Best Goalie Title Belt Reigns

[The Panther]

The thing about Fuhr that people can't get sometimes is that teams played wildly disparate systems in the 1980s. Like, Fuhr had, whatever, an .885 and a 3.40GAA for Edmonton, but if he'd been playing for Philly or Montreal that would suddenly have turned into a .905 and a 2.72GAA.

You can see in the playoffs, when Edmonton would start playing defence in actually meaningful games (notably in '85, '87, and '88) that Fuhr's stats would suddenly rival Roy and whoever's. For example in 1986-87, Fuhr had the 7th best save percentage and an 18th best GAA of 3.44 (min. 20GP). But in the playoffs he suddenly has a .908 and a 2.47GAA.

In Fuhr's best days, I'd estimate that 80% of a goalie's reputation was entirely due to the strength of team defence and style of play. Edmonton's team defence (up to 1988 anyway) was average, and its style of play was a million miles away from Washington's or Montreal's.

I mean, Rick Wamsley and Denis Herron shared the Jennings in 1981-82, simply because they played for Montreal, behind Gainey, Jarvis, Robinson, Langway, Engblom, Lapointe, etc. The same season, Fuhr (as a teenage rookie!) was facing 40 shots a night, endless odd-man rushes against him, and he had the third-best save percentage in the League.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Let's go post-expansion here because prior to that you had an assortment of Hall/Sawchuk/Plante over the previous 15 years or so.

So.............
1967-'71 - Giacomon
1971-'73 - Dryden
1973-'75 - Parent
1975-'79 - Dryden
1979-'84 - Smith
1984-'89 - Fuhr
1989-'94 - Roy
1994-'02 - Hasek
2002-'10 - Brodeur
2010-'13 - Lundqvist
2013-'17 - Price
2017-'22 - Vasilevskiy

Since then, I don't know. Maybe Bobrovsky's re-birth? It is funny because you don't even have Tony Esposito in here and yet he's right there with the best of them. I agree that Belfour never had the belt. Roy was winning the Vezina in between Belfour's two years and Roy also won the Cup in 1993. It was Roy's until Hasek took it from him for about a decade. In my book Hasek and Brodeur have the longest reign out of anyone. And if anyone wondered why I added Parent, there is no way anyone else had that mantle for those two years. Dryden literally took a year off in 1974, and the back to back Cups by the Broad Street Bullies which included two 1st team all-stars for Parent and two Conn Smythes is not a resume anyone else can say in hockey history that they had over a two year span, I don't think. Sawchuk in the early to mid 1950s possibly, Hasek in the late 1990s possibly too. But Parent's best two years back to back you would be hard pressed to find a goalie more decorated in a two year span. So I have to put him in there.

I might go with Tony Esposito from 1970-'72

 

[MadLuke]

The thing about Fuhr that people can't get sometimes is that teams played wildly disparate systems in the 1980s. Like, Fuhr had, whatever, an .885 and a 3.40GAA for Edmonton, but if he'd been playing for Philly or Montreal that would suddenly have turned into a .905 and a 2.72GAA.

Extreme case of that era, those teams had like 100 goals against gap.

1985-86	Winnipeg Jets	NHL	52	2	25	2713	217	5	0	4.80	13	28	5	1162	0.843	2	0	0
1986-87	Montreal Canadiens	NHL	37	2	2	2172	102	2	1	2.82	19	13	4	855	0.893	13	0	2

Moog numbers did not move going to Boston too.

 

[frisco]

Let's go post-expansion here because prior to that you had an assortment of Hall/Sawchuk/Plante over the previous 15 years or so.

