I continue my offseason Western Conference power rankings with a look at the players manning the blue line. Determining the 10 best defensemen in the loaded Western Conference was no easy task. Finding a balance between scoring ability, possession numbers and pure defensive ability was challenging.
In most cases, the tiebreakers came down to the advanced statistics outside of goals, assists and plus/minus rating. I evaluated Corsi percentages, as well as the ratio of zone starts. Players that had high Corsi-for percentages and did it while taking most of their starts in the defensive zone held precedent over flashier defensemen who fell short in the aforementioned areas.