Buy-Low and Sell-High: Goalies

January 1, 2025 Left Wing Lock Staff 0 Comments

Introduction

Welcome to Unsustainable - our weekly look at goalies performing at unsustainable levels. Below, you'll find a data table with an emphasis on save percentages. What we know, from years and years of data, is that it unlikely that a player can maintain a save percentage that deviates significantly from his career numbers.

The aim of this weekly article is to highlight players, that the data suggests, are playing at levels inconsistent with their actual talent.

Even-strength Save Percentage

We'll first look at the EVSV% of several goalies. To put this into context, it is rare for a starting goalie to maintain an EVSV% at or above the .940 level over the course of a season. How rare? At a rate of just under 1 goalie per season since the full-season lockout of 2004-2005. So what are the chances that the starting goalie on your fantasy hockey team is going to maintain that high, early-season EVSV%? Slim to none. Below, you'll find a list of starting goalies most likely to see a regression in their EVSV% in the future.

Player	CSV%	SA	EVSA	SV%	EVSV%
Connor Hellebuyck	0.9175	854	702	0.9297	0.9402
Anthony Stolarz	0.9163	480	379	0.9271	0.9393

Penalty Kill Save Percentage

Next, we want to examine the PKSV% of starting goalies. We know that PKSV% is largely driven by luck, so fantasy hockey managers should be aware of starting goalies with a SV% propped up by an unusually high PKSV% (for reference, the league average in recent seasons is .865). The ASV% column tells you what a goalie's SV% would look like if he were performing at the league average in PKSV%. Note that the list includes goalies with unusually high PKSV% values and goalies with unusually low PKSV% values.

Player	CSV%	SA	PKSA	SV%	PKSV%	ASV%
Arvid Soderblom	0.8882	451	73	0.9069	0.9589	0.8951
Tristan Jarry	0.9098	495	75	0.8828	0.9200	0.8774
Samuel Ersson	0.8904	439	72	0.8838	0.9167	0.8775
Igor Shesterkin	0.9192	829	143	0.9059	0.9161	0.9001
Mackenzie Blackwood	0.9054	756	102	0.9153	0.9118	0.9107
Juuse Saros	0.9160	843	124	0.9027	0.9113	0.8965
Darcy Kuemper	0.9137	443	67	0.9074	0.9104	0.9037
Joey Daccord	0.9081	649	99	0.9122	0.9091	0.9062
Pyotr Kochetkov	0.9072	566	75	0.8993	0.9067	0.8935
Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen	0.9026	745	100	0.8980	0.8300	0.9035
Ilya Samsonov	0.9038	384	41	0.9063	0.8293	0.9103
John Gibson	0.9099	352	58	0.9063	0.8276	0.9178
Spencer Martin	0.8828	175	29	0.8457	0.8276	0.8616
Jordan Binnington	0.9067	754	98	0.8966	0.8265	0.9017
Jake Allen	0.9072	329	46	0.8967	0.8261	0.9063
Aleksei Kolosov	0.8723	321	51	0.8723	0.8235	0.8789
Philipp Grubauer	0.9090	425	56	0.8776	0.8214	0.8838
Alexandar Georgiev	0.9056	574	78	0.8728	0.8205	0.8854
Anton Forsberg	0.9040	271	44	0.8893	0.8182	0.9002
Eric Comrie	0.8947	280	27	0.9036	0.8148	0.9056
Elvis Merzlikins	0.9028	680	107	0.8912	0.8131	0.9022
Jeremy Swayman	0.9141	709	111	0.8914	0.8018	0.9026
Joonas Korpisalo	0.9009	325	43	0.8954	0.7907	0.9065
Marc-Andre Fleury	0.9119	283	28	0.8975	0.7857	0.9059
Joel Hofer	0.9090	347	42	0.9049	0.7857	0.9142
Ilya Sorokin	0.9165	756	85	0.8981	0.7765	0.9071
David Rittich	0.9051	397	49	0.8866	0.7755	0.8992
Calvin Pickard	0.9037	305	35	0.8984	0.7714	0.9064
Dan Vladar	0.8923	500	75	0.8900	0.7600	0.9075
Justus Annunen	0.9047	358	54	0.8911	0.7593	0.9088
Semyon Varlamov	0.9156	262	30	0.8893	0.7333	0.9016
Ivan Fedotov	0.8658	260	26	0.8769	0.7308	0.8897
Cam Talbot	0.9132	541	67	0.9057	0.7164	0.9262

Legend

CSV%: Career Save Percentage

SA: Shots against

EVSA: Even-strength shots against

PKSA: Shots against while on the penalty kill

SV%: 2024-2025 save percentage

EVSV%: 2024-2025 even-strength save percentage

PKSV%: 2024-2025 save percentage while on the penalty kill

ASV%: 2024-2025 save percentage if performing at league average on the penalty kill

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