario Lemieux
42	Teemu Selanne
41	Bryan Trottier
40	Patrice Bergeron
40	Sidney Crosby
40	Steve Yzerman
39	Keith Tkachuk
39	Ray Bourque
38	Alex Ovechkin
37	Daniel Alfredsson
37	Henrik Zetterberg
36	Brendan Shanahan
36	Mike Modano
35	Blake Wheeler
35	David Backes
35	Henrik Sedin
35	Pavel Datsyuk
34	Gary Roberts
34	Ilya Kovalchuk
34	Jari Kurri
34	Nicklas Backstrom
34	Zach Parise
33	Doug Gilmour
33	Mike Bossy
33	Patrick Kane
33	Rick Nash
33	Rod Brind'Amour
32	David Legwand
32	Evgeni Malkin
32	Patrick Marleau
31	Anze Kopitar
31	Jonathan Toews
31	Max Pacioretty
31	Pavel Bure
31	Rick Tocchet
31	Ryan Kesler
30	Brad Marchand
30	Craig Conroy
30	Daniel Sedin
30	Olli Jokinen
29	Guy Carbonneau
29	John Tavares
29	Jordan Staal
29	Justin Williams
29	Mike Ridley
29	Shane Doan
29	Theoren Fleury
29	Tomas Plekanec
28	Doug Weight
28	Dustin Brown
28	Jeremy Roenick
28	Joe Pavelski
28	Kelly Miller
28	Mikko Koivu
28	Patrik Elias
27	Alexandre Burrows
27	Brent Sutter
27	Joe Sakic
27	Martin St. Louis
27	Ray Whitney
27	Sergei Fedorov
27	Trevor Linden
26	Al Macinnis
26	Antoine Vermette
26	Chris Kelly
26	Jamie Langenbrunner
26	Keith Primeau
26	Michael Grabner
26	Michal Handzus
26	Mike Fisher
26	Milan Lucic
26	Peter Stastny
26	Radim Vrbata
26	Scott Stevens
26	Todd Marchant
26	Zdeno Chara
25	Brandon Dubinsky
25	Brian Rolston
25	Chris Pronger
25	Dale Hunter
25	Mats Sundin
25	Nicklas Lidstrom
25	Patrick Sharp
25	Saku Koivu
25	Tony Amonte
25	Vincent Damphousse
25	Vincent Lecavalier
24	Alex Kovalev
24	David Krejci
24	Dino Ciccarelli
24	Jason Spezza
24	Marian Gaborik
24	Paul Coffey
24	Paul Kariya
23	Adam Oates
23	Ed Olczyk
23	Jeff Carter
23	Loui Eriksson
23	P.J. Axelsson
23	Paul Stastny
23	Tom Fitzgerald
23	Troy Murray
22	Alex Steen
22	Dave Poulin
22	Daymond Langkow
22	Glenn Anderson
22	Logan Couture
22	Miroslav Satan
22	Murray Craven
22	Rob Niedermayer
21	Andrew Cogliano
21	Chris Chelios
21	Corey Perry
21	Drew Doughty
21	John Maclean
21	Mike Gartner
21	Radek Bonk
21	Rick Middleton
21	Steve Kasper
21	Steve Larmer
20	Brett Hull
20	Brian Gionta
20	Claude Lemieux
20	Denis Savard
20	Duncan Keith
20	Jamie Benn
20	Jason Pominville
20	Joel Ward
20	Jussi Jokinen
20	Kelly Buchberger
20	Michael Peca
20	Mike Grier
20	Peter Forsberg
20	Ryan Callahan
20	Ryan O'Reilly
20	Tyler Seguin
20	Valtteri Filppula

I cut it off at 20 because it simply got too unwieldy to go further. Some real good players are sadly on this list. Yet another record for Wayne Gretzky which he has a large margin of victory but there likely isn't much pride in this one. Some active players have probably already moved up as this table does not account for cheap points from the current season.

