Oilers decline

binnington suddenly a good goalie?

No. From both sides, really.

Always has been

Well St Louis would be stupid to decline this trade, giving up 3 First round picks to trade $1m more in cap space in Binnington and only take on Campbell for the same term.. Ceci would be shot to the moon tho.. Either way this is a horrible trade idea regardless...

k.

NO

Yea I’m trying to find a good balance between the two but each time I seem to give too much to way too little

Do you enjoy being wrong?

3 1st round picks is absurd, especially retaining half on Campbell. Makes no sense really..

Outside of Binnington's single game in 15/16...he's never gotten better year over year. Not one season can he say he played better than his previous season. Just a consistent decline. I understand that his 8 games this year he's doing ok. Not arguing that, but I don't see a more clear and consistent decline by anyone else in the NHL.

18/19 - .927 SV% 1.89GA 13.7 GSAA
19/20 - .912 SV% 2.56GA 3.3 GSAA
20/21 - .910 SV% 2.65GA 2.6 GSAA
21/22 - .901 SV% 3.13GA -6.4 GSAA
22/23 - .894 SV% 3.31GA -19.2 GSAA

Yup I admitted that

The Blues are absolutely not doing this and it would never be offered anyway.

Dude. Binnington was waaaaaay better last season than he was in 21/22, which thus far has been his only crap season - until the playoffs, that is, when he was the hottest goalie in the league until Kadri whacked him from the series.

When are people going to realize that reading stats and understanding player performance are not the same thing?

Why not just retain 1.5 on Campbell vs retaining on each of them?

No, I get this year he has indeed playing better. I think we can both agree it's still early in the season. It's November 8th. I also agree there should be context to stats and that stats are really just a tool (of many) to evaluate a player. Another STL example that was (for good reason) pointed out to me. Krug had a statically awful season last year, but wasn't he on the ice for something like 17-20 empty net goals? That'll destroy a +/- without really deserving it. I get that, BUT if you're telling me his only crap season was 21/22...then he's a career .907 and that stinks. You shouldn't be able to start in the NHL with a .907 SV%. At some point there needs to be some production, no? At some point there need to be something that says...this guy's good!

Lot to unpack here, let me try to keep it in order...

- No, I meant he was far better in 22-23 than he was in 21-22. He's started well this season, but he always starts well. I'll hold off calling it a full blown renaissance just yet.

- Yes, stats can provide context, but they also require a lot of context. Per your example, yes, Krug was "only" a -9 at 5v5. However, he fully deserved the heat he got for defense because he was so very often the one who made the mistake that led to a goal.

A better example would be Kyrou, who also was -36 and also on for 17 ENGs. He takes too much heat for his defensive play, at least after the first 20-30 games of last season. It's nowhere near as tragic as people want to make it out to be, and actually he's been very responsible this season. Kinda shockingly so. Of course that does not stop people who never actually watch him play from repeating the old line, which by now is almost a year out of date.

As for Binnington last season, did you know that he had teammates kick/glove/bat/deflect 30 goals past him? Thir-ty. That's exactly a half goal per start and accounted for a .015 subtraction from his save %, which is insane. And did you know that Binnington faced the second closest average shot distance among all clear starters/1As? That probably is because of the staggering amount of back-door tap-ins and horrid turnovers leading to sudden odd man rushes the skaters were allowing through most of the season. His average was the closest until the very last game or two, but the Blues suddenly remembered how to (generally) play the right way down the stretch.

I mean, people can assume I'm just being a homer, but everyone who says that also admits they never watch the Blues play (or at least very rarely). Most of the local pro media will say basically the same stuff I said if they didn't already. A couple of them called him their player of the season. Aside from a handful of stinkers, he was very much a victim of the team in front of him last season. And honestly, it's a miracle he was a very solid citizen behavior-wise and team backing-wise. He never pulled one of his pointless freakouts (which only actually happen about 15% of the time people moan that "he flipped out because he allowed goals") and he never moaned about his teammates. Sorry, but cold-cocking someone who intentionally stepped on the back of your leg absolutely does not count as "antics" - this ain't field hockey. That's just FA&FO.

Frankly, he might be the most pearl clutched player leaguewide since the Cup win. And like 97% of hockey fans don't actually know what they're on about (I'm including a not insignificant portion of dependably ignorant Blues fans in this, BTW).

- Also, just FYI for needed context, the current average NHL save percentage is .899, same as last season.In fact, Binnington has yet to play a season where the leaguewide sv pct. was above .905.

So yeah, while so many people want to shriek how he's awful and terrible and the worst and how he hasn't been any good since the Cup win (one of the most blatantly de-bunkable lies on this site), a .907 career sv. pct. is easily above NHL average. Like it's not even close when you're talking about 230 starts across six seasons in total as one thing.

