Calgarypuck Forums - The Unofficial Calgary Flames Fan Community - View Single Post - Mike Smith's... woes? He blows? Eating crows? Who knows! (Also David Rittich exists!)

Split98 · 02-04-2019, 08:32 AM

IMO, there's 2 things you can be upset about with the Smith situation... and they're both marching towards irrelevance.

1. When Smith is in net, the games are more difficult to win. This is something that was upsetting at the start of the season when more games were ahead of us Smith needed to start in. Now, it's too late. The amount of games a replacement backup will play enters 'who cares' territory if you make peace with not catching TB. Knowing that this team can still pull Ws with Smith in net, we could be looking at 'frustrating to watch' as the only real downside to having Smith on the roster still

2. Goalie stability, and confidence in Rittich. At this point though, if Rittich isn't our #1 or there's a stumble... it'd have been a miracle if we rode our backup deep into the playoffs anyway. If this team is successful, it's with Rittich.

All it is now is a mark on management's record, right along with Brouwer and co. Otherwise, it's hardly going to affect this team much going forward. All that's left is 'where could we be without those Smith games?', but it's in the past.

That being said, if there's a good backup option that helps us next year too... I won't be upset to resolve this (now much smaller) Smith problem.

TBH, if that WSH and DET games were steps towards what he can bring the rest of the season, I'm fine with it. There's a better chance we'd have won that with Rittich, but hopefully the schedule doesn't have us playing our backup against a top team again. In hindsight, I think the win in CAR is going to resonate better in the locker room than a win in WAS.

02-04-2019, 08:32 AM	#1010
Split98 Franchise Player Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Ontario Exp:	IMO, there's 2 things you can be upset about with the Smith situation... and they're both marching towards irrelevance. 1. When Smith is in net, the games are more difficult to win. This is something that was upsetting at the start of the season when more games were ahead of us Smith needed to start in. Now, it's too late. The amount of games a replacement backup will play enters 'who cares' territory if you make peace with not catching TB. Knowing that this team can still pull Ws with Smith in net, we could be looking at 'frustrating to watch' as the only real downside to having Smith on the roster still 2. Goalie stability, and confidence in Rittich. At this point though, if Rittich isn't our #1 or there's a stumble... it'd have been a miracle if we rode our backup deep into the playoffs anyway. If this team is successful, it's with Rittich. All it is now is a mark on management's record, right along with Brouwer and co. Otherwise, it's hardly going to affect this team much going forward. All that's left is 'where could we be without those Smith games?', but it's in the past. That being said, if there's a good backup option that helps us next year too... I won't be upset to resolve this (now much smaller) Smith problem. TBH, if that WSH and DET games were steps towards what he can bring the rest of the season, I'm fine with it. There's a better chance we'd have won that with Rittich, but hopefully the schedule doesn't have us playing our backup against a top team again. In hindsight, I think the win in CAR is going to resonate better in the locker room than a win in WAS.