Harder Goalie Trade to Swallow: Kipper or Hill?

[TheBeard]

So with the Kiprusoff retirement ceremony tonight in Calgary it got me thinking, which goalie trade hurt the most?

When Kipper was traded he was a struggling goalie stuck behind Nabber and Vesa. Both Nabs and Vesa went on to have good careers but neither remotely close to the HoF one of Miikka. Now, the sting is lessened by the fact that the second round pick they got in return ended up being Vlasic.

On the other hand, Sharks traded a broken Hill to Vegas for a 4th round pick a mere year after trading their own 2nd to Arizona for his services. We all thought nothing of it (like the Kipper trade), but sure enough our hated rivals ended up riding Hill to a Stanley Cup while we still continue to find answers in nets.

Click to read more...

 

[Skeksis25]

I don't really feel much with Hill. Yeah he's turned out to be a great pickup for Vegas, but its not like I sit here and go, "If only we still had Adin Hill on our team". I don't know if he would be much better than what Blackwood or Kahkonen have been. And with where we are as a franchise, I don't really pine for a goalie who might steal us a few extra wins at the cost of draft odds.

Kipper on the other hand, there were multiple playoff runs where I wished we had him in net instead of Nabby or Niemi. I love Nabby, he is my favourite goalie, but I don't think he ever had a consistently great playoff run. Feel like with Kipper we would have a couple more SCF appearances, possibly even a cup.

 

[Gecklund]

Hill by far for me. Kipper was absolutely the better/more impactful goalie but f*** Vegas.

 

[landshark]

f*** Vegas



That said, Kipper trade just sort of hurt like f*** upfront then slow burn like going WAY too spicy and then having heartburn for about a decade every time Kipper faces the Sharks... and regarding the spicy, you meant to do that, you ate it.

Hill winning the cup after being traded from the Sharks was like alcohol poisoning for three weeks, vomitting every other hour, but not dying of it. Once it's over, it's kinda over, milk has been spilled! If Adin Hill on the VGK somehow ends a playoff run for the Sharks then maybe things would be more meaningful. Hill to VEGAS has me nervous about consuming more of whatever it was I drank too much of last time.

Like, f***ing mint julips... probably not likely to come up again. Sharks won't be ploffs before Adin is likely gone or retired or leads the league in cup rings. one or 8, meh... (Also, I'm not a big Kentucky Derby guy so Julips never again is fine by me)



Ask me again after the draft, and I'll probably vote Kipper. I can still taste the mint right now. I feel like Sharks were completely, woefully unprepared for a post-Strelow world. A world no Sharks fan should have to endure, really.

Spoiler: Crazy madman hater rant :D

Kipper, he was going to be good... Hurt in 2004 a lot. Then it just sort only flared up. Like Ghost Pepper heartburn. It was really kinda stupid trading away Kipper but (you decided to eat the Ghost Pepper crap)... and then later it just sort of burns you up on the inside... Not quite as intense for me.

Hill winning the cup after just all the everything with the wheels coming off the franchise zamboni as some very talented squads and entire seasons seemed single handedly defeated by Joners' five-hole or some other fluke spot for the puck to just go in... bad f***ing juju. Took awhile to sorta shake off. Adin Hill is pretty promising yay!! Oh, yeah, meh... it's the Sharks not the goalie.

Then it's all... So the hey look, we had a goalie capable of winning a stanley cup on the Sharks... so let's put the bitter whipped Yakult topping on the shit smoothie of hot steaming bile over not only VEGAS winning a cup but we handed them the seemingly last piece to their f***ing puzzle in the embodiment of Adin f***ing Hill... I for one was prepped to hate on VEGAS for a long time because no cup... and hope that somehow maybe Seattle wins a cup before them because if not the Sharks than anyone but VEGAS!! Kinda f***ed up a rivalry. Gotta be able to compete to be a rival. LOL

 

[fasterthanlight]

Kipper did become a franchise icon, but the fact that Vegas won a cup with Vegas is so annoying

 

[Pinkfloyd]

Neither trade were very difficult for me. Kipper got us Vlasic when we otherwise would’ve lost him for nothing. Hill shouldn’t have been acquired in the first place but when they’re doing terrible, getting anything for a goalie that wasn’t going to do much here is east to get over for me. I don’t care about Vegas to care if they succeed.

 

[Quid Pro Clowe]

Kipper was always the more talented goalie. It was a numbers game and his bad performance in the 02/03 season that got him traded. At least we turned that 2nd round pick into Vlasic.

Hill is a product of Vegas. If he was still here his numbers wouldn’t be nearly as good.

 

[Levie]

Hill to Sharks physically hurt me.

