James Reimer and rebounds

It starts with a few ill-timed comments on CBC, and it ends with snarky words from Chris Selley in the National Post:

(I actually like Selley and get that it’s snark, but there are some people that perhaps take Selley’s writing a tad too seriously.)

It’s not exactly a secret that people out there don’t exactly trust James Reimer’s glove hand and his rebound control. The simple truth is that most goalies are weak when it comes to the glove hand and rebounds, and Reimer is just under a lot more scrutiny than a goaltender like, say, Jonathan Bernier, because he’s been the most successful goaltender the Maple Leafs have had since Ed Belfour.

Yet most of the local press expressed a dissatisfaction with the idea that the Maple Leafs goaltending solution came in house, and Dave Nonis didn’t otherwise have to go find a starting goaltender in Vancouver or Los Angeles. Reimer, when healthy, has been one of the best even strength goaltenders in hockey for three years now, but that wasn’t enough.

No, rebounds are the thing now. It wasn’t just Selley. Maple Leafs Hot Stove had to ask Justin Goldman, better known as @TheGoalieGuild, about Reimer’s rebound control vis-a-vis Jonathan Bernier’s. Google “James Reimer rebound control” and you’ll find a litany of HF Boards threads like this one, and old news reports like this one from Mike Zeisberger. To Zeisberger’s credit, he at least toys with the idea that the perception of Reimer’s rebounding issues is just perception:

Even once you factor in Bernier’s expected regression to the mean, Reimer should still wind up with a higher save rate than him over the next three years. Kelly Friesen, a co-worker of mine at Yahoo, wrote up a defence of Reimer while mentioning rebound control as an issue. He does however state that Reimer’s “outstanding play against Boston in the playoffs… should have earned Reimer enough respect from Leafs management for them to put faith in him as their No. 1 puck stopper”.

I agree with that sentiment, which is mostly why I’m taking issue with the Leafs spending $3.4-million in cap space, Matt Frattin and a 2nd round pick to “upgrade” Reimer. As if the Leafs’ moves weren’t already telegraphed through the press this offseason, the Leafs have been looking for a goaltender for years. It began with Andrew Raycroft, then Vesa Toskala, then Jean-Sebastien Giguere and Jonas Gustavsson. Finally James Reimer, a third fourth round pick from 2006, found himself in line and he played spectacular in 2011. Lost in all the kerfuffle about how great Randy Carlyle has been for Reimer is that Reimer played at a 95.4-point pace under Ron Wilson. It’s a tad higher under Carlyle, but the Leafs forwards shot better, leading to more wins, the PK improved, and there’s a smaller sample of games.

Point is, over 61 decisions under Wilson, Reimer was 31-21-9. (After Carlyle came in 2011-2012, Reimer went 3-3-0.)

So what about rebounds? As much as they’re joked about around these parts, Rob Pettapiece ran the numbers and found that controlling rebounds isn’t exactly a sustainable talent, for one, and for two, Reimer is actually second behind Pekka Rinne in the last three seasons at controlling rebounds at 5-on-5:

Maybe his style looks a little hectic, or maybe fans don’t like the fact that Reimer doesn’t make many “great saves”, merely a lot of good ones. But that’s the thing—viewers only notice the flashy glove hand or the lightning-quick pad, and it’s more difficult to see the set up to a shot that puts a goaltender in a better position to make the save.

Give me a goaltender that’s able to stop a higher percentage of pucks. Goals against average, wins and shutouts are much more dependent on the team than save percentage. Vic Ferrari found years ago that deviations in save percentage as goaltenders change teams and teams change coaches and coaches change philosophies can pretty much be attributed to random chance.

As an example, the gap between Mike Smith’s 2012 season under Dave Tippett in Phoenix (.936 even strength save percentage) and Mike Smith’s 2013 season under Dave Tippett in Phoenix (.924) is larger than the cap between James Reimer’s 2011 under Ron Wilson (.933) and his 2013 under Randy Carlyle (.924).

Held to a standard in Los Angeles, or Colorado, or Dallas, one might think that Reimer is the next big young goaltender, and maybe even a Team Canada candidate. In Toronto, Philadelphia and Vancouver, three markets that love to eviscerate goaltenders out of boredom, Reimer is a guy worth upgrading.