With all the toing and froing about DP, Roloson, the kids, contracts, commitments, trying to win now vs. the future, thought as a 'Christmas present' of sorts to Lighthouse Hockey, I'd spend a bit of time assembling some all-time stats on Islanders keepers (focusing on those who have played at least half a season - or 40 games or more) - and I put this into perspective by sorting by save percentage

What emerges is much clearer picture than the fog we now have for the most part.

First of all, here's the overall stats:


 

comments

1 - going back past 1980, the number of saves per season per keeper isn't readily available - but was at Hockey DB for 1975-76 for some reason - suffice it to say, who can argue with Battling Billy & Chico being at the top?  Desjardins was a better keeper than his stats showed, from memory - we didn't have much of a D those first two seasons, but he's sort of middle of the pack no matter what, and not terribly noteworthy anyway

Billy Smith is of the course, the best keeper we've had by some margin - and Resch is likely #2

2 - as suspected, Roloson is after Smith & Resch, perhaps the best keeper we've had, which is saying something - he should play the majority of games, or at least his value should not be underestimated - and in retrospect, he will look very good from a historical perspective - we take him way too much for granted

3 - the ongoing temptation of DiPietro makes a bit more sense, contract or otherwise, in this context - but quite noteworthy is that his stats are worse than this each of the last 5 years - so for him to make it all the way back would be defying quite a bit of recent history and ongoing injury - in other words, unlikely - the team is much more likely to win with Roloson now as suspected 

4 - Osgood was one of our best keepers as well, went on to have a great career - was traded to make room for DP, another casualty of the promise of DP

5 - Kevin Poulin's save percentage at Bridgeport is .936, and having had a chance to see him, he has a chance to be an all time great - Lawson's stats aren't bad either, and we have some further prospects in the system, but it's likely all about Poulin from now on

Conclusion

Let's not let relying on DP get in the way of the eventual future star Poulin - DiPietro may go on to be the most overpaid backup keeper in history, but it is what it is...

For now, play Roloson two games out of three, and eventual the job & the future is Kevin's and DP we use at best as a backup

I don't think there's anyway of denying these facts - we can't let DP's contract get in the way of doing what's right for the ultimate best chance of the team's success