Sharing the load
Goalies who play the big minutes
It seems to me that Calgary and San Jose forgot they have more than one goaltender this season.
Even Roberto Luongo's been out of the net for 8 per cent of the minutes this year, but Evgeni Nabokov and Miikka Kiprusoff? Talk about workhorses.
Nabokov's on pace to play 80.5 games this season.
| Name | Team | GP | MIN | %mins | /82 | |
| 1 | Evgeni Nabokov | SAN | 21 | 1249 | 98.1% | 80.5 |
| 2 | Miikka Kiprusoff | CGY | 21 | 1237 | 97.4% | 79.9 |
| 3 | Henrik Lundqvist | NYR | 20 | 1208 | 95.0% | 77.9 |
| 4 | Roberto Luongo | VAN | 19 | 1109 | 91.8% | 75.3 |
| 5 | Ryan Miller | BUF | 16 | 965 | 88.7% | 72.7 |
| 6 | Rick DiPietro | NYI | 16 | 901 | 88.4% | 72.5 |
| 7 | Johan Holmqvist | TAM | 18 | 1039 | 86.6% | 71.0 |
| 8 | Tomas Vokoun | FLA | 19 | 1140 | 86.4% | 70.9 |
| 9 | Martin Biron | PHI | 17 | 966 | 84.6% | 69.4 |
| 10 | Martin Brodeur | NJD | 17 | 1001 | 83.3% | 68.3 |
| 11 | Manny Legace | STL | 15 | 866 | 80.3% | 65.9 |
| 12 | Martin Gerber | OTT | 15 | 907 | 79.1% | 64.8 |
| 13 | Chris Mason | NAS | 16 | 896 | 74.3% | 60.9 |
| 14 | Tim Thomas | BOS | 14 | 848 | 73.6% | 60.4 |
| 15 | Cam Ward | CAR | 16 | 924 | 73.2% | 60.0 |
| 16 | Olaf Kolzig | WAS | 14 | 812 | 68.4% | 56.0 |
| 17 | Nikolai Khabibulin | CHI | 14 | 799 | 66.9% | 54.9 |
| 18 | Marty Turco | DAL | 14 | 805 | 66.4% | 54.4 |
| 19 | Cristobal Huet | MON | 13 | 786 | 64.7% | 53.0 |
| 20 | Pascal Leclaire | COB | 14 | 781 | 64.4% | 52.8 |
by James Mirtle @ 11:35 PM
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8 Comments:
You know what this needs? Historical perspective and analysis. There are coaches who'll spell their No. 1 netminder and there are those who will ride him into the ground, but I've never seen a Bill James-like study which might suggest which approach yields the best results.
Henrik Lundqvist is incredible. He's easily the best of the top eight goalies on this list.
I'd also be really curious to see the historical numbers for something like this.
In fairness to Calgary, their backup has been injured and they've been letting Matt Keetley watch the games from the bench.
Garnet makes an excellent point. How will anyone know which approach is the best? Hockey could use a good dose of "Moneyball", especially in the era of the salary cap. My gut instinct tells me you are better off riding your number one goalie, and paying a minimum salary to the guy in the baseball cap on the bench, but of course I have nothing to back that up.
My gut instinct tells me you are better off riding your number one goalie, and paying a minimum salary to the guy in the baseball cap on the bench, but of course I have nothing to back that up.
It probably depends on what sort of success metric you want to put on that. Regular season success or playoff success?
I'd probably back up your gut feel for regular season success, but we shouldn't understate the role of the #2 come postseason. The last two cups, at least, have gone to goalies with less than 16 wins.
In 2004, I remember that all 4 teams in the conference finals had goalies that had played, at maximum only 55 games that year. The same situation arose the next season ('06). And last season, similar results came from the final 4 teams, although it was a little less pronounced.
Obviously, when guys backstopped by Brodeur, Roy, and Belfour reached the finals through most of the 90's, it seemed that riding your #1 was the best option. Recently, there's been a trend to have two good goalies on your team to get you to the final.
For reference:
'04
San Jose - Nabokov/Toskala
Calgary - Kiprsuoff/Turek/Maclennan
Philadelphia - Esche/Hackett/Burke
Tampa Bay - Khabibulin/Grahame
'06
Anaheim - Bryzgalov/Giguere
Edmonton - Roloson/Markkanen/Conklin/Morrison
Buffalo - Miller/Biron
Carolina - Ward/Gerber (Gerber actually played 60 or so games, but was the backup in the playoffs)
'07
Detroit - Hasek/Osgood
Anaheim - Giguere/Bryzgalov
Buffalo - Miller/Biron/Conklin
Ottawa - Emery/Gerber
There is a very slight correlation (R^2 = 0.04) between regular season team winning percentage and games played by the starter.
I'm not really sure how else you would quantify this effect - look at winning percentage in back-to-back seasons where the starter's load changed?
Incidentally, the percentage of games played by the starter has increased from 60% in 1980 to over 70% now.
I don't think you can take a good goalie and make him a great goalie just by playing him for 78 games (heck, the Leafs tried that last year...). I think the decision to ride one guy has to depend on who that guy is - whether he's good enough, and whether he can handle the work.
Heavy regular season workloads have yet to translate into playoff success for Kiprusoff. We'll see how Nabokov (who's had injuries in his past) holds up this year.
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