Let's Go Blues

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nhl-puck- ... 17108.html

One thing I took away from this is that there are sure a lot of putzes out there. You most certainly can put a bigger net onto the existing holes, you just need to engineer the base of the net a bit differently. I do agree that goalie equipment needs to be shrunk down, but also in conjunction with a bigger net. I don't feel bad for the goalies (sorry ECBM) because 7 or 8 goals a game will be the new norm. A goalie with a 3 or 3.50 gaa will be considered excellent. The standard for excellence will change, but excellence in goaltending will still exist.

F'in absurd if you ask me.

Average is 5.32 g/game this season. So the average game is 3-2, and every third game is 4-2.

How is this a problem? I guess they want basketball scores and to piss on goalies even more.

The shootout is a problem.

The epidemic of diving is a problem.

Concussions are, indeed, a problem.

Off-ice criminal behavior and how it's handled is a problem.

Scoring is not a problem. (And while I'm on my soapbox: nor is the lack of a team in yet another market that isn't interested in hockey.) I appreciate the comments of GMs about how this never stops coming up and how one should consider whether the game is fine as it is. Personally I find it far more entertaining now than right after the rules changes. I can appreciate more about hockey than just scoring.

I think they should just leave it alone. People who are not entertained enough by hockey are idiots. I may be biased but hockey is the best sport on the planet. No two games are the same. On any given night any team can win.

Changing the net size or making the pads smaller would ruin the game. It's not like game are being decided 1-0 every night. I don't want to see teams scoring 10 goals every night. It would be like Baseball using softballs and bigger bats or football making goal posts wider or basketball(ugh) making the hoops twice the size.

The single biggest thing the NHL ever did or will ever do to increase scoring is to eliminate the clutching and grabbing that was endemic in this league prior to '05-'06. Opened up the ice and got rid of the slow guys that could still play until they were 45 by hanging on other players with their sticks.

I agree that they need to slow their roll about changing the game all the damn time. Let it sit. See how these last round of changes evolve the game. The kids coming into the league now: the Connor McDavid's and Jack Eichel's, now grew up playing the "new" 2005-2006 rules of no clutch and grab, etc, so we're going to see even faster and faster kids playing this game and the NHL is going to keep getting younger and younger.

IF they make changes I'm just in favor of regulated goalie pad sizes. We have the technology and equipment companies now that I'm sure we can mandate smaller sizes of equipment without compromising their safety.

WaukeeBlues wrote:The single biggest thing the NHL ever did or will ever do to increase scoring is to eliminate the clutching and grabbing that was endemic in this league prior to '05-'06. Opened up the ice and got rid of the slow guys that could still play until they were 45 by hanging on other players with their sticks.

Or opened it up for 43 year old guys who have skill and can still skate, like Jaromir Jagr, who don't have to contend with the clutchers and grabbers any more.

theohall wrote:

WaukeeBlues wrote:The single biggest thing the NHL ever did or will ever do to increase scoring is to eliminate the clutching and grabbing that was endemic in this league prior to '05-'06. Opened up the ice and got rid of the slow guys that could still play until they were 45 by hanging on other players with their sticks.

Or opened it up for 43 year old guys who have skill and can still skate, like Jaromir Jagr, who don't have to contend with the clutchers and grabbers any more.

That guy is a total freak of nature.

They could just go back to the days where no one wore any pads, helmets, masks, etc... I mean if we want to talk about changing the game, there have been myriad changes that have, as Goon would eloquently say, made it a pansy game. I see nothing wrong with cutting back on the size of goalie equipment. It's like watching the frikkin' Michelin man out there.

The HNIC discussion on this topic was reasonable, with the same sort of split opinions expressed above. They pointed out expanding the goals by just the width of the goalposts, not a huge change in size, would result in about 700 more goals per season.

Compared to the original 6 era, the goalies are bigger and more athletic, the pads are bigger and lighter, and the nets are the same size.

Best solution? I don't know. Asking a player to wear less protective gear (ie smaller pads) seems illogical. The bigger nets don't seem like a big issue to me (baseball wasn't ruined when they lowered the mound, basketball three point lines vary from the NBA to college to International play so the NHL having a different net size isn't a major problem), but won't increase scoring very much(estimate was around 6.4 goals per game). Call every ticky tack obstruction? We all know it won't happen in the 3rd, OT or playoffs; and I don't want games that are endlessly alternating power plays.

Bigger ice surface? Way too expensive to do. Change to 4 on 4 as the norm? No way the NHLPA agrees to that.

Go back to the equipment size for goalies from when Roy started in the NHL. Look at when he first started in the NHL to when he finished.

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We live in an age of advanced technology. You are telling me no one can make smaller goalie pads that offer the same amount of protection?*

*This question was not directed to any one of you directly...just throwing it out there.

To me, the immense size of the goalie equipment takes a lot out of the position. You don't need to be as athletic anymore, if you have some fundamentals and can move side to side fast enough, your pads do a lot of the work for you. Shrinking the equipment will separate the great goalies from the good and from the bad, and will encourage would be goalies to develop better skills so they can adapt to a change in the game the same way offensive players had to adapt to the rule changes.

I just can't see the reason to want to increase the net size. Ok if you want to reign in the goalie equipment size again (they've done that before right?) The game is good as is. In my opinion a 2 - 1 game is just as interesting as a 6 - 5 game if played the right way. I love a good save just as much as a sick goal.

When they placed rules against clutching and grabbing / interference they did away with the New Jersey Devils type of boring games from the 90's. I'm totally against changing the net size.

Goalie equipment was not initially meant to take up space and stop the puck, it was meant to protect the goaltender, period.

Nowadays, the equipment is huge and plays a role in taking up a lot of space in the net, which isn't how the elders intended it to be.

