HOH Top 60 Goaltenders of All Time (2024 Edition) - Round 2, Vote 1

[MXD]

Playing with a dynasty club of multiple HHOFers, heck, top-30 ever skaters versus... not for Hasek.

Here Hasek stonewalls Brett Hull, Pat Lafontaine and co in international play in a game i have NEVER seen before, is only broadcast in Czech, from about the 12 & a half minute mark:

None of this has anything to do with NHL regular season games played/length of NHL career, which was the content of your original "note".

 

[BadgerBruce]

The kiss of death for an O6 goalie was to have his toughness and endurance questioned. Resting was a sign of physical and psychological weakness, even when the reasons were completely legitimate. I honestly don’t think you could name a single O6 goalie who didn’t take a puck to the face, leave to get stitched or taped up, and then return to the crease to finish out the game. Never show weakness was the code they lived by.

Perhaps more importantly, being out of the lineup for home games was considered insulting to fans, a major no-no when the league was almost entirely gated-driven. Guys like Jack Adams and Dick Irvin weren’t shy about calling players out to the press even when the injuries were genuinely serious. They’d publicly question your courage as though you were a soldier gone AWOL.

Different world from today. 20+ years ago Colorado didn’t necessarily need to sellout the building during Patrick Roy’s time. He could sit out 20 games in 2000-01 because of injury or load management with little impact on the club’s financial bottom line, and the club’s leadership would care first and foremost about getting him back healthy. Put him on one of Conn Smythe’s old Leafs’ clubs and his world would have been flipped upside down. Smythe, by the way, publicly said “We aren’t running a fat man’s club!” to shame Turk Broda, and then he brought in both Al Rollins and Gilles Mayer so he could say “now I’ve got the long (Rollins, 6’2”), the short (Mayer, 5’6”) and the fat (Broda).”

I understand that not a word I just posted helps the project participants rank the eight goalies currently under consideration. Personally, I value the old school warriors, the guys who played hurt, the ones who didn’t have the Mitch Korns and Francois Allaires and Warren Strelows to team up with “psychological performance coaches” to get them ready for their next start. Sure, they seldom used techniques even remotely similar to today’s top goaltenders, but getting them to abandon the crease and willingly give up the job for even one game was nearly impossible.

 

[VanIslander]

@MXD If you nix all Hasek's years before the NHL: 1991, 1987, 1984 Canada Cups, 1988 Olympics, considered top goalie in Europe behind the Iron Curtain.... be consistent in dissing Holecek. (or split hairs)

 

[MXD]

If you nix all Hasek's years before the NHL: 1991, 1987, 1984 Canada Cups, 1988 Olympics, considered top goalie in Europe behind the Iron Curtain.... be consistent in dissing Holecek.

Why not extend this to Tretiak too?

 

[ContrarianGoaltender]

I have also been thinking that the findings of modern load management should update our analysis.

But I'm not sure what to make of the actual data. Have you looked at the days by rest report on nhl.com? Most goaltenders' save percentages with 0 days rest are similar to their overall numbers.

For example Martin Brodeur has played in 180 games with 0 days of rest. Of all goalies in the last 50 years*, that's over 50% more than #2. His save percentage in those games is 0.912, identical to his career save percentage of 0.912.

Others with similar numbers. Maybe Roy and Hasek were worse with 0 days of rest, but the statistical difference is only about one standard deviation.

Ed Belfour - 0.906 overall, 0.911 on 0 days rest (106 GP)
Dominik Hasek - 0.922 overall, 0.918 on 0 days rest (103 GP)
Curtis Joseph - 0.906 overall, 0.904 on 0 days rest (93 GP)
Patrick Roy - 0.910 overall, 0.905 on 0 days rest (91 GP)
Henrik Lundqvist - 0.918 overall, 0.926 on 0 days rest (90 GP)
Roberto Luongo - 0.919 overall, 0.919 on 0 days rest (84 G)

It's possible these numbers are skewed by selection effects, where goaltenders have only been played in the easier back to backs. Although Brodeur played 70% of 0 days of rest games on the road, so I'm not sure that's the case for him, at least.

And the 0 days of rest data doesn't speak to the fatigue or wear and tear that a workhorse goalie might accumulate by the end of a season.

With regards to Brodeur, I wondered if his style played a role, and if the modern pro-fly style needs more recovery than some styles of the past. I see @Michael Farkas is thinking along the same lines.

*I wouldn't draw any conclusions from 0 days of rest data from the Original Six. Each team had it's own specific travel schedule where some teams played their back to backs at home and others played their back to backs on the road. Days of rest data from that era can't be compared across teams.

