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Matteo · 08-15-2022, 10:57 PM

Introduction

Now that the first regular season with Franchise Hockey Manager 8 as the sim engine is in the books, it’s time that we take a look at everyone’s favourite position, the goaltender. In this media piece I’ll be using the most readily available indicator of goalie success that we have in the index, the save percentage, to judge how well they performed this past season. I know that there are more factors than this that go into a “good” or “bad” goalie, but for the sake of this media it should paint us a general picture of how well each goalie did this season. I’ll be comparing this stat first with goalies’ TPE to hopefully answer the timeless question of “does it matter,” then with each team’s point percentage to see how much of a factor the team around them played in their success, if any. Today I won’t be looking at individual attributes since pretty much every goalie is still going for the same basic build; positioning, rebound control, recovery, and reflexes as the first tier stats, blocker, glove, and low shots as the second tier stats, and passing, poke checking, puck handling, and skating as the third tier stats. There were two exceptions who both went a few levels higher in these third tier stats that were seen as the least important attributes in FHM 6, but both were pretty middle-of-the-pack save percentage-wise so it did not seem to make much of a difference.

In case you missed it, I did something similar to this after 10 seasons of Franchise Hockey Manager 6. If you want to read that, you can check it out here.

Before we start I want to make a hypothesis because I use science words in this science article (don’t worry that I passed grade 11 chemistry with a big 50%). I’m going to predict that not only does goalie TPE not matter, this season I’ll find that as goalie TPE increased, save percentage slightly dropped. I’ll also predict that there will be little correlation between save percentage and a team’s performance.

TPE versus Save Percentage

So let’s get into it, first off we’ll look at TPE. I chose to use a bubble chart to compare goalie TPE and save percentages, with the bubble sizes being the minutes played for each goalie. This way a starter who played say 3,000 minutes gets more representation than a backup who only had 700.

[Image: SXZuHTU.png]

As you can see, there is a slight positive correlation between TPE and save percentage, which is encouraging until you notice that the difference between a 155 TPE goalie versus a 2,000 TPE goalie is projected to be a .895 save percentage versus a .900 save percentage according to the trendline. This does not seem worth it when you consider that the 155 TPE goalie can be costing only $500,000 while the 2k goalie is costing $6 million, or at best $4 million with one of a team’s hometown discounts.

Something I did find interesting looking at the chart above was that while TPE does not seem to do much in the way of getting a higher save percentage, it did seem to increase consistency a lot as players got to around the 900 TPE range. All of the goalies above this mark are fairly grouped together, with the highest save percentage being a .908 and the lowest not terribly far behind at a .887. Looking below this mark tells a vastly different story, the highest save percentage of a goalie with over one game played being a .930 (and a .952 with only a single game played) and the lowest being a .862. This is over three times more variance between these two ranges.

Point Percentage versus Save Percentage

Now let’s look at how goalies performed on better versus worse teams. For this one I simply added up each team’s goalies’ saves and divided that by their shots against to get a total goalie save percentage for every team. I then compared these, using a scatter plot, to those teams’ point percentages in the index.

I chose to use a logarithmic line of best fit for this one since I felt it better represented the data, especially with what we have seen from Edmonton’s aggressive tanking this season. Note that any of the projected save percentages above a .800 point percentage are purely speculative, as a sharp spike upwards is just as possible as the relatively straight line you’ll see below, especially considering the sharp spike downwards seen in lower point percentage teams.

[Image: KN16XPO.png]

As you can see here, there’s a much clearer correlation between how well a team performs and how the goalies perform on that team. The difference in save percentage between half the chart, a .500 point percentage versus a perfect 1.000 season, is double what the entire TPE trendline shows. Not much to say here other than that; at least this season a team’s performance played a huge role in how well a goalie performed.

Conclusion

Well I was pretty dead wrong about both of my hypotheses, goalie TPE did not negatively affect their performance and there was a pretty strong correlation between team and goalie performance. I had also considered comparing goalie TPE and team performance just for fun, but in the end I decided that GMs get higher TPE goalies when they are trying to compete, it is not goalies pulling their teams out of the dirt (obviously). Correlation versus causation and all of that.

For goalie TPE, I think what led me astray here when I was making my predictions was just my looking at the top couple goalies in the league, 338 TPE Meeka Keprosoft would be a frontrunner for the McBride Trophy if they were active, for example. What I did not consider, however, is that for every low TPE goalie with an amazing save percentage, there was another with similar TPE at the very bottom of the league. We saw this and talked about it when looking at the inconsistencies in goalies below 900 TPE compared with the relatively grouped together goalies above this mark.

