Canadiens1958
Registered User
No. Bowman's list reflects how a team should be structured and the value of individual players.
Top-100 Hockey Players of All-Time - Round 2, Vote 20
- Thread starter quoipourquoi
- Start date
No. Bowman's list reflects how a team should be structured and the value of individual players.
TheDevilMadeMe
Registered User
Yes, the R-on, R-off stats absolutely require context to interpret. For example, while Mark Howe was the clear leader of the pairing, it helps that he played with Brad McCrimmon and the rest of the Flyer's blueline was so-so.
On the flipside, Norm Ullman had to "compete" with the Gordie Howe-Alex Delvecchio duo for his ratios.
Canadiens1958
Registered User
Post 1957 Ullman lost his chance to be Gordie Howe's center.
1956-57 RS the Lindsay-Ullman-Howe line set the record for most points by an NHL line during the regular season.
Howe and Lindsay continued their scoring into the playoffs. Ullman did not:
1957 NHL Stanley Cup Semi-Finals: BOS vs. DET | Hockey-Reference.com
Boston's best center was Fleming Mackell.
BenchBrawl
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I don't care about Bowman's list per say, but within it, the most interesting thing is how he ranked the Big Three.So even if you don't value the list, I'm using in the appropriate context here IMO.
BenchBrawl
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Or... we underrated Serge Savard?!
They weren't the greatest pairing of all-time for nothing.
BenchBrawl
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ChiTownPhilly
Not Too Soft
That list began life as a tool (i.e.: shed-denizen).
Yeah. Good one.
All right- there's this Shakespeare phrase: "the hardest knife ill-used doth lose its edge." That's sort of how I feel about that process. Grateful for as much discussion and presentation as possible- everybody adds something. But when the displays are used as prosecution-evidence against Lidström & Larry Robinson, then it kind of invites skepticism about the entire manner in which the process is applied.
Some of the most valuable lessons we learn from teachers are not the things that they outlined on their lesson-plans.
This is a re-post of my August 17, 2018 post on Holecek during a preliminary thread. TDMM has provided context of why we even talk about Holecek in his post on page 2 (CSSR successes vis-a-vis USSR, anecdotes saying how good and even better Holecek was to Tretiak, etc.). This post focuses more on Holecek himself in detail. If I add a short commentary to what I wrote half a year ago, it will be distingushed in red.
Someone asked about Holecek earlier.. All right here´s a quick post about him, basic things. I´m going mostly on my memory without much citations, hopefully I won´t mess up anything..
First, his style and character. Very elastic almost like a pro gymnast, great reflexes, particularly quick on his feet, not very stable - quite contrary Holecek was the goalie who was constantly moving around the net. Stayed deeper in the goal, often dived down on ice, usually covered the lower shots. Generally he was calm, mentally strong, able to play well in deciding games, despite a few occasions where this was not the case. On the other hand, he did not use his stick a lot, was not very communicative towards his defensemen. His style as a whole suited well against the Soviet forwards who tended to shot from shorter distance. Indeed, one can say that Holecek "figured out" the Soviets. No other goalie played better against them continually. On the other hand, Holecek also had problems against North American teams for the same reasons.
I still stand behind my description of his goaltending style but I have to admit I´ve read various largely contradicting statements about this matter. Some accounts speaks about Holecek as unorthodox, reflexive, mobile kind of goalie, while other accounts speaks about Holecek as being highly composed technical stand-up goalie, who rarely went down on ice, who rarely "flopped" and so on.. These style descriptions likely depends on context to what pool of goalies is Holecek being compared to: CSSR league goalies? WHC European goalies? NHL goalies? I´ll try to expand on this matter hopefully soon...
Otherwise, he was rather phlegmatic, had a closed nature. At the same time, he was highly ambitious, had a "I-want-to-win-at-all-cost" mindset. For these reasons, Holecek seemed to be rather uncooperative with other goalies. The kind of goalie who is not satisfied with a backup role. Wants to be the starter with full confidence in him and wants to play a lot.
Second, let´s skim through his career season-by-season.
If I remember correctly, Holecek started to play hockey very late, when he was 16 or 17 (??). Before that he played soccer as a kid. Obviously he had not enough time to fully develop his talent. After he finished high school, he was drafted into army and as an athlete he got into Dukla Jihlava camp (top Czechoslovak army team focusing on developing young players). This was, I believe in summer 1963, when Holecek was 19 years old. There were 5 goalies arriving at that camp, 2 of them made it into Jihlava team, other goalies went to secondary army team at the time, which was Dukla Kosice playing in the 2nd CSSR league... And Holecek did not made it into Jihlava! He was casted off to Kosice as not talented enough. And it´s not like the Jihlava didn´t know what they were doing, the coach Jaroslav Pitner (also soon-to-be CSSR head coach) was a former goalie himself. To put this into perspective, young players who were unable to get into Dukla Jihlava were thought as perhaps usable in the future as average 1st League players at best...
So 1963-64 is the first Holecek´s season in men´s hockey. Kosice quickly advanced to the 1st League.
1964-65: I haven´t checked the SV% or anything other from this season yet. So I can´t speak much about this season.
1965-66: Holecek had 0.900 in a very high scoring season (above 8 gpg) which was close to the best (2nd or 3rd best SV% among goalies), and he immediately gets into CSSR National team, played a couple of games as a backup. Very impressive that he developed so quickly if you realize that stuff about his beginnings in Dukla.
1966-67: Another season where Holecek finished near the top of the league´s goalies´ save percentage. Posts 0.905 which was again, I believe 2nd best in the League. Plays another WHC as a backup. There were mixed feelings about his performance there, the CSSR team itself sucked, finishing without medal and Holecek was viewed one of the players who should be blamed for failure - despite the fact that he recorded fairly decent 0.927 and played only a handful of games... The problem was probably a tie with the Sweden (5:5, allegedly some weak goals) and a lot of rumours basically saying that Dzurilla and Nadrchal (other Czechoslovak goalies) wanted Holecek out of the team because he´s "too much ambitious". This remains a speculation but Holecek himself admitted some problems in this regard and I´ve seen this information mentioned a couple of times as the reason why Holecek disappeared from international hockey for 4 years. However...
