Fantasy Goalie Quality Control

The offseason is a great time for reviewing last year’s stats. But when we are putting together our draft lists, assembling goalie tiers, or deciding who to draft with our next pick - it’s important that we understand the “how” behind the stats. It’s one thing to pull up a profile of Yaroslav Askarov and notice that the young netminder took the majority of the starts for an up-and-coming Sharks team, and that he won nearly half of those starts (21 wins/45 starts). But it’s another thing entirely to find out that the 24 year old Russian keeper posted 19 Quality Starts (40.4 QS%) versus 17 Really Bad Starts (36.2 RBS%) and, even worse for fantasy managers - just 6 Quality Weeks versus 7 Really Bad Weeks, meaning he likely hurt your fantasy team more often than he helped it.

So what is a “Quality Start” and what is a “Really Bad Start?” And what is a “Quality Week” or a “Really Bad Week?” Let’s review with a quick explanation of each, courtesy of frozen tools , which is the best and my favorite place to look up the stats we are using right here.

Quality Starts (QS) -

Games with save percentage above the league average

Games with fewer than 20 shots and a save percentage above .885

Quality Week -

Weeks with combined save percentage above the league average

Really Bad Starts (RBS) -

Games with save percentage below .850

Really Bad Week -

Weeks with combined save percentage below .850

Now rather than give you the top 10 list in each category (because you can easily do that yourself at frozen tools, I will share some of the names and stats that stood out to me, ramblings style. It should be noted that the following conclusions are based on goalies that played in at least 20 games last season.

Andrei Vasilevskiy (TBL), reigning Vezina trophy winner, led the NHL both in total number of QS (42) and QS% (72.4%) in 58 GP.

Dan Vladar of the Flyers was the only other goalie to crack 70% QS (71.2% in 52 GP).

There were another 12 goalies that finished with 60% QS or higher, but only 5 goalies to achieve 60% QS while appearing in 50 or more games. Those keepers were: Jeremy Swayman (BOS) - 69.1 QS%, Logan Thompson (WSH) - 67.2 QS%, Jet Greaves (CBJ) - 63.6 QS%, Igor Shesterkin (NYR) - 62.7 QS%, and Filip Gustavsson (MIN) - 60.0 QS%.

Of the 14 goalies that had a Quality Start percentage of 60% or higher, Andrei Vasilevskiy, once again, led that group with the lowest percentage of Really Bad Starts with a 10.3 RBS%.

Logan Thompson (13.8 RBS%) and Jet Greaves (14.5 RBS%) are the only other goalies from that group that achieved a Really Bad Start rate of less than 15% while appearing in 50 or more games.

One way of looking at Vasi’s fantasy campaign is that when he started 10 games then 7 starts would be of quality, 2 would have been decent enough, and only 1 would have ended poorly for your fantasy team.

Montreal’s Jakub Dobes did have a Quality Start rate of 62.8% in 43 games, but his 23.3 RBS% was the worst among the 14 goalies with a 60 QS% or higher. Dan Vladar’s 19.2 RBS% and Jeremy Swayman’s 18.2 RBS% were the next highest.

There were 6 goalies that appeared in 50 games or more while recording a Really Bad Start rate of 20% or higher: Sergei Bobrovsky (TOR) - 30.8 RBS%, Stuart Skinner (WPG) - 24.0 RBS%, Darcy Kuemper (LAK) - 24.0 RBS%, Lukas Dostal (ANA) - 23.2 RBS%, Karel Vejmelka (UTA) - 21.9 RBS%, and Dustin Wolf (CGY) - 21.1 RBS%.

It’s worth noting, however, that Vancouver’s Kevin Lankinen (38.3 RBS%) and San Jose’s Yarolav Askarov (36.2 RBS%) each played in 47 games.

Jordan Binnington (STL) led all fantasy netminders with 19 RBS in 41 GP, and his 46.3 RBS% was second only to Sam Montembeault’s 52.0 RBS% in 25 GP.

Now with Edmonton, Frederik Andersen had 12 Really Bad Starts (34.3 RBS%) against 11 Quality Starts (31.4%). Though he did take the Stanley Cup to Lego Land.

Similarly, in a small sample size of 27 GP for the Golden Knights, Adin Hill posted 9 Really Bad Starts (33.3 RBS%), 1 more than his 8 total Quality Starts (29.6 RBS%).

Other fantasy relevant Really Bad Start standouts include: Arturs Silovs (PIT) - 33.3 RBS%, Joseph Woll (PHI) - 30.8 RBS%, Jacob Markstrom (FLA) - 29.5 RBS%, Brandon Bussi (CAR) - 25.6 RBS%, and Joey Daccord (SEA) - 25.5 RBS%.

Thatcher Demko (VAN) had 4 Really bad starts in his 20 GP (20.0 RBS%), but the 30 year old joins the newly assembled Tampa Bay Tandem (Vasi plus newly acquired Dennis Hildeby) as the only goalies to have just 1 Really Bad Week last season.

Scott Wedgewood (COL) led the NHL in Quality Weeks (19) and Quality Week Percentage (79.2%).

Logan Thompson - 76.0%, Andrei Vasilevskiy - 72.0%, Jet Greaves 69.2%, Filip Gustavsson - 65.4%, and Chicago’s Spencer Knight - 65.4% were the only goaltenders to play in at least 50 games while having a Quality Week rate higher than 65%.

Sergei Bobrovsky - 28.0 RBS%, Lukas Dostal - 20.8 RBS%, and Darcy Kuemper - 20.8 RBS% were the only 3 twine tenders to take the ice for 50 games or more and finish with a Really Bad Week percentage greater than 20%.

That’s all for this week, thanks for reading! My name is Garrett Finlay and you can follow me on X @garrett_fi51284 and on Bluesky @garrettfinlay.bsky.social where I am often talking goalies and fantasy hockey. I’ll be back here next Thursday, so until then - Happy Hockeying and good luck out there!