Granted, scorers now are much more prolific, so if we did go back to the pretty small pads they had back in the 60's & 70's, you'd see scoring skyrocket. We'd see games with 15 goals scored quite often.

You'd have to scale things back across the board. Shrink the goalie equipment, take away the tank-like armor that players wear on the shoulders and elbows...and go back to wooden sticks.

None of that is likely to happen though...except for maybe shrinking of the goalie equipment some. (but they did this already a number of years ago, just apparently not enough).

I think increasing the size of the goal is a horrible idea. The goalie equipment can easily be shrunk, they just have to do create the rule and enforce it. Plain and simple...done. Scoring concerns are fixed. Changing the size of the goal from what it has been for over 100 years, is stupid. Rolling back the size of the goalie equipment closer to what it used to be (back in the late 80's or so) but not tiny like it was a LONG time ago (60's & early 70's), is easily the way to go.

It's a no brainer if you ask me.

The Flake wrote:The game is good as is. In my opinion a 2 - 1 game is just as interesting as a 6 - 5 game if played the right way. I love a good save just as much as a sick goal.When they placed rules against clutching and grabbing / interference they did away with the New Jersey Devils type of boring games from the 90's. I'm totally against changing the net size.

Yep. This whole shit begs the question.

Somebody, anybody tell me WHY 5.32 goals per game is a problem.

I'm waiting. I've been waiting. Somebody actually make this argument. Thanks.

cprice12 wrote:except for maybe shrinking of the goalie equipment some. (but they did this already a number of years ago, just apparently not enough).

Enough for what? Anything other than the NHL's desire to market the game to non-hockey fans?

Why do you want more scoring?

ecbm wrote:Somebody, anybody tell me WHY 5.32 goals per game is a problem.

No argument from me on that one. Gord Stellick and Rob Simmer, the morning NHL Radio guys, were discussing this and Gordo mentioned his informal poll of "non-traditional" fans in which 70% of them went to games to see hitting and fights, not more scoring. But the NHL doesn't want to hear that and won't include it in reasons fans want to watch hockey.

I don't think anyone wants to go back to the 80s where games had almost 7.5 goals per game.

My answer to "Why do you want more scoring?" is why do you want less scoring?

Was hockey in the 1980's not hockey because it doesn't fit the standard of the 21st century game? Scoring was elevated in the 1980's... so what? It didn't ruin the integrity of the game.

I don't think the argument is necessarily more or less scoring. It's why bother changing it at all. Isn't the way the game is right now just fine? Quit tinkering with the rules every year for a little while.

Why did they bother changing it in the first place? The 80's gave us great goalies like Grant Fuhr, Billy Smith, Andy Moog and eventually Patrick Roy, scoring was high but excellence in goaltending still existed. The amazing save won't go away if scoring goes up. Now pedestrial goalies like Corey Crawford can win Cups, even multiple times. If scoring goes up, the goalies will have to adjust to keep their teams competitive when it's a (non-literal) shootout and elites vs. so-so's will become obvious.

glen a richter wrote:Why did they bother changing it in the first place? The 80's gave us great goalies like Grant Fuhr, Billy Smith, Andy Moog and eventually Patrick Roy, scoring was high but excellence in goaltending still existed. The amazing save won't go away if scoring goes up. Now pedestrial goalies like Corey Crawford can win Cups, even multiple times. If scoring goes up, the goalies will have to adjust to keep their teams competitive when it's a (non-literal) shootout and elites vs. so-so's will become obvious.

Nothing changed. There are, for example, rules about the size of goalies' pads. Always have been. Players push to the limits to try to gain an advantage, often pushing right into a grey area and beyond. But hey, so what? That's what refs are there to police. Everyone remembers McSorley's illegal curve, right? What's different now to the 80s is that the NHL has been captured by its marketing department, thus the meddling. I don't think changes should be made to the game unless the hockey people involved really want it. The changes in 05-06, those were things many in the sport had been asking for for a long time, mainly the whole "call holding/hooking/interference as they're described in the rules". I don't think anyone was considering bigger nets or smaller goalie equipment until the brain trust at the NHL suggested it.

Scoring will rise and fall naturally. Let it be. The most ridiculous thing I've read on this? This morning, I read a column in the Washington Post by Neil Greenberg, statistical analyst, saying that refs should just call more penalties. He basically observes a trend in penalty calls per game that, to me, shouts that players have adjusted to the new rules and are taking less penalties than they did right after the changes. That's what the eye test tells me too. So this non-hockey expert's genius idea: reward that by calling more borderline plays penalties. It's like there's a class of people who are thinking: it can't be entertaining hockey if there aren't 6 goals per game, so let's manipulate shit to get the average up to that no matter what. It's ridiculous.

I'm not saying the game today isn't entertaining. I think we can all agree hockey is the greatest sport on Earth. What I'm asking is this: is one type of hockey (lower scoring) more or less entertaining than another (higher scoring)? Was the game in the 80's a bummer to those who prefer lower scoring games and the game today a bummer to those who prefer higher scoring games? The NHL has gone above and beyond to protect the goalie by allowing Michelin man body armor, the same way specific members of other sports (can't touch the punter!) have special privleges as a result of the position they play. As dmiles pointed out, with the modern technology we have today, we can't make equally safe goalie equipment that's not as huge? It's inherently difficult to score on a net when there's hardly any empty net to shoot at. It makes lousy goalies good and it doesn't help differentiate between the good and the bad ones the same way that we can easily figure out who are and who aren't the offensive stars and defensive stars. It's an issue of requiring the goalie to be more athletic rather than relying on their equipment to make the saves. I get not making the nets bigger. I don't get not making the equipment smaller.