So.............
1967-'71 - Giacomon
1971-'73 - Dryden
1973-'75 - Parent
1975-'79 - Dryden
1979-'83 - Smith

1983-85 - Barrasso

1986-'89 - Fuhr
1989-'94 - Roy
1994-'02 - Hasek
2002-'10 - Brodeur
2010-'13 - Lundqvist
2013-'17 - Price
2017-'22 - Vasilevskiy

If you're a fan like me, you could maybe slide Barrasso in 1983-1985. He won the Calder and Vezina the one year and then finished runner up for Vezina the next. Fuhr could start his reign in 1986.

My Best-Carey

 

[Stephen]

I think Grant Fuhr was just about the best goalie around from 1983-84 (you can argue Barrasso that year, I guess, with a little Smith and Lemelin, and not to forget Tretiak was in his final year) through 1986-87. That's a four-season span for Fuhr, I think.

In 1987-88, Fuhr was overplayed and very inconsistent in the regular season... yet, bizarrely, was voted the Vezina despite its being his worst season since 1982-83. I'm sure, by 1987-88, Patrick Roy had overtaken him, especially in regular season.

I say Fuhr was tops from 1983-84 through 1986-87.

I want to sprinkle in a little Ron Hextall simply for his unique combination of Vezina and Conn Smythe during his rookie season in 1987, which ranks with the big splashy debuts of Tom Barrasso in 1984, and Ed Belfour's Vezina and Calder in 1991...

Kind of weird that Hextall managed to win a Vezina, but couldn't beat out Luc Robitaille's 84 point rookie season for the rookie of the year. 84 points is nothing to sneeze at, but just a little ordinary compared to the rookie numbers of Lemieux, Hawerchuk, Stastny who also won 80's Calders with at least 100 points.

 

[The Panther]

I want to sprinkle in a little Ron Hextall simply for his unique combination of Vezina and Conn Smythe during his rookie season in 1987, which ranks with the big splashy debuts of Tom Barrasso in 1984, and Ed Belfour's Vezina and Calder in 1991...

Kind of weird that Hextall managed to win a Vezina, but couldn't beat out Luc Robitaille's 84 point rookie season for the rookie of the year. 84 points is nothing to sneeze at, but just a little ordinary compared to the rookie numbers of Lemieux, Hawerchuk, Stastny who also won 80's Calders with at least 100 points.

Sure, although history kind of showed that the right choice was made as Robitaille was an elite scorer through 2002, while Hextall never finished top-4 in Vezina voting again in his entire career. Outside of his rookie season, he was an average goalie at best.

In short, Hextall looked better than he actually was in 1986-87. Why? Consider Bob Froese, Phily's back-up to Lindberg in 1984-85. With the death of Lindberg, Froese suddenly became the starter in Philly for much of 1985-86. He went 31-10-3 (considerably better than Hextall a year later), had an NHL best .909 (better than Hextall a year later), and a 2.55 GAA (better than Hextall a year later).

Hextall was pretty good in the playoffs, though.

 

[The Panther]

Kind of weird that Hextall managed to win a Vezina, but couldn't beat out Luc Robitaille's 84 point rookie season for the rookie of the year. 84 points is nothing to sneeze at, but just a little ordinary compared to the rookie numbers of Lemieux, Hawerchuk, Stastny who also won 80's Calders with at least 100 points.

Another point about this: While Robitaille's 84 points is less than the players you mentioned, it's worth remembering that 1986-87 was the lowest-scoring season in the 80s. Pretty much everyone's numbers dropped that season. I realize this is a sketchy statistic at best, but to add some context, this is how Hockey Ref. adjusts the respective rookie seasons points-wise:
79 - Lemieux
77 - Nieuwendyk
75 - Hawerchuk
72 - Larmer
72 - Makarov
71 - Robitaille

 

[MadLuke]

Kind of weird that Hextall managed to win a Vezina, but couldn't beat out Luc Robitaille's 84 point rookie season for the rookie of the year. 84 points is nothing to sneeze at, but just a little ordinary compared to the rookie numbers of Lemieux, Hawerchuk, Stastny who also won 80's Calders with at least 100 points.

