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Getting to the Core of These Tough Encores |
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A secondary theory on why Year Two is so much harder on a goalie than Year One is that such is not always the case, even if it seems like it.
After what should have been a hard-to-duplicate run to Game Seven double overtime of the conference final in 1994, Marty Brodeur won the Stanley Cup in 1995. And here a sampling of some more guys who were just as good the second time around as the first that they carried the big load for their teams: Dominik Hasek, Jonathan Quick, Curtis Joseph, Henrik Lundqvist and John Vanbiesbrouck.
So you can’t take it with certainty to your fantasy draft that Jordan Binnington and Carter Hart will this season suffer the same right of passage as once did Patrick Roy, Grant Fuhr, Pelle Lindbergh, Ed Belfour, Ron Hextall, Corey Crawford, Carey Price, Roberto Luongo, Tukka Rask and, as we try to keep things all up to do date here at Hockey Buzz, Connor Hellebuyck. But as it clearly has happened to the best of them, we went right to the source of someone who lived that nightmare to gain some insight as to why, in standup days and since, the second year has so often turned into a flop.
A (Steve) Penney for the thoughts of Brian Boucher, who once considered himself an abject failure at age 23 and lived to tell about it for a living.
“My rookie year (1999-00), I had a goals against of under two (1.91),” said NBC’s Boucher. “And that is extremely hard to do.
“You almost have to be perfect night after night and at the end of the day you are not going to be. You put too much pressure on yourself.”
Perfectly set up to fail in 2019-20 is Binnington, the goalie the Blues didn’t know they had until they had nobody else to trust. He then backstopped them from last place in the league to a Stanley Cup in six months. It didn’t seem real, so yeah; let him prove that it was. By November 1, preferably.
Almost as doomed to disappoint could be Hart, who has worn flowing robes and carried two tablets since a 48th overall pick dramatically blossomed as the long-sought hope of the perennially empty-netted Flyers. Called up in an emergency halfway through his first pro season, he keyed a 19-5-2 run for a team dead in the water.
There is very little skepticism around the league about Binnington and Hart’s legitimacy, just a lot of curiosity about how they are going to handle what so many goalies of pedigree, going back to Bernie Parent as a young Bruin, could not.
On the mean streets of Twitter, critiholics who never let the facts stand in the way of their next generalization cannot remember a single save by a single Flyer goalie in 30 years. They forget Boucher was a first-round pick who in 2000 seized the No, 1 job away from Vanbiesbrouck, won two rounds, and took the heavily-favored Devils to a Game Seven in the Eastern Conference final, losing it 2-1.
Boucher looked like the answer and then a year later became just another question. He rebounded to play 13 seasons, enjoy moments like a still-NHL record five-game shutout streak with the Coyotes and even returned to Philadelphia to start its run to the 2010 final, until he got hurt. But in his encore season of 2000-1, Boucher was a mess of his own making.
“Everything I had touched my rookie year turned to gold,” he recalls. “We didn’t win the whole thing but had a big run just as my (entry) contract was up.
“There weren’t comparables to what I was worth (after just one good year) so it put me in an odd spot and at times it was contentious. I took all that to heart, wanted to prove to Mr. (Ed) Snider and Bob Clarke and the Flyers that I was worth the (two year, $3.1 million contract) I received. It wasn’t like I got $8 million, but I don’t think they thought I was of that [value], at least not yet, so I wanted to prove I was worth every dollar and put way, way, too much pressure on myself to be perfect.
“I was overwhelmed, unprepared to be a legitimate No. 1 goalie at that age.”
Boucher had played a couple years in the AHL. Almost every goalie gets minor-league time now. But generally the ones who went from year one to year two as a starter without taking a step backwards–Andrei Vasilevskiy, Braden Holtby, Frederik Andersen–served time as NHL backups.
Learning how to stop the puck apparently is much easier than learning how to handle a sudden inability to stop it, especially if it is for the first time in one’s life. Confidence slips, perspective goes, panic sets in and an utter natural like Lindbergh, is spending his second season on a banana peel. And when that happens, what is a team to do besides go to the other guy?
