Another fun "Goalies Suck" stat

[JoeSchmoe]

Rounding up, the Sabres goalies have let in 10 goals they shouldn't have in 5 on 5 play. Only 11 teams are on the bad side of even for this stat and the next closest team is about 3 goals better. 

Of Adams' many failings, not finding a #1 goalie in 6 years is his worst achievement... Especially with all the extra 1st rounders we've had as trade chips in this time.

Edited yesterday at 03:51 AM by JoeSchmoe

[PromoTheRobot]

Who decides these goals that shouldn't have gone in? I'd really like to know how that judgement is made.

[LGR4GM]

7 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Who decides these goals that shouldn't have gone in? I'd really like to know how that judgement is made.

Statistics is how. It's a reflection of shots faced and league averages.

[bob_sauve28]

We could of drafted this guy

 

https://www.nhl.com/wild/player/jesper-wallstedt-8482661

[LGR4GM]

GSAx works like this. The league tracks every shot on the ice and they get assigned a shot percentage, which means they also have a corresponding sv%. This tells us that compared to league average (shooters and goalies) the Sabres goalies give up the most goals or they are the worst in the league. 

A lot of us focus on defensive breakdowns. "Of course Sabres Goalie (I won't pick on anyone specifically) allowed a goal there, the shooter was left alone on at the dot!" Ok but let's chart all the shots from that spot without a defender within 5ft (they can do this now). Let's say that it goes in 500 out of 1,000 times. That's a .5xGF if you stop it as a goalie you get +.5xGA but if it goes in you get -.5xGA. Some of you are like, "well doesn't that just add goals against!?" and no. You have to remember the majority of shots are saved. Also the majority of shots have a like a .1xGF with stuff like breakaways up around .3xGF so to get up to 10 full goals within 2 months isn't great. That means each game the Sabres goalies are allowing an extra .3goals which doesn't seem like much but image if we swung that in the opposite direction and we were saving .3 more. That means the Sabres goalies are giving up a half goal more per game than the inverse goalies. 

The bottom line is the Sabres are inexperienced and yes there are defensive breakdowns. All teams have defensive breakdowns. Our goalies however are the worst in the league at making saves. We aren't particularly high on the list of giving up HD chances (someone can look at exactly where we are) so my conclusion is 2 things. First is the defense unit (forwards and defenders) are mediocre in their coverages, when a breakdown occurs, they take forever to cover it up. Second, our goalies are not good. Ellis and UPL have not been steady at all and Lyon was good until Lindy decided he should sit for a couple of weeks. The 3 goalie rotation doesn't work and Buffalo should move 1. I favor moving UPL due to the cost of his deal.

[Mustache of God]

It drives me nuts that this is the 3rd year in Adams tenure where they've run 3 goalies, and at the end of each season everyone admits that the 3-goalie thing doesn't work, nobody likes it. 

Just waive Ellis already. You gave up nothing to get him. 

 

#FREEOSTLUND

[DarthEbriate]

3 hours ago, bob_sauve28 said:

We could of drafted this guy

 

https://www.nhl.com/wild/player/jesper-wallstedt-8482661

Wallstedt (or Cossa) were both available at 15.

Remember, the first round was on 7/23 that year; they didn't trade for Levi until the next day. And although they were negotiating with Ullmark, he was already the established #1 veteran -- he needs a long-term replacement (right about last year in 2024). He left in FA 5 days after this pick was made.

When this pick was made on 7/23, their effective goalie pipeline was: Luukkonen coming off his hip surgeries, Tokarski, and Portillo still in college (and he was scared off by the GM's love for the undersized 7th rounder they acquired the next day).

They selected Rosén.

[PromoTheRobot]

15 hours ago, LGR4GM said:

Statistics is how. It's a reflection of shots faced and league averages.

Without taking into account what led to those shots or the context they were taken.

Edited 21 hours ago by PromoTheRobot

[Thorny]

15 hours ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Who decides these goals that shouldn't have gone in? I'd really like to know how that judgement is made.

