State Your Case: Brodeur, Roy or Hasek for best goalie of modern era

Welcome to NHL Goalie Week. NHL Social is celebrating the goaltending position this week, from Aug. 26 to Sept. 1, reveling in the uniqueness and artistry of the puck-stoppers behind the masks. In that spirit, here is a special edition of State Your Case in which the merits of the three best goalies in the modern game, Martin Brodeur, Dominik Hasek and Patrick Roy, are debated.

In the modern NHL era, there are three goalies that stand head and shoulders above the pack. Martin Brodeur played 22 seasons in the NHL, all but seven games with the New Jersey Devils. Patrick Roy played 19 seasons, split between the Montreal Canadiens and Colorado Avalanche. Dominik Hasek played 16 seasons in the NHL, with the Chicago Blackhawks, Buffalo Sabres, Detroit Red Wings and Ottawa Senators.

Each is in the Hockey Hall of Fame, each has won the Stanley Cup, and each has represented his country internationally.

The argument about who is the best has raged for more than a decade. So in this edition of State Your Case, senior writer Dan Rosen (Brodeur), columnist Nick Cotsonika (Hasek) and Editor in Chief Bill Price (Roy) deliver their takes on the debate.

Patrick Roy

Roy is third all-time in wins among goalies (551) despite playing his entire career when games ended in ties. So even if he won half of his 131 career games that ended in a tie, he would have 616 wins, way ahead of Marc-Andre Fleury, who currently is second with 561 wins (496 of them in regulation and overtime). Since Hasek has 389 wins and Brodeur has 691, it's safe to say Roy is, at the very least, the second-best goalie of all time. But then you go to the postseason, where Roy has 151 wins, 38 more than Brodeur, and won the Stanley Cup two times with two franchises and you realize what a difference-maker he was. I don't want to take anything away from Brodeur, who won the Stanley Cup three times with the Devils, but Roy did it with two teams, including under the immense pressure of playing in Montreal. And let's be honest, his Cup wins were epic; he went 15-5 in the postseason as a Canadiens rookie in 1985-86, and 16-4 with Montreal in 1992-93. -- Price

Martin Brodeur

Look, I'm not going to say negative things about Roy. He was great. But better than Brodeur? Not in my book. Brodeur won. Plain and simple, the guy just won. And he won a lot. He won every season. He always was there for the Devils. Bill already mentioned he has the most wins in NHL history, a number that to me never will be touched. He also has League records for most shutouts (125), most games played (1,266), most minutes played (74,438:25), most 40-win seasons (eight) and most 30-win seasons (14). Brodeur won in different eras. He won on a team that, yes, played terrific defense, but there were games he only faced 20 shots and had to be sharp. Ask any goalie and they'll tell you that can be harder than a 40-shot game. Brodeur knew every shooter and his tendencies. He studied his opponents better than anyone else. Ask him about a random player on the Atlanta Thrashers and he would tell you everything about him, from how he comes in, the angle of his shot, where he likes to put it, etc. Roy was great. So was Dominik Hasek. But Brodeur simply won more, which, after all, is the job. -- Rosen

Dominik Hasek

Roy and Brodeur each won more games and more championships. But they played for better teams for the most part, and Hasek was a late bloomer. And consider this: Roy's best single-season save percentage was .925 (minimum 20 games), and Brodeur's best was .927. Hasek was .930 or better five times and .922 during his NHL career. At his peak, Hasek was far ahead of his peers. He led the NHL in save percentage six straight seasons between 1993-94 and 1998-99, ranging from .920 to .937, when the League average ranged from .895 to .908. Hasek won the Vezina Trophy six times, the most since 1981-82, when the NHL stopped giving the Vezina to the goalie whose team allowed the fewest regular-season goals and put it to a vote of NHL general managers. Hasek won the Hart Trophy as the League's most valuable player in 1997 and 1998. He was the first goalie to win it since Jacques Plante in 1962, he's one of six to win it since 1924 and the only one to win it twice. That's, well, domination. -- Cotsonika

Roy

I love it when Dan makes my argument for me. Yes, winning is the job. Winning the Stanley Cup also is the job, and Roy has one more than Brodeur, beating him head-to-head to capture his fourth one. Again, this is not meant to take away from how great Brodeur and Hasek were, but if I had to win one game to win a Stanley Cup, Roy would be my pick. Think about the pressure he faced during that 2001 Cup Final. Not only was Roy facing Brodeur and the defending Stanley Cup champions, but the weight of the world was on his shoulders to help deliver Ray Bourque and the Avalanche a Stanley Cup. With the Avalanche trailing 3-2 in the series, Roy allowed one goal the rest of the way, making 24 saves in a 4-0 win in Game 6 and then making 25 saves in a 3-1 Game 7 win. How great was Roy in that Final? He had a .938 save percentage, a 1.58 goals-against average and two shutouts. Yes, Dan, winning is the job, and when Roy and Brodeur went head-to-head with the Stanley Cup on the line, Roy came out on top. -- Price

Brodeur

You're going with one head-to-head meeting that happened to go the way of Roy and the Avalanche? OK, you win that argument. But you don't win the argument. Let's talk about Brodeur in Game 7's. He played in 10 and went 6-4, a .600 winning percentage. Roy played in 13 and went 6-7, a .462 winning percentage. Brodeur and the Devils were down 3-1 against the Philadelphia Flyers in the 2000 Eastern Conference Final. Losing to the Flyers would have been a killer. What did Brodeur do? He allowed three goals in the next three games and the Devils won the series in seven. Oh, and then there was Game 6 in Dallas in the 2000 Stanley Cup Final. Double overtime. One goal allowed. Devils win the Stanley Cup. In 2003 the Devils had to win Game 7 on the road in the conference final against the Ottawa Senators. Two goals allowed in a 3-2 win. They had to win Game 7 in the Cup Final against the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim. A 3-0 shutout. Again, champs. Nine years later, Brodeur took a Devils team that had no business being in the Stanley Cup Final to the Stanley Cup Final. You can give me Roy's stats and I can counter with Brodeur's brilliance. They both were terrific, but then I'll give you Brodeur's regular-season dominance and that nudges him ahead. One head-to-head meeting doesn't define a career. By the way, as good as Hasek was, he doesn't stack up to these two. You have to be consistently brilliant in the playoffs too. -- Rosen

Hasek

I love how you two debate Roy and Brodeur almost as if Hasek didn't exist. Maybe that's because you don’t have an argument. Playoffs? Again, Roy and Brodeur played on better teams for the most part. When Hasek got to play for a great team with the Detroit Red Wings in 2002, he won the Cup, defeating Roy and the Avalanche in the Western Conference Final. Then there is the Olympics. Hasek won gold, and it wasn't with Canada. In the semifinals in Nagano in 1998, he stoned Canada in the shootout, 5-for-5, while Roy went 3-for-4 at the other end. In the final, he shut out Russia to give the Czech Republic a 1-0 win. Let's talk about style too. I know what Roy did for the butterfly, but Hasek was a mad genius. He did things no one else could, or would, do. Tall and skinny (6-foot-1, 166 pounds), bendy and quick, smart and creative, he came up with an unorthodox method that played to his strengths. He'd roll on his back and lay an arm across the goal line, charge out of his net to break up a breakaway, drop his stick and pick up the puck with his blocker hand. He didn't do it to look cool on the highlights; he did it because it was the most efficient way for him to stop the puck. The split-second reactions were the product of countless hours of practice. Often when a goalie makes a crazy, drop-your-jaw, did-you-see-that save, people say he looked like Hasek. It's the ultimate compliment for a goalie, because Hasek was the best. -- Cotsonika