~AHL level players who had a career year in the NHL.

[FerrisRox]

Behind one of NHL strongest defenses he wasnt exposed as much. He played good for a while which is the point of the thread but in the end his flaws were found out and he never adapted to it. The mark of a AHL level player.

His "flaws" were not exposed. He lost his desire to be a professional hockey player.

 

[FerrisRox]

Darren Jensen was 15-9-1 in 1985-86 with the Flyers , winning the Jennings Trophy with Bob Froese. Jensen never appeared in another NHL game after that season.

Darren Jensen was sent down to the minors that year after the Flyers acquired Chico Resch at the trade deadline, but despite the silverware he won, I'm not sure he qualifies for this. He posted a 3.68 goals against average that year. That's more than a full goal higher than Bob Froese who had a 2.55 GAA. Jensen's name is on that trophy in spite of his play, not because of it.

 

[tapi]

Ville Leino

 

[KMart27]

Didn't notice Ric Jackman mentioned yet. He had 11 points in his first 111 games in the NHL and he went back and forth between the AHL and NHL. Then he went to Pittsburgh in 2003-2004 and had 24 points in 25 games. He followed that up with 28 points in 49 games for Pittsburgh before being traded. After that he played only 46 more games in the NHL and had 14 points.

 

[Thenameless]

Nikolai Borschevsky might fit the bill. One pretty good year in the NHL, another decent half-year, and then gone.

 

[TheMoreYouKnow]

Another one could be Roman Oksiuta, 23G 28 A in 70 games in 95/96. Out of the NHL by 97. Definitely not a Russian guy you'd hear much about.

 

[Normand Lacombe]

Darren Jensen was sent down to the minors that year after the Flyers acquired Chico Resch at the trade deadline, but despite the silverware he won, I'm not sure he qualifies for this. He posted a 3.68 goals against average that year. That's more than a full goal higher than Bob Froese who had a 2.55 GAA. Jensen's name is on that trophy in spite of his play, not because of it.

Agree. Despite the W-L record, that Flyers defense covered up Jensen's weaknesses.

 

[Normand Lacombe]

Evegeny Davydov. 28-21-49 with Winnipeg in 1992-93. Played 64 games with Florida and Ottawa after that season and was out of the NHL by 1995.

 

[Hoser]

Nikolai Borschevsky might fit the bill. One pretty good year in the NHL, another decent half-year, and then gone.

Borschevsky had significant injury troubles. Started with a broken orbital bone in the '93 playoffs. Later had a separated shoulder. Had his spleen ruptured in the autumn of '93, which kept him out for a couple months. He was a pretty small guy (5'8", maybe 160 lbs) but was fearless when he came over and played with the Leafs. After the injuries piled up he became fearful, much more of a skate-around-in-circles perimeter player than the feisty one he'd been in '92-'93. He buggered off back to Europe because his body had had enough; he was more than talented enough to play in the NHL.

Another one could be Roman Oksiuta, 23G 28 A in 70 games in 95/96. Out of the NHL by 97. Definitely not a Russian guy you'd hear much about.

Injuries!

Evegeny Davydov. 28-21-49 with Winnipeg in 1992-93. Played 64 games with Florida and Ottawa after that season and was out of the NHL by 1995.

He was traded to the defence-first Panthers, and simply did not play that game. Being a terrible fit there he was traded to the absolutely putrid '93-'94 Senators, and hated it even more. He refused to report in '94-'95 and signed a deal in the IHL instead. When the IHL season wrapped up he came back, played three games at the tail end of the Senators season and then buggered off. I recall he was invited to the Penguins' training camp in '95, but ultimately went back to Europe because he didn't want to play in North America anymore.

 

[Brodeur]

I still would like to buy Andrew Hammond a couple beers for salvaging a couple 2015 fantasy teams of mine.

 

[ShelbyZ]

Mark Lawrence

14G, 30P in 60 games for the Islanders in 98-99. Is viewed as a future contributor after they trade away Palffy, gets a 2 year extension and then bombs starting the next season with 0G, 4P and -11 in 19games.

