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For those that have browsed my articles on this site you will know that I often ridicule mainstream goaltending evaluation techniques. I do this because they are wrong. Time and time again average goalies are highly touted because of the strength of their team than their own ability. Likewise good goalies are often overlooked because they play on a weak team. So on goes my quest to reveal those hidden gems and reveal the phonies. Well I have developed another technique for the tool box used to TRUELY evaluate goalies.
First I have broken each goalie's game into either a Good, Average or Poor game. This is based on the number and quality of shots in a game. The reason this is important because a few bad games can make make an otherwise impressive streak look only average. This was just the start.....When a goalie allows his goals against is even more critical.
A goalie that allows 5 goals against in a 7-5 win and holds on to win in low scoring close games is more valuable than a goalie that earns a shutout in an 8-0 win but blows a lead in tight scoring affairs. I call this the Grant Fuhr factor - Fuhr was famous in the 80's for allowing a LOT of goals but always making the big saves necessary to win games. He may have allowed 5 or 6 goals a game but if his team scored 7 goals for, he'd make sure that he'd never allow 7 goals against - although allowing 6 may have been quite possible!
So I came up with 2 new stats. The first is called 'Stolen Wins' the other is called 'Blown Wins'. Let me describe each stat...
A Stolen Win is when a team wins because of the goalies effort. If a goalie allows less goals in a game then what an average goalie would have allowed and this effort was the difference between winning or not - then that is a 'Stolen Win'. Imagine a team wins 2-0. The winning team scores 2 goals on 17 shots. The losing team scores 0 goals on 32 shots against. The average goalie would have allowed 3 goals against - turning this win into a loss. Likewise if the same game happen to be a 5-0 win then this would NOT have been a 'Stolen Win' because even if the average goalie allowed 3 goals, the outcome still would have been a win (5-3 instead of 5-0)
A Blown Win is actually a loss. This occurs when a goalie allows more goals against then an average goalie would have allowed and this resulted in a loss. So if a team losses 3-5 and only has 20 shots against. The average goalie may have only allowed 2 goals against - thus turning the loss into a win and showing how this was a Blown Win. Likewise if the same team lost the game 0-3 and allowed 20 shots against this would NOT be a Blown Win. Even if the goalie stopped all the shots or the number an average goalie would have allowed then this would have still been a loss, since the team didn't score any goals to help win.
These two new stats can be quite revealing. It really isolated games that were truely won by the goalies effort or lost because of the goalies weakness. Certainly you would want a goalie with more Steals than Blown games. TO make the stats relative to other goalies I turn it into a percentage compared to games starts. Each goalies Stolen Winss and Blown Wins are divided by games started to come up with the new stats. So let's put it into practice.
Since some people are so convinced of Central Scouting's infallibility, lets look at their top 4 North American goalies with these stats...
| Goalie |
Pull |
SW |
BW |
Good |
Avg |
Poor |
| Malcom Subban (BEL) |
0% |
16% |
5% |
68% |
11% |
21% |
| Matt Murray (SOO) |
8% |
4% |
15% |
27% |
15% |
58% |
| Brandon Whitley (VIC) |
15% |
5% |
10% |
30% |
20% |
45% |
| Jon Gillies (IND) |
8% |
31% |
8% |
73% |
15% |
12% |
| Pull=Pulled%; SW=Stolen Win; BW=Blown Win; Good=Good Start%; Avg=Average Start%; Poor=Poor Start% |
I also through in the percentage of times a goalie was pulled. Quite interesting results. Jon Gillies of the USHL looks quite remarkable. Over 30% of his starts result in him being responsible for the win. That number i almost twice as good as Subban - the next closest! Indiana would be in a world of trouble without Gillies in net!
You should be able to see why I am SO skeptical of Murray and Whitley's high CSB rankings. Those two only steal 1 of every 20 games compared to Gillies' 1 in 3! Furthermore they are both 2 to 3 times more likely to blow a game that should have been a win. Also note the numer of Good starts compared to Poor starts - wouldn't you want a goalie that plays more good games than bad?
What I like about these stats are that they are independent of the team's ability or opponent's strength. All that matters is how well they play and if that had an impact on their team winning or losing.
So lets compare CSB's top 4 against MY top four....
| Goalie |
Pull |
SW |
BW |
Good |
Avg |
Poor |
| Francois Brassard (QUE) |
11% |
17% |
6% |
56% |
6% |
39% |
| Dan Altshuller (OSH) |
0% |
8% |
4% |
56% |
16% |
28% |
| Etienne Marcoux (BB) |
19% |
19% |
10% |
38% |
29% |
33% |
| Alex Dubeau (SHA) |
16% |
20% |
8% |
40% |
24% |
36% |
All but Altshuller have impressive Stolen Win numbers. 1 in 5 times they win games by themselves. Altshuller finds himself ranked so high not because of his ability to steal wins but his ability to play well and rarely cost a team the win. Only 1 in 4 times does Altshuller have a poor start - compared to every other game for Murray and Whitley. Not to mention that Altshuller only blows a potential win 1 in every 25 starts!
I find these new numbers fascinating and find that that they really give insight on how a goalie wins (or loses) and separates to best from the rest. The work to determine these stats can be tedious but well worth the time. Anyone wanted some detailed stats of this nature done for any specific goalies then just drop me an email.
UPDATE:
I had a request for John Gibson of the Kitchener Rangers. I have Gibson ranked as one of the top goalies in the CHL this season - so I figured it would be interesting to see how he did. Here is the output - pretty impressive!
| Goalie |
Pull |
SW |
BW |
Good |
Avg |
Poor |
| John Gibson(KIT) |
0% |
35% |
0% |
85% |
15% |
0% |
Never pulled. Never a poor game. Steals the win over one third of the time. Never blows a win - just great numbers. |