Round 2, Vote 3 (HOH Top Goaltenders)

[unknown33]

No new information is available. It was all out there since the time the players or goalies were active NHLers.

But it wasn't know to the voters at the time I assume, therfore the ranking might change.

 

[Ohashi_Jouzu*]

1939 Bruins were 5-3-0, 23-15 against the Rangers, so over two seasons it is a wash in terms of regular season play, .25 GF advantage to the Bruins over 16 games.

http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/BOS/1939_games.html

1939 playoff series between the two teams was slightly higher scoring. In 6 of the 7 games the losing team scored 1 goal.

Interesting point is that in a more offensive series 1939, the Bruins did better than in a defensive series 1940, the opposite of expectations given that the Bruins had the best defensive forward line of the era in the Kraut Line, an elite defenseman in Dit Clapper, and a HHOF goalie in Frank Brimsek

Yeah, but they got shutout in 3 of the 4 losses (two of them 1-0 losses), right? There isn't a goaltending performance possible that beats a shutout...

Also interesting that, while you point out that the Bruins did better in an offensive series than a defensive one, Brimsek himself actually posted better individual stats in what you categorize as the more offensive series. I, personally, think that having all key players healthy in '39 made the biggest difference, as all of Mel Hill (1st line winger in '39 missed 3 of 6 games in '40), Clapper, Jackson, and Hollett missed time in '40.

And am I to believe hockey-reference when I see that Schmidt - who scored 6 points in 12 playoff games at age 20 ('39) - got shutout in 6 playoff games the very next year (despite leading the league in points during the '39/40 regular season)? Sounds like a whole lot more going wrong in front of Brimsek in '40 than in '39. Also, the name "Eddie Shore" is "conspicuously" absent from the '40 playoff roster, and undoubtedly made a huge difference, even at his age (got 2 points in 3 playoff games for the Americans against Brimsek that year - his last).

 

[Canadiens1958]

Material Difference

The same data may be out there, but from my understanding the same data certainly wasn't presented last time.

For instance, we ABSOLUTELY did not have the information we now have on Vezina last time around. It may have been out there somewhere (obviously it was. There hasn't been a rash of new publications since then saying different things about Vezina) but it wasn't presented or known to people. I don't know why that's a difficult concept.

Sorry the information was all out there. You are referring to varied and different interpretation(s) of the same data.Where you may have had a handful of game reports for each game in a series, today you have multiple handfuls to choose from.

Point is does the increased selection of game reports/stories/columns materially change what happened in a game, a playoff series or a season?

Do posters vet articles to see if the authors had voting privileges for the various NHL awards and honours as these became commonplace?

Are articles researched to see that the author held the same view months or years down the road or even if the article/comment was factually correct? Previous round there was evidence that a writer's comments published in a newspaper about the 1946 finals was simply incorrect. Yet it was part of this new article accumulation.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Balancing

Yeah, but they got shutout in 3 of the 4 losses (two of them 1-0 losses), right? There isn't a goaltending performance possible that beats a shutout...

Also interesting that, while you point out that the Bruins did better in an offensive series than a defensive one, Brimsek himself actually posted better individual stats in what you categorize as the more offensive series. I, personally, think that having all key players healthy in '39 made the biggest difference, as all of Mel Hill (1st line winger in '39 missed 3 of 6 games in '40), Clapper, Jackson, and Hollett missed time in '40.

And am I to believe hockey-reference when I see that Schmidt - who scored 6 points in 12 playoff games at age 20 ('39) - got shutout in 6 playoff games the very next year (despite leading the league in points during the '39/40 regular season)? Sounds like a whole lot more going wrong in front of Brimsek in '40 than in '39. Also, the name "Eddie Shore" is "conspicuously" absent from the '40 playoff roster, and undoubtedly made a huge difference, even at his age (got 2 points in 3 playoff games for the Americans against Brimsek that year - his last).