As far as I can tell, the idea that you should never play your goalies in a back-to-back seems to be an incorrect extrapolation of a few seasons of data in the early 2010s, where for whatever reason there appeared to be a pretty extreme effect. At least that's within the analytics community, I don't know what the teams are thinking.

My assessment of the evidence is that goalies can handle selective back-to-backs without too much difficulty, and the greater issue is cumulative workload. If we're looking for fatigue effects, I'd say they would probably be more likely to show up in situations like playing 4 games in 6 nights, or a few games with high shots against in succession, or games late in a road trip, or late in the season.

Patrick Roy, for example, had pretty rough March/Aprils in his 65+ game seasons:

1991-92: .918 through Feb, .898 Mar/Apr
1993-94: .921 through Feb, .907 Mar/Apr
1997-98: .923 through Feb, .896 Mar/Apr

(There's also 1990-91, where he played in 28 of the first 33, on pace for 68, and then got injured twice.)

I also think that the actual level of the workload is also relevant, as per Jim Corsi, whose original metric was invented to measure goalie workload. So maybe the number of shot attempts faced in game 1 of a back-to-back is an important factor, not just the rest period, because a goalie that faced 20 shots in game 1 is likely going to be less impaired 24 hours later than a guy that faced 50.

 

[VanIslander]

Why not extend this to Tretiak too?

Ah, because he was in the Summit Series, the recognized epic contest of best NHL vs. best Iron Curtained Soviets, and the 20 year old shined. He showed Canada and the world of hockey that he can stop pucks.

The game of Hasek's against Lafontaine and Hull i had to link in the Czech language because it was not a highlight matchup like the stage of the Summit Series was.

Tretiak might be one of the three best goalies ever; he certainly is among the half dozen greatest.

 

[BenchBrawl]

Great to see Terry Sawchuk getting some love.

What's the case for Dominik Hasek over Terry Sawchuk? The Harts? I always saw it as Sawchuk at his peak = Hasek at his peak + winning several cups at the same time.

 

[Professor What]

Great to see Terry Sawchuk getting some love.

What's the case for Dominik Hasek over Terry Sawchuk? The Harts? I always saw it as Sawchuk at his peak = Hasek at his peak + winning several cups at the same time.

I'm not sure that I can see the Cups as a separation for them. Sawchuk had a heck of a lot more to work with in Detroit than Hasek did in Buffalo. It's not really fair to credit or blame a guy for the cast he has surrounding him.

Edit: Sawchuk has been going up in my estimation throughout this discussion, so that's no slap on him.

 

[MXD]

Great to see Terry Sawchuk getting some love.

What's the case for Dominik Hasek over Terry Sawchuk? The Harts? I always saw it as Sawchuk at his peak = Hasek at his peak + winning several cups at the same time.

The cups won by Sawchuck, and not won by Hasek, are mostly a function of one having Gordie Howe, Ted Lindsay and Red Kelly as teammates, with the other having something like Alexei Zhitnik, Mike Peca and Miro Satan.

Hasek is generally considered better, and with absolute cause I might add, because :

- Hasek is undoubtedly an above-average NHL starting netminder outside of his peak, while there are serious doubts regarding Sawchuck in that regards

- Hasek's peak is quite a bit longer, and has happened in somewhat tougher circumstances

- Even in his peak, Sawchuk did drop the ball, to the point where the Wings arguably won despite him.

 

[Bear of Bad News]

Six-team league doesn't hurt, either, especially in the Norris House League years.

 

[Michael Farkas]

But I'm not sure what to make of the actual data. Have you looked at the days by rest report on nhl.com? Most goaltenders' save percentages with 0 days rest are similar to their overall numbers.

Almost everyone plays a much more conservative, defensive style of game in their back to back scenarios. Naturally, that will impact goaltender performance in a positive way.

O6 goalies were much better load managers than the predominantly unkempt goalies of DPE 2.0. I don't think that era gets enough discredit for how weak the goaltending was, as the position - fragile as it is - struggled to adjust to the new rules and keep up with shooting advents.

 

[MXD]

What exactly is DPE 2.0?

 

[Michael Farkas]

Brodeur was one of the last hybrid style goalies. And always played more games than contemporaries.

Not to bring up a guy that isn't available yet...but to add a smidge of fuel...Nabokov was more of a hybrid goalie...the majority of his longest playoff runs (however short they may be) match up his biggest RS workloads.

Re: @MXD honest, non-loaded question here - can you point to where Sawchuk dropped the ball and the Wings won in spite of him?

What exactly is DPE 2.0?

The time just after the lockout (around '08 or '09 it started) where the game actually became too fast for its own good. The emphasis on speed created a race of players that were very fast but couldn't play at speed. And instead of being able to create with speed, they just destroyed. Playing 27 seconds at a time, running into the few real gamebreakers the league had available. This lasted for a good 7 years or so until more players were able to learn to slow the game down with the puck and/or play at speed with the puck. It brought on a rare instance of goal scoring going up WITH league quality, as opposed to the typical inverse relationship that has existed for most of the league's history.