Other than the previously mentioned Rico Fata, the GenX and early Crosby-era Pens have a few. Here's a couple notables:

-Ric Jackman: His total stat line during his Pens tenure (played in parts of 2 seasons) looks almost Norris or All Star vote worthy... 13G and 52P in 74 games. After being acquired around the 2004 deadline, he had 24pts in 25 games to finish the season. In 157 games for 5 other teams, he had 25 points altogether. Part of that includes a brief resurgence in his final NHL stint with the 2007 Cup Winning Ducks, where he had 11pts in 24 games.

-Andy Hilbert: After being picked up on waivers by the Pens, Hilbert put up 18pts in 19 games after being put on wing next to a rookie Sidney Crosby. He then went on to have a "career year" with the pre-Tavares Isles, but never matched his PPG totals during that 05-06 season.

Other honorable mentions: Jim Campbell, Jason Krog, Dean Sylvester

 

[Sentinel]

Several Lidstrom's partners.

 

[brachyrynchos]

Scott Fraser seemed to put up good numbers for the Oilers in '97-98, 29-12-11-23. Signs a deal with the Rangers ($4M over 3yrs)and in 28 games goes 2-4-6.
I read that at the Rangers halloween party he wore a bandit mask and carried a sack, when asked what he was supposed to be he replied "my agent".

 

[Rebels57]

Scott Bjugstad is the poster-boy for this.

43 goals and 76 points in 85-86. His previous career high was 11 goals and his career high after that was 10 goals.

Scott Bjugstad hockey statistics and profile at hockeydb.com

 

[Hoser]

His "flaws" were not exposed. He lost his desire to be a professional hockey player.

His flaws were absolutely exposed, he got picked apart by the Penguins' offence in the '96 playoffs and never recovered. The jig was up: he went down too early, had a weak glove and poor lateral movement. Get him moving back and forth and he was ripe for the picking.

 

[FerrisRox]

His flaws were absolutely exposed, he got picked apart by the Penguins' offence in the '96 playoffs and never recovered. The jig was up: he went down too early, had a weak glove and poor lateral movement. Get him moving back and forth and he was ripe for the picking.

If you say so.

Though I must say, considering Carey was largely a stand up goalie, your opinion that "he went down too early" makes it awfully difficult to take your opinion on him seriously.

 

[billybudd]

Michel Ouellet was a right-handed player with a large "strike zone" when it came to chipping hard, cross-ice passes into the net. He was pretty bad at pretty much everything else.

He made the show because Pittsburgh had three(ish) left-handed centers and few right-handed players who could finish at that time. If he was a lefty or if Crosby, Malkin and Staal were all right-handed, he'd never have made it out of the A.

 

[Puck Dogg]

Didn't Jan Caloun have a 4 goal game and then, thinking the NHL was going to be easy, under train and never become much of anything?

Caloun was very talented but his style wasn't suited for NHL. He was member of the '98 Nagano gold medal Czech team.

 

[crobro]

Gilbert Dionne scored 20 goals in 40 game call up

Worst skater I’ve ever seen

 

[Hoser]

If you say so.

Though I must say, considering Carey was largely a stand up goalie, your opinion that "he went down too early" makes it awfully difficult to take your opinion on him seriously.

I don't know why you've got such a hard-on for defending the play of a guy who was washed up by age 24, but if you reeeeeeeeeeeeeeally want to argue it, fine. Let's watch some tape. I did a search on YouTube for "Jim Carey Capitals 1996", and this was the second result (first was a news report from a 9-0 shutout over the Canucks):



First save he makes at 0:02 he went down (uh-oh, there's that word) to one knee; good old-school save that some still use today. Marty Brodeur used to use it fairly often, and Lundqvist still might (I honestly don't watch many Rangers games, but he used to use this amongst his save selections). The next one he gets low, dives to his left and goes for the poke check.

Now watch the penalty shot. He goes down (uh-oh, there's that word again) into a half-butterfly and makes the save. But, he got lucky. Elik shot a muffin into his left shoulder. His glove hand was low; he didn't give up a goal but he was beatable there.

