A unified theory of goalie analysis, Los Angeles rights the ship, Dubnyk can’t be scored on and more…

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The Toronto Maple Leafs finally ended their franchise record 11-game losing streak on Saturday, defeating the lowly Taylor Hall-less Edmonton Oilers by a score of 5-1. Goaltender James Reimer, who has been on a nice run of late, nearly managed a shutout, but Luke Gadzic – really? – scored his first goal of the season with seconds left to the break the goose egg.

Not bad for Reimer’s second start in back-to-back games. 

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There was some discussion in this space yesterday of whether or not Reimer or Bernier is the better netminder. I’ve generally thought that it’s closer than most believe, but in terms of projecting future performance, I prefer to rely on large sample even-strength save percentage. Since the 2009 season, and not including this year, Bernier has managed a solid .927 save percentage at even-strength – which is roughly what Pekka Rinne has done, albeit in more minutes. Reimer lags behind, but not by as much as you’d think, with a .926 save percentage that puts him in the company of Ryan Miller and Craig Anderson over a similar time frame.

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With goaltenders a lot of people, many of whom have little in the way of formal goalie coaching experience or training, and who probably struggle to identify save selections or when a goaltender is using a post integration technique, seem to enjoy discussing how a guy “looks” in net. “Oh he doesn’t look comfortable!” “His glove hand is shaky!” etc. etc.

I’ve always been really reluctant to pay any credence to these sorts of arguments. The difference between an elite goaltender – one who can consistently post a .928 or better even-strength save percentage over a large sample – and a liability like Ondrej Pavelec is 12 additional saves (or so) over 1000 shots faced. If you think your eyes can pick up on that, I’d suggest that you’re being obtuse.

Thomas Boswell wrote an excellent piece on Greg Maddux as the former Atlanta Braves great was about to be inducted into the Hall of Fame. In a part of the piece, Maddux explains why he didn’t really try to overpower big league batters (even though he had a good fast-ball and could bring the heat). I think it’s relevant here:

Maddux was convinced no hitter could tell the speed of a pitch with any meaningful accuracy. To demonstrate, he pointed at a road a quarter-mile away and said it was impossible to tell if a car was going 55, 65 or 75 mph unless there was another car nearby to offer a point of reference.

 

"You just can't do it," he said. Sometimes hitters can pick up differences in spin. They can identify pitches if there are different releases points or if a curveball starts with an upward hump as it leaves the pitcher's hand. But if a pitcher can change speeds, every hitter is helpless, limited by human vision.

Maddux didn’t think that the eyes of big league hitters could reliabily pick up the difference in the speed of a pitch. That’s similar to what I’ll call my unified theory of goalie analysis: that I don’t buy that the eyes of laymen hockey fans can pick up the difference in the quality of goaltenders.

You watch Dominik Hasek in his prime, and his prime was the best any goaltender has ever been, and tell me he looked comfortable in his crease. Didn’t matter, he saved a way above average rate of shots.

Reimer isn’t at that level, or even close to it, and he never will be. But when comparing him with the smoother, more efficient Bernier, I think it’s worth remembering that both goalies save pucks at an above average rate – and are decent bets to continue doing so for several years to come. 

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Speaking of how goalies are super weird, in less than a year Devan Dubnyk has gone from being out of hockey to being Minnesota’s great hope.

He sure looked shaky last year though, but if you were distrustful of what your eyes said and relied instead on the way he’s saved pucks at an above average rate for several years behind an atrocious defensive club, maybe you wouldn’t be so surprised.