 

[overpass]

Re: @MXD honest, non-loaded question here - can you point to where Sawchuk dropped the ball and the Wings won in spite of him?

Not MXD but I would have to say the 1955 finals, when Sawchuk allowed 15 goals in 3 losses at the Forum, including 6 by Geoffrion. And that was a Canadiens team playing without Maurice Richard. Fortunately for Detroit, they had home ice advantage, having beaten Montreal by 2 points in the regular season for first. And Sawchuk allowed only 5 goals in the 4 home games.

In Game 6, Sawchuk allowed 6 goals, and received a misconduct penalty after attacking referee Red Storey while insisting that Geoffrion had kicked the puck in on the 4-1 goal. The Montreal Gazette noted in their game report that Sawchuk had been the victim of an attack of influenza. Maybe he wasn't at his best.

 

[MXD]

Not MXD but I would have to say the 1955 finals, when Sawchuk allowed 15 goals in 3 losses at the Forum, including 6 by Geoffrion. And that was a Canadiens team playing without Maurice Richard. Fortunately for Detroit, they had home ice advantage, having beaten Montreal by 2 points in the regular season for first. And Sawchuk allowed only 5 goals in the 4 home games.

In Game 6, Sawchuk allowed 6 goals, and received a misconduct penalty after attacking referee Red Storey while insisting that Geoffrion had kicked the puck in on the 4-1 goal. The Montreal Gazette noted in their game report that Sawchuk had been the victim of an attack of influenza. Maybe he wasn't at his best.

That was what I was implicity referring to, but thanks for fleshing it out

 

[jigglysquishy]

A few quotes from Jean Beliveau's book

"Jacques Plante received much of the credit for those back-to-back shutouts, but it was Doug’s inspired play that made the goalie’s work that much easier." Beliveau on 1960 playoffs.


"Jacques Plante had been the Canadiens’ goalie throughout my first ten seasons, backed up by the able and steady Charlie Hodge. From 1955–56 through 1961–62, he was a first- or second-team all-star every year but one and won six of seven Vezina Trophies as the league’s top netminder. I rate him and Terry Sawchuk as the best goalies I’ve ever seen, with Ken Dryden, Glenn Hall, Bernie Parent, and Patrick Roy on the next rung down.

Roy finally convinced me with his excellent play and four Stanley Cups, although I still have a hard time with him and many other present-day goalies because I am not a great fan of the butterfly style, having always favored stand-up, angles goalies. I will admit, however, that few goals today are scored by shots to the upper part of the net and that perhaps 70 percent of all shots will be stopped by the butterfly technique, especially since referees have a tendency to allow interference and open assaults on goalies in their creases.

Many things we teach young goalies today are the result of Jacques Plante’s innovative spirit. Everyone knows that he was the first goalie to wear a mask regularly in NHL action. Jacques had used a mask in practice, but Toe Blake refused to let him wear it in games until Plante was hit in the nose by an Andy Bathgate slap shot in New York in 1959. Andy, a classy player, had one of the hardest and most accurate shots in the league, and he put everything into this one. Streaming blood, Jacques was taken to the Madison Square Garden’s clinic, where a doctor stitched him up and managed to position the nose back into place. However, when Jacques returned to the dressing room, he told Toe, “I’m ready to go back out there, but I’m wearing the mask.

Nobody approached the position of goaltender with as much precision and science as Jacques Plante. His wide-ranging mobility revolutionized the game: he was the first goalie to go behind his net routinely to intercept a pass around the boards. He would rush out to challenge forwards who chased long passes into his zone or skate into the corner to retrieve iced pucks. Other goaltenders attempted these forays, but as a rule they were clumsy skaters and often had difficulty getting back into their nets.

Jacques’ speed and agility enabled him to develop a deadly poke-check. He could hold back deep in his net and then strike like a serpent at a breaking forward—hence his nickname, “Jake the Snake.” Add to that a very quick glove hand and fast feet, and Plante was pretty much the ideal netminder of the 1950s and ’60s.

Here is just one example of Jacques’ uncanny precision. During the first period of a game in Chicago, he complained vociferously that the crossbar on his net was too low, lower than on any other net in the league, he claimed. Naturally, we thought he might simply be crouching differently.

“No,” he insisted, “when I take my position, I do it the same way in every rink. I haven’t changed, this net has, and it’s probably out by a sixteenth, maybe even an eighth, of an inch.” The matter was left at that, although Jacques continued to belabor it after the game. The next time we played in Chicago, we asked our trainers to measure the net. It was exactly one-sixteenth of an inch out of alignment.

