Richter's Windmill

[barnhart_goalie]

I saw Mike Richter pull off the "Windmill" (where he stacks the pads, then swings his feet over him while the shooter tries to shoot above him) I was wondering is there a technical way to do this?? I tried it at practice and the shooter made me look like a fool. I'm not that big so my legs won't cover alot of the net. Anyone have any input??

[Timberwoof]

I don't believe in windmills.

Whether your arm or leg is moving or stationary, it blocks the same amont of area. Moving the arm or leg doesn't increase your chances of stopping the puck. At any one instant, your arm or leg is covering only a specific area, and if the puck is somewhere else, that's that.

The stacked-pad safe is a desperation move with certain assumptions and consequences. One assumption is that the shooter is close enough that he can't get the puck into the air over you and into the net. Another assumption is that you can get into that position in time before the puck hits you. A consequence is that you're completely out of stance and position for the next few seconds until you get up again. So the way I look at it, it's not a usual move. Embellishing it with an arm or leg in the air to block some high shot seems like a waste of time. If you can see well enough to do that, why didn't you stay in your stance and block the high shot the usual way?

(When I learned a nice technical way to do the stacked-pad save, the final piece in the sequence was to get back up again. So now whenever I practice it, I end up on my feet.)

[sloth2946]

Yeah, try something else maybe?! Best I can do on a rather silly question.

Oh, and for Timber's answer, sometimes you need to change the move in the middle of things when the shooter realizes that you have him and he changes what he is doing, so on a pad stack a flailing pad or glove is something that is necessary sometimes, but I think we both agree that to drop in a pad stack to try and make a windmill glove save is retarded and a waste of energy and more often then not unsuccessful.

[Snydes1987]

i do the windmill all the time. I usually just do it in practice to **** off my teamates, but I've pulled it off a few times in games. There really isn't any reason why I do it it's just a reaction and I've become very good at it. Also when ever I do it the other team gets frustrated and the crowd goes crazy.

[Old Swiss2]

I've done it, but only on an odd broken play. (I was late coming across did a stack and the puck took an odd bounce to the other side of the net, so I tried the flip.) It is fun and spectacular, but ineffiecient and desperate.

Old Swiss2

[stollie_the_goalie]

I did it one time (and only once), and I ended up winning a tournament for my team off it. Otherwise we would have been eliminated.

No idea how I did it, or why I even thought to do it, but my team was down by 3 goals in the third period, and their best player had a breakaway. he goes top shelf, and I guess I meant to do a pad stack, but since he shot it high, I threw my legs up and the puck ended up hitting my toe instead of going top corner. Needless to say, we scored on a breakaway on the same play, and ended up scoring 3 more goals in that game and winning the championship.

Sorry to bore you guys. I just thought it was really cool.

[barnhart_goalie]

Thats INSANE, that kind of save is what changes the momentum for your team. I just would like to do it sometime. I read on www.promasque.com an artcile on creativity in goaltending, I used Hasek's "Snow Angel" (where your on your back and you spread out your arms and legs to make a desperate attempt at saving the shot) the team I was facing didn't have much skill though. A half-decent player would have lifted it up over me. Well enough of my babling. I hope someone out there knows anything about it.

[Timberwoof]

Stollie, that was a great story. I enjoyed reading it. And I'll accept no more self-deprecation out of you, young man! You, too, Barnhart. Your posts and questions are worthwhile ... don't apologize for them. (Maybe I should become a motivational speaker... But I'm not aure anyone would listen to me.)

I look at spectacular saves this way: I try to make my saves be routine and correct, and save the spectacular stuff for special occasions. To me, a goalie who's flopping and thrashing around all over the place without good reason isn't working from the basis of good technique. It's the old thing about "If you had to make a spectacular save, you were out of position to begin with."

What's a special occasion? Oh, two opponents playing tennis in front of your crease while your defensemen rush in to help. You make that save, and it's spectacular no matter how you pull it off.

[Bryan]

The windmill leg save is in the same category as the hasek rollover. If you made the right move in the first place, there would be niether the need nor the time to do it. The only reason one should see this type of save is as a second effort after you screwed up on the first move.

Making saves of this nature on a regular basis is pretty much iron clad proof that you doing more guessing than reacting.

[Leffler]

I did it last night. The shooter hit the post. Not something I would like to add my repetiore.

[Ryan]

Tonight in my game, a player had a breakaway coming down the boards, and cut in to come to the center. As im skating backwards with the player, I go to poke check I miss, and I stack the pads. He shoots the puck, I was seconds away from him roofing the puck on me in a breakaway, until I swing my leg and my arm up desperation and I made a great glove save. Making a save like that makes your confidence level shoot sky high. Thats my story.

[stripes]

Okay, "proper goaltending technique" (as we've heard from Woof, Bryan and Sloth) has the following to say on this subject:

1. You weren't in position
2. Because of #1, you're committing yourself to a move that's slow to recover from.
3. If you're doing this as a regular play on a shot, not only does it show that you're guessing, but you're doing it often enough that your opponents will learn to anticipate you.

That's all true. But it's not the whole story.

1. You weren't in position.
You can't always be in position. You should do everything you can to maximize your effectiveness of getting in position - physical condition, skating and movement, and... anticipation of the play (gasp, guessing) all play a part of this. But.. you can't always be in position. When you're not in position, do you have a backup plan?

2. Because of #1, you're committing yourself to a move that's slow to recover from.
How good's your defence? Commit to a save like a padstack, and you'd better hope the shooter has limited time to shoot the puck or deke around you. Of course, you're in this desparation situation partly thanks to your D. Even so, sometimes the saucer pass can still float over the front of the crease onto that opposite winger's stick. You going to let him score on the open net?

