2010-11 Hart Trophy Revisit.

[JackSlater]

anyone who watched the finals instead of just looking at thomas’ stats should know this. it was like in pickup when you give a guy an open shot at the three pt line and double team in the post

then and now my mvp was MSL. i have to remember my reasoning but i’ll come back to this. i was very sure of it at the time.

I agree (not about St. Louis) but people don't want to hear that a team played a perfect style for making save percentage look good, but rather I guess that a guy with no relevant success outside of a few years under Claude Julien suddenly became near-Hasek. I also like the analogy, I've won plenty of one on one basketball games by sagging back and giving up three point shots and cleaning up every rebound. No one has ever lost a game due to shots against, basketball, hockey, or otherwise.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Really, really good. They should have only given up five and shortened that series. But because of goaltending, it was left up to chance...

Like these first three goals in this video...



It's also why the team most familiar with him (Montreal) - who had a bottom five offense, scored 17 on him in the ECQF. That series was a post away from going south, a Michael Ryder save from going south...Thomas was flat out not good in that series overall.

Pretty easy to make a goalie look bad by showing every goal he allows and none of the saves he makes.

 

[WarriorofTime]

I guess that a guy with no relevant success outside of a few years Claude Julien suddenly became near-Hasek.

Must be why Claude Julien has so many other Cups to point to throughout his 20-year head coaching career.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Must be why Claude Julien has so many other Cups to point to throughout his 20-year head coaching career.

Do you equate a couple of non-consecutive, non-workhorse averaging stat seasons with winning Cups in some way...?

 

[WarriorofTime]

Do you equate a couple of non-consecutive, non-workhorse averaging stat seasons with winning Cups in some way...?

I equate a team building their team around a Goaltender and winning the Cup in said way with success, in a very logically coherent way.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Pretty easy to make a goalie look bad by showing every goal he allows and none of the saves he makes.

It's only the bad ones haha

And I say it's about time we show counter-highlights. Everyone looks superhuman in highlight videos because everything goes right. That doesn't paint the right picture either. That's part of the reason why folks think goalies from the 80's were basically folding chairs...they watched Gretzky highlights, and didn't make any saves...

Turnabout is fair play, as they say...

 

[MadLuke]

Must be why Claude Julien has so many other Cups to point to throughout his 20-year head coaching career.

Julien + prime Chara/Bergeron-Marchand and co.... were quite good, reached the finals twice:

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[WarriorofTime]

Julien + prime Chara/Bergeron-Marchand and co.... were quite good, reached the finals twice:

And if everyone else gets their flowers, no reason Thomas shouldn't either, by pretending he was "bad" just because of what league he was in 5 years prior or whatever other excuses people use.

 

[JackSlater]

Must be why Claude Julien has so many other Cups to point to throughout his 20-year head coaching career.

Oh yeah, you really got me there, given all of Thomas' success not under Julien and that Julien only had three goaltenders win the Vezina under him rather than four or five I guess.

 

[BigBadBruins7708]

So far this thread has taught me that Chara has to be a lock for Top 5 defenseman of all time with what he did apparently dragging a JAG goalie to such historic heights.

 

[Michael Farkas]

I equate a team building their team around a Goaltender and winning the Cup in said way with success, in a very logically coherent way.

I love the internet-speak whenever it gets dicey haha

Logically and coherently, they bult around a goaltender...who lost his starting job in the midst of this "run", and then was given away from nothing by 2013?

So, sure, maybe they tried to build something around a goaltender, but it wasn't that one. Plus, they only got out of the first round twice with him. It's not like this was some dynasty. He sonked some folks for 100 or 150 games, there's nothing more to it than that...we don't have to stand by this any longer, we know that he wasn't good, right? It's not like we're still in the moment where folks aren't sure anymore, we can let it die, it's okay haha...

So far this thread has taught me that Chara has to be a lock for Top 5 defenseman of all time with what he did apparently dragging a JAG goalie to such historic heights.

Well, Chara wasn't out there by himself. Team defense is a big deal and Boston had incredible team defense. Led by one of the best defensive d-men out there and maybe the best two-way forward out there...

