darth_henning
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Also, just to illustrate the need for goaltending: 5-on-5 stats for Flames team as a whole: 21st in Shots for/60 minutes (28.1; range is 23.5 to 32, average 28.8) 15th in Shots against/60 minutes (28.8; range is 26 to 32) 10th in the league in goals for (3 behind Chicago) 30th (tied) for goals against 4th in shooting percentage 30th in save percentage We actually aren't giving up an unusual amount of shots. In fact, precisely average in the league. We are in fact shooting less than most teams in the league, but have very good scoring players on the team.
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THIS. If we keep Backstrom to teach, I'd be very VERY happy. He knows how to play, and if he can teach half of that skill he'd be an amazing goalie coach. Ramo uninjured? sure. But he may not play until a couple months into the season. And post-injury we have no idea what his play will be. Again, too much of a gamble. Our team is getting better, and will continue to do so. The biggest need we need to be back in the playoff race? An average goaltender.
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Backstrom had a good game. I'm glad. But to gamble on a tandem of him and Ortio next season would be suicide. (Or Him and any other unproven goalie if we don't like Ortio) Ortio or any other unproven goalie is a risk. Because we don't know if they'll be able to develop into a starter, top out as a decent backup, or not even be able to do that competently. Backstrom's play was dropping off before he missed a year. He may still have good games left in him, he was an excellent goalie and I wouldn't be surprised. But very few in the NHL at any position make it in the league past 35, and goalies have the hardest minutes on them. If Ortio for example had two seasons of play like he's doing now under his belt, and could already be relied on for 20-30 games per year at a 91%+ then I'd be willing to give Backstrom a shot because Ortio would be a strong possibility to be able to step into a starter position if Backstrom faded But we don't know if Ortio can manage that yet. His performance after call-up started out good to great, but has faded a little. Part of that is likely that he hasn't played in a year either. But even if he finishes the year strong he's an unknown for next season. It looks like he may be able to take on more of a load, but we don't know. And without some level of certainty we can't take that risk on BOTH goalies. Same reason we can't re-sign ramo either. We can take a risk on Ortio and whether he can develop into a starter (or backup or whatever), but we need one goalie who is a guaruntee to be able to play NHL games and win. Otherwise we de-rail the rebuid.
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Once you're past 8 games, that's over 10% of a season. That's enough to start looking at trends. I don't think he was bad, he just wasn't good either. And that defines 3 of his past 4 games. Hopefully its just not being used to playing that many straight and needing a break. Don't get me wrong, I've been in the camp almost since the call-up happened that Ortio deserves a chance to compete for NHL starter next year to see if he can earn it. I think he has the potential. What he lacks is consistency (though that seems to be improving) We definitely need a veteran starter for the next 2-3 years though. Ortio is a 50/50 shot at being able to be an NHL starter at best. So are most other prospects. We can't make that gamble at this stage of the rebuild. That worries me. That worries me a LOT. Do we need healthy competition? Yes. But it hould be between Ortio and an experienced goalie to see who earns the starter's job. Not a multi-way competition to see who gets playing time like screwed us over in the early part of this year.
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I'm not terribly worried about what goalie to protect. If Gillies is eligible to be picked, he will definitely be the one protected. if Gillies is not eligible, then we protect whoever our current starter is. If that's Ortio, great, if that's someone else, great. I'm a little concerned with Ortio's play the past week. 6 of his first 7 games since call-up were good to great, with one stinker on a team breakdown. 3 of his last 4 games have been weak, with one excellent game. Average is still decent (0.909, 2.55) but the trendline is a bit of a worry.
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Two games. When the entire team was playing horribly. When he had basically not played for a year outside two (three?) pre-season games. When there was that insane three goalie rotation going and he got the fewest starts. When our top D-man was out, and another of our top 3 was in his first days with the team. Yeah. That's a comparable situation to something that we'll regularly see in the future... Yes, there are problems with him. He needs to win close games when we don't have big offensive outbursts. But there are at best 2 losses since his return that could be qualified as that. 13-14 - 2.51 GAA 0.891 (9 GP) 14-15 - 2.52 GAA 0.908 (6 GP) 15-16 year start - 5.0 GAA 0.846 (2 GP) 15-16 since callup - 2.5 GAA 0.910 (10 GP) One of these things is not like the other things... So yes, it is VERY relevant whether you look at those first games of the year. They in no way represent the player. They are a product of the situation. EDITED to include tonight's game
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Including those two games from the beginning of the year should be irrelevant to the discussion of his play. Since call-up he is at 0.904 and 2.77. Neither of those are fantastic stats. But they're also as good or better than many of the replacement options being tossed around by people here. We have to be realistic. That means that while we accept that he's no price, he's also not a washout either and is worth looking at for next year. 6 games with 2 GA (only one win, one OTL) 2 games with 4 GA (one win one loss) 1 game with 5 GA (one loss) We should have at least 3 more wins in that time if we'd been scoring like the team usually does. IN summary he's had 2 games over 0.94 3 games over 0.92 1 game over 0.90 2 games of 0.88 1 game of 0.80 (which is a remarkable outlyer) That's not bad. Its not great either. But its not bad.