1967-68 and 1968-69: Holecek´s SV% is around the League average, so there could actually be some simpler reasons as to why he didn´t play internationally.. 1969 was also the 1st season where the Golden stick award for the best Czechoslovak players started to exist, 3 goalies received at least a vote, Holecek was not among them.
1969-70: Here we´re starting to see Holecek "rising up" again. Posted 0.919 - 2nd best in the League, well behind Vlado Dzurilla who was having his strongest league season yet (0.935), but also well above the rest of goalies who struggled to get above 0.900 mark. Golden stick voting: Holecek finished 12th and as a 2nd best goalie. But for some reason, he still did not return to CSSR team yet.
To add more context how good Holecek actually was in this season, this is the quote from Jiří Hertl, CSSR hockey association chief-coach, who was responsible for publishing and commenting various league stats including save percentages in Gól magazine, when the SV% tables were published after the league season ended: "Only one change occured in the table compared to previous overview - an important one! Košice´s Holeček fought his way up to the 2nd place. So he exchanged his spot with Jihlava´s Sakač. Holeček was the backbone of his team throughout the whole season, and especially in the last games, when Košice battled for their survival, he demonstrated his an invaluable service to his club." In other words, Holeček´s team avoided relegation largely due to the strength of his goaltending, especially by the end of the season.
1970-71: This season of Holeček is a bit of a mystery to me. Holeček posted 0.900 in the League - good enough for 6th best SV% that season, as the scoring in early 70s in CSSR elite League started to decrease, 90.0 % for a goalie was no longer that big of an achievement. Still, this was the season where Holeček finally got back into the National team and dominated the WHC ´71 with his 0.947 SV% plus winning the best goalie award and All-star team nod. Holeček, Suchy and Firsov seemed to be the three clearly best players of the championship. Holeček particularly shined in both games against USSR (3:3 and 5:2 for Czechs.. but Soviets still took gold). Golden stick voting: 5th overall and 1st among goalies.
Since I wrote this, I´ve solved this "mystery".. There still wasn´t enough trust in Holeček back in 1970 and the Czechoslovaks had been having their goalies more or less settled for 3 years: Dzurilla #1, Lacký #2. Only after WHC 1970 a change could be made, since both goalies disappointed at the Championship ´70, so only after that the CSSR coaches started to explore other options. Holeček already appeared at the following pre-season NT camp in the summer of 1970. Dzurilla struggled a bit during this season so Holeček was free to be given a chance at December 1970 at the Izvestia Cup (=this 'mini-championship', basically the main set of exhibition games during the season in Europe for the National teams). Results were precisely the ones you could have expected! Czechs managed to win the tournament, which was just as rare as them winning the actual WHC, and Holeček was in goal when the Czechs defeated the Soviets 3:1 (if I remember correctly). It was astutely recognized by coaches Pitner & Kostka that Holeček can be the real deal versus USSR, so even if Holeček posted somewhat average save percentage in this league season ´71 (and clearly worse than previous season ´70), he was pretty much set as a starter for the WHC ´71 and he definitely proved his value there...
1971-72: Similar to 1970 when it comes to League performance. Dzurilla led the League with outstanding 0.931 while Holecek came second with also impressive 0.925. Both goalies shared the goaltending duties in CSSR, Holecek did not play well at OG ´72 and recorded just a 0.813 in 2 games that he played. Dzurilla posted 0.926 in 5 games, finishing 2nd best among goalies in that tournament... However, Holecek redeemed himself two months later as he led the Czechoslovaks to their first Championship victory in 23 years. Save percentage 0.932 and I believe the best among goalies, or at least among starters (Tretiak had 0.913, Dzurilla in 4 games had also 0.913). Holecek was reportedly again one the stars in games against Soviets (3:3, 3:2 for Czechs) and of the best players of the Championship again. Although Directoriate handed the award for the best goalie to Valtonen, Holecek received an overwhelming support in the All-star media vote, approximately 70 %. Golden stick voting: 5th overall and 2nd among goalies (Dzurilla finished 3rd overall).
1972-73: This season was very interesting for Holecek and Czechoslovak goalies in general. I have recently written a longer post about the whole goalie situation at this time in the thread "Hockey in Czechoslovakia from 1968 to 1990" which I recommend to you if you want to check the League SV% (or some WHC SV%) more in detail. Essentially, Holecek had statistically his weakest domestic season - 0.895 and 10th best overall. However, if you read the article, you´ll see that Holecek spent the latter part of the season behind the team whose defense was in the state of complete disarray, to the point where forwards of Kosice had to play in defense. 4 of 6 Holecek´s d-men were unable to play... On the other hand, it was also recognized that Holecek decreased in the 2nd half of season post-injury, that it was not all just the missing Kosice´s defensemen... At the WHC, Holecek again delivered the best performance, winning both Best goalie award and media WHC All-star team vote. Additionally, halfway through the tournament, when Soviet, Swedish and Finnish coach was asked who had been the best goalie so far, all of them answered Holecek. 0.926 and 3rd best among starters, although both Leppanen and Lofqvist had somewhat "managed" their games (missing some games against Soviets). Tretiak had 0.921. Holecek was only one of the three CSSR players whose performance in Moscow´s championship was appreciated by the Czech media and coaches. From my perspective, it´s impressive how he took the awards again, despite his team heavily dissapointed, losing to both USSR and Sweden and finishing with just bronze when CSSR was supposed to defend their title... Golden stick voting: 5th overall and 1st among goalies.
1973-74: Somewhat opposite to the previous season, Holecek was stellar in the League and good but not great at WHC. He changed his team, started to play for Sparta Prague and almost on his own dragged the team that had been finishing near the bottom for 3 previous seasons to the final 2nd place (of 12 teams). Sparta (just as Kosice) was a team without any defensive stars, so no need to speculate about team effects boosting his SV%. I think the fact that Holecek faced the higher number of shots every year was something that helped him to better prepare on Soviets.