Like many goalies, Jacques was a solitary sort and could be abrasive at times. That doesn’t mean that he wasn’t a team man; he was. But he had his own way about him. He received a lot of media attention for his habit of knitting—in the dressing room and on trains when we traveled around the league. His needles clicked away, knitting and purling, turning out socks, toques, underwear, and camisoles. Perhaps the concentration of manual busywork had a calming effect on his mind, especially before an important game. Personally, I think he did it to economize. For some reason, it seems a lot of goalies are tight when it comes to money. Ken Dryden used to leave his car out past Greene Avenue in Westmount and walk blocks back to the Forum just to save a few dollars on parking.

Needless to say, some of the jokers on the team were tempted to tease Jacques about his pastime, but I tried to head them off. I knew full well that his temper was not to be trifled with. “Leave him alone; it’s not our business. If he’s happy to handle the tension that way, he’ll probably be better off after his hockey career than most of us.” This turned out to be true.

After his trade to New York, it was a shock to look back at our net and not see Jacques Plante standing there."



"Terry Sawchuk was different. He was an angles goalie who wanted you to shoot. But if you preferred to put a move on him, he was happy to oblige. Both he and Bower were pushing forty in 1967 when we lined up against the Leafs in the league final, and both delivered outstanding performances. Sawchuk was especially amazing during a 3–0 shutout in the second game, April 22, in Montreal, after we had taken the series lead with a 6–2 win in the opener. Later in the series, I walked in on him in Toronto, and how he caught that puck I’ll never know."

 

[jigglysquishy]

I flipped through the Game by Dryden to see if there was anything relevant.

"For me, the greatest goalies must always be Hall, Sawchuk, Plante, and Bower."

I know Dryden grew up in the Toronto area, but it's interesting that Bower is included in the former group.

From Scotty
"Plante was also different in another way. He was a competitor, as all the great players are, and he wanted to win, but unlike every other goalie before or since—except Hašek—he was also an artist, and goaltending was his art. And so he needed to play up to, and live up to, his art. If he couldn’t—if he felt sick or injured and couldn’t be at his best; if an opponent was too good in some way and would get in the way of him expressing his art—he didn’t want to play. Sometimes, especially later in his career, that was a problem. But at this moment in the mid-1950s, he had a more pressing problem.

Oftentimes, someone uses style to hide an absence of substance, and if you’re able to get others to focus on that style, maybe they won’t notice you aren’t any good. Unfortunately for Plante, the reverse was true for most of his goaltending life. His style and his weirdnesses got in the way of others seeing how good he was. A guy who knits, wears a toque, and dons a mask was simply hard to take seriously. It had gotten slightly better for him. His critics had even noticed that the year before—1954–55—his goals against average was 2.12, higher only than those of Sawchuk and the Leafs’ goalie, Harry Lumley. Yet after the season, when there were rumours that Sawchuk might be traded and Canadiens GM Frank Selke was asked if he was interested, Selke didn’t say, “No, we’ve got our guy in Plante.” He said he would be interested. Plante still would need to prove himself. But soon his teammates, the fans, the media, and even Selke and Blake would learn what Plante always knew—that difference is acceptable, if you’re good."


"Hašek was like Jacques Plante. He was a competitor, but also an artist—more than competing against his opponent, he competed against his art and himself. He had faced Patrick Roy once before in a showdown game—in the semifinals of the 1998 Olympics in Nagano, Japan. The game had ended in a 1–1 tie. Then came overtime, and with no goals scored, the ultimate showdown: a shootout. Of the five shots taken by each team, Roy allowed one goal—Hašek none.

It was hard to play mano-a-mano games with Hašek. He was unaware of what Roy was trying to do, or he didn’t care, or maybe he thought it didn’t matter; he had his art and himself to live up to. “That sixth game was 1–0 until the middle of the second period, then we got another.” And, as Scotty says, Hašek was “spectacular.”"



“I remember watching [Sawchuk] play,” Scotty says. “He was big, about 190 or 200 pounds. He started his pro career at 18 in the USHL, then was in the AHL. He hardly played junior. Even by this time [1951–52] he was only 22. He had five straight seasons with [a goals against] average below two. When they talk about the goalies of that era, they talk about Sawchuk, Plante, and Hall, and I had two of them in St. Louis [Plante and Hall]. If you look at longevity, Plante played the longest. Hall played the most games, and I’m a big Glenn Hall supporter.