3. If you're doing this as a regular play on a shot, not only does it show that you're guessing, but you're doing it often enough that your opponents will learn to anticipate you.
If the scenario is coming up that frequently, either you have a really poor D in front of you, or you're not reading the play properly. Recognise the play and you can get ready sooner, meaning you can maybe substitute a "better" save selection from a better position.


There's something underlying all this that I don't quite have my trapper on yet, but it's causing me great discomfort with the statements I read already in this article.

It's easy to point out what's wrong with what Richter's doing here, and what Hasek does apparently all too frequently (it's also VERY easy to point it out when Hasek's not playing very strong.)

But, it's hard to explain why they've had so much success with these approaches. You'd think that with all these tapes, they'd have been dissected and distilled into short HOWTO's on how to beat them.

Perhaps they're still successful because they haven't stayed predictable. And perhaps they do things and get away with them because with an NHL quality defence in front of them, they know that their odds are much better taking the easy shot away in some ugly fashion, because the shooter is going to have until yesterday to make the more difficult shot.

So, here's what I propose.

All goalies can benefit with a solid foundation of skills, practice and bread-n-butter type saves.

But all goalies can benefit from studying the game at the level they play it at, and learn where they can optimize their game for how good their opponents are, and how good their defence is.

All goalies can also benefit by constant appraisal of their own game, and what works and what doesn't even when the level of play doesn't change. If someone's found a hole in your game, adapt to remove that hole.

In the end, a great goalie doesn't have just a great foundation, but also a great ability to adapt. After all, to reach the top, you have to face a lot of different levels of play, and different things are going to work for you (and sometimes against you!)

That's how we can point at goalies like Hasek, and Joseph (referring back that hotstove thread) and say "Don't do what he does" without looking like hypocrits by saying these best-of-the-breed are doing it wrong.

I think it's also why it's so difficult to draft good goalies reliably, and why so many NHL goalies emerge as stars after years of mediocrity, and why some disappear as fast.

So as to Richter's windmill legs - it's probably a move he's got that he uses when he thinks it'll help, but Richter's got so many damn moves that he knows the opposing shooter won't know what to expect. But it's probably one of those 2-robbed-goals-a-season type moves, and if you're doing it 3 times a game, you'll get eaten alive. Richter's aiming for a much finer edge than you are.

In the end he's just doing whatever it takes to make the save, based on dozens of variables, guesses, weighing probabilities, assessing threats, and ON and ON and ON. That's what you should learn from. That Creativity in Goaltending article hit it on the nose when it said you should never, ever give up on a play.

Well, that turned into an essay, didn't it. I still haven't totally come to grips with my objections to the "purist-above-all-else" approach, but we all have goals to work for, don't we?

[Ryan]

I would like to add something. I was playing roller when I made that save. I play roller and ice, and I know that if someone has a breakaway coming from either side of the rink, and cuts in front of the net, and your playing ice there is no way im going to stack the pads for no reason. But I was playing roller in my game, and any roller goalies know that since there is no sliding in roller, when a shooter gets you moving laterally, that opens up the 5 hole completly.

[sloth2946]

STRIPES: That was well put and extremely thought out. I would like to make a couple points on it though. For one, you are right, you can't be in the right position all the time, but the mark of a good goaltender is the ability to limit those opportunities to only 1 or 2 a night. But with the Hasek snow angel and the Richter windmill, you have to realize why they are doing it. More often then not they have gotten themselves out of position and are in a desperation mode. What they are doing is evaluating the potential scoring opportunity that they have given the shooter by lack of patience or poor positioning and are now trying to do their best to take away as much of the visible net as possible. I dare to say that Richter does not practice his windmill, rather it just kinda happens. Same could probably be said about Hasek's snow angel. It is a calculate move. I am a purist from the perspective that you build from a sound foundation of stance, angles, and save selection. That can take care of the vast majority of the scoring chances that you will ever see. The rest is called flying by the seat of your pants and doing whatever you can to stop a goal, and you can't practice desperation that I know of. The only practice to that is the experience of being in the heat of battle and doing what you have to all the while remaining conscious of what the shooter and puck are trying to get at.

[Old Swiss2]

Originally posted by stripes
I think it's also why it's so difficult to draft good goalies reliably, and why so many NHL goalies emerge as stars after years of mediocrity, and why some disappear as fast.

While I agree that successful goaltenders are creative and adaptive, I don't think it is the defining cause of a) draft failures, b) how goalies emerge and c) why some dissapear.

a) fundamental problem with the draft is that you are taking a 17, 18, 19 year old. They have not matured physically or mentally. The GMs and scouts are taking an educated guess. You have the same issues in basketball and baseball drafts.

Additionally, much of a goalies success will be determined by the coaching and training they receive after they are drafted. It is no accident that the Brothers Allaire, Strelow, Korn, et. al. have success where ever they go.

b) Star goaltenders don't blossum from mediocre play. The are on an upward arc. They are creative and adaptive but along with the actual game, there are a variety of obstacles they must master to be a pro: money, relationships, the ability to travel, physical and mental maturity to name but a few. Virtually ever starting goaltender in the NHL came into his own at the ages of 23-25. There are very few surprises. (There are a few exceptions like Kolzig 28, Dunham 27, etc.) And while several Europeans did not play in the NHL until later in thier careers, for the most part, they were stars where they played.

c) When goalies dissolve in one season we conclude that they "lost it" that year. (Perhaps Belfour this year?) But if you watch them close up, you would see a slow, steady decline mitigated by creativity and the ability to adopt. (Belfour's changing stance.) Like an old car that you patch up and fix until one day in can't go anymore. It isn't a loss of will, but the Old Bald Cheater.

In short (too late ) while creativity and evolution are essential to being a top goalie; failure to be a top goalie doesn't mean you lack these attributes.

Old Windbag2