Balancing things. 1939 Mel Hill was the second line RW behind Bobby Bauer on the Kraut Line:

http://bruinslegends.blogspot.ca/2007/05/sudden-death-mel-hill.html

1939 playoffs saw the Rangers use a back-up goalie Bert Gardiner in the last six games of the series,after Dave Kerr was hurt. Yet the Bruins built a 3-0 game lead which the squandered 3-3 before winning in triple overtime.

http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/NYR/1939.html

http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/BOS/1939.html

http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/BOS/1939_games.html

1940 playoffs:

http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/BOS/1940_games.html

Bruins only played the Rangers. Americans played Detroit contrary to your assertion, bolded.

 

[Nalyd Psycho]

No new information is available. It was all out there since the time the players or goalies were active NHLers.

While the information isn't new, access is. Google archives has made it much easier for this community to gain access to what was written during player's careers.

 

[Ohashi_Jouzu*]

Balancing thing. 1939 Mel Hill was the second line RW behind Bobby Bauer on the Kraut Line

Bruins only played the Rangers. Americans played Detroit contrary to your assertion, bolded.

Yeah, hockeyreference fails on my part (whaddyamean NYA isn't the Rangers, lol, and as if I didn't know Shore never played for the Rangers, double lol). Doesn't change anything with respect to what context we're supposed to take away from all that with respect to Brimsek's playoff performances in either year; not one key contributor missing time in '39, vs lots of key offensive contributors missing time in '40 - possibly somewhat affecting the shift to a more defensive brand of hockey?

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Postseason All Star Teams - Brimsek, Broda, and Durnan

IMPORTANT NOTE - From 1935-1956, the 1st Team All Star was the goalie who led the league in GAA (among goalies who played at least 75% of the games) 100% of the time. The 2nd Team All Star was NOT always the goalie who was 2nd. Does this mean we should take 2nd Teams as seriously as 1st Teams for this era?

"3rd Team All Stars" are unofficial, but are based off the same pool of votes that determine 1st and 2nd Team. We have them for every season of the careers of these goalies.

Frank Brimsek
1st Team All Star (1939, 1942)
2nd Team All Star (1940, 1941, 1943, 1946, 1947, 1948)

Brimsek was top 2 in All Star voting every year for a decade starting in his rookie year (1939), except the 2 season he missed World War 2. He never finished 3rd in voting.

Turk Broda
1st Team All Star (1941, 1948)
2nd Team All Star (1942)
3rd Team All Star (1943, 1947, 1949, 1950)

Broda was a rookie in 1937, but not an All Star until 1941. He was top 3 in All Star voting every year for a decade except the 3 seasons he missed due to World War 2. (He only played 16 games in 1945-46, as a late return from the war).

Bill Durnan
1st Team All Star (1944, 1945, 1946, 1947, 1949, 1950)
3rd Team All Star (1948)

Durnan's career lasted only 7 seasons, but he was a 1st Team All Star all 6 times his team made the playoffs, and 3rd in voting the 1 season his team didn't. Two important caveats:

1) See above - the 1st Team AS seemed to automatically go to the leader in GAA so long as he played the full season.

2) His 1944 and 1945 All Star Teams were literally against AHL competition, and his 1946 All Star Team wasn't much better. Every other NHL starter from 1943 went off to war for 1944 and 1945 (including the only 3 to get All Star votes in 1943 - Johnny Mowers, Frank Brimsek, and Turk Broda), and Durnan was left to beat up on what was left. Durnan's 1946 All Star Team wasn't much better, as Brimsek (34 of 50 games) and Broda (16 of 50 games) arrived late from the war. Brimsek was a 2nd Teamer, despite only playing 68% of the games in an era where starters usually played 100%

Here's an article from the beginning of the 1946-47 season:

With the return of Johnny Mowers, completing the old "Big Three" of National Hockey League netminding, Goalie Bill Durnan of the Stanley Cup Montreal Canadiens may as well prepare now for a first-class struggle to defend his stranglehold on the Vezina trophy for these last three years

Durnan, like the Canadiens themselves, has drawn accusations of "ersatz king" of the netminders from some observers, who contended through the latter war years that the test of greatness for both the team and its individuals will come in this season when the roster of returning stars from the service is completed.
...
The other two of goaltending's big three, Frankie Brimsek of Boston and Walter (Turk) Broda of Toronto Maple Leafs rejoined their clubs late last season and this will be their first full test. Now Manager Jack Adams of Detroit Red Wings has decided that the 31 year old Mowers is "ready to go".