- Any way you slice it, the main point is stats usually cannot paint the whole picture of a very complex sport accurately, especially when you go into all the on-ice (six players factor into this, and not equally) and xG stuff (which are all based on a very subjective, flawed stat AND almost never are individual stats.

For me, by season, I would give Binnington these grades for the regular season only:

18-19: A+ (duh)

19-20: A-

20-21: C+ (this is the one season where his stats painted a rosier picture than his play actually did... he was very inconsistent)

21-22: D (I only spare him from an F because he started and ended the season so well, in between was a nightmare)

22-23: a strong B (some local scribes and pundits have given him B+ or even A-, just FYI... I certainly won't go quite that far, but he was consistently stealing points/keeping them in games they had no business being in with insane saves)

And in case you're wondering, that averages out to exactly a B.

Simply for sake of space...I've deleted a bunch.

I very much appreciate the details provided and that's all great stuff. The empty netters something I already knew about (didn't hurt his SV% though). The deflections...If I'm understanding you right...I'd be surprised if 30 deflections is THAT big an outlier. YES, I'm sure the better defensive teams provide more cover for their goalie, but that's just how ALOT of goals are scored in the NHL today. I understand this source is a bit dated (truth be told, I simply don't have a more recent version...so maybe a caveat?) 10% of goals scored in the NHL are off deflection which...ok so your number is a little high, but not nearly as much as you're thinking. That's just part of the game.

https://cdn3.sportngin.com/attachments/document/2b8e-2162057/Science_of_Scoring2.pdf#_ga=2.153599743.693479094.1631133267-2097441603.1631133267

I guess it all goes back to...what's you're career looking like? It's got ups and downs like any career, right? The cards you're dealt are what they are. That stat you're providing for NHL SV% includes backups, rookies, even emergency goalies (though obviously rare, but you get my point). Binnington is supposed to be a NHL starting net minder. He gets paid $6M per season.

Let me take a step back and rephrase. I'm not saying Binnington is literally the worst goalie to put on pads. FAR from that. Maybe I'm even coming across like that though??? This trade has THREE 1sts going to STL to acquire a goalie who is AT BEST below average for STARTING NHL GOALIES. Is that fair?

Thirty deflections is a huge outlier. But it wasn't just deflections. Faulk literally threw the puck in his own net once. Any way you can think to put it past your own goalie, they did it last year, with every body part and piece of equipment. It was weird, man.

And statistically, he's not below average. He's safely but not spectacularly above average.

But I was not suggesting you said he was the worst - that's just a common song around here.

Three 1sts is nice and all, but two of them are deferred, which lowers the value a little. Plus, picks are not really the priority for the Blues right now. But let's break it down anyway:

Right off the bat, you're basically asking the Blues to eat 11.5M of cap burden over the next four years. If the Blues were in a position to do that, that alone would cost the Oilers the 24 1st and let's say half the 25 1st just to keep it simple. That's before we even get to Ceci, who will cost them another 6M+ when they don't even want him. At all. And they give up Bortuzzo, who's a dirt cheap team leader/team muscle/elite PKer they love who almost always fills his role like a pro. Again, I see no reason they'd ever do that swap, but I'll be super generous and give you the other half of the 25 1st in value even if that's certainly not how the Blues would see it.

So that leaves us with a 1st deferred almost three years for a 55-60 start starter who's fairly hot out of the blocks this season. Again, not sure why they'd do that right now.

I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree. WHICH is ok! It's not eat $11.5M of cap for the next four years because you get off Binnington! Over the last 5 years the SV% difference between Binnington/Campbell is legit .000313. That's a .5 - .75 goals...per SEASON delta. I can fully understand wanting to stick up for the hometown guy, but at some point. THREE 1sts for .000313??? You guys keep Binnington. AND from the sounds of it...You're happy. So I can really get upset about that. Go shoot your shot!

Over the last five years is irrelevant. Right now, Binnington is a fairly hot goalie and Campbell, who has played more than 36 games in a season exactly once, is a waived dump.

Also, you keep saying three 1sts to swap goalies. That entirely disregards the huge cap burden transfer, which as I noted eats up at least half those three 1sts, probably more because one is two years away and one is three years away. And they'll all probably be late anyway.

And I would not need to "stick up for Binnington" (otherwise known as state facts people ignore... again, not talking about you) if so many people weren't forever clutching pearls and throwing stones at him like he's the worst goalie in the league. I'm not saying he's an all-star over here. I'm taking him as he actually is, unlike the overly emotional ones out there.