Most Injury Prone Starters In The NHL, Redux
14 years ago
I did this article last summer when people were wondering how durable new signing Nikolai Khabibulin was relative to the average starting goaltender. In yesterday’s piece, I was told that Khabibulin shouldn’t be considered injury-prone, since he’s only had one major injury in the last five years. I disagree, and I have proof.
I’ll employ the same list of players as last season, so some of the younger starters (Tuukka Rask, for instance) aren’t on this list, which counts total games missed due to injury since the NHL lockout. As before, I’ve excluded flu and personal reasons from the games missed list.
- Pascal Leclaire: 145 games (back, left knee, knee, left knee, hamstring, neck, right thumb, ankle, ankle, broken jaw, concussion)
- Kari Lehtonen: 145 games (groin, sprained ankle, groin, back, upper body, back surgery)
- Rick DiPietro: 138 games (concussion, knee, groin, lower body, neck, headache, knee, hip, knee, knee, groin, right knee, knee)
- Nikolai Khabibulin: 127 games (groin, knee, finger, knee, back, lower body, lower body, lower body, back)
- Vesa Toskala: 57 games (groin, groin, groin, groin, groin, groin, hip, hip, knee, groin)
- Martin Brodeur: 56 games (right knee, left elbow)
- Ray Emery: 54 games (wrist, wrist, abdominal, groin)
- Mike Smith: 50 games (concussion, arm, knee, post-concussion, neck)
- Cristobal Huet: 44 games (knee, hamstring, groin, back)
- Marc-Andre Fleury: 42 games (ankle, lower body, broken finger)
- Cam Ward: 38 games (knee, groin, lacerated leg, upper body)
- Ryan Miller: 35 games (thumb, lower body, left ankle)
- Roberto Luongo: 33 games (knee, rib, groin, ribs)
- Evgeni Nabokov: 32 games (shoulder, groin, groin, abdominal, groin, lower body, lower body)
- Jose Theodore: 32 games (knee, heel, hip, knee, back, hip, back, lower body)
- Tomas Vokoun: 29 games (knee, thumb, ankle, back, ear)
- Chris Osgood: 23 games (groin, hand, finger, groin)
- Ilya Bryzgalov: 17 games (groin, groin, back)
- Niklas Backstrom: 13 games (lower body, groin, back, groin)
- Carey Price: 12 games (lower body injury, groin)
- Steve Mason: 9 games (knee, mononucleosis)
- Henrik Lundqvist: 7 games (hip)
- Tim Thomas: 6 games (lower body)
- Marty Turco: 5 games (lower body, neck, lower body)
- Chris Mason: 4 games (groin)
- Jonas Hiller: 4 games (back)
- Craig Anderson: 4 games (neck)
- Pekka Rinne: 0 games missed, 113 GP
- Jonathan Quick: 0 games missed, 116 GP
- Miikka Kiprusoff: 0 games missed, 373 GP
The point to all this should be obvious. Since the NHL lockout, Nikolai Khabibulin has averaged a little over 25 games per season out of the line-up with a series of injuries, and given that he’s 38 years old there is no reason whatsoever to expect his health situation to improve. Even before this year he was one of the five most injury-prone goalies in the post-lockout NHL; as it stands he’s in that elite category (Leclaire, Lehtonen, DiPietro, and Khabibulin) who have missed more than 100 games.
When someone says that Khabibulin is durable, they’re either lying to the listener or lying to themselves or just plain ignorant of the facts. There is no doubt that Nikolai Khabibulin’s health is going to be a key story – perhaps the biggest story – in the Oilers’ on-ice success for as long as he’s under contract.
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