The last thing the Flyers need right now is an early season goaltending controversy. But if Martin Biron does not crank up a strong effort in Colorado, there may be a widespread call for John Stevens to rotate goaltenders in the early going.
Biron was largely a victim of circumstance in the Flyers' opening-night loss to the Rangers. He gave up four goals in the first period, but only one was on a play where he made a clear-cut mistake. In his second start, Biron turned in a pretty ordinary performance. He made one huge glove stop on Alexei Kovalev but otherwise had an average game.
Stevens has often said that the telltale sign of Biron's sharpness is his rebound control. After a razor-sharp preseason, Biron's rebound control in his first two starts hasn't been anything to write home about. Last season, he looked like a Vezina Trophy candidate in the early going.
Antero Niittymäki, on the other hand, has been outstanding in both of his appearances this season. His play in the otherwise meaningless Flyers-Phantoms exhibition game was also note-worthy.
Biron's early struggles and Niittymäki's early strong performances are a bit of a departure from their norms. Biron is more often the one who has stellar Octobers and then tails off a bit as Thanksgiving approaches.
Anthony SanFilippo
wrote today that
it's "an annual rite of autumn" for Niittymäki to start fast in a season and then fade over the course of the campaign.
That's actually not true. Niitty tends to peak in late autumn and early winter. In a typical season, he starts a bit slowly, pick up from mid November to early January and then hit a wall. A look at his career numbers by month, including last night's game in Pittsburgh:
OCT 14 GP, 806 MIN, 4-7-2, 45 GA, 3.38 GAA, 362 SH, 317 SV, .875 SV%
NOV 24 GP, 1299 MIN, 9-8-3, 61 GA, 2.82 GAA, 654 SH, 593 SV, .907 SV%
DEC 27 GP, 1574 MIN, 19-5-4, 75 GA, 2.86 GAA, 823 SH, 748 SV, .909 SV%
JAN 25 GP, 1446 MIN, 11-10-4, 79 GA, 3.27 GAA, 751 SH, 672 SV, .894 SV%
Martin Biron, of course, has had a much lengthier NHL career than Niittymäki. I haven't crunched his career month-to-months in the first half of the season, but here's a look at his Octobers in the last seven seasons (including his first two starts this year):
2008-09 2 GP, 76 MIN, 0-2-0, 8 GA, 6.35 GAA, 40 SH, 32 SV, .800 SV%
2007-08 9 GP, 539 MIN, 7-2-0, 16 GA, 1.78 GAA, 310 SH, 294 SV, .948 SV%
2006-07 2 GP, 120 MIN, 2-0-0, 5 GA, 2.50 GAA, 63 SH, 58 SV, .921 SV%
2005-06 1 GP, 60 MIN, 1-0-0, 4 GA, 4.00 GAA, 37 SH, 33 SV, .892 SV%
2003-04 7 GP, 397 MIN, 4-2-0, 16 GA, 2.42 GAA, 190 SH, 174 SV, .916 SV%
2002-03 9 GP, 548 MIN, 3-4-2, 21 GA, 2.30 GAA, 221 SH, 200 SV, .905 SV%
2001-02 11 GP, 660 MIN, 5-5-1, 24 GA, 2.18 GAA, 276 SH, 252 SV, .913 SV%
Now here's a look at Biron's November history over the last seven applicable seasons:
2007-08 12 GP, 632 MIN, 5-4-2, 34 GA, 3.23 GAA, 361 SH, 327 SV, .906 SV%
2006-07 6 GP, 363 MIN, 5-1-0, 20 GA, 3.30 GAA, 171 SH, 151 SV, .883 SV%
2005-06 13 GP, 689 MIN, 7-4-1 38 GA, 3.31 GAA, 345 SH, 307 SV, .890 SV%
2003-04 8 GP, 445 MIN, 2-4-2, 22 GA, 2.97 GAA, 202 SH, 180 SV, .891 SV%
2002-03 9 GP, 485 MIN, 0-6-1, 25 GA, 3.09 GAA, 197 SH, 172 SV, .873 SV%
2001-02 13 GP, 753 MIN, 6-6-1, 29 GA, 2.31 GAA, 309 SH ,280 SV, .906 SV%
2000-01 2 GP, 120 MIN, 1-1-0, 6 GA, 3.01 GAA, 70 SH, 64 SV, .914 SV%
What does all this mean for right now? In all honesty, not too much. Niitty has been the better goalie so far, but it's still too soon to abandon the plan to give Biron all the starts except on back-to-back days over the course of the early part of the season.
If Biron goes out and has a tremendous game against the Avs, all will be right in Flyerdom (at least for a night or two). But if he struggles, the "Niitty should start more often" debates will absolutely get cranking.
History suggests that Biron will right his ship this month and, if there's a time to start rotating, it'll be in November and December. But the Flyers are playing in the present. Marty Biron's next start is huge both for the team and himself.
***
I use statistics frequently in doing hockey analysis, but it always comes with a caveat: Hockey is not really a sport for which statistical measures are the best indication of how well someone is playing.
Above all, hockey is a situational and observational game. Many of the secondary stat categories are subjective by their very nature.
That said, it gets frustrating sometimes when there's no consistency from building to building in trying to measure certain categories such as hits and giveaways. You can only look at players in the context of their own team and their minutes played.
It also gets a little frustrating when crews make obvious mistakes that don't get corrected.
Case in point: On opening night this season, Steve Eminger was on the ice when the Rangers scored their second goal of the game (and actually contributed to the goal being scored because of a coverage breakdown). He'd hopped on the ice for Lasse Kukkonen about 15 seconds earlier.
However, the stat-keeping crew either did not notice it or didn't correct it. As a result, Eminger was not charged with a minus-one on the play, but everyone else on the ice was -- and so was Kukkonen, who was sitting on the bench.
In baseball, suppose the Phillies bring in Pedro Feliz as a defensive substitute for Greg Dobbs. Feliz boots a ball, but the scorer accidentally logs it as an error for Dobbs. Guaranteed it gets reviewed and corrected.
Unfortunately, the pace of hockey is so fast that it makes the RTSS very, very tough to keep accurate. It's easy for mistakes to slip through the cracks. I've seen players on the bench credited with takeaways (I usually keep a running RTSS window open on my computer when I'm in the press box for games), players who went down the tunnel with an injury get an extra 15 seconds of official ice time, and many similar things.
But the uncharged minus to Eminger on Saturday should have been corrected. That was an easy error to spot for anyone who watched the goal live or on replay. In NHL football, if the wrong defender is initially credited with a solo tackle, it's inevitably corrected in the final stats. In hockey, however, a comparable error may or may not be corrected.
Bottom line: If the sport going to bother to log secondary stats, make sure the easy-to-fix errors are corrected to preserve as much integrity as possible in them.
Philadelphia Flyers Blogger •NHL.com • 
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