Goaltending conundrum
- Thread starter Redleaf
- Start date
Zee
Active member
lamajama said:
He had some INTERESTING things to say about Nash and Wilson too when you read between the lines. He said he "expects Ron to make the playoffs", the implication being he's fired if he doesnt.
When asked to confirm the Nash rumors he pulled out the "I can't comment on that or it would be tampering"
This is going to be an interesting trade deadline I think.
bustaheims
Active member
lamajama said:
Goalies are notoriously hard to judge as kids. That's why guys like Belfour, Joseph and Backstrom went undrafted, guys like Halak, Thomas, Vokoun and Rinne went in the 8th or 9th rounds, and guys like Eric Fichaud and Trevor Kidd were highly touted 1st round picks.
GhostofPotvin29
New member
Zee said:
Gus is also coming off a recent 20-game stretch where he had a .922 sv% over it.
L K
Active member
bustaheims said:
Yeah, not sure what message the 21-24 skaters on the team deserve to receive. Should Gus have been glaring up at the rafters in Burke's direction when half the 3rd period was Phaneuf falling over and giving New Jersey odd-man rushes? How about when everyone looked at Lombardi for being a major goat in the Vancouver game. and on and on and on.
Gus' night last night was pretty prototypical of the Leafs' season. Play great for stretches. Be fine for other stretches and then play absymally out of nowhere.
Even our best line has been an abomination in the defensive zone all year. If they aren't skating with speed through the neutral zone and creating chances, they are being hemmed in the defensive zone and running around incapable of getting hold of the puck.
bustaheims
Active member
lamajama said:Good point. I'd just like the "law of averages" to work out in our favour for once.....
Throw enough lumps against the wall and, eventually, one will stick, right?
Zee
Active member
L K said:
Are you suggesting the Leafs are the only team in the league who have stretches in games where they're outplayed and look bad? That's hockey, all teams have lulls in games and are out worked and outplayed for stretches. The teams that have really good goalies can get past that when their goalie saves a 2 on 1 or breakaway chance. You can't expect a team to dominate in all facets of the game for 60 minutes every night.
GhostofPotvin29
New member
L K said:
But goaltending is probably the one position on the ice that will likely have the greatest impact on the team, for better or for worse. The CuJo/Belfour years saw great goaltending make the teams look better than they probably were, so much so that a couple different bounces here or there and they would have been in the Cup finals.
It's obviously never solely the goalie's fault, but the position is also one that, rightly or wrongly, carries an inordinate amount of pressure on it for its singular ability to affect the outcome of the game.
Wanting much better goaltending does not mean I'm absolving the rest of the team of their role in it, it just means I think we need better goaltending for the team to become consistent.
lamajama said:
Yeah, but at the same time it's better find dropped wallets than not. I don't know how this can be warped into anything but a pro. Besides, Cujo and Belfour went undrafted.
Rinne: 8th Round
Lindback: 7th Round.
Tim Thomas: 9th Round
Jimmy Howard: 2nd Round
Tomas Vokoun: 9th Round
Halak: 9th Round
Anderson: 3rd Round
Lundqvist: 7th Round
Quick: 3rd Round
Nabokov: 9th Round
Hiller: Undrafted?
Rask: 1st Round
Price: 1st Round
Pavelec: 1st Round
Luongo: 1st Round
I didn't include some first rounders, but still, this is a huge list of goaltenders that are either excellent or above average and outside of an excellent 2005 first round goaltending draft, there doesn't seem to be too much of a trend towards high picks. Good goaltenders can come from anywhere, and if one is a late bloomer or overlooked for whatever reason it doesn't mean they aren't going to become anything of note, it just means the percentage is lower and probably rests greatly on the goaltender's ability to learn and train and adapt.
I still don't get how attracting talent is a bad thing or how goaltenders having reverence for Allaire can somehow be construed into Allaire isn't a good coach simply because our goaltenders aren't performing, especially when the man has a track record of success.
I guess Giguere's ability must've been destroyed by playing with Allaire here in Toronto and is now completely recovered from Allaire's flawed teachings now that he's playing well in Colorado? :
I understand maybe the whole "not playing to strengths" is a fair criticism, but goaltenders aren't stupid: they know what they're signing up for and what style Allaire teaches.
If the team and goaltender have deficiencies in their game then that's how it is, and I don't think you can hang it on Allaire. If Reimer plays deep in his net, if Jonas moves his legs to let in a shot that should be stoppable, I can guarantee you that Allaire didn't teach them that!
Zee
Active member
Potvin29 said:
Yes, look no further than the Leafs of last season. From Oct-Dec the Leafs were brutal, bad defensive zone coverage yadda yadda, then Reimer comes in Jan, all is well because he plays amazing and consistently puts up .922 save % numbers. Did the Leafs suddenly improve defensively from Jan on or did they suddenly have confidence in the goalie's ability to save a mistake?
Put it this way, if your team makes 10 glaring defensive errors in a game, and the goalie lets in 1 of those errors but bails you out 9 other times, people will forget the errors and praise the goalie for playing a great game.
If on those same 10 errors the goalie lets in 3, well not so good and suddenly people start saying the defensive zone coverage isn't good enough.
It all snowballs, when the goalie plays well the team relaxes and can play their game. When you're not worried about making a mistake you tend to make fewer of them. It all starts in net for better or worse and the finger is pointed squarely on BOTH Reimer and Gustavsson right now. They need to be better.
L K
Active member
Zee said:
Absolutely, and nowhere have I said that Reimer and Gus have been acceptable in net. The Leafs will not make the playoffs if their goaltending doesn't improve. I only take issue with the notion that the players in front of Gus have been let down by the goaltending any more than the goaltenders have been let down by the play in front of them. Certainly at least to the point that the players are in a position to be pointing fingers and blaming the goaltending for their woes.
Any team that is relying on their goaltending to stop 9 out of 10 screwups, isn't good enough up front to do anything. The fact that the Leafs aren't getting saves on 9 of their 10 screwups a night means that the team isn't going to crawl anywhere beyond mediocre, but it hardly is a marker of a team being held back by their goaltending because a good team isn't relying on 10 defensive zone screwups a night.
It's a very big two-way street. The team that played well last year down the stretch with Reimer did a much better job of keeping shots to the outside, limited bad turnovers and played a much better two-way game than the team that was playing earlier in the year...much in the same way that the team that came out flying in January was a much better team than we have seen in February. Some of it is goaltending, but a good portion of the better play in January was the Leafs weren't committing so many bad turnovers and relying on their goaltender to bail them out every 30 seconds to keep them in a game.
The Leafs forwards deserved better last night than they received from Gustavsson. The goaltenders on many a night have deserved a better defensive effort too.
Regardless, the defensive zone coverage, the clearance of pucks and the goaltending need to be better if the Leafs have any aspirations to be in the postseason next year.
L K said:
I just went off the example you gave. Phaneuf was the last man back because Gunnarsson went in deep on an offensive chance, something he might not have done had the game been tied.
Regardless, sloppy D might make a good goalie look bad, but it doesn't excuse bad goaltending. It all starts from the goal out. If the best the D lets up are 40 foot wristers and your goalie is letting them in, you're going to lose a lot.