Useless Stats

So the Bruins are wandering into Yankees territory.

Oh well. Should make for an exciting Game 7 on Friday night in Boston. If Philadelphia wins, it'll become just the third team in NHL history to come back to win a best-of-7 series after trailing 3-0. If the B's lose, they'd become the first team — in the three major sports that use best-of-7 (NHL, NBA, MLB) — to lose a series after leading 3-0 since, well, you know.

I hate to pick on the Yankees — actually, I love it — but when the Sox are in fourth place in the AL East, you tend to live in the past.

Coming back from a 3-0 deficit to win a series is remarkable, a statistical anomaly. But there are some stats that I feel are just unnecessary to focus on. In every story I've read about the Bruins-Flyers today, the stat I keep seeing is that Boston is 16-0 when leading a series 3-0. Really?

Two teams in NHL history have come back from 3-0 to win a series. That's a good stat because of the improbability of it actually happening. The Bruins being 16-0? It's a space filler.

And same goes for the Celtics-Cavs series; one recurring stat I'm seeing is that the Celts are 32-1, in team history, when leading the series 3-2.

Those stats look good on paper, but how much do they really matter? Do you think the Bruins will be in the locker room tomorrow night, ready to take the ice, when head coach Claude Julien says "Listen men, the Bruins as a franchise, which existed 50 years before most of you were born, are 16-0 when leading 3-0. So don't fret, we've got history on our side tonight!"

I understand that some players take pride in their team's legacy, but most guys are just collecting a pay check from the club that decided to acquire them. And most will end up playing for another team with a whole new set of historical stats that have no direct bearing on their performance.

Maybe I'm making too much of it, but I just think it's silly that these sort of team-history stats are used in print. They're useless. The city and jersey doesn't make a team more likely —  or unlikely — to win a series. The players who make up the team determine that.