McKenna’s Mailbag: Answering questions about Thomas Greiss, Jonathan Quick and modern goalie gear

Mike McKenna
Mike McKenna(MikeMcKenna56)
McKenna’s Mailbag: Answering questions about Thomas Greiss, Jonathan Quick and modern goalie gear

By: Mike McKenna

Here’s the deets on the alumni game Ricky is asking about, from wellsfargocenterphilly.com:

In celebration of the 2021 Flyers Hall of Fame inductees, Paul Holmgren and Rick Tocchet, Flyers Charities and Flyers Alumni Charities will be hosting a Black and Orange Game at the Wells Fargo Center on November 15, 2021. The game will be a showdown between Team Tocchet and Team Holmgren and include Flyers from every decade. Rick Tocchet and Flyers Hall of Famers Eric Lindros, John LeClair and Mark Howe will hit the ice and will be joined by Danny Briere, Scott Hartnell and Scottie Upshall!

There are so many guys in the lineup that I can’t wait to meet. Skating against Lindros and LeClair will be a dream come true. LeClair better be using a Sher-Wood PMP 9950 stick and Lindros a Bauer Supreme 3030. Wood. Not composite. But I’m actually most excited to meet Joe Watson. My Grandpa Bill used to be a linesman in the old CPHL. He’d work the St. Louis Braves games and had fond memories of Joe. I have no idea if he’ll remember my Grandpa but I’m so excited to speak with him. He left a big impression and it’s a full circle moment for myself and my family.

I think Greiss has flown under the radar for a long time, mostly because of labelling. He was never the surefire prospect with San Jose – even bouncing to Sweden for a season. The only real chance he had to become an NHL number one goaltender was in Long Island in 2016-17, when he played 51 games and won 26 times. If he would have backed that up with strong numbers the following season, I think his career would have had a different trajectory. That didn’t happen.

Greiss is known as a complement goaltender among NHL GMs, someone who’s reliable but not necessarily capable of carrying a team to the Stanley Cup. Whether that’s warranted or not is up for debate. But I like Thomas Greiss. He has a career .914 save percentage and has won far more games than he’s lost in his NHL career. To me, he’s a quality goaltender that never really got a big push, and when he finally did, he wasn’t able to grab the opportunity and run with it.

I like your creative thinking. No doubt a reverse offside would keep teams hemmed into the offensive zone. But the reason teams have learned to reset back to the neutral zone is because the prevailing wisdom is that rush chances are more likely to score than in-zone possession during overtime.

Sadly, I don’t have statistics to confirm or deny that belief. But I can say that as a goaltender, I was more nervous when facing an odd-man rush than I was when the other team had the puck in our defensive zone. It’s a numbers game – having less players to defend is never optimal. I actually like it when a team resets – it speeds up the game. I know, it takes a bit to rev up that engine through the neutral zone, but once a rush chances breed themselves. I love it when play in overtime starts going end to end. To me there’s nothing more exciting. My only change to overtime would be to let it go until someone scores. I can’t imagine many games would make it past 10 minutes of OT. I was good at shootouts…but I don’t like ending games with them.

We’re talking about Jonathan Quick going paddle-down again, but let me rephrase the initial question: how hard is it for an NHL goaltender to break bad habits? I think it really depends on the goaltender and how ingrained certain techniques are. For Quick, paddle-down has been a go-to for so long that it’s nearly impossible to stop using it as much. I’m sure there have been conversations about it, I’m sure he’s trying to change. I have no doubt. But old habits die hard.

I say this about goaltending all the time: getting the most out of goaltenders at the higher levels is more about breaking habits than it is teaching new techniques. In today’s world, most goaltenders have a solid grasp on what is needed to succeed. But like any walk of life, bad habits creep in. That’s where goalie coaches are so critical. They can spot these habits and correct them. Having another set of eyes breaking down your game is invaluable.

To me, being patient as a goaltender means staying on your edges as long as possible. Not dropping before the shot. Having good goalie posture with a tall torso. Being patient means letting the shot come to you rather than attacking it. Controlling the puck. Making saves standing or partially upright when the time calls for it.

The butterfly style – and the quality of equipment – has allowed goaltenders to drop on almost every shot without fear of being injured or unable to recover to a rebound. So they default to it. When a goalie drops early, they open the top of the net and decrease their ability to track the puck, because their eyes are in motion. A lack of patience also leads to goaltenders dropping on passes and making poor reads. It all goes hand in hand. Patience is very, very difficult to teach. Some goalies have it. Some don’t. The best thing you can do is show video examples of when a goalie has stayed upright as long as possible. Goalies usually have more time than they think and need to take advantage of it.

There is no oversized goalie gear and there’s no issue. I don’t buy that for a second. Every goaltender’s body is measured countless ways and the regulations are consistent. No one is cheating. I know some people have taken screenshots of goaltenders and their untucked chest protectors look big, but that’s what happens when an athlete’s body is in motion. I think most people would be shocked at how little protection goalies actually have on their upper body. When the rules were rolled back a few years ago and goalie gear was streamlined, we were getting bruises left and right until the equipment companies caught up. I would not be in favor of a rule stating that chest protectors must be tucked into the goaltender’s pants. First, it would be incredibly hard to police. And second, I don’t see it as a problem. An untucked chest protector – to me – hasn’t made any extra saves. All it does is cushion the shot. I preferred a tucked chest protector because I could handle the puck better. And I felt safer. Every time I untucked my chest protector I ended up taking shots to the ribs. That wasn’t fun. It’s probably not surprising, but I like the rules as they are. I think it’s the right balance of safety and performance.

I’d like to think most goalie camps still teach all the relevant post integration techniques: RVH, VH and overlap. And maybe stand-up since Marc-Andre Fleury is the last remaining NHL goaltender to use it. When I’m coaching goaltenders, I like to know they are capable of all three. RVH is the most commonly used post-integration technique because it allows for coverage on the front and backside, but I still like VH as a save selection rather than a static blocking maneuver. Overlap works great on net drives. Basically I’d say this: if your daughter or son is attending a goalie camp that is only teaching RVH, I’d ask for a refund. Goalies need as many tools in their toolbox as possible.

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