Biggest Goaltending Bust of all time??

[Mike C]

1970 (the Gilbert Perrault draft) - Habs draft Ray Martyniuk of the Flin Flon Bombers # 5 over-all and he never plays one game in the NHL. 8 seasons in the minors.

In the same draft the Habs drafted another goalie, Cal Hammond at #45 and he never played an NHL game either.

hope that scout got fired eh?

 

[Michael Farkas]

Heh, I don't need to...but the funny thing about these short seasons that get full fare is that when your season is only three months long, you only need to be good for a couple of weeks (in this case, of your NHL career) to be remembered forever...

Lacher started out 9-2-1 with a 1.99 and a .921, 2 SO

The rest of that season, he was 10-9-1 with a 2.67 and .889.

He was good for five weeks until everyone realized he just stood on the goal line and occasionally tried to elbow folks haha - but because of the short season, it's remembered as like "a season".

Ken Wregget, I can recall off the top of my head of course, had a great five week stretch early in the 89-90 season...

8-3-1, 2.34 GAA, .924 save pct. didn't even need any shutouts for those figures from late October '89 to mid December '89. #2 in everything during that run. Unfortunately, that was one of those darn full length seasons...

If that season had ended after three months, Wregget finishes 1st in save pct. and 5th in GAA. Probably gets some Vezina love that year, especially being on that pretty mediocre Flyers team...

It would have been the only time Wregget got any Vezina consideration in his career...except 1995.

For the record, I'm not responding to anything in particular...I'm just taking a break from what I was working on and I was tagged into the thread haha

 

[Mike C]

considering they only got 4 full seasons out of him, and he has a career losing record AND they are still paying him a mil and a half a year for another FIVE years......ladies and gentlemen, the NYI nominate Rick DiPietro!!

 

[Michael Farkas]

DiPietro was going to be really good...it's a shame he got hurt. He had the talent to be a positive impact player for a while...

 

[Mike C]

DiPietro was going to be really good...it's a shame he got hurt. He had the talent to be a positive impact player for a while...

true enough but in terms of yield for the layout, i have to call him a bust

certainly don't begrudge anybody getting all the money anyone wants to give him. probably a team bust just as well!

 

[Michael Farkas]

true enough but in terms of yield for the layout, i have to call him a bust

certainly don't begrudge anybody getting all the money anyone wants to give him. probably a team bust just as well!

Oh certainly, no disagreement. This thread is littered with bad talent evaluations, but this one was actually a good talent find, but a horrible result...that their accounting team is reminded of every two weeks in perpetuity...

 

[Mike C]

Oh certainly, no disagreement. This thread is littered with bad talent evaluations, but this one was actually a good talent find, but a horrible result...that their accounting team is reminded of every two weeks in perpetuity...

Speaking of which. Happy Bobby Bonilla day in advance (pretty sure Saberhagen is still on the payroll too!)

 

[MarkusKetterer]

Heh, I don't need to...but the funny thing about these short seasons that get full fare is that when your season is only three months long, you only need to be good for a couple of weeks (in this case, of your NHL career) to be remembered forever...

Lacher started out 9-2-1 with a 1.99 and a .921, 2 SO

The rest of that season, he was 10-9-1 with a 2.67 and .889.

He was good for five weeks until everyone realized he just stood on the goal line and occasionally tried to elbow folks haha - but because of the short season, it's remembered as like "a season".

Ken Wregget, I can recall off the top of my head of course, had a great five week stretch early in the 89-90 season...

8-3-1, 2.34 GAA, .924 save pct. didn't even need any shutouts for those figures from late October '89 to mid December '89. #2 in everything during that run. Unfortunately, that was one of those darn full length seasons...

If that season had ended after three months, Wregget finishes 1st in save pct. and 5th in GAA. Probably gets some Vezina love that year, especially being on that pretty mediocre Flyers team...

It would have been the only time Wregget got any Vezina consideration in his career...except 1995.

For the record, I'm not responding to anything in particular...I'm just taking a break from what I was working on and I was tagged into the thread haha

I don’t remember his stats, but Tommy Soderstrom had a lot of hype in his rookie season.

Now he’s just remembered for his weird equipment and getting his ass kicked by Corey Schwab.

 

[Michael Farkas]

I don’t remember his stats, but Tommy Soderstrom had a lot of hype in his rookie season.

That would be weird, considering he could skate under the crossbar without ducking...

The thing I remember about Soderstrom is just how ridiculous his second save process was...I don't know who started this in Europe, maybe one of the Czechs, but he would make a save, and then just sort of throw his feet at the rebound and end up sitting on his wallet haha

 

[Bear of Bad News]

The thing I remember about Soderstrom is just how ridiculous his second save process was...I don't know who started this in Europe, maybe one of the Czechs, but he would make a save, and then just sort of throw his feet at the rebound and end up sitting on his wallet haha

Hey - that's *my* move!