There’s a little man that sits inside the goal that you can’t see, right behind the goal line on top of the camera at the back, who makes the call in real time 

sometimes on the broadcast you can hear a very faint “ow! goal..” when they get hit by the puck but still make the call 

Edited 21 hours ago by Thorny

[Jorcus]

1 hour ago, DarthEbriate said:

Wallstedt (or Cossa) were both available at 15.

Remember, the first round was on 7/23 that year; they didn't trade for Levi until the next day. And although they were negotiating with Ullmark, he was already the established #1 veteran -- he needs a long-term replacement (right about last year in 2024). He left in FA 5 days after this pick was made.

When this pick was made on 7/23, their effective goalie pipeline was: Luukkonen coming off his hip surgeries, Tokarski, and Portillo still in college (and he was scared off by the GM's love for the undersized 7th rounder they acquired the next day).

They selected Rosén.

I think this site would have gone bonkers mad if we had selected Wallstedt with that pick. He lights out right now but the Wild has for the most part been a defensive oriented team where goaltenders do well. Wallstedt may turn out to be a fine goalie but looking at his AHL stats you have to think he could go bad and any moment. in 27 games last year he had a .879 save percentage. That is bad for an AHL goaltender. Let's wait and see if he holds up before we complain about not going after him.

[LGR4GM]

1 hour ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Without taking into account what led to those shots or the context they were taken.

This is inaccurate and also doesn't show an understanding of what is happening in the rest of the league. 

Some of the advanced models do take into account pre-shot puck movement as well as screens, shot type, nearest defender, you could really add any trackable variable to this formula. The other part is you assume that no other team is allowing a cross ice pass for a shot, or a breakaway, or a backdoor look. Most of these models are looking at shots over a 3 year rolling average. These types of plays happen EVERYWHERE on ALL teams. Buffalo's goalies save less of them than the rest of the league. Go ahead and defend UPL or whatever, the fact remains in all metrics that get tracked for goalies in the modern era, he is anywhere from below average to bad. Sure his numbers would improve with a better defense but some of these tracking numbers would not. If he sees an extra 1xG more a start than an average goalie with a bad defense and only sees .5xG more with a good one, that washes out in numbers. Basically if he sees 10 hard shots and saves 8 versus 5 hard shots and saves 4, it's the same. 

[DarthEbriate]

30 minutes ago, Jorcus said:

I think this site would have gone bonkers mad if we had selected Wallstedt with that pick. He lights out right now but the Wild has for the most part been a defensive oriented team where goaltenders do well. Wallstedt may turn out to be a fine goalie but looking at his AHL stats you have to think he could go bad and any moment. in 27 games last year he had a .879 save percentage. That is bad for an AHL goaltender. Let's wait and see if he holds up before we complain about not going after him.

Of course, but we go bonkers about everything.

Last year was bad. The season before was his first in the AHL (age 21) and he put up .910 in 45 games. He'd had good SHL numbers prior to that. Even now, he's a developing goalie who is years from his prime.

But he and Cossa (because either could've been taken depending on preference) were both mid-1st round grades as potential franchise goalies.

If you draft one of them, maybe you trade Reinhart for a different package. If you're a real GM, maybe you don't trade Reinhart ;-] 

[mjd1001]

53 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

This is inaccurate and also doesn't show an understanding of what is happening in the rest of the league. 

Some of the advanced models do take into account pre-shot puck movement as well as screens, shot type, nearest defender, you could really add any trackable variable to this formula. The other part is you assume that no other team is allowing a cross ice pass for a shot, or a breakaway, or a backdoor look. Most of these models are looking at shots over a 3 year rolling average. These types of plays happen EVERYWHERE on ALL teams. Buffalo's goalies save less of them than the rest of the league. Go ahead and defend UPL or whatever, the fact remains in all metrics that get tracked for goalies in the modern era, he is anywhere from below average to bad. Sure his numbers would improve with a better defense but some of these tracking numbers would not. If he sees an extra 1xG more a start than an average goalie with a bad defense and only sees .5xG more with a good one, that washes out in numbers. Basically if he sees 10 hard shots and saves 8 versus 5 hard shots and saves 4, it's the same. 

Thanks for posting this.  You are doing a lot better job explaining it than I can and I agree with most of it.