But as big a fan as Scotty is of Hall’s, as he relates: “Sawchuk is still rated by people as the best of those three. I think the fact that Sawchuk had a checkered career after winning those Cups in ’52, ’54, and ’55 took a lot away from his reputation. He got some kind of malaise, or disease—I don’t think they ever found out what it was. He lost a lot of weight. He was in Boston then, and when he came back to Detroit they were on the decline, then he was in Toronto. But after he left Detroit the first time I don’t think he was ever the same goalie.” Yet in the early 1950s—in 1952: “Nobody was close to him.””

Another difference for Scotty: Harvey was great, Johnson was good, but together the four Wings defencemen were more solid. And then Sawchuk. No matter how good Plante was, in the 1952 playoffs Sawchuk had four shutouts in eight games. His goals against average was 0.62.

"Behind Kelly and Goldham, Pronovost and Reise, was Terry Sawchuk. At 22 years old, it was his second full year in the league. He was big for a goalie in those days—almost six feet tall and 200 pounds, occasionally more—but playing in a deep crouch, coiled, he was remarkably agile. He would play in the NHL for 20 years and for most of those years he was good to very good, but for his first five seasons in Detroit he was great. A few other goalies might lay equal claim to the recognition of being the best ever, but it’s almost certain that nobody has ever had five years better than these. During that time, the Wings won the regular-season title five times and the Stanley Cup three times. Sawchuk’s goals against averages: 1.97, 1.90, 1.89, 1.93, and 1.96. “I talked to Ted Lindsay about him,” Scotty says. “Ted is a smart guy. He said, ‘There’s never been a goalie in his prime like Sawchuk. He had all the mechanics. He had his glove. He just was so focused.’ ”"


"Behind Kelly and Goldham, Pronovost and Reise, was Terry Sawchuk. At 22 years old, it was his second full year in the league. He was big for a goalie in those days—almost six feet tall and 200 pounds, occasionally more—but playing in a deep crouch, coiled, he was remarkably agile. He would play in the NHL for 20 years and for most of those years he was good to very good, but for his first five seasons in Detroit he was great. A few other goalies might lay equal claim to the recognition of being the best ever, but it’s almost certain that nobody has ever had five years better than these. During that time, the Wings won the regular-season title five times and the Stanley Cup three times. Sawchuk’s goals against averages: 1.97, 1.90, 1.89, 1.93, and 1.96. “I talked to Ted Lindsay about him,” Scotty says. “Ted is a smart guy. He said, ‘There’s never been a goalie in his prime like Sawchuk. He had all the mechanics. He had his glove. He just was so focused.’ ”


" When things went wrong—and things always do—Hall couldn’t prey on their minds the way Sawchuk could. He couldn’t haunt them and make them so miserable they wouldn’t dare to play that way again. Sawchuk had been a brooding conscience on the Wings. He had seemed at times to be more trouble than he was worth—until, as the Wings would find out, he wasn’t there."

 

[Professor What]

I flipped through the Game by Dryden to see if there was anything relevant.

"For me, the greatest goalies must always be Hall, Sawchuk, Plante, and Bower."

I know Dryden grew up in the Toronto area, but it's interesting that Bower is included in the former group.

Bower is surprising, but that otherwise kind of reaffirms the O6 threesome. Of course, all of that predates Hasek and Roy, so we don't know from that if those really were "always" the greatest goalies for him.

 

[nabby12]

At 5:20 in the video is the famous clip of Bobby Hull's pointblank slapshot to Sawchuk's face/shoulder in the 1967 Stanley Cup semifinals. When the trainer came out to see if Sawchuk was okay and if he could still play, Sawchuk barked at him, "I stopped the ****ing shot didn't I!? Get out of here!"

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

I'll add one more old post here. I'm not trying to dominate the discussion, but I have time to dig these up now, and likely won't later in the week. This is a very long discussion about why I used to think Brodeur was overrated, and why I changed my mind:

I joined HFBoards in January 2005. At the time, I was convinced that Brodeur was a fraud. (No - I didn't create that website, but I agreed with most of the content). I'm pretty sure I joined HFBoards specifically to argue with people on that point.

Nobody disputes that Brodeur was great during the first five years of his career (1994 to 1998). Here's the case against Brodeur from 1999 to 2004 (a span of six seasons, spanning ages 26 to 31):

