(Almost) all big $$$ goalies suck

[BelovedIsles]

Sorokin is underrated. Before last season he was a perennial top-5 goalie. He suffered a back injury, had surgery, and is playing behind a bottom-tier team.

 

[Martin Skoula]

Might not be for a long time.

Stick technology has progressed to the point it's not humanly possible to be a reflex goalie in the NHL anymore. Goalies play the percentages and try to put themselves in the spot where it's most statistically likely the puck will hit them. This is vulnerable to bad luck and the shooter happening to make the perfect shot. If goalies get bad luck they get in their own heads and start chasing and it goes downhill from there.

Goalies seem unpredictable because it's a luck based position. If the shooter makes the perfect shot there is zero even the best goalie in the league can do about it. Goaltenders are differentiated by their anticipation of the play and ability to get into position.

Didn't used to be this way even 30 years ago. At one time only a couple guys on a team had 100mph shots, now it's the entire team down to the 6th defenceman and stick technology makes shots so much more accurate.

It’s a double edged sword, the save % creep in the late 2000s early 2010s forced a lot of teams to incorporate a lot more random pinball into their games. Netfront specialists like Holmstrom used to be.. well specialists, but now it’s expected that everyone in your top 9 has the hand-eye to tip pucks and generally make the goalie’s life difficult. It indirectly killed the big slapshot from the point since it’s easier for the goalie to read and harder to tip.

 

[The Macho King]

Sorokin is underrated. Before last season he was a perennial top-5 goalie. He suffered a back injury, had surgery, and is playing behind a bottom-tier team.

See that's overstating it. Sorokin had only been a starter for 3 seasons - 2 good and 1 meh.

Consistency in starting goaltenders is rare nowadays.

 

[Henkka]

You pay your goalies and probably lose something (cap space) from defence. Then you blaim the goalies.

And goalie shined, when he was cheap (and more money invested to better defence).

Most goalies are product of a system in front of them, and when they'll get their payday, the system goes weaker, and the "goalie" level will drop.

I would never do a long-term deal for any goalie. Maximum of 3-4 years. You can get rid of the guy of things go south.

 

[bobholly39]

Swayman, Vasilevsky, Shesterkin, all shitting the bed this year and/or recent playoffs. Gibson is still an anchor and Grubauer is a nightmare. Bobrovsky is meh at best, and Sorokin is underwhelming, as is non-4 Nations Bennington. Markstrom es no bueno anymore and neither is Merzlikins. The list goes on. Don't spend money on goalies. Only exception is Hellebuyck.

Boston giving Swayman so much money while having a career high of 44 games is absolutely stupid. As a Boston hater, I also finding it incredibly hilarious though. But it was always a dumb move.

Bobrosvky - I've been a very strong critic of his and his contract, but no more. Great in the last 2 playoffs, and earened it.

Vasi is....weird. I'm super high on him, and he was great during the cup runs, but he seems to have slowed down, with injury/age. Very curious to see if he can bounce back, maybe with these very playoffs.

Shesterkin is having a really bad stretch of like ~10 games or so. I fully expect him to bounce back, so no really worried about contract (the term might be annoying as he ages out, but we'll see).

I'm a Habs fan - and I never once had a problem with Carey Price's contract. BecauseI had full confidence that when the situation was important, he'd step up big time. He did in the 2020 playoffs, and even more so with a heroic playoff run in 2021 all the way to finals. Obviously he got injured, and missed a ton of games. But for me, for Price - it was never about "well, with that $$, he should be top 3 in vezina every year to earn it". For me it's more about playoffs, and having faith he can be consistent in regular season and a killer in playoffs, and I always felt good about that.

As for your comment on Hellebuyck - it's funny you say that, because he's one top goalie who has never performed come playoffs in my opinion. He's obviously a tremendous goalie, but he really needs an extremely strong playoff performance (or a few), to not be labeled a choker.

 

[DrunkTurtle]

The golden age of goaltenders is over. It's better to use more of the cap on skaters and not commit to huge long-term goalie contracts.

 

[ManofSteel55]

Swayman, Vasilevsky, Shesterkin, all shitting the bed this year and/or recent playoffs. Gibson is still an anchor and Grubauer is a nightmare. Bobrovsky is meh at best, and Sorokin is underwhelming, as is non-4 Nations Bennington. Markstrom es no bueno anymore and neither is Merzlikins. The list goes on. Don't spend money on goalies. Only exception is Hellebuyck.

And if you don't spend on goaltending, you end up with a goalie duo of Stuart Skinner and Cal Pickard.

 

[NVious]

You pay your goalies and probably lose something (cap space) from defence. Then you blaim the goalies.

And goalie shined, when he was cheap (and more money invested to better defence).

Most goalies are product of a system in front of them, and when they'll get their payday, the system goes weaker, and the "goalie" level will drop.

I would never do a long-term deal for any goalie. Maximum of 3-4 years. You can get rid of the guy of things go south.

This isn't the case as somebody posted the last 10 cup winners and if you count Fleury, it skews towards higher paid goalies.

These things aren't linear either, not every dollar spent will have equivalent value.

