Quote:
Originally Posted by jayswin
I think the disconnect is you don't understand what a starter's work load is. It's not arbitrary, it's not playing lots of games in a small period of time.
Statistics show that playing at a top starter level for 55+ games (or some number close to that) in a season is completely different than playing at a top starter level for a smaller number of games in a season.
Many, many back ups/prospects can put up strong/elite numbers while playing back up games played within a season. Whether those games are close together or spread apart has nothing to do with anything.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mike F
No, I understand that.
My subjective opinion was that Raanta looked better than Smith last year. To support that, I provided the only objective stats available - that his numbers overall were better than Lundquist's, and that his numbers didn't dip when he played a heavier workload. And FWIW, Rangers observers agreed that over the course of last season, he was overall the team's better goaltender:
Quote:
Raanta is pretty close to the textbook definition of an ideal back-up goaltender. When he was between the pipes he always gave the Rangers a chance to win. And on some nights last season he looked sharper than the Rangers Hall of Fame-bound goaltender.
There’s no other way to say it: Raanta was the team’s most consistent goalie during the 2016-17 regular season.
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Nowhere did I say that I guaranteed that his numbers playing 60 games would be exactly what they were playing 29.
The problem seems to be either (1) people trying to put those words in my mouth, or (2) people taking the position that stats are irrelevant when analyzing the season a #2 goalie had. |
Re-visiting a spirited debate from the pre-season regarding Mike Smith and Antti Raanta, I'd like to point out:
Mike Smith - 55gp 2.65gaa 9.16sv%
Antti Raanta - 46gp 2.24gaa 9.30sv%