That means the old big 3 and Johnny-come-lately Durnan will all be showing their wares tonight when the NHL stages its first all-out hockey night of the season that started last Wednesday.

Associated Press via the Calgary Herald, Oct 26, 1946

I'll post the All Star Teams of the rest in the next post.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Postseason All Star Teams for the Rest

Charlie Gardiner

Charlie Gardiner died after the 1933-34 season.

1930-31 1st Team - Roy Worters had the best GAA but was not a 1st or 2nd Team AS. Gardiner had the 2nd lowest GAA.
1931-32 1st Team - won the Vezina and had the lowest GAA
1932-33 2nd Team - was 3rd in GAA. 2nd in GAA (John Ross Roach) was the 1st Teamer in his career season.
1933-34 1st Team- won the Vezina for the lowest team GAA, but Wilf Cude (who missed games) had the lowest personal GAA

He also had 3 seasons before the official All-Star Teams and newspaper reports praise his play in both 1928-29 and 1929-30

Johnny Bower

1st Team All Star (1961) - over Glenn Hall and Gump Worsley
3rd Team All Star (1962) - behind Jacques Plante and Glenn Hall
3rd Team All Star (1964) - behind Glenn Hall and Charlie Hodge
3rd Team All Star (1965) - behind Roger Crozier and Charlie Hodge
3rd Team All Star (1968) - behind Gump Worsley and Ed Giacomin

Weakest regular season candidate so far?

Tony Esposito

1st Team All Star (1970) - over Ed Giacomin and Jacques Plante
3rd Team All Star (1971) - behind Ed Giacomin and Jacques Plante
1st Team All Star (1972) - ahead of Ken Dryden and Gerry Cheevers
2nd Team All Star (1973) - behind Ken Dryden, ahead of Gilles Villemure
2nd Team All Star (1974) - behind Bernie Parent, ahead of Gilles Gilbert
3rd Team All Star (1978) - behind Ken Dryden and Don Edwards
1st Team All Star (1980) - ahead of Don Edwards and Mike Liut

The only time Esposito finished ahead of Dryden was when Dryden was a rookie. Plante was 41 and 42 years old in 1970 and 71. Esposito got signiificant All-Star consideration, but the Ed Giacomin was the best goalie who was in his prime when Esposito beat him for an All-Star nod (if we assume Parent's prime was those 2 great years).

Bernie Parent

1st Team All Star (1974) - over Tony Esposito and Gilles Gilbert
1st Team All Star (1975) - over Rogie Vachon and Gary Smith

Parent is hurt by stopping at the "3rd Team," as he was 4th in All Star voting in both 1969 and 1970.

Ed Belfour

1st Team All Star (1991) - over Patrick Roy and Andy Moog
3rd Team All Star (1992) - behind Patrick Roy and Kirk MacLean
1st Team All Star (1993) - ahead of Tom Barrasso and Felix Potvin
2nd Team All Star (1995) - behind Dominik Hasek, ahead of Jim Carey
3rd Team All Star (1998) - behind Dominik Hasek and Martin Brodeur
3rd Team All Star (2003) - behind Martin Brodeur and Marty Turco

Belfour was 4th in All Star voting in both 2000 and 2004. I find his record quite impressive, when you consider the competition.

 

[BM67]

A H/R split of Brimsek's pre-war career.

Year|GP|MIN|W|L|T|GA|GAA|SO|GP|MIN|W|L|GA|GAA|SO
38-39 H|20|1230|17|2|1|33|1.61|4|7|505|5|2|11|1.31|0
38-39 R|23|1390|16|7|0|35|1.51|6|5|359|3|2|7|1.17|1
39-40 H|24|1470|20|3|1|42|1.71|3|3|180|2|1|6|2.00|0
39-40 R|24|1480|11|9|4|56|2.27|3|3|180|0|3|9|3.00|0
40-41 H|24|1510|15|4|5|53|2.11|2|6|378|4|2|11|1.75|1
40-41 R|24|1530|12|4|8|49|1.92|4|5|300|4|1|12|2.40|0
41-42 H|23|1430|16|4|3|45|1.89|3|3|180|1|2|12|4.00|0
41-42 R|24|1510|8|13|3|70|2.78|0|2|127|1|1|4|1.89|0
42-43 H|25|1500|17|3|5|85|3.40|1|5|317|3|2|17|3.22|0
42-43 R|25|1500|7|14|4|91|3.64|0|4|243|1|3|16|3.95|0
Total H|116|7140|85|16|15|258|2.17|13|24|1560|15|9|57|2.19|1
Total R|120|7410|54|47|19|301|2.44|13|19|1209|9|10|48|2.38|1

