Holecek and goaltending style
I´ve sort of hinted at this issue in one my previous posts. In what way was Holecek actually stopping the shots? I´ve read accounts that praised Holecek for this technique, other accounts claiming that Holecek was a "reflex goalie"; high-stance goalie with limited mobility vs. low-stance goalie constantly moving around the crease; butterfly goalie staying deep in the net vs. goalie who liked to skate forward to cut the angles and usually stayed on his feet.. I believe that Holecek was generally only praised for his technical, forward-challenging, angles-playing, stand-up style of goaltending when he was being compared to other Czechoslovak, Soviet and other European goaltenders. Compared to them, Holecek almost certainly was "predictable" - in the best sense of the word - i.e. reliable and not prone to allow soft goals. However, I´m going to prove that from a global perspective Holecek and his goaltending style could be likened to early butterfly goalies such as Glenn Hall, Tony Esposito and his early idol Seth Martin. I´ll help myself out with quoting the most reliable (in my opinion) sources on the matter - two hockey books focusing exclusively on popular goalies from the past and the evolution of goaltending, written and published in late 90s, early 00s by respected hockey historians / writers in the field.. and the early 90s brilliant extended interview with Jiri Holecek himself, which I´ve found in the
Gól magazine, February 1994, only month ago.
1) the book
Příběhy z hokejové branky ["Stories from hockey goal"] mainly written by Jiří Koliš with some additions from no other than Dominik Hašek, published in 2002, key parts of the Holeček, Esposito, Dryden chapter on p. 138-161 translated by me:
"First one, who deeply bent forward towards the ice, so that he can better watch the puck between the legs of screening players, was Terry Sawchuk. Although only the next famous goalie - Glenn Hall - came up with truly revolutionary innovation. Before his arrival to Detroit´s goal, goalies tried to cover the space between the posts through frequent tiny sidesteps, it was a sort of ballet on ice. To kneel down if only on one knee was not appropriate. Then this seemingly clumsy rookie suddenly emerged and he kneeled on both knees!
Hall´s playing technique, completely common these days, was a real revolution in his time. Before it got 'the Butterfly' name, it used to be compared to splayed upside-down letter V. Hall´s basic stance was in deep forward bend with knees closed to each other, but with skates widely spread out. It really could have reminded the upside-down 'V' looking from behind, although Hall´s new stance seemed to shooters skating forward as almost an impenetrable dam. But what was the most important, such style was exceedingly effective.
This revolutionary way of goaltending was brought to Europe by excellent American netminder Willard Ikola in the second half of the fifties. But only the Canadian goaltender of the team Trail Smoke Eaters and of the Canadian National Team, Seth Martin, who attended the World Championship six times, and was declared the best goaltender of the Championship four times, perfectly mastered the new style and made it widespread in Europe. Martin even tasted the NHL atmosphere at the end of his career - he joined the team St. Louis Blues in the season 1967-68 for the thirty games of the regular season and for the two play-off games. No other than Glenn Hall was his goaltending partner.
Vlado Dzurilla tried as the first one here the butterfly position during his beginnings in the League and in the National Team. His attempts ended up with torn meniscus though. Such goaltending style wasn´t suited for him. But the fifteen year-old schoolboy Jiří Holeček, who spent hours and hours observing the best ones every day at the World Championship in Prague 1959, should have shown in the next years, how the butterfly position can be effective.
(…)
Jirka attended every league game, he watched the best goalkeepers during the international games too. And he started to invent himself. He tried to copy some sort of half butterfly stances leaning on with the stick at first. That´s how mainly Vladimír Dzurilla practised them. Later, when he [Holeček]
had realized his inborn dispositions, he started testing today completely normal two-sided butterfly positioning. That was when he had already been playing the League in Košice though… in the year 1966 also appeared in the National Team. He went to his first World Championship in Ljublana along with Vlado Dzurilla. There, he carefully observed the representative of a perfect butterfly of Seth Martin in the goal of Canada. He didn´t have the courage to approach him and to find out something more about this style. But he conclusively assured himself, that this is the right way of goaltending intended just for him. He evolved into our best goalie over the course of several years, first peak came at the World Championship in Switzerland in 1971. We earned the title of European Champions there and Jiří Holeček was declared the best goaltender of the Championship (he is going to get this award four more times yet). The Championship in Prague was held next year. Decision for the title should have fallen at April 20 in the game CSSR – USSR. The winner is going to become the champion.