For team performance, I definitely fell into the pitfall of factoring my personal experience into this too much. I saw my own save percentage of .898 on the 2nd team in the standings and compared it with some lower teams in the standings’ goalies who had better or similar seasons as me and figured that this would not be much of a factor either. What I did not look at here was that my backup had a much, much better save percentage than me at .930, probably partially due to some matchup differences, and maybe some FHM magic sprinkled in there. This dragged our team save percentage from what would be a .898 with just me all the way up to a .904, third in the league just barely under Montreal.

The biggest takeaway stat-wise that I found here though is that by far the largest factor in a goalie’s performance that I explored today is how well their team performs around them. This is the opposite of what I found in my similar article looking at goalies in FHM 6, though a big thing to consider was the much larger sample size of ten seasons in that article versus only one in here. We may end up finding out that this was an outlier season and goalie TPE will end up having a huge effect in the coming years, though with the season we had I doubt it. We also may learn that goalie TPE is very important in the playoffs or that mental toughness will play a huge role. Only time will tell assuming everything stays the same for the foreseeable future, so we shall wait and see.

Some Personal Thoughts

What I’ve found in all this is a shame since, to me at least, with the salary cap system the way it is, it makes it seem like a team trying to win the cup would have a better chance with two 299 TPE goalies at the helm each earning $500k, that way they can use this extra ~$3-5 million and potentially their hometown discounts on higher TPE forwards and defensemen who will contribute much more to their chances at winning.

This leaves all the goalies like me and many others who have invested a year, two, or even more into improving this dude we created and grew attached to, to be shown by this new sim engine that all we’ve done has been for nothing and may have actually hurt our teams more than helped them. I know that this is not a new issue and has been around since FHM 6, but from what I found and what I have seen this was nowhere near as big an issue as it seems to be now, since at least back then it seemed like higher TPE gave a little bit of a better chance at being good, even more so than being on a good team. People have always half-joked that goalie TPE does not matter, but now it feels like much more of a reality than it ever has.

A Little Rant for Good Measure

Another issue that I have not talked about so far, but was what inspired me to make this article in the first place, was how low save percentages have been this season relative to both previous seasons and also what we are supposed to be emulating, the NHL. Talking to many other goalies around the league, even though a good save percentage is relative to how well everyone else’s, it sucks having them be so low. Instead of feeling like some of us did well and others did poorly, it feels like we all sucked.

I know I was a little salty when the season ended and I saw that I finished with a sub .900 save percentage for the first time in my career (as the highest TPE goalie in the league no less), but looking more into it what gives me even more complicated feelings was that my .898 was actually above average, with the league’s save percentage being only a .894.

One goalie I spoke to brought up that the league’s goals per game slider should be slightly lowered to make it at least a little bit enjoyable to play the position again, but said that with how much skaters outnumber goalies it would be unlikely to ever happen. It would be such an uphill battle trying to improve the experience of the few goalies in the league since doing so would also make the experience of the vastly greater amount of skaters a little bit worse by lowering their overall points.

Look at the top of both the SHL and the SMJHL this past season though. It is only the first season of FHM 8 and already the SHL goals record has been tied and the goals leader in the SMJHL came one short of tying that one as well. I say this not to take away from either of these players’ fantastic seasons, both the people who led their respective league in goals I share a locker room with and I’m very happy for, but it feels like every offense-based skater record is about to get shattered over and over in the coming seasons while goalies will just be left to be caved in.

It turned out that I had more to say about this than I thought I did, but if you made it this far I thank you for reading, and I hope it made you think. I hope others chime in about this and I can hear some other perspectives about what is going on. I would be especially curious to hear what skaters, especially more offensive-oriented ones, would think about bumping down the goals per game slider.

If you want to look at my data, there is nothing that you would not be able to find in the index, but you can look through it all here as well.

TLDR: Goalie TPE barely mattered this season and a team’s success was a bigger factor in how well a goalie played.

Code:
2,042 words plus data/graphs, ready for grading.

*Zoone16* · 08-15-2022, 11:02 PM

Lol. Glad I'm retired now.

***RAmenAmen*** · 08-15-2022, 11:04 PM

Please just let me take less money so I don't hurt my team by earning.