Highest career cheap assists 1979-1980 to 2017-2018

cheap assists	player
31	Ron Francis
29	Wayne Gretzky
28	Jaromir Jagr
28	Joe Thornton
26	Mark Recchi
26	Patrice Bergeron
24	Jarome Iginla
24	Nicklas Backstrom
23	Craig Conroy
23	Eric Staal
23	Henrik Zetterberg
23	Mark Messier
23	Pavel Datsyuk
23	Sidney Crosby
22	Paul Coffey
22	Ray Bourque
21	Chris Pronger
21	Rod Brind'Amour
20	Anze Kopitar
20	Jari Kurri
20	Marian Hossa
19	Al Macinnis
19	David Legwand
19	Drew Doughty
19	Duncan Keith
19	Henrik Sedin
19	Joe Pavelski
19	Ryan Kesler
19	Zdeno Chara
18	Adam Oates
18	Chris Chelios
18	Dale Hunter
18	Jonathan Toews
18	Michal Handzus
18	Mike Bossy
18	Mike Modano
18	Mikko Koivu
18	Sergei Fedorov
18	Steve Yzerman
17	Brandon Dubinsky
17	Brendan Shanahan
17	Bryan Trottier
17	Daniel Sedin
17	Doug Gilmour
17	Loui Eriksson
17	Mike Fisher
17	Olli Jokinen
17	Ryan Suter
17	Saku Koivu
17	Scott Niedermayer
17	Scott Stevens
17	Teppo Numminen
16	Blake Wheeler
16	Brent Sutter
16	David Krejci
16	Jordan Staal
16	Keith Tkachuk
16	Ray Whitney
16	Ryan O'Reilly
16	Teemu Selanne
16	Thomas Steen
16	Todd Marchant
15	Alex Kovalev
15	Brent Seabrook
15	Jason Spezza
15	Jeremy Roenick
15	Kelly Miller
15	Murray Craven
15	Nicklas Lidstrom
15	P.J. Axelsson
15	Patrick Kane
15	Tomas Plekanec
15	Vincent Lecavalier

Gretzky is probably happy to let Ron Francis have this record. 1415 cheap goals were left unassisted.

Highest cheap points in a season 1979-1980 to 2017-2018

player	season	cheap points
Jaromir Jagr	2000-2001	10
Wayne Gretzky	1986-1987	9
Mike Ridley	1992-1993	9
Keith Tkachuk	1996-1997	9
Mario Lemieux	1996-1997	9
Pavel Bure	1999-2000	9
Jamie Benn	2015-2016	9
Eric Staal	2016-2017	9
Craig Ramsay	1979-1980	8
Wayne Gretzky	1988-1989	8
Theo Fleury	1997-1998	8
Mike Modano	2002-2003	8
Alex Ovechkin	2008-2009	8
Eric Staal	2009-2010	8
Olli Jokinen	2011-2012	8
Joe Thornton	2014-2015	8
Jean-Gabriel Pageau	2015-2016	8
Patrick Kane	2016-2017	8
Sidney Crosby	2017-2018	8
Vincent Trocheck	2017-2018	8

I cut it off at the 20 seasons of 8 or more cheap points as there were 40 seasons of 7! Jaromir Jagr is the only player with double digit cheap points in a season (from 1979-1980 to 2017-2018).

Season by season cheap points leaders 1979-1980 to 2017-2018

season	player(s)	cheap points
1979-1980	Craig Ramsey	8
1980-1981	Bryan Trottier Mike Bossy Wayne Gretzky	7
1981-1982	Mike Bossy	7
1982-1983	Paul Coffey Ron Francis	5
1983-1984	Wayne Gretzky	7
1984-1985	Dwight Foster	6
1985-1986	Murray Craven Troy Murray Wayne Gretzky	6
1986-1987	Wayne Gretzky	9
1987-1988	Denis Savard	6
1988-1989	Wayne Gretzky	8
1989-1990	Brent Sutter	7
1990-1991	Ray Bourque	7
1991-1992	Mike Ridley Wayne Gretzky	7
1992-1993	Mike Ridley	9
1993-1994	Brendan Shanahan	6
1994-1995	Dino Ciccarelli Keith Primeau	4
1995-1996	Keith Tkachuk	7
1996-1997	Keith Tkachuk Mario Lemieux	9
1997-1998	Theo Fleury	8
1998-1999	Alexei Yashin Chris Pronger Craig Conroy Tony Amonte	5
1999-2000	Pavel Bure	9
2000-2001	Jaromir Jagr	10
2001-2002	Bryan Smolinski	6
2002-2003	Mike Modano	8
2003-2004	Jason Blake Mike Peca	6
2005-2006	Michal Handzus Vinny Prospal	5
2006-2007	Jarome Iginla	7
2007-2008	Evgeni Malkin	6
2008-2009	Alex Ovechkin	8
2009-2010	Eric Staal	8
2010-2011	Nicklas Backstrom Patrice Bergeron	7
2011-2012	Olli Jokinen	8
2012-2013	Blake Wheeler	5
2013-2014	Andrew Cogliano Jarome Iginla Max Pacioretty	6
2014-2015	Joe Thronton	8
2015-2016	Jamie Benn	9
2016-2017	Eric Staal	9
2017-2018	Sidney Crosby Vincent Trocheck	8