(Seriously - the only thing keeping me in high-level beer league is the fact that kids these days have never seen a pad stack.)

 

[Michael Farkas]

Haha you probably throw your feet to the side to cover more net...as opposed to throwing them in front of you and then taking a nap like Soderstrom...

 

[Bear of Bad News]

I look about how I imagine a 50-year-old Kirk McLean might look if he let himself go physically after retirement.

 

[Golden_Jet]

Garret Sparks,
Won a Calder cup

 

[Bear of Bad News]

Garret Sparks,
Won a Calder cup

Garret Sparks was a seventh-rounder.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

i remember the 1990-91 season as a bumper crop of young goalies who all entered the league at basically the same time

belfour, richter, and joseph were the real deal

jeff hackett had long career with some high moments

chris terreri had a solid workmanlike career, much of it as a backup

cheveldae and troy gamble, after some initial success (chevy considerably more than gamble), busted hard

those guys were all rookies, or virtually rookies, with hype behind them (as opposed to your stephane beauregards and pat jablonskis, who also were rookies). one rookie with almost no hype but who went on to a respectable decade in the league was rick tabaracci. but there also was tugnutt, essensa, peter sidorkiewicz, vincent riendeau, all second or third year guys who had real hype on them as good young starters with star potential. and of course there was hasek, who spent most of the year in the IHL but got in his first handful of games in the NHL.

and in that group of guys coming up was the bustiest bust of all, jimmy waite. after playing fifteen games over the previous two seasons, he spent the whole year in the minors other than a one game callup (he carried a 3-0 lead into the third period and finished with a 3-2 W). guy had been the best goalie prospect in the world, probably the best goalie prospect in a long time, but was stuck behind belfour in the NHL and shared the crease with (and was completely outclassed statistically by) hasek in the IHL.

 

[MarkusKetterer]

That would be weird, considering he could skate under the crossbar without ducking...

The thing I remember about Soderstrom is just how ridiculous his second save process was...I don't know who started this in Europe, maybe one of the Czechs, but he would make a save, and then just sort of throw his feet at the rebound and end up sitting on his wallet haha

I remember he’d basically hide in his net when the play went to the other end. He did play deeper in his net compared to other goalies (and definitely deeper if you compare him to Robb “Blueline” Stauber), but I wonder if that was his way of knowing where he was in regards to his net.

Either way it worked out for him for his rookie season, then he was sufficient, then it was “oh god no”. He went from a starting goalie in his rookie year to out of the NHL entirely within 4 years (also not that uncommon in the 90s).

 

[MadArcand]

Thinking of Whalers, Kay Whitmore got quite a bit of hype for a while for some reason.

 

[hacksaw7]

Wasnt Jimmy Waite pretty highly touted. He was pretty bad...floated around as a backup for a few years.

 

[carjackmalone]

Mike Moffat

 

[MadArcand]

Corey Hirsch was also highly hyped, made All-Rookie Team and then disappeared.

 

[MS]

i remember the 1990-91 season as a bumper crop of young goalies who all entered the league at basically the same time

belfour, richter, and joseph were the real deal

jeff hackett had long career with some high moments

chris terreri had a solid workmanlike career, much of it as a backup

cheveldae and troy gamble, after some initial success (chevy considerably more than gamble), busted hard

those guys were all rookies, or virtually rookies, with hype behind them (as opposed to your stephane beauregards and pat jablonskis, who also were rookies). one rookie with almost no hype but who went on to a respectable decade in the league was rick tabaracci. but there also was tugnutt, essensa, peter sidorkiewicz, vincent riendeau, all second or third year guys who had real hype on them as good young starters with star potential. and of course there was hasek, who spent most of the year in the IHL but got in his first handful of games in the NHL.

and in that group of guys coming up was the bustiest bust of all, jimmy waite. after playing fifteen games over the previous two seasons, he spent the whole year in the minors other than a one game callup (he carried a 3-0 lead into the third period and finished with a 3-2 W). guy had been the best goalie prospect in the world, probably the best goalie prospect in a long time, but was stuck behind belfour in the NHL and shared the crease with (and was completely outclassed statistically by) hasek in the IHL.

Troy Gamble had PCS before PCS was really considered a thing, and he kept trying to play through it despite dizzy spells.

I can distinctly remember an intermission interview on CKNW in the 1991-92 season where Gamble had had a good period and he was commenting that that was the first time in ages that he didn't feel dizzy when he was in net. Times were totally different then.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

Troy Gamble had PCS before PCS was really considered a thing, and he kept trying to play through it despite dizzy spells.