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WHC ´74, Holecek played the tournament through injury, recorded 0.908, still I think 4th best among starters, was voted as the 3rd best goalie by writers. Tretiak was voted as 2nd but he also won Directoriate´s Best goalie award and posted 0.929. Golden stick voting: 1st overall - Holecek´s one and only victory of this trophy. His excellent league play was good enough to secure the 1st place for him.
1974-75: Holecek won both League SV%, WHC SV% and Directoriate´s Best goalie award. Surprisingly, Tretiak was this time favoured by the writers. Stats - League: 0.924, WHC: 0.938. Tretiak at WHC ´75 for comparison: 0.925, just behind Holecek and Leppanen. Golden stick voting: 2nd overall, 1st among goalies.
1975-76: Holecek finished 2nd in League SV% only behind resurrected Vladimir Dzurilla. 0.923 for the former, 0.924 for the latter. Holecek´s OG´76 performance was legendary, I believe he had leading 0.934. Holecek, as the rest of CSSR played while being affected by flu epidemic. On top of that, Holecek suffered from eye injury after some deflected shot from the game vs. USA. During these Olympics, Bobby Hull made his famous comment about Holecek being the best goalie in the world, "better than Tretiak, Dryden or Parent". Although Czechs once again came short of defeating Soviets and capturing the gold, they finally made it 2 months later at WHC ´76, going undefeated through the championship. WHC SV% - Holecek had 0.943, best among starters. Tretiak had 0.931. Best goalie award and All-star team nod was given to Holecek. Golden stick voting: 2nd overall, 1st among goalies.
1976-77: Downseason for Holecek. He finished 3rd in League SV% with 0.916 which was still OK, but lost his starting position to Dzurilla at both Canada cup ´76 and WHC ´77. CC 1976 - 0.861, one of the worst SV% among goalies. WHC ´77 - 0.870 in 4 games, 8th best SV% out of 16 goalies. Czechoslovaks finished 2nd at Canada cup with one win over the all star Canada lineup and they also defended their previous championship title by winning the gold at WHC twice in a row now - not because of Holecek though! Goran Hogosta delivered his career-best performance leading goalies in SV% (0.958), WHC all-star voting and winning the best goalie award. Tretiak came 2nd with 0.918. Golden stick voting: 8th overall, 2nd among goalies (Dzurilla finished 6th overall).
1977-78: Great bounceback season by Holecek. After dissapointing 1977, Holecek originally wanted to end his international career but he was talked into giving himself and rest of Czechoslovak team a second chance by Karel Gut. Full confidence expressed by the head coach of CSSR was certainly something that Holecek appreciated. His performance - domestic and international - came back to his 74-76 level. League - 0.920, 2nd best SV% behind only league´s dynasty goalie M. Krása who played only 24 games... WHC - 0.916, only Dennis Herron had better SV% (0.920) albeit in only 5 games. Tretiak behind Herron and Holecek on 3rd place with 0.908. Holecek received Directoriate´s Best goalie award and once again won the media All-star team voting by an overwhelming majority (approximately 65 % of the media voted for Holecek). Czechs were narrowly beaten by the Soviets, although they allowed about one third less goals than Soviets in the tournament. Golden stick voting: 2nd overall, 1st among goalies.
1979 till 1981: Holecek ended his career by playing 3 seasons in Germany.
Third, question about Holecek´s ranking.
I personally find it useful to structure every player´s career on season-by-season basis and with Holecek, we can make more informed judgement if we will look at how many times he was the best goalie in Europe? This is obviously up for debate, but in my opinion Holecek was clearly the best goalie in Europe in 4 seasons: 1971, 1975, 1976, 1978.
Then there are 2 seasons where it is very hard to decide who was the best keeper in Europe: 1973 when Holecek finished 5th in GS voting, Tretiak finished 4th in SPOTY voting. Holecek outplayed Tretiak and everyone else at WHC, but also had somewhat weaker domestic regular season... And 1974, when both Holecek and Tretiak won the Czechoslovak and respectively Soviet "MVPs", Tretiak had better WHC but Holecek played quite well through injury and had his best League performance of his career...
Finally, season where Holecek was IMO clearly 2nd best Euro goalie, which in my view still means a lot value, would be 1972.
Seasons 1977, 1970, 1967, 1966 are up for everybody to decide how much value to put on them.
Fourth, attempt to create some general pros and cons of Holecek.
Pros:
a) Best cumulative save percentage during his prime (70/71 - 78) both on domestic and international level.
b) That he was the best goalie during his prime is confirmed by his outstanding collection of international awards. I believe only Fetisov and Makarov can match Holecek in this regard.
c) I personally really like his tenacity, desire to prove himself and ability to bounce back after terrible performance. Casted off as a teenager not good enough for the elite league - made into National team just 2 and half years later.
Casted off after dissapointing WHC ´67 under strange circumstances - came back 4 years later dominating the championship despite losing the first game at that tournament (1:5 loss to USA).
Delivered terrible OG ´72 performance (once again 1:5 loss to USA) - only to become hero of the nation two months later by taking the team to its first gold since 1949.
Suspicious league performance in 72-73 for a goalie of his qualities - delivered the best of his goaltending right at the championship.
Down-season in 1977, losing his spot to Dzurilla - came back again in the following year winning the best goalie trophies for the last time when Holecek had turned 34 already.
d) And also repeatedly outplaying Tretiak in head-to-head tournaments is a nice thing to have. Btw. I believe Czechoslovaks actually allowed less goals than Soviets in the 1971-1978 timeframe, despite Soviets taking most of gold medals.