 

[Bizz]

trading Kipper was a no brainer, we already had Nabokov and despite Kipper becoming the face of the Flames franchise, Nabby was the better goalie up until 2010. Point to the stats all you want but the Flames never won a Cup with Kipper and lost the only playoff matchup between the two.

trading Hill for a 4th to a division rival is one of the many boneheaded decisions Mike Grier has made.

 

[LilLeeroy]

trading Kipper was a no brainer, we already had Nabokov and despite Kipper becoming the face of the Flames franchise, Nabby was the better goalie up until 2010. Point to the stats all you want but the Flames never won a Cup with Kipper and lost the only playoff matchup between the two.

trading Hill for a 4th to a division rival is one of the many boneheaded decisions Mike Grier has made.

Lol you think Nabokov was a better goalie than prime Kiprusoff? Kiprusoff also sent Nabokov and the Sharks home packing in the 2004 conference finals.

Multiple people in the organization also preferred Kiprusoff over Nabokov, so it's not like this is a total hindsight thing that nobody could have predicted either.

 

[TheBigDrunkPanda]

Lol you think Nabokov was a better goalie than prime Kiprusoff? Kiprusoff also sent Nabokov and the Sharks home packing in the 2004 conference finals.

Multiple people in the organization also preferred Kiprusoff over Nabokov, so it's not like this is a total hindsight thing that nobody could have predicted either.

At the time of the trade Nabby and arguably Toskala were better then kipper, however prime Kipper was better then Prime Nabby

 

[one2gamble]

Hill for me.

Kipper was a toss up. It sucked but it was a coin flip.

Hill f***in just is garbage end to end. Ga e up assets to acquire, was complete trash whe. They really needed a goalie. Was given away for free only to get decent again.

 

[TheBigDrunkPanda]

Kipper sucked because he bounced the sharks in the conference finals the year of the trade. Hill was just a trade for a potential future starter, turns out he’s injury prone the 2nd rnd pick reflected his value as a potential at the time, ultimately was proven right with the knights. 4th rnder for a broken goalie who did nothing but flounder was a pretty good return. At least sharks got Vlasic out of the Kipper trade

 

[LilLeeroy]

At the time of the trade Nabby and arguably Toskala were better then kipper, however prime Kipper was better then Prime Nabby

Like somebody mentioned earlier, he was coming off a bad year but keeping Kiprusoff and trading Nabokov was not a crazy opinion at the time. Nabokov was really struggling at points through those seasons and lost his starting role multiple times. A lot of people at the time thought Kiprusoff was the more talented goalie.

Sure would have been nice to have a Hart level Thornton and a Vezina level Kiprusoff at the same time.

 

[Pinkfloyd]

Like somebody mentioned earlier, he was coming off a bad year but keeping Kiprusoff and trading Nabokov was not a crazy opinion at the time. Nabokov was really struggling at points through those seasons and lost his starting role multiple times. A lot of people at the time thought Kiprusoff was the more talented goalie.

Sure would have been nice to have a Hart level Thornton and a Vezina level Kiprusoff at the same time.

It kind of would’ve been crazy to trade Nabokov then. He was the only established goalie of the three on a competitive team. Kipper and Toskala had limited experience then. And of those two, Kipper was much worse. Kipper was also doing much worse than Nabby but it was never a real idea to go with two inexperienced goalies when you already had one who had been doing consistently well.

 

[Pavelski2112]

Lol you think Nabokov was a better goalie than prime Kiprusoff? Kiprusoff also sent Nabokov and the Sharks home packing in the 2004 conference finals.

Multiple people in the organization also preferred Kiprusoff over Nabokov, so it's not like this is a total hindsight thing that nobody could have predicted either.

Kipper sent the Sharks packing, but he also lost in the Finals

 

[nabbyfan]

Its actually pretty crazy how close the Career statline between Kipper and Nabby is.

Kiprusoff: 2.49 GAA and a .912 Sv% over 623 GP. 319 Wins.

Nabby: 2.44 GAA and a .911 Sv% over 697 GP. 353 Wins.

Playoff Nabby stayed very close to his stats. 2.43 and .908.

Playoff Miikka improved to a 2.32 and .921. Who knows how it wouldve worked out if he stayed in San Jose. But still cool to see his number raised to the rafters in Calgary, congrats to him.

 

[Quid Pro Clowe]

trading Kipper was a no brainer, we already had Nabokov and despite Kipper becoming the face of the Flames franchise, Nabby was the better goalie up until 2010. Point to the stats all you want but the Flames never won a Cup with Kipper and lost the only playoff matchup between the two.

trading Hill for a 4th to a division rival is one of the many boneheaded decisions Mike Grier has made.