I don't go to analytics first for my opinions. I see something and then I'll try to go to analytics to see if they support what I think I saw.

Starting last year, I saw with my eyes that UPL was letting in a lot of bad goals, and all the other Sabres goalies that played besides him weren't much better (althoug it seems like when a goalie has a good week, this forum is quick to annoint him..."He's the #1!")

expected goals is not a perfect stat, but it is a LOT closer to perfect than almost everything that has been used over the years.  And when someone points out a flaw in the stat because of an individual event, usually those 'individual events' even out over time.  Maybe expected goals doesn't give you a good picture over the short term (a game, a couple games) because of those individual events, but those events get smoothed out over time in the numbers.

As has been said many times, the Sabres 'bad defense' is factored into the numbers.  If is the 'bad defense' that leads to 'good chances against' that cause that expected goals against number to go up.

Back to the goalies...None of them are good, UPL has been average-to-downright awful the past 1.5 years or so....that is what MY eye test tells ME, and the numbers back it up.

[PromoTheRobot]

2 hours ago, LGR4GM said:

This is inaccurate and also doesn't show an understanding of what is happening in the rest of the league. 

Some of the advanced models do take into account pre-shot puck movement as well as screens, shot type, nearest defender, you could really add any trackable variable to this formula. The other part is you assume that no other team is allowing a cross ice pass for a shot, or a breakaway, or a backdoor look. Most of these models are looking at shots over a 3 year rolling average. These types of plays happen EVERYWHERE on ALL teams. Buffalo's goalies save less of them than the rest of the league. Go ahead and defend UPL or whatever, the fact remains in all metrics that get tracked for goalies in the modern era, he is anywhere from below average to bad. Sure his numbers would improve with a better defense but some of these tracking numbers would not. If he sees an extra 1xG more a start than an average goalie with a bad defense and only sees .5xG more with a good one, that washes out in numbers. Basically if he sees 10 hard shots and saves 8 versus 5 hard shots and saves 4, it's the same. 

 

1 hour ago, mjd1001 said:

Thanks for posting this.  You are doing a lot better job explaining it than I can and I agree with most of it.

I don't go to analytics first for my opinions. I see something and then I'll try to go to analytics to see if they support what I think I saw.

Starting last year, I saw with my eyes that UPL was letting in a lot of bad goals, and all the other Sabres goalies that played besides him weren't much better (althoug it seems like when a goalie has a good week, this forum is quick to annoint him..."He's the #1!")

expected goals is not a perfect stat, but it is a LOT closer to perfect than almost everything that has been used over the years.  And when someone points out a flaw in the stat because of an individual event, usually those 'individual events' even out over time.  Maybe expected goals doesn't give you a good picture over the short term (a game, a couple games) because of those individual events, but those events get smoothed out over time in the numbers.

As has been said many times, the Sabres 'bad defense' is factored into the numbers.  If is the 'bad defense' that leads to 'good chances against' that cause that expected goals against number to go up.

Back to the goalies...None of them are good, UPL has been average-to-downright awful the past 1.5 years or so....that is what MY eye test tells ME, and the numbers back it up.

Here's how I see it. Every goalie we bring in starts well but regresses to an inadequate performance level. When these things keep happening I ask why? Is it just a coincidence that every goalie the Sabres sign is equally bad? Or is it the way we play the game in front of them wears them out eventually? We'll never know for sure, unless you put 100% faith in stats. From what I see the bad goaltending starts in front of the goalie, all the way to the opposing blue line. All 5 skaters are sloppy, they don't know how to handle a puck, they skate themselves into trouble, and all opposing teams need to do is wait for us to cough up the puck and they're off to the races. Night after night after night it's like this. 

Now think back to the Winnipeg game in Buffalo. The Jets came in flat and the Sabres played a near flawless game. UPL gives up one goal. One breakaway, few if any turnovers at the blue line, and the ones that happened, skaters got back and erased the mistake.

