Height, Weight, and BMI of NHL Players

I recently created a number of graphs to see whether the term bigger in the saying players are getting bigger, faster, and stronger to see whether this is true in the current NHL as there appears to be a large influx of smaller young and fast players post 2004 lockout (and in response to new rules that include further restrictions to hits to the head) as oppose to larger, hard hitting players.

 What the data and graphs below show is that the average NHL players does weigh less, while the average height of a player appears to be stabilizing.

 The following graphs use data from 1960 to 2012-2013 season. The average weight and weight is calculated, along with the standard deviation. The third degree polynomial trend line is shown using the black dotted lines.

 The average weight of NHL players saw an upward trend until the beginning of the past decade. After the 2004 lockout, the average weight of players sees a dramatic drop as teams move away from big, hard hitting players.

 The average height on the other hand has kind of stabilized post 2004 lockout. As well, the spread of players is larger. There is now a wider range of short and tall players than in the past. Teams are drafting shorter, faster players but not at the expense of taller (most likely defensive) players.

While the average human being is now taller (and bigger) than those in the past, it is of larger magnitude, with the average human measuring x in xxxx and x in xxxx, compared to around 71 inches (x feet x inches) and over 73 inches (x feet x inches) in 2012.

 Combing the height and weight of players to get the average BMI, it is shown that it has significantly dropped in recent years. Falling from 26.9 in 1996 to 25.4 in the past year.

 This provides some evidence on how the NHL has changed in past decade, and possibly where it is going in the future. The new rules put in place post lockout has changed the type of players teams are looking for, now going to less heavy (and most likely hard hitting) players for smaller (faster) players.