That Thursday spring evening ended the drought for a big joy of our hockey after long twenty-three years. Before the final whistle confirmed the 3:2 victory, it had cost a lot of effort and nerves. Everybody gave for heroic performance, but it was most likely the life game for the two from the entire lineup. (…) The power of the Soviet Red Army was in its tremendous fitness, accuracy of the execution of every action, and in the perfect interplay. To succeed over such team, it meant you had to build from secured defense and to have a truly magnificent goalie behind your back in the goal, who is just having ‘his day’. Jirka Holeček luckily had it. He covered a big chance of Alexander Yakushev right at the beginning of the match, soon after he neutralized the ‘bomb’ of defenseman Lutchenko. After next shift, Kharlamov appeared alone right in front of him at first, then Maltsev too. The zero was shining on our side of the scoreboard for the whole first period though. We´ve survived a crushing game start largely on the merit of Holeček.
At the beginning of the third period during the 3:2 score [in favour of CSSR]
, a big chance of Alexander Maltsev came up. Jiří Holeček had a total of 21 successful saves according to official record of the game, to this day he perfectly remembers right this one: ‘I knew the better players of the Championship well, I anticipated their game. Maltsev belonged to the best and fastest forwards, I ever played against. He frequently got into breakaways, mostly skated from the right wing, from the side of the left goal-post from my point of view. First, he very markedly faked a shot, but then took the puck to the side over whole crease. A netminder had to usually go down on ice, to slide down. But the whole upper half of the goal got open. And he was able to lift it back to the more distant left goal-post. He scored a lot of goals this way. Now he found himself against me exactly in such situation. I didn´t panic, initially I pretended that I took the bait, but I waited and didn´t lay down. I stayed on my feet. He went with the puck over the crease as usual, I only skated calmly forward and set my glove hand. He couldn´t stuff it anywhere else than right into it. It definitely didn´t look like some difficult save, many people probably considered it as more of a Maltsev´s failure, a mistake, but for me it was terribly important moment, maybe even defining moment of the game.’”
2) the book
Než přišel Dominátor ["Before Dominator came up"] written by Miloslav Jenšík, published in 1999, key parts of the Jiří Holeček chapter on p. 130-140 translated by me:
“’Košician’ Ladislav Štemprok is also among coaches, who went to Ljublana to observe… He says to the writer of the magazine [Svět v obrazech]
about his first ward who made it to World Championship [in 1966]
: ‘Jirka is a big hope of our hockey. He has huge appetite for the game, will to prove something and extraordinary quick reaction for the close-up shots. He does have a shortcomings, perhaps a full concentration on the game on the other side of the rink. I think he´s growing into successor of Nadrchal and Dzurilla.’
(…)
Prague´s fans have been looking forward to his arrival [to Sparta Prague in 1973]
for a long time. Finally the ‚Holendr‘ is here! A nickname adopted by the fans after the players had begun to call him that and it stuck. But he´s more of a ‘Fakír’ in a team now; when he undresses into his shorts, he really looks like one among typically so muscular hockey players. Or also ‘Live rope’ – an impulse to this nickname was given by a scream of amazed respect from one of his teammates for his [Holeček´s]
even a serpentine mobility, which is an outcome of years of tough conditioning drills.
Butterfly position is his finest showcase. He watched this move from Seth Martin, who played at several World Championships in the sixties. He improved it thanks to his physical properties to the extent, that in a blink of a second he can impassably cover the lower parts of the goal. But that´s not only why forwards of opponents are desperate from him; not only why supporters of teams, whose goal-crease is guarded by him, are maximally thrilled.