 

[Michael Farkas]

Granted the scoring kind of changes (there's an understatement)...but I found it a tiny bit interesting that the Bruins goal differential home/road is bigger in the 1943-44 season alone than it is from 1938-1943 combined.

I think that helps further confirm that the Bruins - and Brimsek - were failed by their management in adjusting to the red-line era. As a result, Brimsek suffered more compared to his peers.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

The case for Frank Brimsek:

Basically, in the late 30s, he was considered the best goalie in the world, better than Tiny Thompson who preceded him in Boston, and better than everyone who came since Charlie Gardiner. He went off to serve during World War 2, came back, and was considered just as good as Bill Durnan when he came back.

Basically, Brimsek likely peaked as high as Durnan but maintained that level for longer. And I think Brimsek was more of a difference-maker in the playoffs than Duran.

Detailed arguments from last round:

Brimsek was likely cheated out of 2-3 1st Team All Stars by the tradition that the 1st Team always went to the Vezina winner:

• In 1942-43, players, general managers, and opposing goaltenders all seemed to agree that Brimsek was the best goalie
• In 1947-48, Brimsek lost the 1st Team to Turk Broda, the Vezina winner, by a single point, but easily beat him in Hart voting (finishing 2nd while Broda got no votes).
• In 1940-41, Brimsek lost the 1st Team by a single point to Broda, the Vezina winner.
• It's highly suspicious that in Broda's long, Hall of Fame career, the only two times he was awarded the 1st Team were the two times he happened to lead the league in GAA

Details: http://hfboards.mandatory.com/showpost.php?p=55392199&postcount=151

Brimsek likely deserved 4 1st Teams and 4 2nd Teams, with possibly a 5th 1st Team. And that's before you take into account that he lost 2 years in the middle of his prime to World War 2.

Brimsek was very good in the playoffs for most of his career

• The Bruins ended a 10 year Cupless Drought in Brimsek's rookie year and won 2 Cups in his first 3 seasons in the league before the team was destroyed by World War 2
• Brimsek played very well in 1946, his first playoffs after the war, but was let down by the Bruin Defense

Details: http://hfboards.mandatory.com/showpost.php?p=55392313&postcount=152

Why Brimsek over Gardiner? Longevity. Why Brimsek over Vezina or Benedict? Better established as the best of his generation.

I also do think there is something to the statements by Jack Adams and Dick Irvin that goaltending improves over time, so the best goalie of the 40s maybe should be rated a bit higher than the best of the 20s. As a group, we seem to endorse that thinking as not a single member of our top 8 played in the NHL before 1950.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

I really don't understand why you guys are even talking about the addition of the Red Line. This is what happened in 1943-44:

In 1943, the rules committee was looking for ways to increase the speed of the game and make it more entertaining. Rangers coach Frank Boucher proposed that the neutral zone be divided by a centre red line, and that teams be allowed to pass the puck out of the defensive zone into their half of the neutral zone.[60] Previously, the league required that defensive players skate the puck out of their defensive zone, not permitting a pass across the blue line.[61] Introduced in 1943–44, the new rule changed how the game was played. Where strong forechecking teams were previously able to pin their opponents in their own zone for minutes at a time, teams were able to create rushes up the ice by having defencemen pass to forwards across the blue line.[60] Scoring increased 10% league-wide, and four of six teams topped 200 goals, the first teams to do so.[61]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_National_Hockey_League_(1942–1967)

How exactly is this relevant to goaltenders? Defensemen had their role changed - breakout passes became more important and skating less important. Also, they had to learn to defend against the puck moving forward between zones. But goalies? How did their role change? I saw the claim that goalies started handling the puck more after the Red Line was put in place. But I'm pretty sure that's not true. Jacques Plante gets massive credit as an innovator for being the first goalie to go out of his way to play the puck, when everyone else stayed in their crease. And Plante came on the scene more than a decade after the Red Line was introduced.