No, he beat Nabby in 03-04. They were 1-1 head to head in the playoffs.

 

[sharski]

Not re-signing Irbe was the worst don't @ me

 

[karltonian]

bothered by neither. both were terrible with SJ and probably would have remained terrible in SJ.

 

[karltonian]

So with the Kiprusoff retirement ceremony tonight in Calgary it got me thinking, which goalie trade hurt the most?

When Kipper was traded he was a struggling goalie stuck behind Nabber and Vesa. Both Nabs and Vesa went on to have good careers but neither remotely close to the HoF one of Miikka. Now, the sting is lessened by the fact that the second round pick they got in return ended up being Vlasic.

On the other hand, Sharks traded a broken Hill to Vegas for a 4th round pick a mere year after trading their own 2nd to Arizona for his services. We all thought nothing of it (like the Kipper trade), but sure enough our hated rivals ended up riding Hill to a Stanley Cup while we still continue to find answers in nets.

Nabby had a better career than Kipper, especially for the Sharks. Nabby had much more playoff success than Kipper, other than the one finals run. Kipper only had 5 playoff runs as starter, all with the Flames and 4 of them were 1st round exits. Missed the playoffs 4x with the flames while Nabby missed only once with the Sharks. Nabby started in 8 playoff runs (7 sharks), had 84 playoff starts (78 Sharks) and 42 wins (40 Sharks), with 7 series wins. Kipper had 52 playoff starts, 24 wins, and 3 series wins for the Flames.

Honestly more than a little weird to get his number in the rafters for the Flames, and it is most definitely not a HoF career, certainly not more of one than Nabby.

 

[OrrNumber4]

Nabby had a better career than Kipper, especially for the Sharks. Nabby had much more playoff success than Kipper, other than the one finals run. Kipper only had 5 playoff runs as starter, all with the Flames and 4 of them were 1st round exits. Missed the playoffs 4x with the flames while Nabby missed only once with the Sharks. Nabby started in 8 playoff runs (7 sharks), had 84 playoff starts (78 Sharks) and 42 wins (40 Sharks), with 7 series wins. Kipper had 52 playoff starts, 24 wins, and 3 series wins for the Flames.

Honestly more than a little weird to get his number in the rafters for the Flames, and it is most definitely not a HoF career, certainly not more of one than Nabby.

Kipprusoff made the finals.

Overarching thoughts:

Nabokov never lost a series where the Sharks averaged more then 2.00 g/game. At the same time, actually watching those games, Nabokov definitely failed to come up clutch again and again.

Kipprusoff was a Vezina-caliber goaltender. Hill simply isn't; he was an absolute passenger in that cup run. I continue to believe his numbers are a mirage. He works for Vegas and good for them both, but Kipper would have been an elite goalie anywhere.

 

[karltonian]

Kipprusoff made the finals.

Overarching thoughts:

Nabokov never lost a series where the Sharks averaged more then 2.00 g/game. At the same time, actually watching those games, Nabokov definitely failed to come up clutch again and again.

Kipprusoff was a Vezina-caliber goaltender. Hill simply isn't; he was an absolute passenger in that cup run. I continue to believe his numbers are a mirage. He works for Vegas and good for them both, but Kipper would have been an elite goalie anywhere.

He made the finals once and that's it, lost every other time in the 1st round -- that's less than Martin Jones did for us. Nabby was also close to a Vezina caliber goalie, having a 2nd place and several 4th place finishes.

 

[KarlssonsGroin]

Kipper. We keep him, we might win in 04.

We traded Hill when we were a bottom barrel team.

 

[cheechoo]

Nabby had a better career than Kipper, especially for the Sharks. Nabby had much more playoff success than Kipper, other than the one finals run. Kipper only had 5 playoff runs as starter, all with the Flames and 4 of them were 1st round exits. Missed the playoffs 4x with the flames while Nabby missed only once with the Sharks. Nabby started in 8 playoff runs (7 sharks), had 84 playoff starts (78 Sharks) and 42 wins (40 Sharks), with 7 series wins. Kipper had 52 playoff starts, 24 wins, and 3 series wins for the Flames.

Honestly more than a little weird to get his number in the rafters for the Flames, and it is most definitely not a HoF career, certainly not more of one than Nabby.

I think it's harsh to compare them in absolutes like this. Nabby was a top keeper in this league, but Kiprusoff at his peak was a level above and arguably the best of his generation. It was pretty much him and Iginla carrying fodder to the playoffs each and every season whereas we were a perennial 105+ point team loaded with stars.

I understand not being bothered by this anyways because it's too much butterfly effect stuff.