And rookie Jimmy Carson on the same team scoring 79 could have risked to split the vote more or make 84 look less special.

Voter could have considerer it a weak year for goaltender, Liut will have almost the exact same season the year after and will go from second place to 12.... (exact same goal against in one more game, exact same save percentage, virtually same GAA, etc...), tie with Hextall.

 

[blogofmike]

Moog numbers did not move going to Boston too.

Andy Moog did win the Jennings, which he wasn't doing in Edmonton, and this GAA improvement may have helped him get his best finishes as a 3rd team AS and 3rd place Vezina finalist.

 

[MadLuke]

Moog was .895-.889-.881 his 3 last Oilers years then 877-.893-.896 his first 3 years with the Bruins not really a big swing (they average too .8884 vs .8887, exactly the same and pretty much exactly the nhl average).

He just received less shots ?

 

[Staniowski]

Yeah, it depends if you're talking about best goalie or the goalie commonly identified as the best.

And no other positional lists would be as disputed, or change as often from year to year, or be just plain wrong.

 

[MadLuke]

And no other positional lists would be as disputed, or change as often from year to year, or be just plain wrong.

Could depend on the era at least for the belt reigns, would there be much dispute about Roy from 88 to 93, Hasek from 94 to 01

 

[Staniowski]

Could depend on the era at least for the belt reigns, would there be much dispute about Roy from 88 to 93, Hasek from 94 to 01

It would depend on whether it's best goalie, or the majority pick of best goalie.

Roy finished 2nd in Vezina voting on his own team in '88, and lost the starter job in the playoffs. And certainly some people thought Hasek was best in the world in the late-'80s....but most North American hockey fans hadn't even heard of him at that time.

Less dispute around Hasek for most of those years.

 

[MadLuke]

Less dispute around Hasek for most of those years.

Which to be fair could be an exception a la Orr and maybe the only almost undisputed champion the nhl ever had.

It is more about (at least in many eras) not sure if best forward or defenseman are that less disputed.

Even Crosby never had much of a time when everyone agreed on, McDavid took quite the time and talk started during this season, Lidstrom or Pronger was a debate.

Outside Gretzky prime, it is rarely for that long undisputed.

 

[Crosby2010]

1983-85 - Barrasso


If you're a fan like me, you could maybe slide Barrasso in 1983-1985. He won the Calder and Vezina the one year and then finished runner up for Vezina the next. Fuhr could start his reign in 1986.

My Best-Carey

Thought of him too, but was it long enough or dominant enough? Kudos to Tom for the Vezina win right out of high school but man 1984 was not known as a particular standout year for goalies. The top 5 in voting that year was: Barrasso, Lemelin, Pat Riggin, Al Jensen and Dan Bouchard. Yikes. Fuhr was 6th. The next year was: Lindbergh, Barrasso, Lemelin, Riggin, Hayward. That's shaky at best as well. So I don't think there was ever that mantle passed to Barrasso, not even briefly. And Lindbergh won in 1985 in a landslide and made the finals too. I'll stick with the 1984 Cup final as the transition to Fuhr.

 

[Michael Farkas]

If we're giving it to Barrasso or, worse, Hextall...then scrap the concept and just take the Vezina vote, right...?

Is the best goalie in the world typically sent to the minors for poor performance...?

 

[Brodeur]

A bit stupid, but EA sport nhl rating can give an idea of popular perception.

NHL 94, Belfour was the highest rated goaltender, Fuhr was still really high.

Roy was closer in 95, but Belfour was still ahead, and Hasek = Fuhr, followed by Joseph-Potvin then Brodeur.

They probably consult expert and have some want for accurary, but they would have also have what players want and thinks of player in minds.

I remember reading an article about the early NHL90s games and how the programmers didn't realize how seriously the players would take the ratings. Their focus at the time was having a functional game and the ratings were a secondary thing that became a bigger deal as the series got more traction. I vaguely recall one of the programmers doing a demo for the NHLPA(?) and one players present was a goon. At some point the goon half-jokingly cornered the programmer and said something like "So you think I have zero offensive awareness?"