I can distinctly remember an intermission interview on CKNW in the 1991-92 season where Gamble had had a good period and he was commenting that that was the first time in ages that he didn't feel dizzy when he was in net. Times were totally different then.

oh i didn’t know this, poor guy

i was nine during his rookie year and we fourth graders LOVED troy gamble although tbf i think most of us weren’t even watching the games until the playoffs because of parental malaise

i dug this up on google: he likely got that concussion in february. his record when he went down was 13-13-4, 3.38 GAA, .884 SV%. a bottom five starter in the league, looking only at averaging stats.

his stats the rest of the way were even worse: 3.75, .856 in eight starts after a week off. he did have a good playoffs though: two strong starts in essentially one goal losses to gretzky and the kings, one win in a wild 6-5 victory, and a stinker. mclean played the other two games.

but what i am seeing here is it wasn’t the concussion that destroyed his once promising rookie season. he had kind of just turned into a pumpkin at the end of december. from christmas to the concussion game he was horrendous: 4-8-2, 4.36, .861 (tbf, mclean was equally bad in his half of the starts in those two months).

whereas up to christmas, gamble had top five stats: 9-5-2, 2.53 (5th), 907 (4th), one win out of the top ten despite playing on a garbage team and starting 5-10 fewer games than most other starters.

but it is interesting to look at the stats leaders up to christmas. almost all rookies or guys in their first starting roles:

wins are 1. belfour, 2. cheveldae, 4. terreri

GAA: 1. belfour, 4. gamble, 8. cujo

SV%: 1. richter, 4. belfour, 5. gamble

ie, he was right there with some big boys until he hit his rookie wall

my other thought here is, with all due respect to gamble and his career-destroying injury (who knows if he could have had a long career as a 1A or backup?), it was maybe for the best for mclean to be unopposed in the net. i feel like having a clear pecking order where mclean was 1 and whitmore was a very dependable 2 was useful for mclean to himself get back to an all-star level and hit the heights he hit in 92 and 94. in my memory, he just didn’t seem do well with gamble breathing down his neck.

 

[Peter Tosh]

Rick DiPietro is the biggest goaltending bust of all time, considering his contract

 

[BigBadBruins7708]

its injury related, but Hannu Toivonen. He was to be the next great Finn in net..

1st round pick
a great WJC of 4-2, .920/1.85
dominated in the AHL with .921/2.30 and .932/2.05
was a lone bright spot on the terrible "Thornton trade" 06 Bruins going 9-5-4 and .914

then had bad injury luck, never came close to regaining his form and bounced around the AHL for a while

 

[MS]

oh i didn’t know this, poor guy

i was nine during his rookie year and we fourth graders LOVED troy gamble although tbf i think most of us weren’t even watching the games until the playoffs because of parental malaise

i dug this up on google: he likely got that concussion in february. his record when he went down was 13-13-4, 3.38 GAA, .884 SV%. a bottom five starter in the league, looking only at averaging stats.

his stats the rest of the way were even worse: 3.75, .856 in eight starts after a week off. he did have a good playoffs though: two strong starts in essentially one goal losses to gretzky and the kings, one win in a wild 6-5 victory, and a stinker. mclean played the other two games.

but what i am seeing here is it wasn’t the concussion that destroyed his once promising rookie season. he had kind of just turned into a pumpkin at the end of december. from christmas to the concussion game he was horrendous: 4-8-2, 4.36, .861 (tbf, mclean was equally bad in his half of the starts in those two months).

whereas up to christmas, gamble had top five stats: 9-5-2, 2.53 (5th), 907 (4th), one win out of the top ten despite playing on a garbage team and starting 5-10 fewer games than most other starters.

but it is interesting to look at the stats leaders up to christmas. almost all rookies or guys in their first starting roles:

wins are 1. belfour, 2. cheveldae, 4. terreri

GAA: 1. belfour, 4. gamble, 8. cujo

SV%: 1. richter, 4. belfour, 5. gamble

ie, he was right there with some big boys until he hit his rookie wall

my other thought here is, with all due respect to gamble and his career-destroying injury (who knows if he could have had a long career as a 1A or backup?), it was maybe for the best for mclean to be unopposed in the net. i feel like having a clear pecking order where mclean was 1 and whitmore was a very dependable 2 was useful for mclean to himself get back to an all-star level and hit the heights he hit in 92 and 94. in my memory, he just didn’t seem do well with gamble breathing down his neck.

I'm not sure when the concussion was - might have been during 90-91 but the interview I'm referring to was during 1991-92 when he was struggling badly and McLean was carrying the team back to credibility.

I was like 11 or 12 and I remember at the time being like 'WTF why is he playing?!?' and it's something that's stuck in my mind ever since.