NLL Player Rankings: Week 6

After the first six weeks of the 2022-23 National Lacrosse League season are complete, The Lax Mag will publish a weekly NLL Player Ranking, examining the league’s Top 30 players from Week 1 right up until the end of the regular season.

TLM’s Top 30 NLL Player Rankings have nothing to do with reputations, career resumes, success in past seasons, whether we know a player personally, recognizing deserving players who’ve previously been passed over, player popularity, the size of their social media following, whether you slide into their DMs, or who others around the league tell us should get hype.

This year’s rankings, which only take into consideration a player’s performance for the current regular season, will be calculated using both our star-rating system after each game, but also a player’s season-long statistical position (based on per-game average, not full-season totals) across the league. Only players who have played two-thirds of their team’s games will qualify.

Randy Staats, Halifax Thunderbirds (Photo: Michael Hetzel)

Every game: Star-rating system

At the conclusion of every weekend, TLM will rank the top six players for each team from that weekend’s game or games (double headers). Players will be selected and ranked in order of the impact they had in that specific game(s). A player ranked first will receive six points, a player selected in the second spot will be awarded five, three gets four, four three, five two, and sixth gets a single.

This half of our ranking calculation will put an emphasis on individual game performances from Game 1 to Game 18 during the regular season - every performance is equally important no matter when it occurs.

Full season: Statistical system

For players that have played in two-thirds of their team’s games, we will take into consideration where they rank in a variety of per-game stats, including The Lax Mag’s Clutch Kings (a weighted goal-scoring system that grades game-tying, go-ahead and game-winning goals, including when in a game they’re scored and whether they’re even-strength, power-play or short-handed goals). Click here for a full rundown of how we calculate Clutch Kings, which last year was won by Colorado Mammoth Cup-winning forward Eli McLaughlin.

The following per-game stats will be used for players: goals, assists (ultimately points), loose balls, turnovers, caused turnovers, blocked shots, shots blocked, face-off wins, special-teams scoring, shooting accuracy (attempts & on goal), and those previously mentioned Clutch Kings points. Plus, for goalies: minutes played, goals against (GAA), saves (save %), saves per minute (more on that here), assists and even goals. Wins are more of a team stat (some would argue GAA is a defensive unit + goalie stat, but we’re still including for this season’s stoppers), so we won’t be using that.

Also, our Clutch Kings countdown returns next week.

Curtis Dickson, San Diego Seals (Photo: Steven Richardson Jr.)

The star-rating will act as a Most Valuable Player approach (since a player’s impact within each game will be graded against his own teammates’ performance in that same game), while the season-long stats comparison will be more of a Most Outstanding Player approach (since he’ll be compared against both his teammates and rest of the league).

While this year we’ve attempted to give the rankings even greater in-game & statistical depth, last season our star-rating system predicted every single one of the league’s most-important individual trophies long before they were announced.

Rookie of the Year: Jeff Teat
Transition Player of the Year: Zach Currier
Goalie of the Year: Matt Vinc
Defensive Player of the Year: Mitch de Snoo
Most Valuable Player: Dhane Smith

While we focused on explaining our rating & ranking system today, in future weeks, we’ll provide in-depth details & analysis on what players did the previous weekend and why their per-game stats are so special & significant. We might grade them on their game-day style again too, especially considering how many more of those shots are in Photoshelter this year!

Here is our first Top 30 of the season…

Connor Fields, Rochester Knighthawks

NLL Top 30: Week 6

1. Connor Fields, Rochester (F)
2. Curtis Dickson, San Diego (F)
3. Randy Staats, Halifax (F)
4. Kyle Rubisch, Saskatchewan (D)
5. Dhane Smith, Buffalo (F)
6. Robert Church, Saskatchewan (F)
7. Nick Rose, Toronto (G)
8. Dane Dobbie, San Diego (F)
9. Josh Byrne, Buffalo (F)
10. Dillon Ward, Colorado (G)
11. Mark Matthews, Saskatchewan (F)
12. Wes Berg, San Diego (F)
13. Rylan Hartley, Rochester (G)
14. Kiel Matisz, Philadelphia (T)
15. Christian Del Bianco, Calgary (G)
16. Mitch de Snoo, Toronto (D)
17. Jeff Teat, New York (F)
18. Reid Bowering, Vancouver (D)
19. Jake Withers, Halifax (D)
20. Tom Schreiber, Toronto (F)
21. Zach Currier, Calgary (T)
22. Joe Resetarits, Philadelphia (F)
23. Ryan Benesch, Halifax (F)
24. Jesse King, Calgary (F)
25. Lyle Thompson, Georgia (F)
26. Brad Kri, Toronto (D)
27. Curtis Knight, Rochester (F)
28. Graeme Hossack, Halifax (D)
29. Will Malcom, Panther City (F)
30. Kyle Buchanan, Buffalo (F)