• First, so I don't get flamed by Devils fans - I'm not saying I agree with all this today. But this would have been my position at the time.
• Save percentage isn't perfect, but it's the best single measurement of how effectively a goalie stops the puck. During this period, Brodeur was barely above the league average. Across those six years, Brodeur's save percentage was 91.0%, compared to the league average of 90.7%. Brodeur didn't place in the top ten in save percentage in any of those six seasons. Yet, somehow, he walked away with two Vezina trophies, six straight years in the top five, and two years as a Hart trophy finalist. There was a massive disconnect between his performance, and how he was perceived.
• This was true in the playoffs too. During these six seasons, 12 goalies played in thirty or more games. Ten of them had save percentages over 92%. The only exceptions were Brodeur, and Osgood - another goalie who wasn't as good as his numbers suggested.
• Brodeur had a big advantage by playing in New Jersey. He was playing in front of two Hall of Fame defenseman and a multiple Selke trophy winner. More importantly, it was about the "system". The Devils were (probably) the most disciplined and most defensively sound team in the NHL. The Devils took by far the least penalty minutes (per game) during this span. Only one team (the Blues) allowed fewer shots per game. It was obvious from watching them play that the Devils were a suffocating defensive team. He was much less busy than Hasek, Joseph, and many others.
• Yes, Brodeur won a lot of games, but that's largely because he played a lot of games (he was also near the top of the list in terms of losses), and also because he was behind such a strong team. During these six years, statistically, Brodeur was only slightly better than his mediocre collection of backup goalies. (At the time, I found this point particularly persuasive).
• A study was published in 2004 where save percentage was adjusted to take shot quality into account (ie was it a breakway or from the point? one-time or slap shot? PP or ES?). This was the early days of hockey analytics, but the conclusion made sense ("It came as no surprise to me that New Jersey lead the league in this metric, allowing 8.5% fewer goals than an average team because of its ability to minimize shot quality"). This was statistical evidence for the advantage of the Devils' system.
• Some people pointed to Brodeur winning the gold medal in 2002 as proof that he didn't need "the system" in New Jersey. This was never a convincing argument. No shit, Brodeur was able to win four games (two of which were against Belarus and Germany) playing with 12 HOF teammates. This is supposed to be evidence that Brodeur didn't need a stacked team to win?
• Brodeur played a lot of games, and that's beneficial to his team. But it isn't clear if a slightly above average goalie playing 70+ games is necessarily better than an excellent goalie playing 60+ games. (Goals versus average tries to summarize a goalie's impact into one number, taking into account their workload and performance. By that metric, Brodeur looked good, but he was clearly behind Hasek, Roy and Belfour, despite them all playing in fewer games. And he didn't even separate himself from the next tier of goalies, like Luongo, Joseph, Khabibulin, Nabokov, etc). A goalie who plays 70+ games on a strong team will get a lot of wins, but he hasn't necessarily contributed more than someone who places 10 fewer games per year, but at a higher level.
• A lot of people argued that Brodeur's puckhandling hurt his save percentage (because he doesn't get credit for a save if he clears the puck on his own - and once you factor that in, his save percentage would be much higher). That argument was never persuasive. First, several goalies from this era were equally good at puckhandling, and many of them had save percentages that were vastly higher - Marty Turco being the best example. Second, if you look at the number of shots that Brodeur faced per game, and compare it to his backup - there was minimal difference. From what I recall, if we attribute all of the difference in shots faced to Brodeur's puckhandling, it worked out to about one shot per game. Factor that in and his save percentage jumps a bit, but he was still far from the Hasek/Roy level.

That was my opinion at the time. I now rank Brodeur 5th all-time among goalies. What's changed? Brodeur's performance after the lockout has done a lot to prove to me that he wasn't just a product of "the system". Specifically:

• After the lockout, Brodeur (apparently) became much better at stopping the puck. Yes, he trailed off after 2010, but in the first five years after the lockout, he ranked 5th in save percentage, out of the 32 goalies who played in 150+ games. (That made me question - how likely was it that Brodeur, from ages 33 to 37, suddenly learned how to stop the puck again? Were there systematic issues that deflated his save percentage pre-lockout?)
• He had an all-time great season in 2007. (I thought Luongo was more deserving of the Vezina, but both had very strong years). The Devils still had some big names from the dynasty years, but Stevens and Niedermayer were gone. The Devils allowed 28.4 shots per game (slightly better than average, but not much). This was a strong Vezina win by historical standards.
• His playoff run in 2012 was excellent. This edition of the Devils wasn't particularly disciplined or responsible defensively. Their top defenseman was Marek Zidlicky, who was a defensive black hole. Their top forward was Ilya Kovalchuk, who got credit for being semi-responsible defensively for the first time in his life. This helped convince me that Brodeur could carry a (relatively) weak team to the Stanley Cup finals.
• The study that I mentioned before about shot quality was "recalled". Unfortuantely, the recall notice appears to be down, but the conclusion was that the shot quality that Brodeur (and other Devils goalies) faced, wasn't quite as easy as we first thought. (This is what a reasonable person should do - revisit their previously-held opinions in light of new evidence).
• The final point is probably the most important, though it's also the most philosophical. The problem with using a stat like "goals versus average", is that it treats a goalie who plays 70+ games at the league-average level as having (essentially) zero impact. Looking at how GM's award contracts - they clearly don't agree with that idea. And there's definitely value in a goalie playing a lot of games, even if it's only at the league-average level. If nothing else, it means the team is spared from having to play a backup-calibre goalie. (Simply being a top 15-20 goalie in the world is a hugely impressive accomplishment). From 1999 to 2004, Brodeur ranked 4th in "goals versus threshold" - which is still lower than his reputation suggests, but it's a much smaller disconnect.
• Building on the above point, my own research shows that Brodeur ranks 4th in NHL history (going back to the mid 1950's, based on GVT). Who am I to argue with myself?