When the Sabres play like that, suddenly goaltending looks pretty good. When you watch other games, you simply do not see the level of sloppiness you see in this team. So go ahead and say this goalie or that one isn't good enough, and spew all the advanced analytics you want. I know what I see and you will NEVER find that mythical goalie we all dream of because no goalie stands a chance playing behind the Sabres.

[mjd1001]

4 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

 

Here's how I see it. Every goalie we bring in starts well but regresses to an inadequate performance level. When these things keep happening I ask why? Is it just a coincidence that every goalie the Sabres sign is equally bad? Or is it the way we play the game in front of them wears them out eventually? We'll never know for sure, unless you put 100% faith in stats. From what I see the bad goaltending starts in front of the goalie, all the way to the opposing blue line. All 5 skaters are sloppy, they don't know how to handle a puck, they skate themselves into trouble, and all opposing teams need to do is wait for us to cough up the puck and they're off to the races. Night after night after night it's like this. 

 

Yes, awful defense causes more goals against, but this team has goalies that RARELY "steal" games for them (yet it seems like backups do that to the Sabres quite often) and other than the win vs Ottawa (which was probably the worst NHL goatending game I have ever seen by their goalie), The sabres goalies (eye test) allow way too many soft goals, compared to the teams they play.

It makes just as much sense to me saying good goaltending can MAKE a defense look better than it is, just as much as its true the other way around. In reality, those expressions are probably a wash.

As far as every goalie we bring in starts well but regresses..that is for sure not always the case. In the most recent few seasons playing behind a lot of the current players:

UPL into his 4th 'full' season with the Team. He had the worst GAA and 2nd worst save percentage in his 'first' season, where he started 32 games (and he wasn't exactly a rookie, he was already in his 23/24 year old season)

-Levi, he might be the best example of what you are saying..he started out pretty well, but the more games he played in Buffalo, the worse he seemed to get.

-Last year James Reimer was up and down the entire year. Good month, bad month, good month, bad month, but the first half of his games were about equal to the 2nd half of his games.

-Eric Comrie was bad in both years in Buffalo with a GAA and save percentage close in both seasons.  Again, the first half of his games were just about as bad as the 2nd half of his games.

-Craig Anderson actually had slightly better numbers in his 2nd year with the team compared to his first year.

-Tokarski was much like Reimer in his one year with the Sabres..good month, bad month, good month, bad month...but overall his peformance wasn't any better in the first half of his starts compared to the 2nd half of them.

-With Ellis this year, its hard because he has played so little games. But he has had an above .900 save percentage 3 times in 7 games: His first game, his 4th game (the middle game of his starts) and his 6th game. Spread out pretty evenly.

-Lyon has definitely tailed off as the season has gone on, but besides his shutout, his next best game was probably his 33 save effort vs Utah, one of his more recent starts. 

[PromoTheRobot]

6 minutes ago, mjd1001 said:

Yes, awful defense causes more goals against, but this team has goalies that RARELY "steal" games for them (yet it seems like backups do that to the Sabres quite often) and other than the win vs Ottawa (which was probably the worst NHL goatending game I have ever seen by their goalie), The sabres goalies (eye test) allow way too many soft goals, compared to the teams they play.

It makes just as much sense to me saying good goaltending can MAKE a defense look better than it is, just as much as its true the other way around. In reality, those expressions are probably a wash.

As far as every goalie we bring in starts well but regresses..that is for sure not always the case. In the most recent few seasons playing behind a lot of the current players:

UPL into his 4th 'full' season with the Team. He had the worst GAA and 2nd worst save percentage in his 'first' season, where he started 32 games (and he wasn't exactly a rookie, he was already in his 23/24 year old season)

-Levi, he might be the best example of what you are saying..he started out pretty well, but the more games he played in Buffalo, the worse he seemed to get.

-Last year James Reimer was up and down the entire year. Good month, bad month, good month, bad month, but the first half of his games were about equal to the 2nd half of his games.

-Eric Comrie was bad in both years in Buffalo with a GAA and save percentage close in both seasons.  Again, the first half of his games were just about as bad as the 2nd half of his games.

-Craig Anderson actually had slightly better numbers in his 2nd year with the team compared to his first year.