Cons:
a) Is a player, who was considered the best player within his own nation just once, top 100 material? (Vladimir Martinec does not have this "hole" in his resume)
b) Question that will have to be adressed if Holecek later comes up for a discussion as a candidate, is his suspicious record versus North American teams. Although everyone know that he generally performed well against Soviets, and badly against NA, it would be good to examine that more thoroughly. Holecek certainly had also very good games against NA teams, so his record is not completely black and white. Particularly his "last hurrah", WHC 1978 Holecek seemingly looked very good against NHL Canada team...
c) Did not have longer extended prime like Tretiak for example. And you can´t say that Holecek was actually the best goalie in Europe in every single season during his prime if you structure him and other goalies on season-by-season basis.
d) Holecek lacked some tools in his goaltending toolbox compared to a lot of goalies: work with the stick, on-ice communication with d-men.
______________________
My next post on this subject will be solely informative without any interpretations: tables with domestic and international statistics of Holeček and his competitors.
Someone asked about Holecek earlier.. All right here´s a quick post about him, basic things. I´m going mostly on my memory without much citations, hopefully I won´t mess up anything..
First, his style and character. Very elastic almost like a pro gymnast, great reflexes, particularly quick on his feet, not very stable - quite contrary Holecek was the goalie who was constantly moving around the net. Stayed deeper in the goal, often dived down on ice, usually covered the lower shots. Generally he was calm, mentally strong, able to play well in deciding games, despite a few occasions where this was not the case. On the other hand, he did not use his stick a lot, was not very communicative towards his defensemen. His style as a whole suited well against the Soviet forwards who tended to shot from shorter distance. Indeed, one can say that Holecek "figured out" the Soviets. No other goalie played better against them continually. On the other hand, Holecek also had problems against North American teams for the same reasons.
I still stand behind my description of his goaltending style but I have to admit I´ve read various largely contradicting statements about this matter. Some accounts speaks about Holecek as unorthodox, reflexive, mobile kind of goalie, while other accounts speaks about Holecek as being highly composed technical stand-up goalie, who rarely went down on ice, who rarely "flopped" and so on.. These style descriptions likely depends on context to what pool of goalies is Holecek being compared to: CSSR league goalies? WHC European goalies? NHL goalies? I´ll try to expand on this matter hopefully soon...
Otherwise, he was rather phlegmatic, had a closed nature. At the same time, he was highly ambitious, had a "I-want-to-win-at-all-cost" mindset. For these reasons, Holecek seemed to be rather uncooperative with other goalies. The kind of goalie who is not satisfied with a backup role. Wants to be the starter with full confidence in him and wants to play a lot.
Second, let´s skim through his career season-by-season.
If I remember correctly, Holecek started to play hockey very late, when he was 16 or 17 (??). Before that he played soccer as a kid. Obviously he had not enough time to fully develop his talent. After he finished high school, he was drafted into army and as an athlete he got into Dukla Jihlava camp (top Czechoslovak army team focusing on developing young players). This was, I believe in summer 1963, when Holecek was 19 years old. There were 5 goalies arriving at that camp, 2 of them made it into Jihlava team, other goalies went to secondary army team at the time, which was Dukla Kosice playing in the 2nd CSSR league... And Holecek did not made it into Jihlava! He was casted off to Kosice as not talented enough. And it´s not like the Jihlava didn´t know what they were doing, the coach Jaroslav Pitner (also soon-to-be CSSR head coach) was a former goalie himself. To put this into perspective, young players who were unable to get into Dukla Jihlava were thought as perhaps usable in the future as average 1st League players at best...
So 1963-64 is the first Holecek´s season in men´s hockey. Kosice quickly advanced to the 1st League.
1964-65: I haven´t checked the SV% or anything other from this season yet. So I can´t speak much about this season.
1965-66: Holecek had 0.900 in a very high scoring season (above 8 gpg) which was close to the best (2nd or 3rd best SV% among goalies), and he immediately gets into CSSR National team, played a couple of games as a backup. Very impressive that he developed so quickly if you realize that stuff about his beginnings in Dukla.
1966-67: Another season where Holecek finished near the top of the league´s goalies´ save percentage. Posts 0.905 which was again, I believe 2nd best in the League. Plays another WHC as a backup. There were mixed feelings about his performance there, the CSSR team itself sucked, finishing without medal and Holecek was viewed one of the players who should be blamed for failure - despite the fact that he recorded fairly decent 0.927 and played only a handful of games... The problem was probably a tie with the Sweden (5:5, allegedly some weak goals) and a lot of rumours basically saying that Dzurilla and Nadrchal (other Czechoslovak goalies) wanted Holecek out of the team because he´s "too much ambitious". This remains a speculation but Holecek himself admitted some problems in this regard and I´ve seen this information mentioned a couple of times as the reason why Holecek disappeared from international hockey for 4 years. However...
1967-68 and 1968-69: Holecek´s SV% is around the League average, so there could actually be some simpler reasons as to why he didn´t play internationally.. 1969 was also the 1st season where the Golden stick award for the best Czechoslovak players started to exist, 3 goalies received at least a vote, Holecek was not among them.
1969-70: Here we´re starting to see Holecek "rising up" again. Posted 0.919 - 2nd best in the League, well behind Vlado Dzurilla who was having his strongest league season yet (0.935), but also well above the rest of goalies who struggled to get above 0.900 mark. Golden stick voting: Holecek finished 12th and as a 2nd best goalie. But for some reason, he still did not return to CSSR team yet.
To add more context how good Holecek actually was in this season, this is the quote from Jiří Hertl, CSSR hockey association chief-coach, who was responsible for publishing and commenting various league stats including save percentages in Gól magazine, when the SV% tables were published after the league season ended: "Only one change occured in the table compared to previous overview - an important one! Košice´s Holeček fought his way up to the 2nd place. So he exchanged his spot with Jihlava´s Sakač. Holeček was the backbone of his team throughout the whole season, and especially in the last games, when Košice battled for their survival, he demonstrated his an invaluable service to his club." In other words, Holeček´s team avoided relegation largely due to the strength of his goaltending, especially by the end of the season.