Iafrate point leader different from scoring leader

• 1979-1980 (was tied): Wayne Gretzky 134 (Marcel Dionne 132)
• 1994-1995 (was tied): Eric Lindros 68 and Jaromir Jagr 68
• 2000-2001: Joe Sakic 116 (Jaromir Jagr 111)
• 2002-2003: Markus Naslund 104 and Peter Forsberg 104
• 2014-2015: Jamie Benn 84 and John Tavares 84

The highest scoring player who never scored a cheap point from 1979-1980 to 2017-2018 is Reijo Ruotsalainen with 344 wholesome Iafrate points

Technically speaking Guy Chouinard and Steve Shutt scored more points in the time frame without scoring a cheap point but since their careers predate 1979-1980 I cannot give them such an honor without confirming

Al Iafrate himself unfortunately scored 3 cheap points

date	team	opponent	goal	first assist	second assist	period	time	situation
12/15/87	toronto maple leafs	washington capitals	ed olczyk	al iafrate	tom fergus	3rd	19:51	ev
2/18/92	washington capitals	san jose sharks	al iafrate	dale hunter	kelly miller	3rd	19:25	ev
12/5/92	washington capitals	new york islanders	mike ridley	dale hunter	al iafrate	3rd	19:52	ev

I bet the goal is an error in scorer transcription and I can only imagine what happened in the locker room after the game after the other two empty net goals were scored

No excuse for these cheap points

I know some of you will come at me with the talk that cheap points are valuable for ensuring the win. Well these guys don't even have that going for them. These are the empty net goals (not at weird times discussed below) that didn't win the game in regulation (four empty net goals were actually scored in games where the player's team lost but they were all at weird times):

date	team	opponent	location	result	goal	first assist	second assist	period	time
12/30/88	minnesota north stars	st louis blues	road	tie	marc habscheid	neal broten	brian maclellan	3rd	19:27
11/24/08	new york islanders	montreal canadiens	road	win (so)	bill guerin			3rd	15:13
4/4/10	vancouver canucks	minnesota wild	home	win (ot)	alexander edler			3rd	19:05

Empty net goals due to brilliant coaching (brought to you by Patrick Roy)

Coaches having been pulling the goalie earlier in recent seasons but I remember that Patrick Roy was on another level at doing this and even though it worked sometimes it seemed to backfire just as much and I never understood why (maybe he was still traumatized by a game where he felt he should have been pulled earlier ). So here are the empty net goals at really weird times (not in the last 5 minutes of the third):