I'm not sure that it elevates other players into weird spots...but we saw what happened with the goaltending transition after the lockout and how quickly those guys were swept away...we don't have to pretend any longer because now we're not in the moment. We got over Cechmanek, I'm sure we'll have the brain power to get over this...

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

I agree (not about St. Louis) but people don't want to hear that a team played a perfect style for making save percentage look good, but rather I guess that a guy with no relevant success outside of a few years under Claude Julien suddenly became near-Hasek. I also like the analogy, I've won plenty of one on one basketball games by sagging back and giving up three point shots and cleaning up every rebound. No one has ever lost a game due to shots against, basketball, hockey, or otherwise.

Thomas' GAA led the league also that season at 2.00. And 1.98 in the playoffs. Not to mention the important one, most wins in the playoffs with 16.

 

[WarriorofTime]

I love the internet-speak whenever it gets dicey haha

I don't know what you even mean by this or what you think is "dicey", but let's leave the personal attacks out of it this time.

then was given away from nothing by 2013?

When he was... 40 years old?

Carey Price "lost his job" to Halak who took Montreal to two big upsets. It happens with Goaltenders.

Thomas burned hot and bright for a short time. Not the first or the last player to fit that bill.

 

[WarriorofTime]

I'm not sure that it elevates other players into weird spots...but we saw what happened with the goaltending transition after the lockout and how quickly those guys were swept away...we don't have to pretend any longer because now we're not in the moment. We got over Cechmanek, I'm sure we'll have the brain power to get over this...

This isn't "getting over it" for a one time 2nd-team All-Star, this is just straight up erasure of a 2-time Vezina Winner and 1X Conn Smythe Winner.

 

[Michael Farkas]

He didn't kill his wife and a waiter, it's not like we're gonna take it away from him. He just wasn't a very good player that got put into a perfect situation. And was not considered NHL caliber outside of that. So, that means either he somehow got really good at 34 and 36 years old somehow...or, he was just never very good, and it's another example of team effects dictating averaging stats.

He was given away at age 38, which is evidently his prime haha

And we have the video, we know now that it was a bad goaltender where it worked out for a little bit. Like you said, he burned hot for a minute statistically - Cechmanek, Elliott stuff...no big whoop. Difference was having a team to bail him out and little league-wide competition at his position.

 

[JackSlater]

Thomas' GAA led the league also that season at 2.00. And 1.98 in the playoffs. Not to mention the important one, most wins in the playoffs with 16.

Definitely more important, yes. I certainly believe that Boston had a great defence that season (and others) but on my list of responsible people Thomas is not near the top. If this was the 1940 season or something I'd be higher on Thomas, though confused about his career, but it was 2011 so I could watch him and see how he played and how his team played.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Definitely more important, yes. I certainly believe that Boston had a great defence that season (and others) but on my list of responsible people Thomas is not near the top. If this was the 1940 season or something I'd be higher on Thomas, though confused about his career, but it was 2011 so I could watch him and see how he played and how his team played.

You say that as if I didn't.

Good chance you are underrating Thomas and I am underrating the Bruins defense.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Definitely more important, yes. I certainly believe that Boston had a great defence that season (and others) but on my list of responsible people Thomas is not near the top. If this was the 1940 season or something I'd be higher on Thomas, though confused about his career, but it was 2011 so I could watch him and see how he played and how his team played.

Right. He's a Dave Kerr type (who?) with less longevity. Who cares...

 

[MadLuke]

And if everyone else gets their flowers, no reason Thomas shouldn't either, by pretending he was "bad" just because of what league he was in 5 years prior or whatever other excuses people use.

I think this is a bit of a strawman, the argument is more even has is peak Thomas was Rask good (which is really good), not best of all time good like his numbers indicate.

A bit like Elliot .940 / 1.56 GAA on the Hitchock Blues around the same time than Thomas .939 run, was not an Hasek goaltender.

Take it a bit like Kunitz-Cheechoo-Hyman goal scoring prowess at their peak season playing with great players, they still need to be perfectly good top 6 level player (or even better for reaching Rocket winning number with Cheechoo) just inflated by who they played with.

 

[JackSlater]

You say that as if I didn't.

Good chance you are underrating Thomas and I am underrating the Bruins defense.

