Player Discussion Linus Ullmark (G)

[vandelay]

I did find it strange that green didnt put him back in for last night's game. Forsberg has been better but getting ullmark going would seem to be priority 1 right now...

 

[bicboi64]

Wow, Ullmark brutal in his post game comments after Vegas,

"If we had a capable goalie, we'd have won 4-3"

I like him taking accountability but hope he's not so hard on himself that he messes up his confidence.

Nice to see some real leadership coming from between the pipes (been forever since we've had a keeper with the talent, confidence, and accountability). Hope he bounces back with a shut out

 

[Sanderson]

He shouldn’t have suited up for the Czechs in Turin Olympics. We were gonna win the Cup. That’s why Brodeur is better. He’s so good league had to nerf him with the trapezoid.

Brodeur is better because Hasek got injured?

I'll never get why anyone would claim Brodeur to be the best goalie ever. With Roy at least you can point at the 80s and early 90s, with his Conn Smythes and Vezinas, but Brodeur really has no claim at all.

The best ever does not get bested year after year after year during his peak (or prime) by someone else. Yet Hasek absolutely clobbered Brodeur again and again. There was only one season where it was even close. Heck, Brodeur couldn't even get a Vezina when Hasek missed half a season. You have to go all the way up to 06/07 to find a season in which Brodeur actually outperformed Hasek, 03/04 if you want to count the season Hasek barely played in, and Hasek was ancient by that time.

93/94: Hasek (28) wins the Vezina, Brodeur (21) wins the Calder, Hasek has the much better season
94/95: Hasek (29) trounces the entire league (Vezina), Brodeur (22) is very average
95/96: Hasek (30) is the best goalie again, but not quite as dominant, and Buffalo is struggling, so no Vezina for once, Brodeur (23) is doing really well, but is not on Hasek's level
96/97: Hasek (31) wins the Hart, Pearson and Vezina, Brodeur (24) is actually pretty close for once
97/98: Hasek (32) trounces the league again, winning another set of Hart, Pearson and Vezina, Brodeur (25) is among the best of the rest, but far behind Hasek
98/99: Hasek (33) wins another Vezina and probably should have won more, yet another truly dominant season compared to the rest, Brodeur (26) is very average
99/00: Hasek (34) misses half the season, judging by his form later on, it probably would have been another Vezina if he hadn't, Brodeur (27) with another average season
00/01: Hasek (35) with another Vezina, though not as dominant as he used to be. Brodeur (28) again with an average season
01/02: Hasek (36) with a good but not great season in Detroit, as Theodore wins the Vezina and Hart. Brodeur (29) with another average season
02/03: Hasek retires, Brodeur (30) wins his first Vezina, though that seemed based more on his name than performance, as he wasn't even close to the best that year
03/04: Hasek (38) returns but barely plays, Brodeur (31) wins another Vezina, but again it's a rather dubious one
05/06: Hasek (40) on course for another Vezina until an injury ends his season, Brodeur (33) good but not great
06/07: Hasek (41) has a decent season, Brodeur (34) actually deserves his Vezina for once, though voting ends in a very close call against Luongo
07/08: Hasek (42) is all but done, Brodeur (35) wins another Vezina in yet another close call against Nabokov. Though voting seems largely based on them playing all the time, not on how dominant they were, because they weren't.
08/09: Brodeur (36) misses half the season
09/10: Brodeur's (37) last really good season, Vezina finalist.
Afterwards a bunch of very average years to finish his career.

In other words: Brodeur couldn't win a Vezina until Hasek was gone. There were quite a few years were Brodeur was anything but special, and he even missed out on being a Vezina-contender when there was an opening, like in 2000. And unlike Hasek, he never dominanted the other goalies. He either won close calls, or based on playing a ton, not because he performed better in the games he played. In many years he got some Vezina consideration due his high nunber of wins and games played, not because his performance actually matched others. A rather warped way of voting for the best.

Brodeur got lots of wins and shutouts, thanks to playing lots of games every year for a very long time. But that doesn't make you the best when you can never actually beat the best during his prime. It's like suggesting Mark Messier was a better player than Mario Lemieux. Alltime great, among the best ever, sure, but not close to being the best.

It's also wrong to claim they changed the rules because of Brodeur. Brodeur was hardly the only goalie who could play the puck, and at the times they made the change, there was others equal to him (like Marty Turco). The change happened because they needed to do something about defensive schemes, which caused a lot of ineffective dump-ins that got handled by the goalies before any attacker could do anything about it. This happened with basically every goalie, regardless of whether he was good at playing the puck or not. What mattered was that a goalie could be there first.