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In a Season of Problems, Brodeur was the Biggest


Devils Pride 26

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As much as it pains me to say it, if we do miss the playoffs, a large chunk of the responsibility falls on Brodeur.

This year, the Devils have average 2.42 goals per game. Not good, 25th in the league. However, the Devils have had plenty of years where they have had low scoring teams and been successful. Minnesota and LA both average 2.39 goals per game and seem to have no trouble making the playoffs. The difference, has been goaltending.

In looking at the statistical leaders, three of the top for goaltenders in terms of GAA are Schneider, Quick, and Harding.

Minnesota had a problem with an aging goaltender who wasn't performing and they fixed it by playing him only 21 games. Backstrom had gotten hurt, but it was unlikely Minny was going to keep trotting him out there hurt or not. Harding played out of this world with a 1.65 GAA and .935 save % before getting hurt. Now Minny is relying on a kid in Darcy Kuemper (2.42 GAA, .915%) and Bryz, who has done pretty damn good (1.67 GAA, .929%)

Quick and Scheids have nearly identical numbers. Cory has a GAA of 2.00 and save % of .919 while Quick has a 2.03 GAA and .918 save % - Cory has played 3 less games.

The most glaring difference between the Devils and Kings this season has been the goaltenders who've played in the absence of the starter. The Kings got 19 excellent games out of Ben Scrivens before dishing him off to Edmonton. Scrivens posted a .931 save % and a 1.97 GAA (and only managed to go 7-5-5, damn we thought Cory was snake bitten). After trading Scrivens, Martin Jones stepped in and has played phenomenal as well posting a .932 save % and 1.91 GAA in 18 games.

While the Kings have gotten 37 games of .930% and sub 2 GAA hockey from their backups, Brodeur has played 37 games to the tune of a .900 save %, and a 2.52 GAA.

Our scoring woes hurt us this year but what really did us in was 37 games of 2.52 GAA and .900%

Marty, you've been a fan favorite for a long time, but this is not at all how I want to remember you playing. Please call it quits at the end of this year and spare everyone the drama.

Edited by Devils Pride 26
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Marty's play definitely hurt at times, no question.  The passable GAA is a result of the Devils keeping shots down.  His save% was bad last year and it was bad this year, and you don't have to do much math to realize that for every .920ish 5-game burst, there's going to be painful stretches of .880-.890 play, which is what .850-.860ish goaltending was in the 80s.  Sadly, though some fans will try to downplay it or find reasons for it, on average 10% of pucks fired on Marty find their way to the back of the net, and this is now a two-season trend.     

 

It's been brought up multiple times, but this season was going to be a rough transition because of who was involved, and sadly, it went about as expected...the guy who was once consistent very good to great is often not even good most nights (and there's not much rhyme or reason to when he WILL be good), but he doesn't see it and the team doesn't want to disrespect him or come off like they don't appreciate all that he's done, so he plays more than he should.  Unless the player suddenly reverses his decline, it's pretty much a no-win situation, and Marty didn't do anything to make any of it easier. 

 

That being said, there's other guys to blame.  You can't have a guy expected to score only scoring one goal in 33 games.  Brunner was an "upside" signing where you hope for the best, but he now has 13 goals in his last 91 regular-season games, and is prone to long invisibility droughts.  The goaltending in shootouts wasn't good, but the scoring was even worse.  Boucher could've been a nice "from within" help, but it just didn't happen.  Gelinas clearly needs work in his own end.  And then, when they least need it, the Devils lose three forwards, two of whom can actually put the puck in the net.   

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I don't want to sound melodramatic, but I'm not sure what I'll do if Marty is brought back next season.

 

I have absolutely no interest in going through this BS again where Marty gets starts solely because of his legacy.

 

Give him whatever games are left after the Devils are eliminated, then say goodbye.  The ONLY reason to bring him back is sentimentality, and considering that Lou witnessed the Messier Mess across the river first-hand, he has no excuses for allowing this to continue.  I'll give everyone involved a pass on this situation this year, only because it was going to be hard for everyone involved, but it absolutely cannot continue next season.  If Marty wants to limp towards 700 wins somewhere else, that's his choice. 

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I just knew this post was coming.

 

Yeah it has nothing to do with getting shutout ten times, not being able to score a goal in 9 of 11 shootouts, Ryder scoring one goal in three months yet still being third on the team in goals while a 42 year old is our leading scorer or Cory dropping the ball just about every time they tried to give it to him to run with.