Let's watch more, here're highlights from a game against the Rangers from Jan. 5, '96 (fourth YouTube search result after an interview vid):



Watch the first goal at 1:27. Leetch takes a shot from the point and Carey is already down (dammit there's that word again!); Verbeek screens him, beaten glove-side.

Watch the next one at 1:46 by Laperriere. Carey comes out to the top of his crease to cut down the angle, Laperriere takes the slap shot and aims high on Carey's glove side. Admittedly Carey stayed up until the last split-second but he throws his glove up in a desperation move and the puck deflects off the bottom of it, and down and in. His timing on the glove was off and Laperriere was gifted a goal he shouldn't have had as a result. Less than two minutes into the game and it was already 2-0 Rangers. (Olaf Kolzig ended up making 35 saves on 37 shots.)

This was before his epic meltdown in the '96 playoffs, just to show you that this was not the result of his "disinterest" in playing after the playoff drubbing he suffered at the hands of Lemieux, Jagr, Francis, Nedved & Co. These were flaws that were already there, ripe for the picking.

Let's take another game; this is against Detroit in December of '06, when Fedorov scored all five goals in a 5-4 victory:



First goal (0:08): high glove side!

Second goal (1:15): breakaway, dives to his stick side, high glove side...

Third goal (2:28): Carey is slow to move across as Konstantinov catches him too far to his stick-side post, Carey goes down (**** there's that ******* word again!!) in anticipation of a shot, Konstantinov makes a cross-ice pass right in front of him to Fedorov instead, and Carey is waaaay too slow to get back across to defend the gaping maw on his glove side.

Fourth goal (5:07): Fetisov makes a nice pass to Larionov in the corner and Larionov catches Carey DOWN TOO EARLY as he makes a CROSS-ICE PASS RIGHT IN FRONT OF HIM and Fedorov buries it ON HIS GLOVE SIDE.

Fifth goal (6:44): Larionov passes it to Konstantinov coming up the middle and Carey WENT DOWN TOO EARLY. Konstantinov caught him doing it, dumped it back to Fedorov trailing behind him, Carey had to get back off his knees—and he did—but Fedorov caught him overcompensating on the glove side and beat him low stick-side.



You wanna call this his "lost desire to be a professional hockey player", fine, but don't go around talking smack because you don't think I know what I'm talking about. I know damn well what I'm talking about. [/discussion]

 

[FerrisRox]

I don't know why you've got such a hard-on for defending the play of a guy who was washed up by age 24, but if you reeeeeeeeeeeeeeally want to argue it, fine. Let's watch some tape. I did a search on YouTube for "Jim Carey Capitals 1996", and this was the second result (first was a news report from a 9-0 shutout over the Canucks):



First save he makes at 0:02 he went down (uh-oh, there's that word) to one knee; good old-school save that some still use today. Marty Brodeur used to use it fairly often, and Lundqvist still might (I honestly don't watch many Rangers games, but he used to use this amongst his save selections). The next one he gets low, dives to his left and goes for the poke check.

Now watch the penalty shot. He goes down (uh-oh, there's that word again) into a half-butterfly and makes the save. But, he got lucky. Elik shot a muffin into his left shoulder. His glove hand was low; he didn't give up a goal but he was beatable there.

Let's watch more, here're highlights from a game against the Rangers from Jan. 5, '96 (fourth YouTube search result after an interview vid):



Watch the first goal at 1:27. Leetch takes a shot from the point and Carey is already down (dammit there's that word again!); Verbeek screens him, beaten glove-side.

Watch the next one at 1:46 by Laperriere. Carey comes out to the top of his crease to cut down the angle, Laperriere takes the slap shot and aims high on Carey's glove side. Admittedly Carey stayed up until the last split-second but he throws his glove up in a desperation move and the puck deflects off the bottom of it, and down and in. His timing on the glove was off and Laperriere was gifted a goal he shouldn't have had as a result. Less than two minutes into the game and it was already 2-0 Rangers. (Olaf Kolzig ended up making 35 saves on 37 shots.)