I can find you atrocious 4-6 million dollar contracts just like you can find atrocious 10+ contracts. It's not a guarantee that if you avoid an ok 10+ contract you'll find two studs for that number nor is it a guarantee you'll find an amazing 10 million dollar defenseman.

In Hockey 10s don't ever become available, McDavid/Drai/Mak/Mack are basically locked down and even if they do become available, it's basically to 2-3 teams, so you'll never just get a 10 like that easily. It's not like you can let Shesterkin go and sign McDavid or any of those guys for 15 and be happy about it.

Ultimately you have to build around 8s-9s which many of these guys objectively are (except Swayman who has done nothing, but even still he is at worst a 7 with good potential) as the perfect 10s are unavailable and although you will find bad contracts at any position at any dollar range, the results of high paid goalies speak for themselves.

The 10 million+ guys before this season started had 2 cup finals and a cup win. Even if you want to lump Shesterkin in there, a 930 playoff career save percentage and 2 conference finals is still fantastic, again unless you think "well if we didn't have Shesterkin, we'd obviously have something even better," which is not even close to a guarantee.

 

[Lunatik]

And if you don't spend on goaltending, you end up with a goalie duo of Stuart Skinner and Cal Pickard.

Or you spend and get spoiled Soup.

 

[Joe Hallenback]

Boston giving Swayman so much money while having a career high of 44 games is absolutely stupid. As a Boston hater, I also finding it incredibly hilarious though. But it was always a dumb move.

Bobrosvky - I've been a very strong critic of his and his contract, but no more. Great in the last 2 playoffs, and earened it.

Vasi is....weird. I'm super high on him, and he was great during the cup runs, but he seems to have slowed down, with injury/age. Very curious to see if he can bounce back, maybe with these very playoffs.

Shesterkin is having a really bad stretch of like ~10 games or so. I fully expect him to bounce back, so no really worried about contract (the term might be annoying as he ages out, but we'll see).

I'm a Habs fan - and I never once had a problem with Carey Price's contract. BecauseI had full confidence that when the situation was important, he'd step up big time. He did in the 2020 playoffs, and even more so with a heroic playoff run in 2021 all the way to finals. Obviously he got injured, and missed a ton of games. But for me, for Price - it was never about "well, with that $$, he should be top 3 in vezina every year to earn it". For me it's more about playoffs, and having faith he can be consistent in regular season and a killer in playoffs, and I always felt good about that.

As for your comment on Hellebuyck - it's funny you say that, because he's one top goalie who has never performed come playoffs in my opinion. He's obviously a tremendous goalie, but he really needs an extremely strong playoff performance (or a few), to not be labeled a choker.

Helly has had several quality years in the playoffs. Shitting on him because of last year is well quite frankly stupid because I can't think of too many teams that wouldn't love to have him on that contract right now. He would drag Montreals sorry ass into the playoffs just like Price did year after year

 

[Flat Ronnie]

Vasi is....weird. I'm super high on him, and he was great during the cup runs, but he seems to have slowed down, with injury/age. Very curious to see if he can bounce back, maybe with these very playoffs.

Time to check in on that bounce back...

 

[boltsfan86]

Vasilevskiy had one average season which, coincidentally, was when he missed part of the season due to back surgery. Not sure how you can really say this about a guy who put up around a .930 save percentage over 2 or three consecutive playoff runs and is still objectively elite

 

[boltsfan86]

Vasilevskiy's atrocious play is by far the biggest reason why Tampa has been garbage in the playoffs the last few years.

Yep, Oettinger and Jarry most definitely, and can also throw in Ullmark as well.

It was when the Bolts lost to the Leafs, but last year we could have had two Vasilevskiys in goal and it wouldn't matter because the Panthers skated circles around them at 5v5 and held Kucherov to a point a game

 

[WarriorofTime]

Goalie is just volatile.

A goalie is 16th and he's a top 25 percentile goaltender. The equivalent of a 1st line forward. But lower end 1st line forward gets more of a pass as "well he's still a contributor even if he makes too much" whereas top 15 goaltender is considered "average starter" and not considered a contributor because average starter is the baseline expectation.

 

[Bear of Bad News]

Goalie is just volatile.

A goalie is 16th and he's a top 25 percentile goaltender. The equivalent of a 1st line forward. But lower end 1st line forward gets more of a pass as "well he's still a contributor even if he makes too much" whereas top 15 goaltender is considered "average starter" and not considered a contributor because average starter is the baseline expectation.

Adding to this, average starters definitely have value. I'll submit evidence of GDTs during the playoffs where people are complaining about not having even an average goaltender.

 

[FiveTacos]

There's a lot of luck and variance, sure. Which is probably why even the greats have playoff years where they aren't godlike. Patrick Roy wasn't pulling an '86 or a '93 every year. But the fact is, some guys who have a high ceiling and a high floor ... well those are the ones who over a 10 year period might have multiple good playoff runs in them, and very few choke jobs. And those guys are absolutely worth the money.