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The good news is that the legacy starts have faded, so if he came back next year he'd get games in Montreal and that's probably it.

 

The shootout is a much bigger issue.  This team was built to play a ton of low scoring games and if you can't win a shootout, you're not going to go very far.

 

Devils have still scored 14 more goals for Brodeur even though he had 5 fewer starts.  It's utterly insane that he had 5 fewer starts but hey winnzzzzzz.

Edited by Triumph
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I just knew this post was coming.

 

Yeah it has nothing to do with getting shutout ten times, not being able to score a goal in 9 of 11 shootouts, Ryder scoring one goal in three months yet still being third on the team in goals while a 42 year old is our leading scorer or Cory dropping the ball just about every time they tried to give it to him to run with.

 

The bolded is completely wrong.

 

Cory has been dynamite in his last 7 games, and he was also dynamite in 14 starts leading up to the Olympic break (2 goals or less allowed in 13 of them).  I wouldn't call that dropping the ball.

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I just knew this post was coming.

 

Yeah it has nothing to do with getting shutout ten times, not being able to score a goal in 9 of 11 shootouts, Ryder scoring one goal in three months yet still being third on the team in goals while a 42 year old is our leading scorer or Cory dropping the ball just about every time they tried to give it to him to run with.

 

Total BS. Cory had as many bad games as most very good starters in the NHL. They just get a chance to get back in the next night more often than not. Every bad game from Schneider meant time to give Brodeur another shot. Or even after great games, they still went with Brodeur.

 

There is no doubt the Devils had scoring issues all season. But many teams have shown you can overcome it with great goaltending. The Devils actually overcame Brodeur's sh!tty performances with goal scoring a good portion of the season. It is why Brodeur's record is not that awful.

 

In the end, the Devils really just needed the scoring to be spread out differently. Cory lost 6 games when giving up 1 goal. Brodeur probably won more games when giving up 3. 

 

Is Brodeur single-handily cost the Devils a playoff spot? It's possible since the margins are so thin. But we'd all be stupid to think playing Cory 65 games next year solves all the problems. Cory getting 65 games and getting some shootout luck again will be a nice bump though.

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Marty hurt but honestly it's hard for me to look to him for first blame, I mean this teams offensive production is on the level of Florida, Vancouver, and Nashville. Our shootout losses are at a historic level. On top of that you can blame Marty for poor play but not the fact that Lou didn't have the balls to sit him more, whether Marty wanted to play or not. You also are being strategic in using la for comparison- they are by far the best gaa team in the nhl.

There are plenty of other reasons this team is where it is, so to make a thread dedicated to Marty seems a bit of an overreaction.

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Skeeter is a Marty fanboy and is as delusional as Brodeur. Marty is ONE of the reasons why this team won't make the playoffs, Cory is not a reason at all. Give Cory most of Marty's starts and goal support and this team is above a wild card spot especially if they could win just a few shootouts.

Next season I don't want to see Brodeur Ryder and Salvador on this team.

Edited by Zubie#8
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To an extent people harp on Marty (even though he was merely problem #2 behind the offense) because that was something completely in the Devils' control. The offensive woes...well when you're 29th in offense last year and Kovy walks you're not really expecting that to get much better.

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Marty was bigger than the offense. The wild and kings are examples of teams that scored less and seem to be fine. Show me a team that trotted a goalie 45th in save percentage for 37 games that EVER made the playoffs.

You can make the playoffs with an offense like this, but not with a goaltender putting up Marty's numbers. That is the main point of the thread. There were a number of reasons but Brodeur was the biggest

Edited by Devils Pride 26
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Shutout 10 times, 10 shootout losses, offense that ranked 26th in goals, and 4 losses of 1-0 or 2-0. That's what killed the Devils. Brodeur was bad and should have played 10 less games, but those offensive numbers are a disaster.

 

this. Our inability to score is clearly the problem and we pulled the same sh!t with either brodeur or schneider in net.

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Marty was bigger than the offense. The wild and kings are examples of teams that scores less and seem to be fine. Show me a team that trotted a goalie 45th in save percentage for 37 games that EVER made the playoffs

Show me a goalie anywhere with Cory's splits and an absurdly poor W/L record.

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Marty was bigger than the offense. The wild and kings are examples of teams that scores less and seem to be fine. Show me a team that trotted a goalie 45th in save percentage for 37 games that EVER made the playoffs

 

Sure.  Chris Osgood in Detroit 2008-09 is one example that leaps to mind.  Devils in 2011-12.  Blackhawks in 2011-12.  There are plenty of examples, they are just mostly on really good teams or on teams that got incredible shooting luck.