For the 1943-44 rule change to be relevant here, two things must be true:

1) The rule change must have changed the way goalies have played
2) Changes in goaltending technique actually matter when we are ranking goalies.

So far, no evidence has been provided as to why the Red Line matters when talking about goalies. Sure, GAAs went up - for everyone! If you're ranking these guys against their peers, the Red Line is irrelevant.

And that's not even getting into the fact that as late as 1947-48, Brimsek and Durnan were basically considered co-best goalies in the league. So even if evidence was provided that the Red Line changed the way goalies played, it's pretty clear that the goalies we are discussing here adjusted just fine.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

While the information isn't new, access is. Google archives has made it much easier for this community to gain access to what was written during player's careers.

Yes, someone would have to find a library and pour over microfilm for hours to find what google gives us in a minute. Google archives has increased our knowledge base by a lot since 2009.

Another factor is the fact that nobody noticed that the 1st Team All Star was attached to the lowest GAA at the time until recently.

 

[vecens24]

Yes, someone would have to find a library and pour over microfilm for hours to find what google gives us in a minute. Google archives has increased our knowledge base by a lot since 2009.

Another factor is the fact that nobody noticed that the 1st Team All Star was attached to the lowest GAA at the time until recently.

This. I have no idea why this is so difficult and insane to understand.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

First order of business.

Brimsek vs Durnan II: The Reckoning

For me, Durnan vs Broda is a more difficult comparison, as I like Brimsek over both.

Durnan has the regular season peak advantage over Broda, but Broda has both playoffs and longevity on his side.

 

[Hawkey Town 18]

For me, Durnan vs Broda is a more difficult comparison, as I like Brimsek over both.

Durnan has the regular season peak advantage over Broda, but Broda has both playoffs and longevity on his side.

As I mentioned earlier in this thread, this is a comparison I've been having trouble with as well. I think we've gone over pretty thoroughly how much better Durnan did in the regular season, but we haven't gotten into as much detail in regards to Broda's edge in the playoffs. That is something I'd like to see.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Why Does It Matter?

Yes, someone would have to find a library and pour over microfilm for hours to find what google gives us in a minute. Google archives has increased our knowledge base by a lot since 2009.

Another factor is the fact that nobody noticed that the 1st Team All Star was attached to the lowest GAA at the time until recently.

Unsupported assumption that is waiting for an answer to the following question? Question follows a factual correction.

First your assertion that this was the case between 1935 to 1956 is factually wrong. 1951 Al Rollins who played more games than Turk Broda with the Leafs was awarded the Vezina yet neither made the AST.

http://www.hockey-reference.com/awards/vezina.html

Sawchuk and Rayner were the 1st and 2nd AST goalies.

http://www.hockey-reference.com/awards/nhl_all_star.html

Why should there not be such a connection between the GAA leader especially in a 6 - 8 team league over a 15 season period? Once the NHL had contracted to first 8, then 6 teams, the best goalies were retained, so anomalies like Worters on the Americans ceased to exist.

Older observers may have caught the 1951 anomaly that others since have not. Who is the actually observer who made the false Eureka discovery?

The 1935 to 1950 is left to explore. Given the facility provided by Google newspaper archives it should be easy to find a massive hue and cry of hockey writers fans from a specific year questioning the 1st team AST goalie selection. Is there any evidence of this?
Furthermore during the 1944 - 1950 period, except for 1948 the Vezina winner enjoyed a solid double figure GA advantage on the runner-up, so why would another goalie be expected to be the 1st AST.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Maybe

This. I have no idea why this is so difficult and insane to understand.