date	team	opponent	result	goal	first assist	second assist	period	time
11/28/79	new york islanders	colorado rockies	loss	billy smith			3rd	4:50
11/29/87	new york rangers	new york islanders	win	david shaw			2nd	8:59
3/27/88	new jersey devils	new york rangers	win	pat conacher	randy velischek	claude loiselle	3rd	14:43
4/1/89	st louis blues	toronto maple leafs	win (ot)	gino cavallini	bernie federko	greg paslawski	ot	4:10
4/2/89	pittsburgh penguins	philadelphia flyers	win (ot)	mario lemieux	troy loney		ot	3:38
4/16/92	winnipeg jets (1979)	san jose sharks	win	ed olczyk			2nd	19:46
4/12/93	washington capitals	montreal canadiens	win (ot)	mike ridley	bob carpenter	kevin hatcher	ot	4:12
11/2/93	detroit red wings	boston bruins	win	paul coffey			2nd	3:30
12/4/97	new jersey devils	pittsburgh penguins	win	bob carpenter	kevin dean		3rd	8:44
11/25/98	toronto maple leafs	vancouver canucks	win	dmitry yushkevich			3rd	10:58
12/29/98	montreal canadiens	edmonton oilers	win	mark recchi			1st	5:56
1/2/99	ottawa senators	new jersey devils	win	damian rhodes			1st	8:14
2/15/00	new jersey devils	philadelphia flyers	win	martin brodeur			3rd	9:43
4/7/00	edmonton oilers	vancouver canucks	win	rem murray			ot	4:01
3/25/03	columbus blue jackets	los angeles kings	win (ot)	andrew cassels			ot	4:12
12/31/05	mighty ducks of anaheim	st louis blues	win (so)	vitaly vishnevski			2nd	7:27
4/15/06	nashville predators	phoenix coyotes	win	chris mason			3rd	10:47
1/16/08	chicago blackhawks	st louis blues	win	patrick kane	robert lang	brent seabrook	3rd	14:38
3/21/09	phoenix coyotes	vancouver canucks	win	viktor tikhonov			2nd	10:30
1/12/14	edmonton oilers	chicago blackhawks	loss	boyd gordon			2nd	11:29
3/29/14	buffalo sabres	tampa bay lightning	loss (ot)	cory conacher			3rd	8:14
11/28/14	vancouver canucks	columbus blue jackets	win	brad richardson	nick bonino		3rd	14:38
12/20/14	vancouver canucks	calgary flames	win (ot)	yannick weber			1st	4:40
2/19/15	washington capitals	winnipeg jets (2011)	win	troy brouwer			3rd	13:33
2/24/15	nashville predators	colorado avalanche	win	eric nystrom	roman josi		3rd	8:28
3/17/15	st louis blues	calgary flames	win	david backes			3rd	14:25
1/26/16	san jose sharks	colorado avalanche	win	paul martin	brent burns		3rd	8:21
2/4/16	florida panthers	detroit red wings	win	vincent trocheck	reilly smith	jussi jokinen	3rd	14:19
2/21/16	minnesota wild	chicago blackhawks	win	erik haula			3rd	13:49
2/21/16	vancouver canucks	colorado avalanche	win	chris tanev	henrik sedin	daniel sedin	3rd	11:37
3/22/16	dallas stars	chicago blackhawks	win	cody eakin	jamie benn		3rd	13:48
3/26/16	minnesota wild	colorado avalanche	win	mikael granlund	erik haula		3rd	11:06
4/9/16	ottawa senators	boston bruins	win	jean-gabriel pageau			3rd	11:33
4/9/16	ottawa senators	boston bruins	win	zack smith	jean-gabriel pageau		3rd	14:29
10/15/16	calgary flames	vancouver canucks	loss (so)	troy brouwer			1st	9:14
12/13/16	dallas stars	anaheim ducks	win	radek faksa	jordie benn		3rd	13:57
1/5/17	nashville predators	tampa bay lightning	win	colton sissons	calle jarnkrok		3rd	14:02
1/14/17	st louis blues	san jose sharks	win	alex steen	jaden schwartz	kevin shattenkirk	3rd	14:37
2/9/17	ottawa senators	dallas stars	win	chris kelly			1st	17:55

Some are likely own goals and I'd imagine the overtime ones were due to pulling the goalie to try and win for playoff positioning but yeah...

Wouldn't a shooter tutor be better than a goalie who lets in empty net goals?

date	team	opponent	goal	first assist	second assist	goalie	period	time
10/14/16	edmonton oilers	calgary flames	leon draisaitl	milan lucic	darnell nurse	brian elliott	3rd	18:40
11/30/16	new york islanders	pittsburgh penguins	nikolai kulemin	casey cizikas		matt murray	3rd	19:36
1/16/17	san jose sharks	winnipeg jets (2011)	joe thornton			michael hutchinson	3rd	19:50
2/4/17	pittsburgh penguins	st louis blues	sidney crosby			jake allen	3rd	19:42
11/3/17	nashville predators	anaheim ducks	p.k. subban	pekka rinne	austin watson	john gibson	3rd	19:42
11/21/17	dallas stars	montreal canadiens	tyler seguin	alexander radulov		charlie lindgren	3rd	19:33
12/1/17	winnipeg jets (2011)	vegas golden knights	kyle connor	mark scheifele	blake wheeler	maxime lagace	3rd	18:52
12/14/17	columbus blue jackets	new york islanders	josh anderson			thomas greiss	3rd	19:59
12/22/17	florida panthers	minnesota wild	jonathan huberdeau	aleksander barkov		alex stalock	3rd	19:54
2/2/18	minnesota wild	vegas golden knights	eric staal	mathew dumba	jonas brodin	devan dubnyk	3rd	18:31
2/16/18	new york islanders	carolina hurricanes	john tavares			cam ward	3rd	19:28
2/24/18	washington capitals	buffalo sabres	lars eller	alex chiasson	matt niskanen	robin lehner	3rd	17:48
3/8/18	san jose sharks	st louis blues	tomas hertl	brent burns		jake allen	3rd	19:45

This is either scorer transcription error or perhaps they are now starting to call it a goal against the goalie and an empty net goal when the goalie is out of the net but hasn't made it to the bench but it must suck to be a goalie that lets in empty net goals.

ALL OF THIS IS JUST JOKES AND INTERESTING STATS NO OFFENSE TO ANY PLAYERS OR ANYONE :]