This has turned into a much longer response than I intended. Ultimately, I think Brodeur was overrated during the period from 1998 to 2004, and there are legitimate criticisms that can be made. That clearly knocks him below Hasek, Roy and Plante on any all-time ranking. But his performance after the lockout was great, and it leads me to conclude that I was probably too harsh on him back when I first joined HFBoards.

I wouldn't go that far, but I still think Brodeur is overrated.

Based pretty much on seeing tons of Devils games.

First off, to me, what makes Brodeur an all-time great was his puck handling ability. Best ever. Hands down. A big part of the Devils defensive game plan. But not an all-time great puck stopper.

Chico Resch was famous for his catch phrases as a Devils color commentator. One of them was "You don't see Marty give up many like that".

 

[Michael Farkas]

But not an all-time great puck stopper.

How's that?

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

How's that?

My opinion?

From watching him play. Seeing him give up many bad goals. Not needing to make a lot of great saves because he was playing behind the defensive juggernaut Devils.

 

[Michael Farkas]

My opinion?

From watching him play. Seeing him give up many bad goals. Not needing to make a lot of great saves because he was playing behind the defensive juggernaut Devils.

Ok, so bad goals do matter even if you're clearly an elite puck stopper by the stats, right? Because sometimes that doesn't matter, or so I've read.

Brodeur is top 10 all time in GAA. And that's the name of the game, right? Not allowing goals.

Also, it's a common misconception that Brodeur always played for a defensive juggernaut. Even in the DPE.

Yes, the Lemaire Devils were a very conservative bunch. But any more of a "defensive juggernaut" than Pat Burns with Patrick Roy? Or Toe Blake with Jacques Plante? Or...

The Robbie Ftorek Devils were much different. They were more aggressive. Just a sampling can be gleaned here, because I don't think anyone wants to sit through a complete tactical breakdown because I'm not gonna break buzzword-led stereotypes in this post...



I mean, look at this mess from NJ. There isn't five guys on a screen, sometimes there's only two. There's guys diving all over the floor, not a staple of Devils hockey, odd-man rushes. These Devils teams were 2-men up. They attacked defenders at the breakout level as opposed to sitting back and attacking forwards at the center and defensive blue.

As a result, they lost to a more defensive Penguins team in 1999 to save their franchise...ironically enough.

Obviously, Brodeur transitioned out of the DPE into a wide open lockout era where he couldn't necessarily have had a "defensive juggernaut". He proceeds to win multiple Vezinas, finish near the top for others, was a prime candidate in the Hart discussion, etc. Oh and MOST IMPORTANTLY (sonk) .920 save percentages! Hooray!

With Colin White's giant brain playing 22+ minutes on this "juggernaut", you know things are air tight haha

That's NJ...25 years of pure stalwart hockey...including the three-man aggressive forecheck and cycling game led by Ilya Kovalchuk and backed by #1 d-man Marek Zidlicky that got to the Final.

Ken Dryden...yeah, now, that's a guy that was really fighting it. 7 years with a roster three tiers better than everyone else, behind the guy that famously brought defensive cohesion everywhere he went, on a team with three #1 d-men, some of the best checkers of all time, in an unbalanced league...

Not Patrick Roy, on a team that carried on the legend of being a defensive team, with famously great checkers and defensive coaches...

Let's check out the 1986 Habs...you'll eventually see them on the screen against this Whaler breakout.



Look, I'm not saying that Brodeur didn't benefit from the trap (well, in a real sense...but in a faulty save pct.-led sense, probably not...his reputation seems irreparably damaged by something that he played behind for about five years of his 20 year career). I just never understand why it's applied so heavily to Brodeur and so lightly to every other goalie. As if everyone else was a disciple of the 1985 Oilers or something haha

These goalies are up here because they played for defensive teams for most of their careers. Otherwise, they wouldn't be recognized in the first place.

I'll be back to talk about the "bad goals theory"...

 

[BM67]

My opinion?

From watching him play. Seeing him give up many bad goals. Not needing to make a lot of great saves because he was playing behind the defensive juggernaut Devils.

Why does it always seem like being in position and not having to make a great save is somehow not good goaltending?