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I don't really care much about the win-loss ratio if he's losing 2-1 games for most of them (which are most of his losses since call-up) That's on the team's scoring not him. If he puts up anything under 0.900 POST-CALLUP, then we walk away. If he can do better we give him a chance and see.
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I'll defer. I've only played as a forward recreationally, and I've never really looked at goalie equipment (let alone the pro level stuff) Seeing those pics there's a lot more additional pieces than I expected.
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Interesting. While equipment has been getting bigger, I've never notice that the body protection or pants was a particular issue. Pads and blockers are more the issue in my mind. The body protection can only be so loose before it does more harm than good, so its a little difficult to abuse as much.
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1) Probably true. Given he's 0.904 since call-up, I think he's looking at an extention and "show me" contract. Though I debate the price if we're keeping it to one year. If he drops under 0.900 we need better options. I can't see him cracking 0.930 any way this season. 2) seems to already be happening.
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Either we're going to have to give him term or a small raise (1 mil or less though) to keep him. I'd rather spend a couple hundred K more than give him term. 800K-1mil for 1 year would be perfectly acceptable. Doesn't break our bank, and doesn't tie us to him if he can't keep it up. One goal was definitely on him. Two were stopable, but got him based on his play style. However, he made a lot of important saves as well that not every goalie would so I'd argue it balances out. Not a good game, no argument, but not as horrible as you make it sound. Don't get me wrong, he didn't play well in the 3rd in Ottawa, but honestly none of those three goals should have even got to him had the team been playing properly, so I think the farest thing to do is drop that outlier. That still elaves two weak games. The question is whether those continue to be the minority of games.
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I'd argue that the Ottawa game's third period was a full team breakdown. Take that out, his numbers still aren't great but they aren't as bad. (specifically 0.917, 2.50 GAA) With that, his numbers aren't fantastic, but they aren't terrible. Ottawa was a team breakdown. Blues was 7-4 river hockey. Yes, we have to factor those in, but I'd hardly call either of those typical. Assuming that those don't recur in the next 10 his numbers will definitely improve.
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Ortio has had two sub 0.900 games. I don't really blame him against the Blues as they're a top team in the league, and the score WAS 7-4 so it was a bit of river hockey going on, and he did make the key saves towards the end to keep it from being a more ridiculous score. That said, his play hasn't been as good as it was the few games before, so give him a game off and lets see how he does after a night away. He has had I think 8 straight starts, so he is due a rest anyway.
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Which is about 2 mil more than we can afford for a goaltender this coming season...
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Well, if he got 14 straight shutouts.... But no, I agree. Much though I like Ortio, and think he deserves a chance to be evaluated as a starter if he continues his current level of play consistently, Its insane to trust him with the keys to the kingdom. We didn't trade Iggy, dump all our vets and hand the keys to Monahan, Gaudreau, Beartschi and Bennett. We brought in a few vets who could give us relatively competitive, though not top end play, and kept them around until the kids were ready to shoulder the load on their own. Right now Ortio is where Monahan was after 9 games his first season. Promising, very promising, but not someone you put in the top role YET. Monahan and Gaudreau earned top line minutes within their first seasons. Ortio COULD earn starting goaltender within next season. But you don't just ASSUME he will. If he earns the job, you have a veteran mentor and backup who the flames can have faith in. If he doesn't, you still have a starting goaltender.
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I have to disagree with Both DD ad JJ respectively. 1) We are NOT going to get a "true" #1 goalie (aka cup-winner) this summer in UFA or Trade simply because we have cap problems due to 6 contracts that will be almost impossible to off-load, and because any trade to get one will cost someone we can't afford/dont want to trade. 2) We should NOT go into next year with 2 prospects competing for roles and no stability in net because this is a recipe or disaster. One hopefully would work out, but if neither does (or one goes down to injury and the other isn't up to par) we're screwed. And while we get another good pick out of it its a wasted season. When we Drafted Monahan, Gaudreau and Bennett, we didn't drop off every veteran forward the day after the draft to play these guys. We brought in a few veterans (even if contract length has become an issue on a couple), and kept around guys like Glencross, Hudler, Jones, Frolik and Stajan to shelter and mentor them while they grew into the roles. Monahan took most of a season before he was a 1st line center. Gaudreau took a few months. Bennett has taken a year and still has a little way to go to be a 'great" top 6 player, but is on his way. We only started shipping out GlenX, Hudler and Jones once it was clear that they'd been passed by the youth and were replaceable. Same thing is happening now on Defence with Kevin, Kulak, Nakladal and Wotherspoon pushing out Wideman, Smid, Engellend and Russell. We need to take that same approach in goal. In 10% of a season, Ortio is showing decent numbers. Could he be the future? I have no idea. Just like we really didn't know what we actually had in Monahan after 9 games when we were forced to keep him up. But we put him in a position to find out. We have a solid veteran who can give us decent (ie. league average) play while we develop him. Put Ortio in a position to start as backup or tandem and play his way to starter like the other guys did. Hopefully he can based on play so far. Blocking up the development system with a "maybe starter" vetran is bad for the future. Going in with two unproven goalies is bad for now and the future. Right now we are still in the later stages of rebuild. We have 4/6 top 6 players We have 4/6 bottom 6 players We have 3/4 top 4 D We have 4/2 bottom 2 D We have 0/2 goaltenders We have 6 contracts to off-load There's still another 2-3 years before we're cup contenders. But with the right moves in goal this year we are back to playoff contender next season. Tanking is unacceptable. Deluding ourselves that we're cup ready is unacceptable. We take the next step and finish building
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Agreed, Ortio had a slightly poor game, but only 2 of the 4 goals were on him. We'd have lost regardless. (Why do we only ever score 1 goal for this poor guy? He should have like 6 wins since coming up) Still, .88 save percentage, while bad, isn't horrendous. Its a bad game, every goalie has them. BTW, he's now played 8 full games since call-up, which is basically 10% of the season so we can start doing a fair performance evaluation. 0.907, 2.625 GAA Below league average, but still in the top 30. Remove the full-team breakdown of Ottawa: and it jumps to 0.923, 2.29 GAA which is more-or-less league average. He'll probably be close to 20 games post-call up by the end of the year. And assuming there's no more Ottawa-like games, I think we can definitely say he's a good bet for a contract for next year.