This was before his epic meltdown in the '96 playoffs, just to show you that this was not the result of his "disinterest" in playing after the playoff drubbing he suffered at the hands of Lemieux, Jagr, Francis, Nedved & Co. These were flaws that were already there, ripe for the picking.

Let's take another game; this is against Detroit in December of '06, when Federov scored all five goals in a 5-4 victory:



First goal (0:08): high glove side!

Second goal (1:15): breakaway, dives to his stick side, high glove side...

Third goal (2:28): Carey is slow to move across as Konstantinov catches him too far to his stick-side post, Carey goes down (**** there's that ******* word again!!) in anticipation of a shot, Konstantinov makes a cross-ice pass right in front of him to Federov instead, and Carey is waaaay too slow to get back across to defend the gaping maw on his glove side.

Fourth goal (5:07): Fetisov makes a nice pass to Larionov in the corner and Larionov catches Carey DOWN TOO EARLY as he makes a CROSS-ICE PASS RIGHT IN FRONT OF HIM and Federov buries it ON HIS GLOVE SIDE.

Fifth goal (6:44): Larionov passes it to Konstantinov coming up the middle and Carey WENT DOWN TOO EARLY. Konstantinov caught him doing it, dumped it back to Federov trailing behind him, Carey had to get back off his knees—and he did—but Federov caught him overcompensating on the glove side and beat him low stick-side.



You wanna call this his "lost desire to be a professional hockey player", fine, but don't go around talking smack because you don't think I know what I'm talking about. I'm know damn well what I'm talking about. [/discussion]

"The goaltending position hadn’t changed yet, either. He was more of a standup guy who was really concerned with his positioning on every shot. He was a stickler for that, and he did a heck of a job controlling rebounds. The puck just stuck to him like Velcro. When he was on there was just never a second shot with Jim."

- Keith Allain, Jim Carey's Goaltending Coach with the Washington Capitials and St. Louis Blues.

But what would he know about Jim Carey's style?

 

[Hoser]

I didn't say "Jim Carey dropped into a butterfly too early," did I? Whatever man, keep digging that hole [Mod]. Based on your quick reply it's obvious you didn't read my post nor watch the actual game video.

 

[FerrisRox]

I didn't say "Jim Carey dropped into a butterfly too early," did I? Whatever man, keep digging that hole [Mod]. Based on your quick reply it's obvious you didn't read my post nor watch the actual game video.

You say one of his main issues was he went down too early, his actual goalie coach calls him a stand up goalie, which is exactly what I recall from watching his career.

If you want to argue against the man's actual goaltending coach, you are certainly free to do so, but please don't expect me to take your arguments seriously.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Carey had an awful glove and often dipped his shoulder too early...he was pretty easy to figure out, pretty quickly too. He committed first to everything, so you just had to wait him out a second and then you could put it through him, put one under his glove or over his shoulder...didn't get better, couldn't adapt (that's why he was so easy to figure out in the playoffs...if you needed to beat him, you could...you couldn't hit that guy with a bowling ball in a playoff game)...and, poof, out of the league...

 

[Hoser]

You say one of his main issues was he went down too early, his actual goalie coach calls him a stand up goalie, which is exactly what I recall from watching his career.

If you want to argue against the man's actual goaltending coach, you are certainly free to do so, but please don't expect me to take your arguments seriously.

Likewise I can't take someone who quite literally thinks "stand-up goaltending" means that a goalie never, ever leaves his feet seriously. Your ignorance of the subject is not only palpable but profound. You haven't a clue what you're talking about. You're obviously going to latch onto this idea that "stand-up = never go down" in the vain hope that you'll 'win' this 'argument', and won't or can't admit your recollections are either misplaced or delusional. It's quite sad.

Jim Carey was easy to figure out and blamed everyone but himself for the shortcomings in his game. He sucked. I don't have to rely on hazy recollections, I have video proof.