The Death of the Elite Goalkeeper
Antti Niemi had a total of three National Hockey League starts to his name prior to the beginning of last season. Now he is a Stanley Cup winning goaltender. Unfortunately, Niemi’s success will not just cost him money, but actually reshape the entire goaltending market.
Niemi, who earned $827 thousand last season, has reinforced the trend of relatively inexpensive goaltenders being in between the pipes for extremely successful teams. Even if the Blackhawks had lost to the Philadelphia Flyers in the Finals, the trend would have been proven, as neither member of the Flyers' goalkeeping duo [Brian Boucher and Michael Leighton] had a salary above $1 million a year.
The year before this, the now seemingly expensive Chris Osgood, who only made $1.417 million, helped Detroit to the Stanley Cup the year after they had won it.
This seems to spell the end for the ‘elite’ goaltender. Teams are now slowly moving to a trend of inexpensive goalkeeping bolstered by team spending elsewhere. This has been evident in this year’s free agent market. Former San Jose Sharks goalkeeper Evgeni Nabokov could not get a contract from any NHL teams. Veteran keepers Marty Turco and Jose Theodore have not been courted by any teams. Even younger keepers like Chris Mason and Dan Ellis took pay cuts to get signed.
This trend may have been started by Detroit Red Wings general manager Ken Holland, himself a former goaltender. According to Holland: "Other than the top few goalies, I've always said the defensemen are the most important players in the game today. In the days of [Dominik] Hasek and [Patrick] Roy and [Martin] Brodeur, the feeling was that the goaltender was the most important player in the game because they were so dominant. Well, we don't really have that any more."
This philosophy, based in part on the 2005 NHL rule changes which restricted goalies to a trapezoidal area in net, seems to be spelling the end for the concept of high-priced goalies.
While there are still some serious free agent goaltenders available, the NHL as a whole currently has about $140 million committed to 52 goalies. Even with possible signings, this will statistically result in a much lower percentage of team funds spent on goaltending. Additionally, this number is inflated by large contracts held by goalkeepers like Boston Bruin Tim Thomas [$5 million] and Florida Panther Tomas Vokoun [$5.7 million].
As these remnants of a different era in hockey depart, the younger free agents will simply not be given offers like that and the trend will show itself to be even more severe within a few years.
Mathematically, the trend makes sense. Analysis shows that there has been very little correlation between the percentage of a team’s salary cap spent on goaltending and the team’s subsequent victory rate.
As Holland notes: "Everyone who plays in the NHL is pretty good. But there's a cut-off line where there is a major difference between the very elite goalies in the world and everyone else."
These elite goalies, like the New York Rangers’ Henrik Lundqvist, do exist but will also suffer from this development. The winning percentage for these goaltenders is overall only slightly advantageous and no team with an expensive keeper has won a Stanley Cup in a noticeable time.
Unfortunately for Niemi, his Stanley Cup victory may even cost him his job. The Blackhawks chose to match the offer sheet for restricted free agent Niklas Hjalmarsson, even if it meant not being able to re-sign Niemi. If they release Niemi, they’ll be able to sign Turco or Theodore for a cheap rate, something Niemi actually perpetuated.
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