Quote:
Originally Posted by ComixZone
At 28, this next year is a make or break year for the affable fella. I love cheering for Ritter because he’s as quirky a goalie as you’ll find, but he needs to hammer out his conditioning/health issues/mental stuff that sees his game fall apart after he hits about 30 games played.
I do think this organizationally has fatally screwed up in how they’ve handled him though. Rittich should have been the guy last season in the playoffs, and should have been the guy this season in the playoffs.
If you believe in a player, you take some lumps as you go. Instead? They cast him to the background in favour of “post-apex” goalies who let you down in the end anyways - and both were likely gone after the playoffs anyways.
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Strongly disagree with the bolded. Both Smith and Rittich were inconsistent last year and as a goalie who was just starting his career, it made sense to go with the veteran for game one. Which was a good bet cuz Smith was good. Maybe Rittich would have been too but that's not at the fault of the coaching staff it was the right decision.
This year, Talbot was playing better down the stretch and if the season would have continued strong odds he was going to be the starter anyways. But that doesn't matter because there was a three month break. During that time Talbot was on the ice every day staying sharp and it showed in camp where they gave both goalies a chance to earn the start and Talbot was just better. He earned it, Rittich didn't and once again it was the right choice by the coaching staff, because Talbot was very good, except for game 6, but I'll take 5 stud games for every bad game every time.
It's not on anybody but Rittich why he hasn't started playoff games. And I'm not saying he doesn't have the potential or wouldn't have done just as good, but he hasn't earned a playoff start yet. There is something holding him back and the way I see it he has one more season to figure it out with the flames or he will never be more than a good backup/ average starter.
I am, however, a strong believer that Jordan Sigalet needs to go. Wheter Rittich's problem is conditioning, mental side of the game or what have you, it's sigalets job to identify it and find a way to help the goalie overcome it. And I get the argument that sigalet hasn't had studs to work with ever but no goalie has actually improved consistently while they've been here even marginally so what the hell are we paying that guy for if there is no actual tangible positive outcome for what he's doing?