Rocket:
“Playing goal for the Montreal Canadiens is the toughest position in sports” — Pierre McGuire.
Well Habs fans, there’s no shortage of opinions today on what’s wrong with the Canadiens..but most of them revolve around Carey Price. “Price is still injured” “Fire Rollie Melanson” “Carey lost too much weight” Some of these bizarre comments make my head spin. Carey Price is a convenient target but he is not the source of problems for the Canadiens.
It seems that fans have completely blanked out the first period of the Leafs game. Price faced 18 shots and allowed 1 goal Even Boone said “Price is exceptionally sharp”. So how did Price go from standing on his head in the first to supposedly losing his technique in the 2nd and 3rd?
I was talking to a knowledgeable hockey person about the game. He offered this observation: “Carey Price keeps second guessing his reads on plays because he doesn’t trust his teammates to be there.” Exactly! While some are saying that Carey Price has lost confidence in himself, I believe that he has lost confidence in his teammates, specifically some of the defensemen in front of him.
Craig Simpson mentioned a few times that Price was playing deep in his crease. Jaroslav Halak normally plays deep but Carey does not. So when do goalies play deep? Remember the All-Star game? All goalies said they played deeper in the crease due to a lack of defense. The all-star goalies had to protect against the cross-ice pass. So there seems to be a parallel when Price does not trust his defensemen.
A prime example is Jason Blake’s goal that beat Price glove side high on a 2 on 1. Normally Price would challenge the shooter, but doing so Carey would have to be confident that his defensemen would take away the pass/the second attacker. Josh Gorges was the defenseman on the play. Josh was -4 on Saturday night. Price had to stay deep, and in fact was leaning towards the long side to protect against the pass. As result, the short side was exposed to a great shot by Blake.
This explanation also fits with Carey Price playing so well in the first period.
So rather than focus on Price, Canadiens fans should look at the defensive corps that has struggled all season long. The addition of a quality defenseman with power-play ability will help at both ends of the ice.
Excellent review, and very true. A goaltender can only compensate for his team so much before he really begins to suffer.. which is what happens to Carey Price (and possibly to Halak as well). I think that a lot of people arn’t blaming Price for what happened during that game (especially if they actually SAW the game), simply because of the poor team work that happened in front of the net.
And I mean.. if this is happening to both goalies, maybe it says something about the team rather than them. (And — please do not shoot me I know this is a Habs blog — this is very reminicent of whats happening in Toronto. Goalies trying to overcompensate for a lack of defence and its not going right. And all three (or five in this case) goalies cannot ALL be bad, right?)
No shooting here…maybe for other commenters, but not this one. :)
I agree…you are absolutely right! Price has done all he can to contribute to the team. And then, as you mentioned, he tried to overcompensate for the team's failings. At the end of the game, he was completely spent (physically & emotionally), frustrated, and left without a solution to fix this team. Thing is, he can't do it on his own.
Excellent comment!
Hey Rocket, I agree that there seems to be a lot of over reacting and scape goating going on up there lately. I can’t say that watching the Habs struggle saddens me, but some of the finger pointing is getting out of control. The one thing I’ve noticed about Price is, he seems to be so reliant on technique, that if things get out of sorts in front him, he “gives up” on plays (for lack of a better term). I don’t mean he gives upon the game overall, but if he drops into his butterfly and a shot gets deflected/blocked or whatever, and ends up headed to the far post…he barely reacts and seems to assume the goal. Hard to describe exactly what I mean, but when you watch the goals, most of the time he’s still on his knees with barely a move towards the puck. Not to start a(nother) Thomas vs the world debate, but the one hing everyone agrees on is his “compete level”. He never ever gives you the impression that he conceded a goal. If he’s down on the left post and it ends up on the right side, he will dive, crawl, flop…whatever it takes to get SOME part of his body on the puck. Style points, or even effectiveness aside, it has to be maddening watching your goalie sort of “let” goals be scored. Not saying if Price scrambled around the crease he would have stopped any of the goals against Toronto. But he *might* have stopped one or two. Personally, I’d like to at least see my goalie appear to give every effort on every shot.
I know the above will be construed as “Hab bashing” or “Price hating”, but it isn’t. It’s just one fans observation.
Kynch
Hey Kynch..
Thanks for the well-reasoned comment. I know (and others should know) that you were not Price bashing…well, not here anyway. :)
Carey Price is an exceptionally talented goaltender who relies on technique and positioning. His aim is to make himself big improving the odds that the puck with hit him. Many of the young goaltenders have adopted a similar style: Steve Mason, Cory Schneider, Chet Pickard.
Comparing Carey Price to Tim Thomas is like comparing apples to…well…a big, bouncy, luvable pear. Price has nothing to learn from Thomas and vice-versa. Their styles are just so different.
Thomas makes up for his lack of technique by battling. As Craig Simpson would say ‘playing desperate’.
Price is a thinking goalie. He has superb vision of the ice and sees things that others miss: like positioning of the shooters hands, angle of the stick blade, etc. Problem is that a thinking goalie also notices inadequacies in his team mates when things are going poorly. Price gets in trouble when he tries to compensate for those team failures.
Like I said, I don’t want to turn this into a “Price vs. Thomas” thing. They are obviously two very different styles, and one couldn’t play the other’s. I will say though, Thomas does still get a bad rap when it comes to technique. His technique has gotten much better. And, he plays a much more controlled style when his team is playing good D in front of him….just like price.
And of course I wouldn’t outright “bash” in here. I have SOME class you know! I know to only put my feet up on my own sofa, I wouldn’t do that in anyone else’s house. :)
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