Honestly?

No, Luongo isn’t as special as he once was.  He’s just another good goalie now, I think.  You can see the chinks in his armor now, and you can’t ride him like you once could.

I think a cult following almost made sense in the past, considering what he accomplished while in Florida.  But now in Vancouver… unless the Canucks win a Cup (unlikely), I don’t see that he’s done a darn thing to warrant all the attention he gets.

Sorry, but when Jon Quick and Craig Anderson have basically the same numbers as you, you’ve fallen off.  Time to come to grips with this…

Posted by Primis on 03/18/10 at 12:14 PM ET

Could just be an off year, though.

Kiprusoff isn’t lights out each and every season.

There was even talk of Brodeur being washed up in the first season after the lockout and he won two more Vezinas after that.

Posted by steve on 03/18/10 at 12:22 PM ET

Could just be an off year, though.
Kiprusoff isn’t lights out each and every season.

Well, nevermind that Kiprusoff isn’t what he once was, but he has a Vezina to his name AND has taken his team to within one game of winning the Stanley Cup.

Roberto Luongo once had the dubious distinction of being called the best goalie to never play in the playoffs.  Now he’s a very good goalie who hasn’t done anything in the playoffs.

Oh, and he’s a team captain who blamed his team for his poor play this year.

Posted by Garth on 03/18/10 at 12:56 PM ET

luongo’s form this season has been the product of being overplayed - he no longer has the stamina he used to demonstrate in florida, or his first seasons as a canuck. while still a special goalie, he needs to be sat down and told that, for the good of the team, he cannot play as much as he would like to. fortunately, the canucks still have corey schneider, who can be an excellent 1B goalie; this is what he needs to be next season.

Posted by fredster from manchester on 03/18/10 at 12:58 PM ET

Primis he didn’t he didn’t accomplish anything in Florida at least no more than Vokoun which is to make a lot of saves for a bad team and not make the playoffs. The best goalie to play for Florida was Vanbiesbrouck, he actually took the team to the finals.

On a nonrelated note I happened to be on FOX News and checked out their hockey section. It may be fair and it may be balanced but their NHL standings seems a little off.
http://www.foxnews.com/sports/hockey/standings/index.html

Posted by Bo from FL. on 03/18/10 at 01:35 PM ET

I happened to be on FOX News

There’s your problem right there.

Posted by Muero on 03/18/10 at 02:14 PM ET

Is he special? I can’t answer that since I don’t know if he rides a different bus to the game, but he does have a great rep based on having played for a bad team. What he hasn’t been is overly impressive in big games and the Olympics may have just given a larger audience a chance to critique his game.  His glove hand certainly has become more exposed. Not saying he isn’t one of the NHL’s better goaltenders, since he did win Vigneault a coach of the year award.

However, as was the case in Florida, if no one is there to see him play can you really get an honest opinion of his performance? In Florida the assumption was that he was doing great because of his numbers and everyone overprojected what he could do with a good team. Some goalies look a lot better on bad teams since the inflated number of shots they face doesn’t indicate the quality of chances they face, attacking teams tend to let up once they have a lead and the goalies are under less pressure to win. It makes the save percentage go up, keeps GAA on par and yet the wins don’t increase.

Posted by hockey1919 from montreal on 03/18/10 at 02:25 PM ET

If the Sedins were co-captains of the Canucks, this article would have been written about them instead of Luongo.

The fact that Luongo hasn’t won a Vezina is an argument that the voting is bad, not that Luongo is bad.

Luongo has a 2-2 record in playoff series.  Kiprusoff has a 3-5 record.  Miller is 4-2.  All pretty small potatoes compared to a guy like Brodeur (although remember that he’s been on better teams than any of the other guys), who is 20-11.

Luongo also has by far the best playoff save percentage, .930, of any active goalie with at least 20 games.  His playoff GAA is 2.09, which is admittedly behind Brodeur’s 1.98 (although keep in mind there are era effects there, because Brodeur played through a long low-scoring era), but well ahead of Kiprusoff (2.32), Miller (2.40), Fleury (2.45) and just about any other goalie you can name.

Of course, none of that proves that he’s better than Brodeur or Kiprusoff or whoever.  But it’s certainly better evidence than saying he’s never won a Vezina or never made it past the second round.

Posted by Ryan from Toronto on 03/18/10 at 02:54 PM ET

If the Islanders could go back in time they would’ve hung onto Luongo instead of “crutches” DiPietro.  But you just have to have an American starting goaltender on the island for some reason. 

Luongo has NEVER put up truly STELLAR numbers over the years despite the fact that he’s at least 20% bigger than the average nhl goalie.  I’d say a lot of teams would be happy to have him but if you can’t play defense then he’s only a serviceable goaltender.  This is pretty much the majority in the NHL.  What goaltender can stand on his head nowadays?  Maybe Rask, Anderson, Lundqvist, Bryzgalov, and Rinne but they have truly cruddy nights sometimes.

Posted by stoneman from vegas on 03/19/10 at 04:49 AM ET

Maybe Rask, Anderson, Lundqvist, Bryzgalov, and Rinne but they have truly cruddy nights sometimes.

Marc-Andre Fleury was born for this category. Sometimes utterly unbeatable, sometimes torches his own team.

Maybe Luongo’s overhyped, but the only teams in the East that would even think about not taking him over what they’ve got are Pittsburgh, Florida, Jersey and New York.

Posted by steve on 03/19/10 at 03:33 PM ET