1970-71: This season of Holeček is a bit of a mystery to me. Holeček posted 0.900 in the League - good enough for 6th best SV% that season, as the scoring in early 70s in CSSR elite League started to decrease, 90.0 % for a goalie was no longer that big of an achievement. Still, this was the season where Holeček finally got back into the National team and dominated the WHC ´71 with his 0.947 SV% plus winning the best goalie award and All-star team nod. Holeček, Suchy and Firsov seemed to be the three clearly best players of the championship. Holeček particularly shined in both games against USSR (3:3 and 5:2 for Czechs.. but Soviets still took gold). Golden stick voting: 5th overall and 1st among goalies.
Since I wrote this, I´ve solved this "mystery".. There still wasn´t enough trust in Holeček back in 1970 and the Czechoslovaks had been having their goalies more or less settled for 3 years: Dzurilla #1, Lacký #2. Only after WHC 1970 a change could be made, since both goalies disappointed at the Championship ´70, so only after that the CSSR coaches started to explore other options. Holeček already appeared at the following pre-season NT camp in the summer of 1970. Dzurilla struggled a bit during this season so Holeček was free to be given a chance at December 1970 at the Izvestia Cup (=this 'mini-championship', basically the main set of exhibition games during the season in Europe for the National teams). Results were precisely the ones you could have expected! Czechs managed to win the tournament, which was just as rare as them winning the actual WHC, and Holeček was in goal when the Czechs defeated the Soviets 3:1 (if I remember correctly). It was astutely recognized by coaches Pitner & Kostka that Holeček can be the real deal versus USSR, so even if Holeček posted somewhat average save percentage in this league season ´71 (and clearly worse than previous season ´70), he was pretty much set as a starter for the WHC ´71 and he definitely proved his value there...
1971-72: Similar to 1970 when it comes to League performance. Dzurilla led the League with outstanding 0.931 while Holecek came second with also impressive 0.925. Both goalies shared the goaltending duties in CSSR, Holecek did not play well at OG ´72 and recorded just a 0.813 in 2 games that he played. Dzurilla posted 0.926 in 5 games, finishing 2nd best among goalies in that tournament... However, Holecek redeemed himself two months later as he led the Czechoslovaks to their first Championship victory in 23 years. Save percentage 0.932 and I believe the best among goalies, or at least among starters (Tretiak had 0.913, Dzurilla in 4 games had also 0.913). Holecek was reportedly again one the stars in games against Soviets (3:3, 3:2 for Czechs) and of the best players of the Championship again. Although Directoriate handed the award for the best goalie to Valtonen, Holecek received an overwhelming support in the All-star media vote, approximately 70 %. Golden stick voting: 5th overall and 2nd among goalies (Dzurilla finished 3rd overall).
1972-73: This season was very interesting for Holecek and Czechoslovak goalies in general. I have recently written a longer post about the whole goalie situation at this time in the thread "Hockey in Czechoslovakia from 1968 to 1990" which I recommend to you if you want to check the League SV% (or some WHC SV%) more in detail. Essentially, Holecek had statistically his weakest domestic season - 0.895 and 10th best overall. However, if you read the article, you´ll see that Holecek spent the latter part of the season behind the team whose defense was in the state of complete disarray, to the point where forwards of Kosice had to play in defense. 4 of 6 Holecek´s d-men were unable to play... On the other hand, it was also recognized that Holecek decreased in the 2nd half of season post-injury, that it was not all just the missing Kosice´s defensemen... At the WHC, Holecek again delivered the best performance, winning both Best goalie award and media WHC All-star team vote. Additionally, halfway through the tournament, when Soviet, Swedish and Finnish coach was asked who had been the best goalie so far, all of them answered Holecek. 0.926 and 3rd best among starters, although both Leppanen and Lofqvist had somewhat "managed" their games (missing some games against Soviets). Tretiak had 0.921. Holecek was only one of the three CSSR players whose performance in Moscow´s championship was appreciated by the Czech media and coaches. From my perspective, it´s impressive how he took the awards again, despite his team heavily dissapointed, losing to both USSR and Sweden and finishing with just bronze when CSSR was supposed to defend their title... Golden stick voting: 5th overall and 1st among goalies.
1973-74: Somewhat opposite to the previous season, Holecek was stellar in the League and good but not great at WHC. He changed his team, started to play for Sparta Prague and almost on his own dragged the team that had been finishing near the bottom for 3 previous seasons to the final 2nd place (of 12 teams). Sparta (just as Kosice) was a team without any defensive stars, so no need to speculate about team effects boosting his SV%. I think the fact that Holecek faced the higher number of shots every year was something that helped him to better prepare on Soviets.
