Expected Goals 1.0

I first introduced our shot location data here, and now it will be available every week! I broke the field down into six scoring zones (shown to the right), and I tallied shot-taking data from these zones. I will post updated league rates on this page in addition to luck charts. PK attempts are included in zone 2, but own goals have been left out.

I have a hunch that most teams’ finishing rates will tend to regress at least partway toward to the league’s average finishing rate within each zone, especially the finishing rates against. Thus the difference between goals and expected goals may imply some impending regression in the points table for some teams.

The Distribution columns (Distr) indicate the percentage of the particular events that come from the zone in question. For example, 54.9% of all goals are scored from zone 2 while only 30.7% of the attempts are taken from zone 2. It’s an efficient zone, though probably not quite as efficient if I were to remove PKs.

League Data (2013)

Locations	Goals	GoalDistr	SOGDistr	OffDistr	BlksDistr	AttDistr	Finish%
One	129	15.7%	7.4%	4.6%	2.4%	5.0%	31.1%
Two	451	54.9%	36.8%	31.5%	20.7%	30.7%	17.7%
Three	100	12.2%	18.4%	15.7%	17.1%	16.9%	7.1%
Four	85	10.4%	17.5%	17.2%	25.5%	19.2%	5.3%
Five	51	6.2%	18.2%	28.8%	33.5%	26.4%	2.3%
Six	5	0.6%	1.8%	2.1%	0.9%	1.7%	3.5%

If we regress each team’s finishing rates (for and against) back to league averages, we get the following table for goal differential (GD) versus expected goal differential (xGD). I have also included the components of GD and xGD. 

“Luck” Table

Team	GF	GA	GD	xGF	xGA	xGD	Luck
LA	52	38	14	50.6	31.2	19.4	-5.4
SKC	45	30	15	48.1	29.8	18.3	-3.3
SJ	34	42	-8	49.3	42.5	6.8	-14.8
COL	43	38	5	45.1	39.5	5.7	-0.7
PHI	42	43	-1	48.2	42.8	5.5	-6.5
NYRB	56	39	17	46.3	41.0	5.3	11.7
HOU	40	39	1	49.6	44.3	5.3	-4.3
POR	53	33	20	42.8	40.1	2.7	17.3
SEA	39	42	-3	44.3	42.8	1.5	-4.5
FCD	46	49	-3	44.1	43.3	0.8	-3.8
CHI	46	49	-3	47.5	49.4	-1.9	-1.1
CLB	41	46	-5	42.6	44.7	-2.1	-2.9
NE	48	36	12	38.3	41.1	-2.8	14.8
RSL	56	41	15	42.0	46.1	-4.1	19.1
MTL	50	48	2	41.2	46.5	-5.4	7.4
VAN	53	41	12	40.3	47.2	-6.9	18.9
TOR	28	46	-18	34.3	46.3	-12.0	-6.0
DCU	21	55	-34	35.4	47.4	-12.0	-22.0
CHV	28	66	-38	31.0	55.0	-24.0	-14.0