(…)
He´s thirty-three and he counts that he´s done with the National Team [in 1977]
. Coaches persuades him to try it out one more time, till the next year when the Championship comes back to us [= WHC ´78 held in Czechoslovakia]
. He listens, he does excellently already at a December´s Izvestia tournament, especially against Russians, whom we beat on their ice 8:3. Then in April´s Prague, he plays a way, that one of the headlines of special issue of Československý sport is entitled IT WAS HOLEČEK´S CHAMPIONSHIP. ‘He remained to be our number one,’ as it was stated there, ‘even though he wears the number two on his jersey. It´s remarkable for how long he´s been able to maintain his outstanding play without bigger fluctuations. His coordination of moves in the crease is a source of lessons to be learned for all successors. The whole array of foreign players suffers from longtime ‘Holeček complex’. When he´s in the goal, they won´t know where to shoot, how to outsmart him.’”
3) Minor things but some people might find these interesting. a) An example of contemporary descriptions of CSSR league goalies including Holecek from 1978. You can see that Holecek is suddenly described as a goalie with “lesser activity in the crease”…
1977-1978
(...)
1) Goalies.
Vladimír Dvořáček, former CSSR goalie who played at OG 1960, gives us a quick review of goalie starters in the 78´ Czechoslovak hockey league. I figured it might serve someone´s interest. Considering the names of these goalies, it could also be argued that the Czechoslovak league´ goalie depth was at its peak here…
J. Holeček: “High level of covering the space and of work of legs and hands. Lesser activity in the crease and minimal work with the stick.”
J. Crha: “Excellent, rising form this year, his job is impeded by weaker game of Pardubice´s defense. Good skating-wise, correctly covers the space and aims for a contact with attacking player. A ‘free hand’ [i. e. catch glove, trapper?] is his strong weapon. He can improve the stick-work yet.”
V. Dzurilla: “Always delivers reliable performance, draws from his experience, excellent work with the stick, covering the space and glove saves.”
M. Kapoun: “Still very good. Greatly eliminates specifically mid-high shots. Yet to improve the stick-work, on-ice-shots saving and skating.”
J. Králík: “Belongs to the top through his stable performance, even though his style still has some shortcomings: frequent, useless leaving the goal to the sides (when an opponent can block him away), and reserves (blocker saving).”
I. Podešva: “Fast legs reaction and good mobility; needs to improve skating, stick-work and glove saving.”
L. Brož: “Correct space covering, saving on-ice shots and glove saves; needs to improve stick-work and saving the shots going into higher part of the goal.”
M. Krása: “Very good glove saves and on-ice-shots saving; needs to stabilize the basic stance, to improve the blocker saves, skating and stick-work, to increase the activity.”
M. Sakáč: “Good reaction on mid-high and high shots, lesser mobility and activity in the crease; needs to stabilize the way of saving the shots along the ice.”
M. Kolísek: “Biggest hope among goaltenders, although he needs to polish his goalie style; he can grow into a goalie of high qualities who would fully engage into the game with establishing attacks (just like Canadian Sawchuk and Plante used to attempt for it in the past).”
“The rest of the league goaltenders produce various performances, they usually miss to choose proper style that would serve them best. Therefore the most efficient, fastest, original style; there is no point for instance, to use a ‘butterfly’ when it is not fully extended. We still have reserves here when it comes to goalie preparations. While goaltending individual needs systematic management not just on the physical fitness side of things, but especially on the side of mental endurance. Goalie coaches should be in every clubs and should be established on level of regular club coaches and not just on the professional side of things but also material.”
b) Same year 1978, an excerpt from interview with Holecek, question about Canadian goalies, and his own stickhandling.
3) Holecek
While writing long post about CSSR goalies in a previous season 77-78, I completely forgot to add one minor but interesting insight of Jiri Holecek after the end of WHC ´78 and his international career as well. When asked: “What is your opinion on Canadian goaltenders?”
Holecek answers: “The best ones are equal to the European [goalies]. Moreover, they are great in a good work with the hockey stick, in a quick release of a pass. I´ve never learnt that because since youth, coaches rather forced me to play safe.”
4) The extended interview with Jiří Holeček made by Pavel Bárta, published in
Gól magazine, issue 11, February 1994, p. 2-3. Interview was made at the occasion of Holecek celebrating his 50-year anniversary. I decided to translate key parts about him looking back over his career but also about his views on contemporary hockey. February 1994 was the time where one of his ‘trainees’ was finally breaking out in the NHL…
“How did you come across the ‘Fakír’ nickname?
JH:
I was terribly thin. The thinnest one of all. I reminded the Indian fakir who sleeps on nails and whistles to that. Perhaps Jarda Holík started it. But I´m not sure anymore.