After playing on fire during the Canadiens 1986 Cup run, Roy had to be benched in favor of Brian Hayward during the 1987 conference final. After enduring one of the worst-ever debacles suffered by a favorite, Edmonton’s loss to Los Angeles in 1982, Fuhr wasn’t the Oilers playoff goalie when they got to the finals the following year. Andy Moog was.
So how is it that a lot of these kids could handle the game’s biggest stage and fell apart afterwards, when only the home fans were watching? Actually, in that remarkable 1986 run, Roy didn’t merely handle the pressure. It may have helped to make him.
“When you play deep into the playoffs there is a drive, both in the locker room and all around the team, that give you jolts of energy,” said Boucher. “It’s easier in those situations to elevate your game, even though the stakes are higher. You are playing on Cloud Nine.
“What I found difficult is recreating that level of passion and energy in October. The reality is those games don’t have the same juice. Your team may not play with the same energy and attention, so that means a goalie has to be even better than his team until it gets its rhythm, one more reason to feel pressure.
“When you became the No. 1 guy, you have to manage your practices and understand that there is a different routine in being a No. 1 versus No. 2. At No. 2 you practice a little harder to maintain your readiness. But as a No. 1 you have to find ways to manage your practices. When is it time to work and when do you pull back? It’s a big learning curve. And a long year.
“The other thing is that teams have a book on your tendencies, making it harder still. It’s a good league. They do their homework on you and you have to make adjustments.
“But I also think these guys today are better trained in mental strength, focus and preparation than 15 years ago. And, both then and now, I’ll say this with certainty: No guy who had a good rookie year goes into the next one taking his foot off the gas. Ninety-nine per cent of the time, it’s a case of trying too hard.”
After a Vezina Trophy rookie season, in which he took his team all the way to Game Seven and practically reinvented puck handling with the big stick, Hextall announced his intentions of trying to be the best goalie ever. He wasn’t bragging, just trying to raise his bar but the effort exhausted him and then the self-loathing set in. He would have gotten over it, but injuries intervened and he never was the same again.
As he moves into What’s Next, it should help Binnington that he never was The Next.
“He has been through the grinder (four AHL teams in five years, dumped to a non-St. Louis affiliate because there was a prospect the Blues valued higher) and so is far more mature than I ever was in that situation,” said Boucher. He is older (26) and eaten more humble pie and is a little more calloused.
“In talking to him last week, I don’t get the sense he is putting any pressure on himself. So I don’t think there will be a huge dropoff. Not saying he will play to a .925 and not saying that he won’t, only that I wouldn’t be surprised if there is a little drop. But I don’t get the sense he is going to get eaten alive by it.”
And Hart? Since blossoming as Canada’s best junior goalie, he hasn’t suffered a hard time since, save for a slow start last season at Lehigh Valley, He overcame that quickly, a good sign, but the Flyers have waited so long for a savior, he had better not put himself in the role of delivering them anything but his next save.
“He seems like a real mature kid really focused on the process who doesn’t get excited about the noise around him,” said Boucher. “I think he will be fine.
“But I’ll say this, having a veteran in Brian Elliot with him is going to be important. I don’t know what the plans are. If it is to have Carter play 60-plus, he probably could do it, but I wouldn’t be afraid to use Elliott. You need time to shut off. Once the most important part of the year comes, it’s go-go-go and if you have been to the well too much [play] can drop off and then confidence can be a problem. I would take a conservative approach.”
Binnington could put his ring on a chain and wear it under his chin flap, but the bouncing against his trachea could cause breathing difficulties. Now that he has won that piece of jewelry, the cache and inner peace it brings will become a leaning post through his career, but for now the best place for storage is the bottom of the sock drawer. Hart should remind himself he won 17 games last year and still needs two to pass Michael Leighton for 29th place on the all-time Flyer victory list.
And if Boucher knew than what he knows now?
“My advice would be, ”Don’t think you can do it like last year,’” he said. “You have to realize that this is new one, when there are going to be bumps it the road. It doesn’t mean you are a bad goalie all of a sudden.
“Focus on the process, the preparation, and on your off-days getting your work in. Be realistic with yourself. There is enough pressure. You don’t have to compound it.”
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