NORMAL GOALIE DEVELOPMENT (4 ARTICLES)
INTRODUCTION TO GOALTENDER DEVELOPMENT
more than 60% of goaltenders drafted between 2000 and 2010 have not played a single NHL game.
JUNIORS VS NCAA VS PRO'S
Normal goaltender development, then includes several years development between the time a player is drafted and the time they become an NHL goalie of any stripe. They all spend some time in a primary minor league like the AHL, SHL, or KHL at some point, regardless of how they spend the years up to that point, and the majority spend more than one season there.
PATH TO NHL RUNS THROUGH AHL
For virtually all goalies, the path to the NHL leads through the AHL at some point.
there’s a fairly normal career path that includes the following milestones: about 1-2 years in juniors OR about 2-3 years in the NCAA, some time in a secondary minor league (see below), and about 4 years in a primary minor league, including at least one year in the AHL and the NHL.
CONCLUSION
The average NHL goaltender played their first NHL game 3.98 seasons past their draft. The average first rounder: 3.68 seasons.
In some ways, they do. Eventual starters play their first NHL game slightly sooner than the population as a whole, getting that first game after about 3.25 seasons
Eventual starters also spend less time in primary minor leagues (3.45 seasons) than the population as a whole (4.24 seasons).
More significant, however, is that among players who get their first NHL game within three seasons of their draft, 40% (20/49) become starters at some point in their career, a somewhat better success rate than the population as a whole (30%) and definitely higher than those who play their first game four seasons out or later (20%).
GOALIE AGING CURVES
SV% BY AGE
the very best goaltenders peak at age 25.
HOW DO GOALIES AGE
Generally speaking a goalie will have his best years between ages 22 and 34 after which the drop off is fairly pronounced.
DECLINE WITH AGE
(Dec 2012)
Goalies do decline with age, and the goalies who have long careers are the ones who are better than average to begin with and so can withstand more decline and remain viable NHL options.
Once you account for survivorship bias, it seems very clear that goalie performance does decline with age.
HOW WELL DO GOALIES AGE
blatant outliers notwithstanding, goalies DO NOT IMPROVE with age.
Goalie performance is on average ALWAYS worse relative to average as they get older, even at young ages.
Your lousy 25 year old goalie is not going to get better with experience – he’s just going to get worse.
Goalies will fall off a cliff from age 35 on
1. Don’t improve as they get older
2. By age 30, goalie decline starts to get REALLY noticably
3. By mid-30s, even with the aging line, goalies rapidly start to fall apart.
GOALIE AGING CURVE
The older you get the more you are expected to drop off from the previous year
How much a player declines each years increases
This corroborates previous work showing that goalies start declining early
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