Michael Farkas
Celebrate 68
I've played goaltender for 32 years.
Try again.
So did Thomas, so did Cechmanek, so will Yutaka Fukufuji...doesn't necessarily make you a subject matter expert. You're plainly demonstrating that right now.
I've played goaltender for 32 years.
Try again.
So did Thomas, so did Cechmanek, so will Yutaka Fukufuji...doesn't necessarily make you a subject matter expert. You're plainly demonstrating that right now.
Would you say that although technically challenged, he had great reflexes and a good read on shots/good ice vision, at least for first shots?
Because as others said, he had to be doing something right to get 2 Vezinas and be as "statistically dominant" as he was. Maybe he did not control his rebound well and made great use of Chara and Bergeron for that, but he was stopping those first shots right?
Just an honest question here
Yes, you ranked Stanley Cup champion and two time Vezina winner Tim Thomas below Peter Budaj and it's me that is plainly demonstrating that I don't know what I'm talking about when it comes to goaltending.
Got it.
I'm not so sure I'm putting Hasek above the likes of Price, Lundqvist, and a few others there if we are only talking about his 1999 and beyond body of work.
I looked at the thread title, saw who the OP was, and knew exactly what was coming.
Did Tim Thomas run over your dog?
I don't like the Bruins (Patrice Bergeron notwithstanding) and I don't like Tim Thomas. But I can't imagine how he could possibly be ranked behind the likes of Budaj, Lalime, Biron etc. who, while respectable goalies (as is anybody who had a cup of coffee in the NHL) had difficulty holding down starting jobs. Hell even as a 39 year old after a 1-year hiatus Thomas had a somewhat respectable 0.909 save percentage over 40 games on a poor Florida Panthers team.
Unorthodox, hilariously flawed style? Sure. Abrasive jackass? Yup. But with 2 Vezinas (and another top-10 voting result) and 2 1st Team All-star nods he sure fooled a lot of knowledgeable hockey people if he was truly that bad. I wish I could fake it like that.
Osgood can best be summed up as a pre-1994 goalie in a post-1994 world...very untidy game, a lot of pucks could bore a hole through him which is weird for a compact goalie...and he really did a poor job maintaining angles when the puck moved across even a single lane... or really even down through layers, a puck in shooting position at any point tends to lock him up and then you just see there is no depth adjustment, there is no back shoulder rotation and with his size, he can't cheat like a Bishop or Rinne can (and do)...
Stats =! talent. I was asked to provide the coaching/scouting perspective on goaltenders and that's what was done. No looking at numbers, the numbers are influenced by things other than talent.
Vezinas compared to save pct record* are weak, check the voting ballot. A lot of GMs were not trusting of the player despite the stats. If save pct. was what it's supposed to represent, surely breaking the record* and having these balloon figures would lead to a near clean sweep against some of the weakest competition in history...Ryan Miller, Steve Mason, bleh...
Stats =! talent. I was asked to provide the coaching/scouting perspective on goaltenders and that's what was done. No looking at numbers, the numbers are influenced by things other than talent.
Vezinas compared to save pct record* are weak, check the voting ballot. A lot of GMs were not trusting of the player despite the stats. If save pct. was what it's supposed to represent, surely breaking the record* and having these balloon figures would lead to a near clean sweep against some of the weakest competition in history...Ryan Miller, Steve Mason, bleh...
Mike's point is, if you see a guy with Thomas' technicals, you're not exactly tempted to bet the future on him. He MIGHT be really good at stopping pucks, which Thomas ended up being, but there's a reason why it took a long why he had a chance.
....If you don't care about technicals, well, it's an entire different story.
But I don't think that is his point. It sounds to me that Mike's point is that Thomas actually was *not* good at stopping pucks. He was simply the benefactor of great team defense and a system that was set up (intentionally or otherwise) to cover up his vast weaknesses. And that few in the Vezina/AS voting pool were perceptive enough to notice.