↑
1973-1974 Save percentage:
1. Jiří Holeček (Sparta): 40 games / 91 goals allowed / 1311 saves / 0.9351 %
2. Jiří Crha (Pardubice): 43 games / 119 goals allowed / 1247 saves / 0.9129 %
3. Jiří Svoboda (Jihlava): 43 games / 88 goals allowed / 913 saves / 0.9121 %
4. Jaroslav Jágr (Č. Budějovice): 22 games / 76 goals allowed / 749 saves / 0.9079 %
5. Miroslav Kapoun (Litvínov): 42 games / 148 goals allowed / 1431 saves / 0.9063 %
6. Pavol Svitana (Košice): 41 games / 123 goals allowed / 1187 saves / 0.9061 %
7. Vladimír Dzurilla (Brno): 36 games / 116 goals allowed / 1066 saves / 0.9019 %
8. Miroslav Krása (Kladno): 26 games / 85 goals allowed / 745 saves / 0.8976 %
9. Vladimír Plánička (Č. Budějovice): 23 games / 92 goals allowed / 801 saves / 0.8970 %
10. B. Pavlík (Vítkovice): 32 games / 114 goals allowed / 972 saves / 0.8950 %
11. Josef Hovora (Plzeň): 34 games / 124 goals allowed / 1054 saves / 0.8947 %
12. Miroslav Termer (Kladno): 19 games / 60 goals allowed / 506 saves / 0.8940 %
13. Luděk Brož (Vítkovice): 12 games / 42 goals allowed / 346 saves / 0.8918 %
14. Marcel Sakáč (Slovan): 34 games / 129 goals allowed / 981 saves / 0.8838 %
15. Melíško (Slovan): 11 games / 48 goals allowed / 341 saves / 0.8766 %
16. Hoznourek (Chomutov): 23 games / 104 goals allowed / 711 saves / 0.8724 %
17. Slánský (Chomutov): 19 games / 121 goals allowed / 645 saves / 0.8420 %
_________________
Petr Hnídek (Jihlava): 1 game / 1 goal allowed / 19 saves / 0.9500 %
Jan Ráca (Pardubice): 2 games / 5 goals allowed / 56 saves / 0.9180 %
Vlastimil Březina (Litvínov): 3 games / 8 goals allowed / 85 saves / 0.9140 %
Vladimír Nadrchal (Brno): 9 games / 23 goals allowed / 228 saves / 0.9084 %
Jaroslav Radvanovský (Sparta): 5 games / 16 goals allowed / 153 saves / 0.9053 %
Šott (Plzeň): 7 games / 27 goals allowed / 176 saves / 0.8670 %
Jaroslav Rozsypal (Košice): 3 games / 14 goals allowed / 83 saves / 0.8557 %
Herceg (Plzeň): 4 games / 17 goals allowed / 93 saves / 0.8455 %
Primas (Chomutov): 3 games / 14 goals allowed / 76 saves / 0.8444 %
Ligeti (Košice): 1 game / 1 goal allowed / 4 saves / 0.8000 %
František Reiner (Č. Budějovice): 1 game / 1 goal allowed / 3 saves / 0.7500 %
1. Jiří Holeček (Sparta): 40 games / 91 goals allowed / 1311 saves / 0.9351 %
2. Jiří Crha (Pardubice): 43 games / 119 goals allowed / 1247 saves / 0.9129 %
3. Jiří Svoboda (Jihlava): 43 games / 88 goals allowed / 913 saves / 0.9121 %
4. Jaroslav Jágr (Č. Budějovice): 22 games / 76 goals allowed / 749 saves / 0.9079 %
5. Miroslav Kapoun (Litvínov): 42 games / 148 goals allowed / 1431 saves / 0.9063 %
6. Pavol Svitana (Košice): 41 games / 123 goals allowed / 1187 saves / 0.9061 %
7. Vladimír Dzurilla (Brno): 36 games / 116 goals allowed / 1066 saves / 0.9019 %
8. Miroslav Krása (Kladno): 26 games / 85 goals allowed / 745 saves / 0.8976 %
9. Vladimír Plánička (Č. Budějovice): 23 games / 92 goals allowed / 801 saves / 0.8970 %
10. B. Pavlík (Vítkovice): 32 games / 114 goals allowed / 972 saves / 0.8950 %
11. Josef Hovora (Plzeň): 34 games / 124 goals allowed / 1054 saves / 0.8947 %
12. Miroslav Termer (Kladno): 19 games / 60 goals allowed / 506 saves / 0.8940 %
13. Luděk Brož (Vítkovice): 12 games / 42 goals allowed / 346 saves / 0.8918 %
14. Marcel Sakáč (Slovan): 34 games / 129 goals allowed / 981 saves / 0.8838 %
15. Melíško (Slovan): 11 games / 48 goals allowed / 341 saves / 0.8766 %
16. Hoznourek (Chomutov): 23 games / 104 goals allowed / 711 saves / 0.8724 %
17. Slánský (Chomutov): 19 games / 121 goals allowed / 645 saves / 0.8420 %
_________________
Petr Hnídek (Jihlava): 1 game / 1 goal allowed / 19 saves / 0.9500 %
Jan Ráca (Pardubice): 2 games / 5 goals allowed / 56 saves / 0.9180 %
Vlastimil Březina (Litvínov): 3 games / 8 goals allowed / 85 saves / 0.9140 %
Vladimír Nadrchal (Brno): 9 games / 23 goals allowed / 228 saves / 0.9084 %
Jaroslav Radvanovský (Sparta): 5 games / 16 goals allowed / 153 saves / 0.9053 %
Šott (Plzeň): 7 games / 27 goals allowed / 176 saves / 0.8670 %
Jaroslav Rozsypal (Košice): 3 games / 14 goals allowed / 83 saves / 0.8557 %
Herceg (Plzeň): 4 games / 17 goals allowed / 93 saves / 0.8455 %
Primas (Chomutov): 3 games / 14 goals allowed / 76 saves / 0.8444 %
Ligeti (Košice): 1 game / 1 goal allowed / 4 saves / 0.8000 %
František Reiner (Č. Budějovice): 1 game / 1 goal allowed / 3 saves / 0.7500 %
WHC ´74, Holecek played the tournament through injury, recorded 0.908, still I think 4th best among starters, was voted as the 3rd best goalie by writers. Tretiak was voted as 2nd but he also won Directoriate´s Best goalie award and posted 0.929. Golden stick voting: 1st overall - Holecek´s one and only victory of this trophy. His excellent league play was good enough to secure the 1st place for him.
1974-75: Holecek won both League SV%, WHC SV% and Directoriate´s Best goalie award. Surprisingly, Tretiak was this time favoured by the writers. Stats - League: 0.924, WHC: 0.938. Tretiak at WHC ´75 for comparison: 0.925, just behind Holecek and Leppanen. Golden stick voting: 2nd overall, 1st among goalies.
1975-76: Holecek finished 2nd in League SV% only behind resurrected Vladimir Dzurilla. 0.923 for the former, 0.924 for the latter. Holecek´s OG´76 performance was legendary, I believe he had leading 0.934. Holecek, as the rest of CSSR played while being affected by flu epidemic. On top of that, Holecek suffered from eye injury after some deflected shot from the game vs. USA. During these Olympics, Bobby Hull made his famous comment about Holecek being the best goalie in the world, "better than Tretiak, Dryden or Parent". Although Czechs once again came short of defeating Soviets and capturing the gold, they finally made it 2 months later at WHC ´76, going undefeated through the championship. WHC SV% - Holecek had 0.943, best among starters. Tretiak had 0.931. Best goalie award and All-star team nod was given to Holecek. Golden stick voting: 2nd overall, 1st among goalies.