I don't say it as if anyone didn't see him, I assume that most people here saw Thomas play. If you're a Boston fan you presumably saw more of him than I did. I think that people have trouble looking at goaltenders properly and separating the team from the player, myself included I'm sure. Jim Carey got a Vezina, Vernon got in the hall of fame, and there are people who swear that Osgood should get in too. It happens.

When I watched Thomas I saw an erratic goaltender who was compensated for by an elite defensive team. Others saw something else I guess, but the overall picture of his career is very strange. I am far more confident that the rest of Boston's defensive personnel was responsible for the team's excellent defence than I am that a career journeyman was.

 

[MadLuke]

He didn't kill his wife and a waiter, it's not like we're gonna take it away from him. He just wasn't a very good player that got put into a perfect situation. And was not considered NHL caliber outside of that. So, that means either he somehow got really good at 34 and 36 years old somehow...or, he was just never very good, and it's another example of team effects dictating averaging stats.

There also the teams judging goaltenders issue, Hasek was not though to be particularly NHL caliber by some until he turned 27, to be number on he was almost 30, maybe in reality Hasek was one of the top 15 best goaltender in the world since he was 17 or so, but because of his style, people judging goaltender by how they look thought he was not nhl starter role caliber.

Martin St-Louis, and what not

 

[WarriorofTime]

He didn't kill his wife and a waiter, it's not like we're gonna take it away from him. He just wasn't a very good player that got put into a perfect situation.

Again, these are fighting words, you can't just be the very best by objective performance and be called "not very good" because of..

And was not considered NHL caliber outside of that.

It's not relevant. Why would it be? How good he was deemed five years earlier doesn't actually matter to how he performed in 2011 which is the topic of the thread. We're talking about isolated performance here. This all gets dangerously close into "my preference is more for goaltenders that thrive in multiple situations.." which is again, irrelevant to the isolated 2011 season discussion.

And we have the video, we know now that it was a bad goaltender where it worked out for a little bit.

We had video back in 2011, that stuff wasn't invented in 2020, lol. There was plenty of opportunity to scout, but it wasn't enough to deny a great performance.

 

[Michael Farkas]

There also the teams judging goaltenders issue, Hasek was not though to be particularly NHL caliber by some until he turned 27, to be number on he was almost 30, maybe in reality Hasek was one of the top 15 best goaltender in the world since he was 17 or so, but because of his style, people judging goaltender by how they look thought he was not nhl starter role caliber.

Martin St-Louis, and what not

Hasek, the decorated Czech U18, U20, pro, and international player before stepping foot in the NHL?

I don't think that's the same thing as traipsing around the Finnish leagues and not being able to beat out Parris Duffus for playing time on a sad sack World Champs team.

Hasek came right in and played in the '92 Final, was named to the All-Rookie Team and lost his spot to Eddie Belfour. Granted, for a song...no question. But even in Hasek's shaggiest dog story, it's not even remotely close to Thomas...

Plus, even if we take their stories as somehow similar for some reason...exceptions don't prove the rule.

 

[WarriorofTime]

exceptions don't prove the rule

Indeed, nobody would have expected a 28 year old Finnish-League Pro Goaltender to become the best performing goaltender in the world and backstop his team to a Cup, but it happened. Crazy sport like that sometimes.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Again, these are fighting words, you can't just be the very best by objective performance and be called "not very good" because of..

It's not relevant. Why would it be? How good he was deemed five years earlier doesn't actually matter to how he performed in 2011 which is the topic of the thread. We're talking about isolated performance here. This all gets dangerously close into "my preference is more for goaltenders that thrive in multiple situations.." which is again, irrelevant to the isolated 2011 season discussion.

We had video back in 2011, that stuff wasn't invented in 2020, lol. There was plenty of opportunity to scout, but it wasn't enough to deny a great performance.

It's not "dangerous" at all. It's exactly the process for not getting sucked into the hype of players that don't deserve it. Which matters when you're talking about the MVP of the league.

Look, even with the power of retrospect, you're not gonna bend here. And I haven't flinched on this even while it was happening, so...I don't know what to tell ya.

It's been litigated to death already...