I forget if one of the programmers was friends with Cliff Ronning or just a big fan, but Ronning had high ratings in some of the early installments.

I used to spend hours updating NHL '95 on PC and the stock ratings weren't great. They had Scott Niedermayer as average to below average for most of the attributes.

[/excusetochataboutNHL95]

Edit: found the article

https://thehockeynews.com/all-access/the-making-of-nhl-94-an-oral-history

BROOK: When we were making NHLPA Hockey ’93, we had to bring it to the NHLPA licensing committee for approval. We weren’t allowed in the room, so I’m sitting in the foyer, waiting for the meeting to end. Saskin comes out and he’s shaking his head. Apparently, the players on the committee noticed that they had individual player ratings in the game. Ken Baumgartner was on the committee. He came over to me and said, “I’m Ken Baumgartner, the guy you gave a zero rating for intelligence.” It never really dawned on me that I’d actually meet the players. I tried to do my best on these ratings. There was some statistical basis. Intelligence, it was really Offensive Awareness. Baumgartner had one point and 225 penalty minutes in 55 games. So, it isn’t like he was going to make much of an impact in scoring. That led to some changes. We had to take the ratings more seriously.

Borgen gets Brook in touch with Igor Kuperman, a former sportswriter from Moscow who now works in hockey operations for the Winnipeg Jets, to rate the players.

IGOR KUPERMAN [Winnipeg Jets’ Director of Hockey Information / Player Ratings: NHLPA Hockey ’93 & NHL ’94]: I had to rate players in 12 categories, such as accuracy, shot power, checking, passing ability and fighting, on a scale of zero to six. I also had to figure out who was on the first power play, second power play, first penalty-killing unit and second penalty-killing unit.

BROOK: I took Igor’s ratings as a guideline and converted them from a 0-to-6 rating to a rating out of 100, using additional information and stats, and included a random factor.

 

[Stanislasjc]

If we're giving it to Barrasso or, worse, Hextall...then scrap the concept and just take the Vezina vote, right...?

Is the best goalie in the world typically sent to the minors for poor performance...?

This is my thinking too..I'd rather have the belt "up for grabs" than given to someone who happened to have a great season during a weird period.

Like Gerald Ford was technically president, but he was never elected. He was just filling in for Nixon after Watergate, and was knocked out during the next election by Jimmy Carter.

Actually that's kind of fun. I'm not American, but thinking of the goalie title belts like presidential terms tickles me:

You have your one termers (Fuhr), your two termers (Hasek), and your Gerald Ford interim types lol

Maybe I'll do a thread like that some day lol

 

[Iron Mike Sharpe]

A lot of Fuhr mentions...was he the best goalie or was he the "team that was winning with Gretzky starting goalie"...?

Is there much harm in just going from Smith to Roy...?

Yeah, geez, NOBODY thought of Fuhr as the top dog at the time, I have no clue where the hell this is coming from. Between Dryden and Roy, the belt was vacant... closest to holding it was Liut.

 

[The Panther]

Yeah, geez, NOBODY thought of Fuhr as the top dog at the time, I have no clue where the hell this is coming from. Between Dryden and Roy, the belt was vacant... closest to holding it was Liut.

Uh... were you alive then? It was a very common and much discussed point that Fuhr was the best in the League circa 1984 playoffs through 1988 Cup.

Fuhr was quite over-rated at the time, but the hating on Fuhr here has gone too far in the opposite direction where people are just looking at stats and under-rating him.

One of these days, I'm going to go a bit in-depth to see how many goals againt Fuhr in that era were basically meaningless (due to Edmonton's unique playing style). Let's just say Patrick Roy and Bob Froese / Ron Hextall had it a lot easier in those days...