1976-77: Downseason for Holecek. He finished 3rd in League SV% with 0.916 which was still OK, but lost his starting position to Dzurilla at both Canada cup ´76 and WHC ´77. CC 1976 - 0.861, one of the worst SV% among goalies. WHC ´77 - 0.870 in 4 games, 8th best SV% out of 16 goalies. Czechoslovaks finished 2nd at Canada cup with one win over the all star Canada lineup and they also defended their previous championship title by winning the gold at WHC twice in a row now - not because of Holecek though! Goran Hogosta delivered his career-best performance leading goalies in SV% (0.958), WHC all-star voting and winning the best goalie award. Tretiak came 2nd with 0.918. Golden stick voting: 8th overall, 2nd among goalies (Dzurilla finished 6th overall).
1977-78: Great bounceback season by Holecek. After dissapointing 1977, Holecek originally wanted to end his international career but he was talked into giving himself and rest of Czechoslovak team a second chance by Karel Gut. Full confidence expressed by the head coach of CSSR was certainly something that Holecek appreciated. His performance - domestic and international - came back to his 74-76 level. League - 0.920, 2nd best SV% behind only league´s dynasty goalie M. Krása who played only 24 games... WHC - 0.916, only Dennis Herron had better SV% (0.920) albeit in only 5 games. Tretiak behind Herron and Holecek on 3rd place with 0.908. Holecek received Directoriate´s Best goalie award and once again won the media All-star team voting by an overwhelming majority (approximately 65 % of the media voted for Holecek). Czechs were narrowly beaten by the Soviets, although they allowed about one third less goals than Soviets in the tournament. Golden stick voting: 2nd overall, 1st among goalies.
1979 till 1981: Holecek ended his career by playing 3 seasons in Germany.
Third, question about Holecek´s ranking.
I personally find it useful to structure every player´s career on season-by-season basis and with Holecek, we can make more informed judgement if we will look at how many times he was the best goalie in Europe? This is obviously up for debate, but in my opinion Holecek was clearly the best goalie in Europe in 4 seasons: 1971, 1975, 1976, 1978.
Then there are 2 seasons where it is very hard to decide who was the best keeper in Europe: 1973 when Holecek finished 5th in GS voting, Tretiak finished 4th in SPOTY voting. Holecek outplayed Tretiak and everyone else at WHC, but also had somewhat weaker domestic regular season... And 1974, when both Holecek and Tretiak won the Czechoslovak and respectively Soviet "MVPs", Tretiak had better WHC but Holecek played quite well through injury and had his best League performance of his career...
Finally, season where Holecek was IMO clearly 2nd best Euro goalie, which in my view still means a lot value, would be 1972.
Seasons 1977, 1970, 1967, 1966 are up for everybody to decide how much value to put on them.
Fourth, attempt to create some general pros and cons of Holecek.
Pros:
a) Best cumulative save percentage during his prime (70/71 - 78) both on domestic and international level.
b) That he was the best goalie during his prime is confirmed by his outstanding collection of international awards. I believe only Fetisov and Makarov can match Holecek in this regard.
c) I personally really like his tenacity, desire to prove himself and ability to bounce back after terrible performance. Casted off as a teenager not good enough for the elite league - made into National team just 2 and half years later.
Casted off after dissapointing WHC ´67 under strange circumstances - came back 4 years later dominating the championship despite losing the first game at that tournament (1:5 loss to USA).
Delivered terrible OG ´72 performance (once again 1:5 loss to USA) - only to become hero of the nation two months later by taking the team to its first gold since 1949.
Suspicious league performance in 72-73 for a goalie of his qualities - delivered the best of his goaltending right at the championship.
Down-season in 1977, losing his spot to Dzurilla - came back again in the following year winning the best goalie trophies for the last time when Holecek had turned 34 already.
d) And also repeatedly outplaying Tretiak in head-to-head tournaments is a nice thing to have. Btw. I believe Czechoslovaks actually allowed less goals than Soviets in the 1971-1978 timeframe, despite Soviets taking most of gold medals.
Cons:
a) Is a player, who was considered the best player within his own nation just once, top 100 material? (Vladimir Martinec does not have this "hole" in his resume)
b) Question that will have to be adressed if Holecek later comes up for a discussion as a candidate, is his suspicious record versus North American teams. Although everyone know that he generally performed well against Soviets, and badly against NA, it would be good to examine that more thoroughly. Holecek certainly had also very good games against NA teams, so his record is not completely black and white. Particularly his "last hurrah", WHC 1978 Holecek seemingly looked very good against NHL Canada team...
c) Did not have longer extended prime like Tretiak for example. And you can´t say that Holecek was actually the best goalie in Europe in every single season during his prime if you structure him and other goalies on season-by-season basis.
d) Holecek lacked some tools in his goaltending toolbox compared to a lot of goalies: work with the stick, on-ice communication with d-men.
______________________
My next post on this subject will be solely informative without any interpretations: tables with domestic and international statistics of Holeček and his competitors.
MXD
Original #4
- Oct 27, 2005
- 50,798
- 16,540
That would perhaps be useful in the ATD but when talking about the best 100 players of all time Scotty Bowmans list is pretty useless.
Put another way his list would have been rejected by this project (with players from Europe injected in the right spots)
As for Savard and Howe, Howe simply has a much better and longer impact than Savard plain and simple.
ted2019
History of Hockey
My early week thoughts.
1. Mark Howe. Terribly underrated and is my top player from the pervious round. Played in an era on Ray Bourque, prime Paul Coffey, Larry Robinson, etc..