-Tokarski was much like Reimer in his one year with the Sabres..good month, bad month, good month, bad month...but overall his peformance wasn't any better in the first half of his starts compared to the 2nd half of them.

-With Ellis this year, its hard because he has played so little games. But he has had an above .900 save percentage 3 times in 7 games: His first game, his 4th game (the middle game of his starts) and his 6th game. Spread out pretty evenly.

-Lyon has definitely tailed off as the season has gone on, but besides his shutout, his next best game was probably his 33 save effort vs Utah, one of his more recent starts. 

This is just the goalie version of Chicken vs Egg. But I will point out that expecting a goalie to steal you games isn't a strategy. It's what good teams need when they have a bad night.  Like Jake Allen did against us in the Devils game where he made 42 saves. If you think a goalie is going to steal games for your sorry squad night after night, sorry but Domenic Hasek isn't walking through that door.

[JoeSchmoe]

8 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

This is just the goalie version of Chicken vs Egg. But I will point out that expecting a goalie to steal you games isn't a strategy. It's what good teams need when they have a bad night.  Like Jake Allen did against us in the Devils game where he made 42 saves. If you think a goalie is going to steal games for your sorry squad night after night, sorry but Domenic Hasek isn't walking through that door.

The defense is good this year... Probably why our PK is where it is.

This is all on the goaltending.

 

[PromoTheRobot]

13 minutes ago, JoeSchmoe said:

The defense is good this year... Probably why our PK is where it is.

This is all on the goaltending.

 

Cool colors and stuff. 

[mjd1001]

27 minutes ago, JoeSchmoe said:

The defense is good this year... Probably why our PK is where it is.

This is all on the goaltending.

 

I think it is more on goaltending that some thing, but in my opinion, the problems with this team allowing goals are, in the following order:

1.)  First and foremost, the forwards are still awful, absolutely terrible (as a unit) helping out in their own end.

2.) Goalies let in too many soft goals

3.) Some bad plays by the D-men.

For it it is definitly in that order...still...just like last year..and the year before...

[PromoTheRobot]

10 minutes ago, mjd1001 said:

I think it is more on goaltending that some thing, but in my opinion, the problems with this team allowing goals are, in the following order:

1.)  First and foremost, the forwards are still awful, absolutely terrible (as a unit) helping out in their own end.

2.) Goalies let in too many soft goals

3.) Some bad plays by the D-men.

For it it is definitly in that order...still...just like last year..and the year before...

I have to ask, do you consider breakaways soft goals? 1-on-0? 2-on-1?

[LGR4GM]

8 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

I have to ask, do you consider breakaways soft goals? 1-on-0? 2-on-1?

Other goalies, save those sometimes, most times even. 

[JoeSchmoe]

17 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

First and foremost, the forwards are still awful, absolutely terrible (as a unit) helping out in their own end.

This could be part of the problem... Possibly in the other end as well.

The Sabres still give up a fair number of low danger shots. Keeping shots to low danger tells me the D are doing their jobs by keeping pucks to the outside. But giving the other team the opportunity to be in our zone enough to take that many shots might be more on the our F's not maintaining possession in the attacking zone.

(More cool colours.)

[PromoTheRobot]

23 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

Other goalies, save those sometimes, most times even. 

So do the Sabres goalies. We just forget about them.  It's when they let in the 4th or 5th try we take notice.

[LGR4GM]

1 minute ago, PromoTheRobot said:

So do the Sabres goalies. We just forget about them.  It's when they let in the 4th or 5th try we take notice.

That's not what's happening. 

[PromoTheRobot]

6 minutes ago, JoeSchmoe said:

This could be part of the problem... Possibly in the other end as well.

The Sabres still give up a fair number of low danger shots. Keeping shots to low danger tells me the D are doing their jobs by keeping pucks to the outside. But giving the other team the opportunity to be in our zone enough to take that many shots might be more on the our F's not maintaining possession in the attacking zone.

(More cool colours.)

That's the thing I keep asking: who decides what's low danger, high danger or an expected goal? Just because something is based on "years of data" doesn't answer the question.

Just now, LGR4GM said:

That's not what's happening. 

It is. Many times. You just don't notice.