And if Binnington keeps producing quality starts at a 35% pace, how long do you stick with him? I said there wasn't a controversy earlier in this thread, but the fact is Binnington hasn't been good this year.
Last night wasn't a quality start by the numbers but he was our best player by a pretty healthy margin. So long as the goalie I'm watching is playing like that then I'd stick with him regardless of what the stats show. Statistically, he had an awful game last night. He sported an .878 SV% and allowed 5 goals on an expected 3.59. But he also made some fantastic saves, was the only reason we were in the game late and didn't really have much of a chance on anything that beat him. He got scored on after contact that absolutely prevented him from catching a puck (legal, but certainly not his fault), a top corner PP one timer, a bat out of mid air rebound following a very good save, a backdoor tap in and a cross ice feed lasered top corner far side. Here's the heat map showing the goal locations:
We had the best goalie on the ice last night, but he took a non-quality start. It's happened too much this year.
He also had a non-quality start in the Winter Classic, but I didn't have a problem with that game either. Mikkola buried a beautiful centering pass from Kaprizov, Perunovich had a gorgeous deflection to put in the puck off his helmet, goal #3 was a fantastic cross ice back door one-timer and goal #4 was a centering pass to a guy all alone in front who faked a one timer and then deked and buried it. Notice that two of those goal scorers play for the Blues.
9 goals against in the last 2 games and not a single one was soft. 3 of them were catastrophic breakdowns leading to a sure goal so long as the shooter doesn't fully botch it, 2 of them were fluky bounces off our own D men where Binner was properly positioned, 1 of them was a zero-reaction-time top corner PP one timer that goes in every time it gets executed, and 1 of them was a play where his ability to make the save was fully removed from incidental contact through no fault of his own. That's 7 of the 9 that I can't fathom anyone could have expected a different outcome with another goalie in net. The remaining two were the batted home rebound and the cross ice pass that was wired top corner far side. The rebound that got batted home was on a great blocker save on an uncovered Pen 4 feet on top of the crease that got to deke and then attempt a backhand roof job. That absolutely can't be chalked up to the goalie. So is the complaint that he should have stopped the cross crease pass and only allowed 8 goals in the 2 games? Under the assumption that every one of his very good saves would have been made by anyone?
I genuinely don't understand how anyone with a shred of hockey knowledge could have watched these games and be displeased with Binner's play since the break. He's had just an okay season so far this year and we'll see if that was a slump or if the inconsistency continues as the sample size grows. But he has been very good recently despite putting up one statistical quality start in 3 games.