Maybe because it has just been shown to be a false claim.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Charlie Gardiner

HawkeyTown has posted a lot of good info on him. Here's a link to the profile I made of Gardiner not too long ago. I had him in two consecutive All-Time Drafts, so the profile is quite detailed and has some of the same quotes HawkeyTown has been using:

http://hfboards.mandatory.com/showpost.php?p=48175199&postcount=14

Summary:

• Gardiner was a 3 time 1st Team All Star, 1 Time 2nd Team All Star competing against George Hainsworth, Tiny Thompson, Roy Worters, Alec Connell, Lorne Chabot, and John Ross Roach in the first 4 years of the All Star Teams
• Gardiner received a lot of praise for his 1928-29 and 1929-30 seasons, the last two seasons before the official All-Star teams. We have records of Roy Worters getting the unofficial GM 1st Teams these seasons, but no records of the 2nd Teams.
• When Frank Brimsek was a rookie, the press called him "the best looking rookie goaltender since Charlie Gardiner," indicating that Gardiner was playing well even as a rookie in 1927-28.
• Gardiner was outstanding in the playoffs in losing causes in 1930 and 1931 for the hopelessly outmatched Blackhawks
• Gardiner was a key part of the Blackhawks' first Cup in 1934.
• Howie Morenz, Aurele Joliat, Frank Boucher, and Charlie Conacher all considered Gardiner the best goalie they ever played against.
• Dick Irvin (who loved his boy Bill Durnan) called a rookie Durnan "the best goalie since Charlie Gardiner).
• When the press discussed how big a star Dave Kerr was, the conclusion was that he was "no Chuck Gardiner or Georges Vezina."

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Unsupported assumption that is waiting for an answer to the following question? Question follows a factual correction.

First your assertion that this was the case between 1935 to 1956 is factually wrong. 1951 Al Rollins who played more games than Turk Broda with the Leafs was awarded the Vezina yet neither made the AST.

http://www.hockey-reference.com/awards/vezina.html

Sawchuk and Rayner were the 1st and 2nd AST goalies.

http://www.hockey-reference.com/awards/nhl_all_star.html

Why should there not be such a connection between the GAA leader especially in a 6 - 8 team league over a 15 season period? Once the NHL had contracted to first 8, then 6 teams, the best goalies were retained, so anomalies like Worters on the Americans ceased to exist.

Older observers may have caught the 1951 anomaly that others since have not. Who is the actually observer who made the false Eureka discovery?

The 1935 to 1950 is left to explore. Given the facility provided by Google newspaper archives it should be easy to find a massive hue and cry of hockey writers fans from a specific year questioning the 1st team AST goalie selection. Is there any evidence of this?
Furthermore during the 1944 - 1950 period, except for 1948 the Vezina winner enjoyed a solid double figure GA advantage on the runner-up, so why would another goalie be expected to be the 1st AST.

This is the original post on the subject:

From 1935 to 1970, there is a very simple algorithm to determine the First Team All-Star goalie. Look at all the goalies who played in at least 75% of their team's games, rank them by goals against average, and take the guy at the top of the list. That's the First Team All-Star. That solution worked in 30 out of 36 seasons, all of them except for 1957, 1958, 1960, 1964, 1968 and 1969. Here are the goalies who were named First Team All-Star ahead of the high-minutes GAA leader in those seasons:

http://brodeurisafraud.blogspot.com/2009/09/dont-always-believe-your-lying-eyes.html

Al Rollins (who led the league in GAA) played only 40 of 70 games in 1951. I should have been more clear that 1st Team went to the goalie with the lowest GAA who played enough games. This was an age where starters played every game if healthy.

 

[Ohashi_Jouzu*]

First your assertion that this was the case between 1935 to 1956 is factually wrong.

Is it factually true for 1935 to 1956, except for '51? Because that would still be a pretty established pattern of bias toward nominating the GAA leader to the 1st all-star squad in recognition. Maybe it just made sense to everyone at the time that a GAA leader (i.e. Vezina winner) would be as much of a glaring omission as a points leader (i.e. "Art Ross" winner... which didn't exist for some of that, but you know what I mean). No thinking required. I don't think that's the prevailing opinion of today, though (with respect to the GAA leader part, not the Vezina winner aspect).

I wonder who the last Art Ross winner to be left off of a post season all-star team is, if one ever has.

 

[Hawkey Town 18]

I wonder who the last Art Ross winner to be left off of a post season all-star team is, if one ever has.

Gretzky's 94 instantly came to mind, he won the Art Ross, but "only" made the 2nd Team behind Fedorov (and rightfully so).