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To an extent people harp on Marty (even though he was merely problem #2 behind the offense) because that was something completely in the Devils' control. The offensive woes...well when you're 29th in offense last year and Kovy walks you're not really expecting that to get much better.

 

 

This^ , to many idiots complaining about scoring as if we can magically fix it overnight (not that it isn't a problem but it is what it is, and there isn't anything thats going to change that this year or even next year for the most part). We could have made this team much better by playing our top goalie like an NHL starter instead of like a quasi back up and with that we would be a playoff team much like the OP stated.

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Show me a goalie anywhere with Cory's splits and an absurdly poor W/L record.

 

Roberto Luongo, 2003-04: 25-33-14, ,931 SV%

 

Kari Lehtnonen, 2007-08:  17-22-5, .916 SV%  (Hilariously, Hedberg was 14-15-3 with an .892 that year)

 

and so it goes.

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Marty's play definitely hurt at times, no question.  The passable GAA is a result of the Devils keeping shots down.  His save% was bad last year and it was bad this year, and you don't have to do much math to realize that for every .920ish 5-game burst, there's going to be painful stretches of .880-.890 play, which is what .850-.860ish goaltending was in the 80s.  Sadly, though some fans will try to downplay it or find reasons for it, on average 10% of pucks fired on Marty find their way to the back of the net, and this is now a two-season trend.    

Not to attack you, but that bolded statement makes no sense at all.  SV% is on average lower when you face less shots as a 'tender, hence you should be looking at SV% anyway.  GAA has nothing to do with shots against.  The GAA is evidence that the defense and the goalie was not scored on very often.  You can argue that the team defense kept shots low, but that only amplifies the value of the SV% because a goalie who faces less shots is going to get nailed when he does allow one, for example, 9/10 Saves is a 90% 9/11 is 81.1%.  On top of that, I agree that 2.50 GAA isn't really acceptable. 

Now to discuss Marty.  I think the guy is really done, but try telling him that.  My prediction is that he shop around and look elsewhere for more playing time and will not get what he wants, then come crawling back and accept Lou's deal, which is hopefully close to 1.5 to 2m/year.  A little bit higher than that would be acceptable and I think he'll accept that his role is a backup.  He'll play maybe 20-30 games (hopefully less) and he'll have to deal that.  The question is, do any of you believe that Kinkaid or Wedge is ready to be a serviceable backup? Would you trust either of them with 10-20 games(Or more if Cory would get injured, god forbid).  Wedgewood maybe, but I think he's still too young.  You don't have success in this league without two great goalies.  There's a reason the Devils went far in 2012 because they had too serviceable goalies who played well during the season.

Edited by RizzMB30
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Anyone could back up Cory. How much worse than .900% can you get? There's always more goalies than homes for goalies. Give Cory 70 if you have to for Christ sake.

The problem isn't so much the .900%, backstrom had a similar number. The problem is having it played in 37 games when we'd be better off if it was 15 games or so

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This Blame-Marty is non-sense.

 

What killed us this year were (in order):

 

1. Our inability to score in shootouts. if we were 50% W, we'd be in the playoffs and this thread would not exist.

2. Our inability to score 5-5. Shut out too many times and we can't score even on backups and the other teams know it. (Blame Lou for having old scorers that can't score)

3. Our inability (blame the coach) to protect 3rd period and 2 goal leads. How many times do I have to see Zidlicy pinching down while we are up 3-1 or Jagr taking late 3rd period lazy shifts when we have the lead?

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Shutout 10 times, 10 shootout losses, offense that ranked 26th in goals, and 4 losses of 1-0 or 2-0. That's what killed the Devils. Brodeur was bad and should have played 10 less games, but those offensive numbers are a disaster.

 

10 shutouts and 12 one-goal games.  Devils went 0-10-0 in the shutouts and, somewhat amazingly, 2-5-5 in the one-goal games (Schneider was in net for 8 of those nine points earned). 

 

But yeah, in games where they scored 2+, the Devils went 32-14-11.  Sucks that they couldn't get to that total more often.   

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Roberto Luongo, 2003-04: 25-33-14, ,931 SV%

Kari Lehtnonen, 2007-08: 17-22-5, .916 SV% (Hilariously, Hedberg was 14-15-3 with an .892 that year)

and so it goes.

Splits meaning save pct 'and' GAA. Cory's top five or close to it in both and has won under 50% of his games.

Edited by NJDevs4978
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