[News] Leafs waive McElhinney, Pickard, and (not) Carrick

[TheScorpion]

Three very intriguing players, to be sure.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1046767922687832064

[Otto-matic]

Pass on McElhinney IMO, he looked pretty bad in the Det game on Saturday.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by Otto-matic

Pass on McElhinney IMO, he looked pretty bad in the Det game on Saturday.

It doesn't really mean much. Most goalies look like garbage in September.

[Gaskal]

Pickard has been regressing steadily. He was a capable backup like 2-3 years ago.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Textcritic

It doesn't really mean much. Most goalies look like garbage in September.

True, but this necessarily applies to the ones already here.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by GioforPM

True, but this necessarily applies to the ones already here.

Yeah, exactly. It is driving me crazy how much some people are reading into preseason performances from Flames goalies.

[TheScorpion]

Originally Posted by Textcritic

Yeah, exactly. It is driving me crazy how much some people are reading into preseason performances from Flames goalies.

Oh, thanks for letting me know!

> opens "things_that_make_textcritic_crazy.docx"

[foshizzle11]

No thanks to any pick ups. I still think our guys are capable. If we start to struggle at the goalie position then we make an early season trade. I think we have the depth now to be able to make something happen that is positive. We do have wizard at the helm already, he is great at making things happen in our favour.

We need to be patient still with Gillies and Parsons, I am not sold on Rittich, but I am good to wait until the games count before jumping on these guys. Lets see how the season starts to roll out before doing anything drastic or muddying the waters with another goalie who isn't really an upgrade.

[Nelson]

I would absolutely pick up Pickard.

Pickard's NHL Numbers

In 2014-15, .932 in 16 gp
In 2015-16, .922 in 20 gp
In 2016-17, .904 in 50 gp (in front of a garbage team)

Rittich's NHL Numbers

In 2017-18, .904 in 22 gp

I would not want anything to do with McElhinney.

In the NHL, you would of course have Smith and Pickard. In the AHL, I would have Gillies and Parsons. I would demote Rittich to the ECHL, at which point he would go back to Europe. Heartless, I know. And I hate it. But I think it gives the Flames better goaltending.

[ComixZone]

Originally Posted by Textcritic

Yeah, exactly. It is driving me crazy how much some people are reading into preseason performances from Flames goalies.

My concerns with Smith date back to the All-Star Break in 2018. After the All-Star game, Smith was clearly burned out. After the all-star game, he bounced between decent and awful, and then bowed out with an injury. Rushed himself back, and continued to play poorly - and has now put together a poor pre-season showing. So...can he bounce back? Well, he’s 36 - so Father Time definitely isn’t on his side. I guess we’ll see.

I think a lot of our overreaction/reaction through the pre-season is a build up of years and years of goaltending flops.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Nelson

I would absolutely pick up Pickard.

Pickard's NHL Numbers

In 2014-15, .932 in 16 gp
In 2015-16, .922 in 20 gp
In 2016-17, .904 in 50 gp (in front of a garbage team)

Rittich's NHL Numbers

In 2017-18, .904 in 22 gp

I would not want anything to do with McElhinney.

Well if you compare the same year (last year), Rittich was better. Pickard couldn't make backup over the guy you want nothing to do with.

[RichKlit]

I’m surprised how militant both sides of the goalie debate are. None of our goalies have instilled any confidence in any of us, well for sure at least me. Patience only goes so far, at some point other avenues need to be explored and we are getting awful close to the tipping point. This team cannot waste another season on suspect goaltending.

On the other hand every goalie that passes through the waiver wire isn’t an immediate upgrade, at best from the goalies I’ve seen pass through it’s a roll of the dice. There has been zero clear cut upgrades that have been put on waivers. Maybe there will be but at this point everything would have been a lateral move at best.

I think both sides of this debate need to relax their positions a bit, this team needs someone to step up and they need it to happen now. I don’t care who it is or whether we drafted, signed, claimed or trade, someone has to perform for this team to take another step in the right direction.

[Nelson]

Originally Posted by GioforPM

Well if you compare the same year (last year), Rittich was better. Pickard couldn't make backup over the guy you want nothing to do with.

Well, Pickard only had 1 GP in the NHL last year and he was .857. But overall Pickard’s NHL numbers are still way better and over a much larger sample size. I mean, if we’re just talking about last year, Rittich was .889 in 12 GP in the AHL whereas Pickard was .918 in 33 gp. But I’d rather look at the whole body of work, in which Pickard’s numbers are better.


Anyways, we’re totally dealing with the unknown here. No one knows that Pickard would be a better option than Rittich. I’m just guessing he would be based on past results.

[Monahammer]

Sure preseason means very little, but I think many people are weighting it heavily because of the total failure of our goalies to step up to the plate last year when given opportunities. If you're not concerned about our goalie situation right now you're fooling yourself.

[Yoho]

If we wanted Pickard we should have made a trade for him. He won’t get to the Flames in waiver order IMO.

[neo45]

Numbers wise McBackup has the very clear edge, but you have to factor in that Pickard was on a dumpster fire in Colorado and did ok.

Also factor in that Torts/Babcock play systems that generally make goalies numbers look good.


ALSO factor in the main reason Pickard was in the AHL was that he had cleared waivers prior to Toronto trading for him so he could be sent down easier. It wasn’t necessarily that he was worse than McBackup.


Long story short I have no idea what to do but McBackup always seemed like a good guy who understood his role and it would be cool for his career to come full circle. We can sign Keetley now too.

[The Boy Wonder]

I think I fall firmly in both camps. I think our goaltending is not good enough but I also don't think we change anything about it right now.

I think long term you can't bring someone in who is going to bump one of Gilles or Parsons to the ECHL and you probably don't want to roll the dice with a waiver wire goalie over Rittich.

I think if the flames are going to do something risky I'd rather it be something like trade smith for Price or Bobrovsky, either one would be a significant upgrade and I tend to agree with Comix_Zone that smith has not been good enough for most of 2018. The lower risk move for a backup off waivers probably does more to hurt the long term development of our goalie prospects than it helps the flames short term

[Nelson]

Originally Posted by neo45

Numbers wise McBackup has the very clear edge, but you have to factor in that Pickard was on a dumpster fire in Colorado and did ok.

Also factor in that Torts/Babcock play systems that generally make goalies numbers look good.


ALSO factor in the main reason Pickard was in the AHL was that he had cleared waivers prior to Toronto trading for him so he could be sent down easier. It wasn’t necessarily that he was worse than McBackup.


Long story short I have no idea what to do but McBackup always seemed like a good guy who understood his role and it would be cool for his career to come full circle. We can sign Keetley now too.

I don’t know about very clear edge. NHL numbers are .913 for Pickard and .909 for McBackup.

[neo45]

Originally Posted by Nelson

I don’t know about very clear edge. NHL numbers are .913 for Pickard and .909 for McBackup.

Last couple of seasons. I don’t really think looking back to 2007 or whenever he started playing is really relevant here

[Nelson]

True. What about since 2014-15? That’s probably the best comparison since the last two seasons Pickard has had 1 GP and 50 GP in front of 1 of the worst teams in NHL history.