You were the first one who introduced a butterfly positioning here. How much of a revolutionary new thing that was at the time?
JH:
No. I only improved it and frequently used it. Otherwise I watched it from the Canadian goalie Seth Martin, who came by here in the sixties. Vlado Dzurilla started trying a butterfly after him, and then me. Since I have had a bit looser joints, I was good at it.
Many viewers also remember you, how you were straightening your blocker in front of you after a save in the games with Russians. People accepted it gratefully, they saw a certain gesture in it, coming from the era and situation in our country. How did you get along with Russian players?
JH:
Mostly, they were fine boys, so well. Some douchebags could have been found there too but it wasn´t a lot. For example, the Championship ended, they took bottles and came to our room at 3AM to talk through the whole thing with us again. Or the game in Moscow at Izvestia ended and Yakushev invited us for a dinner. A lot of heckling in the games. Kharlamov always asked Olda Machač, why does he hit him so hard? He responded: You don´t want me to hit you? You know I don´t, Kharlamov responded. And Olda speaks: Then skate on the other side. I was downright joyful for the games with Russians. I enjoyed it so much, because they were nervously shaking before the games with us, they were terribly scared of us. They always imagined, what´s probably going to happen when they don´t win over us, what is going to be done to them at home. I teased them and told them, don´t be nervous. It´s just hockey.
Did you have any proven method for game preparation?
JH:
I would say that already then, in amateur conditions, I had professional attitude. Each game started already in the evening for me. Go to sleep at half eleven o´clock at the latest, intentionally not to be in a hurry with anything in the morning. Everything peacefully, comfortably, freely. If we were somewhere at a tournament, I would exercise in the morning, a rest after lunch, maybe a soft massage, a coffee, I had to have one too. I dressed always the same, I don´t even know, if I started with the right or left shoe. And if the game-score was tied, we´ve exchanged the sides during the third period and I skated the red line sooner than an opponent´s goalie, I knew we´ll win. I rushed so that I could get sooner on the other half. If it worked out, we would usually really win.
Against whom you played the best internationally?
JH:
Technical teams, which combined until the goal was empty, suited me more. I was very mobile, I managed to move with passes. I have already always known, who´s going to finish off and I waited for him.
When our team travelled to the first year of Canada Cup in 1976, it didn´t have many experiences with overseas hockey. What did you perhaps know about the NHL then?
JH:
Nothing at all, except for what had appeared in the press. Television broadcasted nothing. I knew that some players exist there, who is likely the best. I´ve never seen them in life and suddenly we were supposed to play them. I mean the whole environment was different and new. I was considerably nervous before the first game, which I hadn´t had experienced here in a long time.
Since then, it stuck with you that you can´t play against Canada, on the contrary Dzurilla earned a shutout in the first match with the home team and later, for instance at the World Championship in Vienna, he was preferred. Did you cope easily with the feeling that somebody won´t trust you?
JH:
Normally. Lineup was determined, we played. Nothing could have been done about that. I failed in the initial exhibition game. Vlado started the next one, it got well, we defeated them 1:0. He played the second game and I exchanged him at the 4:0 score for Canada. But everyone remember that 1:0. Vlado became famous for it, although he had been my backup for eight years. On the other hand, it cannot be claimed that I didn´t play well against Canada. I played in both games at the World Championship in Prague 1978. We defeated them 5:0 first, 3:2 then.
Is for a goalie to have the knowledge, that he has his place under pension, very important?
JH:
There should be a goaltender in every team, who knows that he´s the starter. He needs a certainty, that he won´t be damned if something goes wrong once. When we went to World Championships, it´d be always said, you´re a starter, you deal with a backup role. We´ll see what happens, perhaps someone gets hurt, won´t play well.
You´ve trained Hašek since he was fifteen years old. Other goalies, including Králík, Turek, went through your hands too. Was Hašek the most talented?
JH:
Absolutely. I say everywhere that Hašek is a world class, and Petr Bříza, whom I also like, is of the same year as Dominik and were together in juniors, is a European class. And after them in the League, from what I´ve seen in the television of course, because I don´t attend the League, Turek seems to me like clearly the best. It´s a shame that the work with goalies was interrupted, and that there is no man in the association, who would take care of them. I don´t believe we´re going to have enough good netminders for the next years. There will emerge some maverick once in ten years, an above-average talent. That will be all.
