The Most Protected Player In The NHL

When we look at the top 20 offensive zone starters, we see that Ed Jovanovski leads the league.  He has a significant lead on anyone else in the league.  Jovanovski has 168 more offensive zone starts than defensive zone starts.  Patrick Kane of Chicago is in second place well back at 139.  This is an amazing total given that Phoenix had the worst team Corsi Number in the league last season and had many more defensive faceoffs than offensive faceoffs to take last year.  Given that Jovanovski is the highest paid player on the Coyotes with a $6.5 million salary cap, this isn’t good enough.  He should be the player who leads the team and does the hard work to make the team win.  In Phoenix, it is Zbynek Michalek and Kurt Sauer who play the tough roles.  They are on for the most defensive zone starts in Phoenix.