 

[Ohashi_Jouzu*]

Gretzky's 94 instantly came to mind, he won the Art Ross, but "only" made the 2nd Team behind Fedorov (and rightfully so).

Fedorov is the only one I could think of (thanks to participation in another ongoing thread elsewhere), but I mean has one ever been left off all together? Certainly not that I can think of.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Red Line Evidence

I really don't understand why you guys are even talking about the addition of the Red Line. This is what happened in 1943-44:



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_National_Hockey_League_(1942–1967)

How exactly is this relevant to goaltenders? Defensemen had their role changed - breakout passes became more important and skating less important. Also, they had to learn to defend against the puck moving forward between zones. But goalies? How did their role change? I saw the claim that goalies started handling the puck more after the Red Line was put in place. But I'm pretty sure that's not true. Jacques Plante gets massive credit as an innovator for being the first goalie to go out of his way to play the puck, when everyone else stayed in their crease. And Plante came on the scene more than a decade after the Red Line was introduced.

For the 1943-44 rule change to be relevant here, two things must be true:

1) The rule change must have changed the way goalies have played
2) Changes in goaltending technique actually matter when we are ranking goalies.

So far, no evidence has been provided as to why the Red Line matters when talking about goalies. Sure, GAAs went up - for everyone! If you're ranking these guys against their peers, the Red Line is irrelevant.

And that's not even getting into the fact that as late as 1947-48, Brimsek and Durnan were basically considered co-best goalies in the league. So even if evidence was provided that the Red Line changed the way goalies played, it's pretty clear that the goalies we are discussing here adjusted just fine.

The Red Line changed the mobility factor, especially the lateral mobility and movement north/south to cut-off angles. Skating for defensemen never became less important. The opposite is true, especially backward skating. The 1945-46 Leafs did not make the playoffs, liquidated most of their old defence, came back with a younger, faster defence and won three consecutive SCs.

Because you have a faster game with faster forwards and defensemen plus the Red Line defining icing and offsides, the horizontal attacking angles to the net change, the passing angles to the net change. This forces goalies to adapt. A premium is placed on their lateral movement across the crease area and their north/south movement within the crease area.

Your two conditions have been met.

Well before Plante goalies used to rush with the puck. Some even scored goals, pre NHA, Rayner used to rush at times. Somewhat of a novelty. Plante was an innovator because he would go out of his net and play the role of a third defenseman, countering the dump and chase, cleared pucks during PP situations, etc.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Skating for defensemen never became less important. The opposite is true, especially backward skating. The 1945-46 Leafs did not make the playoffs, liquidated most of their old defence, came back with a younger, faster defence and won three consecutive SCs.

I'm not interested in playing games with semantics, I was talking about defensemen rushing with the puck. After the Red Line, it was very rare for defensemen to rush with the puck, which is one reason why defensemen point totals dropped like a rock after World War 2.

And yes, there were exceptions during the depleted War Years of 1943-44 and 1944-45. But after the NHL talent pool came back and guys like Babe Pratt couldn't just skate circles around the sub-AHL stiffs replacing the guys who went off to war, defensemen rarely skated with the puck... at least until Bobby Orr.

Because you have a faster game with faster forwards and defensemen plus the Red Line defining icing and offsides, the horizontal attacking angles to the net change, the passing angles to the net change. This forces goalies to adapt. A premium is placed on their lateral movement across the crease area and their north/south movement within the crease area.

Your two conditions have been met.

Assuming all this is true (and it would be nice if a link was provided), it might explain why Johnny Mowers failed to reclaim a starting position after the war. But the guys available now - Turk Broda and Frank Brimsek seem to have been just as good after the rule change as before it.

Well before Plante goalies used to rush with the puck. Some even scored goals, pre NHA, Rayner used to rush at times. Somewhat of a novelty. Plante was an innovator because he would go out of his net and play the role of a third defenseman, countering the dump and chase, cleared pucks during PP situations, etc.

Your previous claim was that the Red Line forced goalies to leave their net to handle the puck. And nobody did so regularly until Plante. Terry Sawchuk, the best goalie of the early 50s certainly didn't. And as far as I can tell, neither did Bill Durnan.

And as we both know, pre-NHL was WAY before the Red Line - the forward pass wasn't allowed at all.