You´ve recently said about Hašek that you don´t believe he´s worse than other NHL goaltenders. Apparently also due to lower salary, than Belfour and Fuhr have had, he didn´t get many chances in Chicago and Buffalo in last seasons. Maybe Canadian patriotism has come up. Agree?
JH:
Of course. They can´t allow some foreigner to be the best goalie, because they´re the best in the world. Just like they won´t let in any foreign coach there.
What do you say about the goaltending style, for which Hašek has been heavily criticized?
JH:
The best one, that there can be. They [Canadians, or North Americans]
can´t play goalie at all. For example, they turn the leg when the puck goes along the ice. Doctor Řezáč did that in 1924 first Olympics. If I let the heel clenched, what will I cover with that? A hole here, a hole here. Behind the heel and around the skate. But when I slide the leg to the side, I´ll cover the space with the pad and put the stick between my legs, nothing will come through. That´s what Hašek is doing. That´s what I was doing.
If you were younger, would you go to the NHL with the same risk as him [Hašek]?
JH:
I would. For five millions per season for sure.
No goalie has that. Not even Patrick Roy…
JH:
If I was the best goaltender in the world, I would get it. Roy wasn´t declared the best goalie in the world five times like I was. No one in history, from any country.
Not even your rival Vladislav Tretiak, who earned a huge reputation in Europe, but also in overseas. How would you view him?
JH:
Average goalie, who would have been in the fifth place in our League. But he had advantage, that he could stand there like a stone. Mostly only long distance shots got at him. If we outplayed them sometimes, we would score nine goals to him too. He wasn´t used on so many shots at him. Four five shots per period and from the blueline yet. He made a reputation behind the ocean, when the trip in 1972 worked out well for him. Russians played the Series with NHL selection team. Everybody was surprised, nobody believed that Russians could also have such a goalie. But Canadians are foolish and shoot from every possible and impossible positions. He skated forward well, stood six seven metres from the goal and they threw it at him. Canadians couldn´t pass like Martinec with Šťastný and Jirka Novák, former Pardubician line. He´d catch nothing. However, the best goalkeeper which Russians had for twenty years.
Is there something which you wanted to achieve but didn´t?
JH:
I didn´t win the Olympics. That is one big gold, which is missing in my collection. My wish to come to play to Canada also didn´t come true. One, to try the NHL on my own skin, two, to earn a big cash. I won´t make it now.
The only option was emigration in your time. Hadn´t you played with this thought?
JH:
As soon as I was somewhere, I´d got homesick and wanted to go home. I could not withstand to be there for long, and especially not without family. I could have gone to Chicago immediately. Bobby Hull once asked me, what´s my salary. When he learnt, he said, that it´s not bad per minute. I could have stayed, but what? I wouldn´t be able to go [with the National Team presumably]
, family would be a second issue. Wife at home with two little kids.
Don´t you regret that you´ve never even win the domestic title?
JH:
I played ten years for Košice, which was mostly circulating between 5th and 10th place. When I arrived to Sparta in 1973, it was separated two spots from relegation. After that, we didn´t get any goal in the first 3 games and finished second in the end. The title ran away from us twice more. But I don´t regret anything. We didn´t have the team for it. I´ve already experienced the biggest disappointment in a year 1967 at the Championship in Vienna, where we lost to Finland for the first time in history, and ended up fourth. Nadrchal began to play with Finns, and they sent me there in the 10th minute, 0:2 score. I got one goal, we lost 1:3, so I played fifty minutes 1:1. After the World Championship, they blamed the loss on me, and they fired me for three years from the National Team. I returned only before the Championship in Bern and Geneve in a year 1971. When they asked coaches, why in spite of my league performances am I not in the National Team, they´d answer, that I´m too much ambitious. Allegedly, they count with Dzurilla as a starter. Well, and when I´m there, he feels, that I´m pushing onto his place, thus making him nervous.
Though every player should have a certain amount of ambitiousness…
JH:
It was the reason why they fired me in my case. Except for the 1:3 result with Finland.”