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All of the TWO games Ortio played before being sent down. You and I have very different definitions of "lengthy".
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NO. Definitely not. Ortio is a definite backup, who MIGHT be able to elevate himself to tandem or starter. But that's an unknown. The other guy we bring in has to be a sure thing. It's likely 3 years before Gillies reaches the NHL. We need one stable starter until then. I hope its Ortio, and he's certainly starting to make a case for that, but that's no garuntee so we need another option sitting ready to go that is more of a sure thing.
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Realistically we're not going to get much "better than Ramo" at the price we can afford to pay this year. We'll get right around league average, which is about what an un-injured Ramo would provide. Lets not get ahead of ourselves on that. Right now, we're signing a stop-gap for two years until Ortio proves he can play starter, or if he can't until Gillies is ready. Were not going to get top of the league goaltending at 4.5 million so lets not kid ourselves there. As for Ramo, I like the guy, but ACL surgery is not one I take a chance on. We're already going to have to take a chance on Ortio to see what he has, so we need a dependable NHL goaltender as the other half of the pairing. That eliminates Ramo. Had Ramo not been injured I'd feel differently. But then again, if he hadn't been we wouldn't be getting the look at Ortio we're getting now.
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I'm sure if you took the 6 best games from anyone's season you'd find a couple guys each season with a 1.000 save and 0GA average. I'm not remotely suggesting that that's Ortio's likely average over the season, but its interesting to note that he has that potential over a sequence of games. That's a bit of a higher ceiling thatn we've seen from him in years past. As someone mentioned above, he seems to see the opportunity and is putting all of himself into it. We are going to have to start averaging 3 goals a game with him in net though While I agree that we don't anoint him a starter I find it disappointing that so many (more than you two) are pegging his ceiling as being a "good backup". Yes, we need an experienced NHL goalie on a short-term contract for insurance. But why on earth we wouldn't give Ortio the opportunity to show he can be a 1a/1b or starter next season baffles me. When Gaudreau and Monahan came in no one said, "Oh, they had a few good games! They should get a short contract for our third line". No, all of us started thinking about what their ceiling could be. Look at Bennett, throughout the year people have said that he's the most dynamic player on the team and our future #1C. His freshman season is shaping up to be very similar to Monahan's and though he does have some brilliant moves, he's faded down the stretch. No one's crying to lock him into the bottom 6 because he hasn't had a good enough sample yet. We all still expect him to be a top 6 or top line center who will cost us a bundle. Yet for some reason no one's willing to give Ortio that same opportunity to prove himself, "backup's all he can be". No you don't hand him the keys to the net, and hire a 20 year old backup. That's stupid. But you give him the chance to run things and see how he manages. As this callup has shown, give him some rope to prove himself and he'll do a pretty good job. My goal would be to see how many games he can keep this up for, not limit him now. If he fails, have an NHL-ready starter ready to step in and keep the team competitive. If he succeeds, you know you have a veteran backup ready to go at all times as insurance and a trade chip for when another youngster (Gillies) is ready to step into the big league.
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0.930, 2 GAA Which would put him top of the league in each category. But lets not get ahead of ourselves on the basis of 6 of those games. If it gets up to 15 to 20....THEN I start to wonder.
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Ortio Since Callup update: Average 0.911 - 2.43 GAA 0.946 - 2 0.941 - 2 0.800 - 5 0.920 - 2 0.935 - 2 0.913 - 2 0.923 - 2 Dang that's a consistent GA. Also Equivalent of 31st in the league for Save % Equivalent of 20th in the league in GAA
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Hope this means that Ortio gets mot of the remaining starts. Backstrom gets 2-4. Hiller sits in the press box..
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