Pavalec Experiment Over Yet?

[Jouko-Pouko]

I can't stop responding to this thread because I find the narrative that Hellebuyck had been consistently bad very annoying. Hellebuyck had not been bad, he had been inconsistent.

Here's his 10 games before the 2 games that he pooped the bed and got benched:
3-2 Loss to EDM - 3 Goals Allowed on 30 shots. .900 save %. Below average game.
4-3 Shootout Win over FLA - 3 goals allowed on 44 shots / .932 save% / Very Strong Game - Helly won this one for them.
4 - 1 Win over COL - 1 goal allowed on 28 shots / .964 save % / Very strong game, albeit against a weak opponent.
1 - 4 Loss to Vancouver - 3 goals allowed on 23 shots / .870 save % / weak game, but they wouldn't have won unless he stole that game 1-0 or won it 2-1 in OT.
3 - 1 win at CHI - 1 goal allowed on 34 shots / .971 save % / Very strong game - Helly won this one for them.
2 - 6 loss vs NYI - 4 goals allowed on 15 shots / .733 save % / very weak game - showing his inconsistency.
6 - 4 loss to TB - 4 goals allowed on 36 shots / .889 save % / weak game
4 - 1 win at FLA - 1 goal allowed on 32 shots / .969 save % / Very strong game
3 - 4 loss at BUF - 4 goals allowed on 36 shots / .889 save % / weak game
2 - 0 win against CGY - 0 goals allowed on 28 shots / 1.0 save % / very strong game

Then he pooped the bed twice and here we are. 6 games on the bench, and he wins his first game back in Chicago with 3 goals allowed on 41 shots, .927 save %. Very Strong Game.

I guess my issue is that people are acting like he has been a bad goalie. No, he's been an inconsistent goalie. In his last 13 games he has had 6 very strong efforts where he had at least .927 save % and won the game. Then 4 weak games that were essentially on par with Pavelec's last two starts, and 3 absolute clunkers. Although who knows whether those two that he got pulled out of in the first period would have kept getting even uglier or if he would have composed himself and ended with 4 goals allowed on 30-40 shots to make it just a below average effort instead of a terrible one.

I can accept a lot of what everyone has been saying, but I can't help getting frustrated by comments like:
"he really couldn't be worse than Helle/Hutch had been" - he probably can't be as good as Helle has been either.
"Maybe Hellebuyck is just not a real #1 goalie." - he's been a high end #1 goalie half the time lately. needs to get consistent.
"Hellebuyck has been sub par most of the season" - He has switched off between great starts and poor starts for most of the season. He hasn't been sub-par on a consistent basis. Maybe this is just semantics...

Again, I don't take issue with most of the points made in this thread. It just bothers me that it feels like people think Hellebuyck has been performing poorly on a consistent basis, when in fact he has been putting up very strong efforts half of the time and masking them in his overall numbers with poor efforts on other nights due to inconsistency. He is young, so he is still trying to figure out how to avoid the clunkers in between the great games. The only way he will become consistent is to keep getting out there and making mistakes and learning from them.

/endrant.... sorry, couldn't help it. I'm sure I didn't change any minds, but at least I feel better now.

If people just used the word "inconsistent" instead of "bad", then I don't think I could take any issue with any of the criticism. Guess I am just getting hung up on word choice.

For starting goalies, inconsistent equals to bad. You won't last long as a starting goalie if you're not consistent. Inconsistent goalies can be great backups but teams cannot rely on them night after night. Check around the league for the best backup goalies, and you'll notice that they have great stats but they cannot do it consistently.

I'm in no way saying Hellebuyck cannot improve his consistency and be a real starting goalie. I'm just saying that until that happens, his team cannot rely on him night after night.

[BreadManPanarin]

For starting goalies, inconsistent equals to bad.

Point well taken. I have no problem with saying "Hellebuyck has been playing inconsistently, which is bad."

[stevegamer]

No goalie in Winnipeg this year is putting up quality starts with any regularity. 53% is roughly league average for the stat in a given year. Winnipeg has:

Hellebuyck at 48.5% quality starts, which is bad, and ranks 46th in the league.
Hutchinson at 26.7%, which is atrocious, and ranks 65th of 69 goalies who've started.
Pavelec at 25.0%, which is also atrocious, but in a small sample size. He's in a 3-way tie for 66th of 69.

So Hellebuyck has been bad, but has had enough good moments to clearly be the guy moving forward next year.
Pavelec is a backup quality goalie, and Hutchinson seems to be about the same.

Some goalies are inconsistent, yet escape the "bad" label. Marc-Andre Fleury is the poster boy for this phenomenon. He's had 5 seasons where's he been below average in quality start percentage, and a few of those years have been under 50%. In some formats, he's a bad goalie, and he's not good for spot starts if you care about SV% or GAA.

Hellebuyck could easily improve his consistency, and that would be big for the Jets, as they have lacked an above-average goalie for a long time.

[BreadManPanarin]

Excerpt from the Big Man's ramblings this morning:

"Ondrej Pavelec continues to be showcased and continues to let team management down, despite the win. At his salary, his 0.893 SV% this season wouldn?t even garner a bucket of pucks in a trade. No NHL team would give up even a balled-up piece of used hockey tape for him. Not even blackened and hard gum that was scraped off the underside of the bench.
Not even the Blues would look at him ? and they just lost to him. Because as shitty as Jake Allen is doing, his save percentage (0.895) is actually somehow better than Pavelec?s."