GMs to discuss size of goalie equipment

[sketchyt]

Originally Posted by blankall

Either goalies have started taking a huge number of shots directly to the top of their trapezius and sides of their arms, or equipment is being designed specfically to take up space in the net and not for protection.

You'd be talking about the shoulder floaters and elbow blocks. I think the size of them could be reduced, but its function is actually for protection first and size. You'd be surprised at how shots can and will find you.

Anyways, here's a picture of a similar (and higher end unit) with someone wearing it (not me). It's not as bulky as you're making it out to be.

[corporatejay]

Why are the yellow RBk/premier cuffs so wide? How big are those wrists?

[indes]

To stop the puck from going in between your forearms and body it would seem

[GrrlGoalie33]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

Why are the yellow RBk/premier cuffs so wide? How big are those wrists?

The elbow floaters are designed to protect the inside of your arms at the elbow. I think you can change the shape to be rounded with the curve of the arm instead of square. This way you're not sacrificing protection, but still allowing for a high level of protection

It's a pretty sensitive and vulnerable area.

[sketchyt]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

Why are the yellow RBk/premier cuffs so wide? How big are those wrists?

Those cuffs (elbow blocks) probably don't need to be that wide, but again, reducing the width of them isn't going to magically increase scoring. But they're there to protect the elbow hinge area. Because of the need for arms at the elbow to move fully, the protection below there is pretty thin. However, there is a pretty big need for those (or something similar) to exist as that's normally a pretty vulnerable spot.

Warrior is introducing a new piece of gear to address that, which the NHL has approved:



Anyways, I think stuff like this is probably only interesting to goalies so I'm going to leave it alone. My point is, there's a reason or multiple reasons for why goalie gear is made how it is. In nearly every circumstance (I've pointed out previously the spots where protection isn't the issue), it's there for protective reasons.

Sure, you can get to the nitty gritty and reduce the size of some of it, but it's not going to address the "issue" that there's not enough scoring in the NHL.

[Eric Vail]

When you look at the amount of space available around the goalie to score from 20-30 years ago, it has decreased substantially. Because goalies seem unwilling to find a way to reduce their size to a more reasonable level, it stands to reason that the nets should be made bigger by a proportional amount to compensate.

This wouldn't be the sacrilidge that some claim. Peter Maher is an advocate for doing this. It would simply take away the advantage that goalies have gained due to their large equipment and put things back on equal footing.

When it comes to the record book, it is crazy to compare goalie stats from now with any other era because of the vast advantage goalies now have due to the huge equipment they wear.

[Sainters7]

I love how in a season where our goalie is getting ran over seemingly every game, the only issue we're hearing about with them is trying to make their gear smaller.

The NHL needs to do something about how much crease crashing has increased the past decade, seems like players don't even try to slow down or get out of the way. I don't remember it ever being this bad back in the day. Start protecting the goalies better, and then we can talk about shrinking their gear (minus the Giguere-style offenders)

/biased goalie post