As someone else said, the real differentiaion for elite goalies is the playoffs. What's merely a good but unspectacular save in January, is a totally different thing in a do-or-die pressure cooker playoff situation. The degree of difficulty does in fact change.

Not every guy is up to it ... There's a lot of "pretty good" starters who play okay in postseason, but also seem to allow just enough "man we really needed that one" goals to lose in the playoffs year after year.

And if you don't believe there's much difference between goalies just ask yourself, down 2 with 10 minutes in game 7, are there guys you'd really not want to see in the other net, or guys you'd feel you had a real chance against? If you say they're all the same to you, I think you're kidding yourself.

 

[Armourboy]

Looking that list that was posted of the cup winners, the thing that seems to be missed is that the " cheap " guys were cheap because they were young and mostly unproven and in most cases weren't expected to be the starter to begin with. Teams didn't win cups because they signed cheap goalies, the goalies just happened to be young and not in a position to be making any kind of money to begin with.

The reason there is a split with it either being cheap or being top heavy, is that teams either won with an established good goaltender or they got lucky with a young guy that just came up who in most cases became a regular NHL starter.

Some of those guys got derailed by injuries, but almost none of those guys on the list were specifically signed because they were cheap and then won a cup.

 

[admiralcadillac]

Swayman, Vasilevsky, Shesterkin, all shitting the bed this year and/or recent playoffs. Gibson is still an anchor and Grubauer is a nightmare. Bobrovsky is meh at best, and Sorokin is underwhelming, as is non-4 Nations Bennington. Markstrom es no bueno anymore and neither is Merzlikins. The list goes on. Don't spend money on goalies. Only exception is Hellebuyck.

Vasilevsky has a 2.23 gaa and .921 svp

That’s elite

 

[FiveTacos]

Looking that list that was posted of the cup winners, the thing that seems to be missed is that the " cheap " guys were cheap because they were young and mostly unproven and in most cases weren't expected to be the starter to begin with. Teams didn't win cups because they signed cheap goalies, the goalies just happened to be young and not in a position to be making any kind of money to begin with.

The reason there is a split with it either being cheap or being top heavy, is that teams either won with an established good goaltender or they got lucky with a young guy that just came up who in most cases became a regular NHL starter.

Some of those guys got derailed by injuries, but almost none of those guys on the list were specifically signed because they were cheap and then won a cup.

Yeah, I think it's very much an argument against signing a mid priced slightly above average starter. It may not blow up in your face, but it's also unlikely to yield a Cup.

If you have a potential contender, ideally you do get a great goalie to make it stick. Barring that I'd rather roll the dice on an overlooked backup or young guy with potential, than the guy with a track record of being okay but not anything more.

If you have the better team, also having the better goalie is what makes it stick. If you have the lesser team, the better goalie is what gives you a shot to steal it. Either way, you don't want to go through 4 rounds of hockey with the 2nd and 3rd best goalies in each series on your roster, that's just not a Cup winning formula unless you have a vastly superior squad.

 

[Washed Up 29YearOld]

Shitting the bed?

I love how you say shitting the bed right over a graphic where it looks like dressed AV is literally shitting on top of his mug shot

 

[Tawnos]

Looking that list that was posted of the cup winners, the thing that seems to be missed is that the " cheap " guys were cheap because they were young and mostly unproven and in most cases weren't expected to be the starter to begin with. Teams didn't win cups because they signed cheap goalies, the goalies just happened to be young and not in a position to be making any kind of money to begin with.

The reason there is a split with it either being cheap or being top heavy, is that teams either won with an established good goaltender or they got lucky with a young guy that just came up who in most cases became a regular NHL starter.

Some of those guys got derailed by injuries, but almost none of those guys on the list were specifically signed because they were cheap and then won a cup.

Absolutely... and it's well illustrated by both Vasilevskiy and Crawford. They won two Cups in different brackets.

Vasilevskiy's first Cup was on his bridge deal @ $3.3m. It was signed in the summer of 2016, when he hadn't even played a full season as a starter yet. His second Cup was on his $9.5m contract.

Crawford's first Cup actually came on his 3rd contract @ $2.7m. It was signed after he'd first established himself as the Blackhawks starter in 2011. His second Cup was on his $6m contract.

I didn't include Quick in my breakdown, because I put the cut-off at the 2012 lockout that established the 50/50 split between players and league. His first Cup came on a $1.8m contract, which when signed was 3% of the cap. The first season of it was 10-11, but he actually signed it at the beginning of the 09-10 season which is the first year he was the full-time starter for the Kings. His second Cup was on his $5.8m contract.

Some people might point to Crawford's $6m and Quick's $5.8m as examples of not paying goalies top tier, but they're forgetting that the Cap in those seasons was lower. Quick's was 9% of a $64.3m cap and Crawford's was 8.7% of a $69m cap.

 

[wasup]

good goalie = consistent
bad goalie = not consistent

A lot of goalies can get hot and have runs and sometimes it's in the playoffs . Just cause you have won a little hardware here or there does not mean you are a great goalie . Same goes for the opposite .

Vas , Bob , Helly , Shesterkin have generally been the most consistent so those are who I consider elite .