Do Goalies Need to Face Shots in Order to Stop Shots?
by Hawerchuk on Dec 3, 2009 9:00 AM EST
in Shot Quality
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PrintRich Pollock asked me an interesting question the other day:
"I was watching the Sens today, and the announcers kept saying that Leclaire hadn't seen any shots in the second and that goalies need action to "play better/feel in the rhythm." I was wondering if goalies actually did post better statistics when challenged more often."
There are a bunch of ways to look at this, but let's see if goalies - in general - give up more goals if they haven't faced a shot recently:
We see the rebound effect for the first four seconds, but if a goalie hasn't faced a shot for between five and 150 seconds, it has no impact on the percentage of shots he allows. I've included all shots at net here - including posts, crossbars, shots over the net and shots that went wide. Even if these shots weren't on target, they presumably gave the goaltender something to work on.
Basically, this hockey announcer truism just isn't true.
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I remember looking at this once, and, at the game level, I found that the save percentage was higher, the more shots were faced (after controling for the goalie).
Perhaps if you look at save percentage by number of shots faced in the previous 5-65 seconds, you might get a different number. For example, perhaps if he faced 0 shots in the previous 5-65 seconds, his save % might be .950, and if he faced 1 shot it might be .952, and 2 shots it might be .954, etc, etc.
You could do it at the league level, and at the individual goalie level (and take the simple average of the 30 goalies with the most minutes).
I’d bet that the goalies do not shots to be sharp.
I’ll check it out. The 0,1,2..N shots in the previous X seconds approach makes sense. My concern with game level stats is that trailing teams get a lot of low-quality shots, so the outshot goalie is expected to have a higher SVPCT.
tango,
in your study did you use all shot attempts like gabe did, or did you just use shots on goal?
by sunnymehta.com on Dec 4, 2009 1:00 PM EST up reply actions
I think this is one of those things that are casy by case. When I played goalie, if I didn’t see a shot for 15 minutes, it definetly made me lose SOME focus. I wouldn’t say it hindered me to a large degree or the effect lingered but it’s true.
The problem is this may not apply to all goalies and the effect may be overstated in the media blanter. I’m sure if we did that study on a case by case basis, I’m sure some goalies may be effected by it, but as the chart says for the general population, overall it’s not that big an issue.
I second this – going long stretches without seeing a shot always made me a little uneasy and took me out of the game, I felt. Maybe it’s just our perception that our focus is down, or maybe it’s one of those things that gets weeded out by that level of hockey.
I think any easily perceptible issue like you describe gets weeded out at the NHL level. We can’t draw conclusions from our own playing experiences and apply them to professionals who spend every day of their lives playing hockey for decades. We also need to be careful not to draw conclusions based on limited observation.
At the same time there has been testifications from NHL goalies who said it was an effect. The problem is whether or not it’s substantial which it probably isn’t, what the time sample is over a year of shots faced after a long period which I’d also guess is minimal and also how much of it is in the goalies head.
Kinda like I ran a red light when my car seat was too far back, doesn’t mean I ran the red light because of it, but it happened at the same time. So I can see after a long duration of not shots a goalie letting a goal in and thus making a correlation. Again, I’d be curious to see this study in an isolated case fashion.
2.5 minutes isn’t a terribly long time between shots. If the data is available, try getting up to the 5 or 10 minute range.
by Belligerent Burkie on Dec 4, 2009 6:27 PM EST reply actions
Yeah, two and a half minutes isn’t the time frame you typically hear this one said. It’s much more likely to happen after a 5-15 minute gap.
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It’s pretty rare to go 15 minutes without a shot, right? If we assume that 50 shots are directed on goal per game, then assuming a uniform distribution, it only happens 2.5 times per season.
Prob of no shot: (1 – 50/3600)
Per 900 seconds: (1 – 50/3600)^900
Must start in first five minutes of period: 300 opportunities
Total opportunities per season = 2 * 1230 * 300 * (1 – 50/3600)^900 = 2.5
Exactly, you don’t have many games where you go even 5 minutes without a shot; meaning that you generally don’t have time to lose focus to the point where it alters your performance. Do you have data for 5 minutes? I think 10 and 15 are probably too high and wouldn’t have sufficient data to make a conclusion on.
by Belligerent Burkie on Dec 5, 2009 4:24 PM EST up reply actions
I agree with Belligerent Burkie and Doogie2K that 150 seconds is not long enough to look for a lag in the goalie’s concentration. 5+ minutes, more like it.
I’ve included all shots at net here – including posts, crossbars, shots over the net and shots that went wide.
What about shots that are blocked?
I’d be tempted to go the other way, restrict your data just to shots on goal (which is what the truism generally refers to). For sure you would find more examples of longish gaps between shots.
Writer for The Copper & Blue and primary shareholder of Zorg Industries
One part of the saw is that "reflex" goalies like to see a lot of shots
while positional ones don’t care. I wonder if you could break out the CuJo’s and Hasheks of the world for this anlaysis? Would be a lot of coding.
and the Mustache of Truculence (formerly Canada4Mizzou)
I think so...
I feel that in games where I see a lot of action, I play that much better. When there is a lot going on, I seem to get in ‘the zone’. Once in that advanced state of focus, it seems like you get a piece of pucks you normally wouldn’t get to, like through a screen or a deflection. When there isn’t much going on, say 3-4 minutes with no SOG, I get cold, and pucks seem to find a way in. I much prefer a busy game.
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