2. Eric Lindros. When you are the most dominating player in the league for a few seasons, you are a top 100 player. His hockey IQ killed his career.
3. Eddie Gerard. His resume speaks for itself.
4. Dave Keon. I had him out of my top 100, until I saw his R-ON, R-OFF playoff numbers. Just incredible.
5. Valeri Vasiliev. If it wasn't for Keon, I'd have him at 4.
6/7/8/9/10. A mash-up of: Serge Savard/Jiri Holecek/Sid Abel/Norm Ullman/Russell Bowie
1. Mark Howe. Terribly underrated and is my top player from the pervious round. Played in an era on Ray Bourque, prime Paul Coffey, Larry Robinson, etc..
2. Eric Lindros. When you are the most dominating player in the league for a few seasons, you are a top 100 player. His hockey IQ killed his career.
3. Eddie Gerard. His resume speaks for itself.
4. Dave Keon. I had him out of my top 100, until I saw his R-ON, R-OFF playoff numbers. Just incredible.
5. Valeri Vasiliev. If it wasn't for Keon, I'd have him at 4.
6/7/8/9/10. A mash-up of: Serge Savard/Jiri Holecek/Sid Abel/Norm Ullman/Russell Bowie
DannyGallivan
Your world frightens and confuses me
Parent is up for voting? Cool. I thought I would have been the only one to even have him crack the top 120.
DannyGallivan
Your world frightens and confuses me
Can't think of any goaltender with a more dominant peak. Not Hasek. Not Roy. Not Sawchuk (well, maybe Sawchuk). It's just that his peak was so short, comparatively speaking.
While I don't think that Parent is a top 100 player of all time (Holecek is a better option this round perhaps) the precinct for a really good 2 year peak of Dickie Moore has him on this list already.
I think Parent has the better 2 year peak.
tony d
Registered User
Yeah, Parent's peak was amazing but aside from that peak I don't know how high I'd rank him. It probably won't be on this list.
Kyle McMahon
Registered User
- May 10, 2006
- 13,301
- 4,353
One thing that everyone has to keep in mind is that R-on/R-off numbers don't capture the effects of player match-ups. I think sometimes the raw R-on number is getting downplayed a little in terms of its importance, specifically in the case of high-usage defensemen.
Elite defensemen tend to play the hardest even-strength minutes. You're not throwing a third pairing out against another team's #1 line. You're probably not even throwing a second pairing out if you can help it, if it's a high-leverage situation. And you're certainly not wasting your workhorse d-man's energy by playing him against opponent depth players. We can look at Serge Savard and say "hmmm...his team was actually better when he was off the ice, that's odd...". But perhaps Savard was continuously deployed against Orr and Esposito. If that was the case (speculation, but not unreasonable and perhaps some of our veteran posters actually recall), an R-on number that was around 1.00 or even a little less would indicate that Savard was pretty damn effective. Or at minimum, he was part of a 5-man unit that was. Whatever the R-off number happens to be is not particularly relevant to evaluating Savard as an individual in this hypothetical instance.
I think it's a little murkier with forwards. They tend to play fewer minutes, and the coach with the match-up advantage will tend to look for an exploit as opposed to going strength-versus-strength. A coach is trying to get his top offensive forward on the ice against inferior opponents; it's the complete opposite with his top defensive players.
Elite defensemen tend to play the hardest even-strength minutes. You're not throwing a third pairing out against another team's #1 line. You're probably not even throwing a second pairing out if you can help it, if it's a high-leverage situation. And you're certainly not wasting your workhorse d-man's energy by playing him against opponent depth players. We can look at Serge Savard and say "hmmm...his team was actually better when he was off the ice, that's odd...". But perhaps Savard was continuously deployed against Orr and Esposito. If that was the case (speculation, but not unreasonable and perhaps some of our veteran posters actually recall), an R-on number that was around 1.00 or even a little less would indicate that Savard was pretty damn effective. Or at minimum, he was part of a 5-man unit that was. Whatever the R-off number happens to be is not particularly relevant to evaluating Savard as an individual in this hypothetical instance.
I think it's a little murkier with forwards. They tend to play fewer minutes, and the coach with the match-up advantage will tend to look for an exploit as opposed to going strength-versus-strength. A coach is trying to get his top offensive forward on the ice against inferior opponents; it's the complete opposite with his top defensive players.
Canadiens1958
Registered User
Serge Savard had the hard match-ups. As stated previously replacing J.C. Tremblay. Also plenty videos showing him drawing Orr, Esposito and the top lines. Ald.ready poste
Internationally, 1972 drew the hot lines, the PK first unit with Bill White.
Canadiens1958
Registered User
1976 Canada Cup, Sittler series winning goal, note who was on the ice post PP and started the transition on the winning goal. Serge Savard.
TheDevilMadeMe
Registered User
If you value R-on/R-off that much, Iginla has a case for #1 this round, based off his regular season numbers.
And that moved Savard up to a +1. Among Canada's regulars, it was well below the +10, +8, +7 and +6 posted by the other defenders.
Conversely, there is Challenge Cup 1979. Note who politely observes Zhluktov stand in the slot to score on his goaltender, is caught up ice and abandons Robinson on a Soviet 2-on-1, and flat-footedly refuses to obstruct Kovin's scoring chance in any way on his journey to a -4 through the first 4 goals of the game. Serge Savard.
Hockey Outsider
Registered User
- Jan 16, 2005
- 9,144
- 14,456
Out of curiosity, how many players are we adding (to the voting pool) next week? Is it 5 more? Or we're ultimately picking the last six from this group of 20?
Will try to make a post on Johnny Bower time permitting.
Will try to make a post on Johnny Bower time permitting.
MXD
Original #4
- Oct 27, 2005
- 50,798
- 16,540
Dennis Bonvie
Registered User
Dennis Bonvie
Registered User
But you are talking about a dynasty team. Savard & Robinson along with Dryden in goal. Shouldn't they be able to handle anyone? Aren't almost all the top defensemen we are voting on going against the best of the other teams?
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