 

[overpass]

Some quotes from Dick Irvin Jr's book In the Crease:

On Jacques Plante
"Plante was a student of the game. My father was his first NHL coach and thought he had the best overall knowledge of hockey of any young player he had met. Plante was also the best interviewee in the game. "

(Plante did some work as an analyst on hockey broadcasts during his 1965-1968 retirement. Red Fisher thought Plante was the best analyst he had ever heard on hockey broadcasts, even better than Scotty Bowman.)

On Terry Sawchuk, and why Dick Irvin Jr rates him #1.
"The greatest display of goaltending I ever saw took place at the Montreal Forum October 22, 1951, in a game that has long been forgotten by everyone but me. When it was over, the Canadiens had outshot the Detroit Red Wings 48-12. Final score: Detroit 3, Montreal 1. I have watched a lot of goalies stop a lot of shots since then, but I have never forgotten the Detroit goalie's performance that night. It was the first time I had seen him play, and maybe that's why I usually answer Terry Sawchuk when asked to pick the all-time best goalie.

"After two more Stanley Cups in Detroit in 1954 and 1955, Sawchuk was traded to the Boston Bruins. From then on his story has a darker cast. He had had three operations on a damaged elbow, the last one in 1952 to remove sixty pieces of bone. He had a ruptured appendix, suffered severe chest injuries in a car accident, and was stricken with infectious mononucleosis. A broken right arm didn't heal correctly and was left a few inches shorter than his left arm. He suffered a fractured instep, ruptured disks, punctured lungs, and severed tendons in both hands. He dent through a fit of depression during his second year in Boston and quit playing for several weeks...His Detroit teammate Ted Lindsay agreed with me that at one time Sawchuk might have been the greatest goalie the game had ever seen. "But then somebody convinced him to lose weight," Lindsay said, "and he was never the same after that." At times his weight dropped below 170.

A fact check on Irvin's memory finds the Montreal Gazette also praising Sawchuk for being "virtually unbeatable", "sensational throughout", and saying the Red Wings "couldn't have won last night without Sawchuk. The Gazette had the shots as 45-24, not quite as lopsided as Dick Irvin Jr remembered, but otherwise the description matches his memory.

Quotes from Glenn Hall
"I wasn't always a goalie. When I was young I played forward until I was eleven or twelve. That's how I learned to skate and it really helped me. I think what hurts a lot of kids today is that they're always goalkeepers. They're six and seven years old and they're a goalkeeper. Goalies have to skate too. If you can't skate well, then you can't play."

About his time in junior leagues and minor leagues.
"In all that time I never had a coach. Absolutely not. The older goalies knew you were interested in their job and they did nothing to make it easier for you so you learned two ways. You learned by watching, and you learned by trial and error. If you weren't paying attention you were gonna fall by the wayside. If you didn't learn you didn't last very long."

About practices:

"I feel quite fortunate to have played in a time when the goalkeepers and the players could think for themselves. In those days we were looking at 40 to 50 shots in a scrimmage. Today the goalkeepers look at 300 shots in a practice. They tend to get into what I call a "locked" tendency rather than a "moving" tendency. I like the goalkeeper who moves to the puck, who goes in and out. The mask changed a lot of things, including how they practice today. How many teams scrimmage? Go to a practice and it's shoot, shoot, shoot."

90s backup goalie Jeff Reese:
"I had both Johnny Bower and Glenn Hall as goalie coaches and that was something else...when I got to Calgary, Glenn had started coming out on the ice with the goalies. He was jumping around in there, back and forth. He was amazing. He'd say, 'I couldn't practise. I could play games right now but I couldn't practise.' The guy was sixty years old but I think he meant it."

Quotes on Ken Dryden

Scotty Bowman - "I can honestly say I can't remember him having two off-games in a row. Coming back after one was always a challenge to him. He was a fierce competitor and he played for only one reason -- to win."

Harry Neale says that Dryden is the only goaltender he has known who, when he was at the top of his game, gave the opposition the feeling they would not score a legitimate goal on him. Maybe they'd get one on a tip-in, or a deflection, or during a scramble, but that was the best they could hope for.

John Davidson: "Ken Dryden was the best in the business at being in games when he might get only eighteen or twenty shots and seven or eight would be classic scoring opportunities. He could keep his mind focused even though he wasn't getting a lot of work. He played the game under such control. It was like someone pushed a button and an arm came out. Then someone pushed another button and a leg came out. Everything he did was concise and for a reason. He was magnificent."

Patrick Roy

John Davidson talked about Roy while we chatted for the book. J.D. doesn't throw accolades around too freely, especially when it comes to goalies. But he said about Roy, "Name me one who has been any better the last twenty years." Montreal sportswriter Red Fisher refers to the Canadiens' Number 33 as "Saint Patrick".