***luke*** · 08-15-2022, 11:10 PM

some general thoughts of my own

I think scoring was way up this season and that was evident through the save%, it is similair to like inflation era of STHS
Inflation Era (S9-S11)
T-1. .903 - John McBride (S10)
T-1. .903 - John McBride (S11)
3. .901 - John McBride (S9)
4. .900 - Ryan Jesster (S10)
5. .898 - Tom Corcoran (S10)

So its really on HO if they want to lower the goals per game, which I think they should do.

Other than that, I think the perfect goalie is around 800-1400 TPE range, but if you want a goalie for both the longevity, and if they are in general a good person, you want them for longer. I dont think the era of having goalies at high tpe is going to go away, but I do understand the risk of teams that might use the strat of 2 low TPE goalies and still perform the same.

Matteo · 08-15-2022, 11:20 PM

08-15-2022, 11:10 PMluke Wrote: some general thoughts of my own

I think scoring was way up this season and that was evident through the save%, it is similair to like inflation era of STHS
Inflation Era (S9-S11)
T-1. .903 - John McBride (S10)
T-1. .903 - John McBride (S11)
3. .901 - John McBride (S9)
4. .900 - Ryan Jesster (S10)
5. .898 - Tom Corcoran (S10)

So its really on HO if they want to lower the goals per game, which I think they should do.

Other than that, I think the perfect goalie is around 800-1400 TPE range, but if you want a goalie for both the longevity, and if they are in general a good person, you want them for longer. I dont think the era of having goalies at high tpe is going to go away, but I do understand the risk of teams that might use the strat of 2 low TPE goalies and still perform the same.

I don't think high TPE goalies will go away either just because that's how it's always been, I hadn't considered the locker room aspect though, that's also a really good point.

Another reason why no matter how little goalie TPE matters I'll never advocate for bot goalies.

**brickwall35** · 08-15-2022, 11:40 PM

Change the damn sliders

***HabsFanFromOntario*** · 08-15-2022, 11:42 PM

Please fix goalie tpe, ramen has a gun at my head.

*RashfordU* · 08-16-2022, 12:01 AM

@Matteo
just wanted to say, very well written, appreciated the deep dive into this season

nykonax · 08-16-2022, 02:07 AM

08-15-2022, 10:57 PMMatteo Wrote: What I did not look at here was that my backup had a much, much better save percentage than me at .930, probably partially due to some matchup differences, and maybe some FHM magic sprinkled in there. This dragged our team save percentage from what would be a .898 with just me all the way up to a .904, third in the league just barely under Montreal.

Your backup has a name you know... and it's probably due to just being outright better, not whatever matchup and FHM copium you're overdosing on rn.

get skrolk'd

gordieboom · 08-16-2022, 02:09 AM

Well, this is depressing and if this doesn’t change in a few seasons i don’t see a reason to continue.

***Chevy*** · 08-16-2022, 07:35 AM

I’ll sum this up in two words:

Geezus Kryyst

*Carpy48* · 08-16-2022, 07:43 AM

08-16-2022, 07:35 AMChevy Wrote: I’ll sum this up in two words:

Geezus Kryyst

The Cleo Green of goalies.

jumpSeat · 08-16-2022, 09:24 AM

Matteo Wrote:...but it feels like every offense-based skater record is about to get shattered over and over in the coming seasons while goalies will just be left to be caved in.

So it's basically an all-star game, but without the car and the cool skills competition? Tongue

Quote:I hope others chime in about this and I can hear some other perspectives about what is going on. I would be especially curious to hear what skaters, especially more offensive-oriented ones, would think about bumping down the goals per game slider.

It's generally well-known within the FHM community that the 2D engine produces higher points than the classic engine. Notwithstanding that, it's nice to see the point demonstrated the way you've done here, so thanks for taking the time to put this all together. Cheers

Quote:Goalie TPE barely mattered this season and a team’s success was a bigger factor in how well a goalie played.

The devs have received a LOT of feedback in this regard, and as they're generally pretty responsive to the community, we're still hopeful for legit improvements in v9.

***Wally*** · 08-16-2022, 10:04 AM

Was hoping to see someone delve into the adv goalie stats finally… sad :*(

Matteo · 08-16-2022, 10:45 AM

08-16-2022, 10:04 AMWally Wrote: Was hoping to see someone delve into the adv goalie stats finally… sad :*(

GSAx in the index when

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