I know nothing about goaltending, but I always thought Osgood's biggests strengths were mental. He might not have been the best goaltender in the world, but he sure thought he had the potential to be. Listen to any interview with him. Every time he left the locker room he thought he was going to be the greatest goalie in the world, even though he might have had two terrible periods before that.
Do you think that in a position were focus and confidence seems to play a big role, maybe a good mindset can offset some of the technical weaknesses? One of those "stupid goalie tricks" we talk about I suppose. Or does it all come down to technique?
Thomas has 22 first place votes, Mason was the next highest with 3 first place votes. What on earth are you talking about?
How is that Thomas, that untalented bum had a .938 save percentage and an even 2.00 goals against meanwhile Rask, who you have ranked in in the second tier, oozing with talent, with the exact same team in front of him was only able to get a .918 save percentage and a 2.67 goals against? That's a huge difference despite the exact same team in front of them not to mention the dramatic difference in "talent" between these two.
How do you account for that?
So your thinking is that voters for the Vezina trophy (NHL GMs) and post-season All Star Teams (hockey writers I think) were blinded by conventional stats (W, GAA, SPCT) and could not see that this was just a poor goalie benefiting from a team that was built/coached to compensate for his faults? Do you think that's fair/reasonable? Are they that unsophisticated?
“I’m 12-1 in my last 13, I don’t think it’s this building,” said Thomas, when asked about his success at Scotiabank Place. “It’s not Ottawa, it’s not Canada. I get asked this a lot. This team is finding ways to win right now, whether we’re playing our best hockey … that might not be the case.”
2011 is the real key. 2 flat GAA, .938 record* save pct. 17 first place votes. 17! He is left off of more than a sixth of the ballots entirely. But the stats! He narrowly beats out Pekka Rinne despite his gaudy numbers.
In 2012, Lundqvist appears on all 30 ballots, despite much stiffer competition from Rinne and Quick.
You're either intentionally leaving out information or you simply don't know what you are talking about.
You seem shocked that Thomas *only* had 17 first place votes as if that is somehow an indictment of him, then you point out the ballots he is not even on, as if that again is a slight, and then you go on to say that he "narrowly beat out Pekka Rinne despite his gaudy numbers."
Let's unpack some of the things that you have strangely left out.
First of all, he got 17 first place votes in large part because of the incredibly stiff competition that year. Rinne, who garnered six first place votes, had a 2.12 GAA and a .930 save percentage and Roberto Luongo, the third nominee, had a 2.11 GAA and a .928 save percentage. I don't know what it's shocking to you that the winner wouldn't sweep the first place votes in a scenario like that.
Then you point out that he's not even on a sixth of the ballots (he received 26 total votes) yet strangely you don't point out that no other goaltender received more votes than he did. Rinne also only had 26 total votes. Luongo had the third most with 13. What point do you think you are making here?
Finally, you say despite he "gaudy numbers" he narrowly edged out Rinne. Considering both he and Rinne (and Luongo) all had similar numbers, again, what point do you think you are making? Also, Thomas beat Rinne by 20 points. Pretending that is "narrowly" breathing him is disingenuous at best.
Guess how many first place votes Lundqvist had? 17! The very same number that was apparently a damning indictment of Thomas in his win the year before. And now you want to pretend that Rinne and Quick are much stiffer competition than the excellent seasons put up by Rinne and Luongo?
He reminded me a lot of Hasek
"Goalie talent" is so ambiguous it's pretty much impossible to separate from results. It's pretty hard to argue it's on "luck" or "his team covers his faults" if you get results. Especially results like winning (two) Vezina trophies, a Conn Smythe and the Stanley Cup... Frankly it seems like you're trolling us a bit, making controversial choices for the sake of generating discussion. For shame, Mike.
Chicanery with respect to Tim Thomas aside, I'd say you put Tuukka Rask, Ondrej Pavelec, Johan Hedberg, Petr Budaj and Devan Dubnyk too high. Conversely you put Sergei Bobrovsky, Chris Osgood, Jose Theodore and Tommy Salo too low.