Shooting Technique/Art of scoring series

[Bronco14 0]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sp3yNDYzshg&feature=channel&list=UL

So according to this video im suppose to use the whip of the blade for a better shot which as like in the comments is the exact opposite of stiffer blade designs such as 20k, rbz, nxg etc. I thought companies for going for less blade flexion?

[flaming_june 2]

Yea, more stiffness, more accuracy. But you'll still be using the flex of the blade to shoot. If you're doing it right you'll be putting your whole body through the shot. Remember how Brett Hull used to flex his blade when shotting? Kind of like that.

[Chadd 916]

I hate it when people say that one method of shooting it the best or the only way to shoot. Especially when there are as many moving parts as there are with that style of shooting. As far as the blade goes, more stiffness will equal more accuracy and more flex will equal more velocity and less control.

[flyers10 57]

Yea, confusing. He says to shoot off the toe and not the heel and using the heel is main problem for kids today. I thought you really needed a toe curve to do that.

[Chadd 916]

Yea, confusing. He says to shoot off the toe and not the heel and using the heel is main problem for kids today. I thought you really needed a toe curve to do that.

Yep, he thinks everyone should use a toe curve

[Beleafer 14]

nvm

[flaming_june 2]

I hate it when people say that one method of shooting it the best or the only way to shoot. Especially when there are as many moving parts as there are with that style of shooting. As far as the blade goes, more stiffness will equal more accuracy and more flex will equal more velocity and less control.

Yeah I was going to mention that at the end, but deleted it since this is just an intro video trying to sell easton stuff. Many good athletes from amateur to nhl pros all shoot differently. One thing though, you don't really need a toe curve just to shoot from the toe.

[CommodoreColt 19]

This is advertising disguised as a tutorial or useful information.

Kid: "I want to capitalize on my scoring chances, I need to take the shot more often."

Instructor: "The problem must must be your angle. Listen up kids. A lot of times, there will be a man between the puck and the net."

*Kid laser beams top corners*

Instructor: "The problem that pretty much all kids have is the lack of NHL-quality release quickness."

Kid: *snipe snipe snipe*

*End scene*

The stiffness of the blade is definitely a preference that varies from individual to individual. Shooting with the mechanics described in the video is one of many ways to shoot in one of many situations.

This video's purpose is to convince you that you have a shortcoming in your current stick's flex properties, which may or may not necessarily be true depending on a lot of things.

[Law Goalie 147]

Others have hit on some points -- it is advertising, not education, and and its insistence on 'one right way' is pedagogically idiotic -- but I do think it's worth parsing this a bit.

A flexible blade does not increase accuracy; even a blade that flexes extremely consistently (e.g. a composite blade with carefully designed flex) will still involve more factors going 'right' for an accurate shot than a stiff one. Flexible blades do, however, increase shot velocity, which is one of the things the Hull Brothers and Stan Mikita found out when they started softening blades in buckets of hot water and curving them under doors. You get two effects at once: the 'trebuchet' effect of the puck sliding along the curve, like a jai alai ball, and that of the blade flexing and returning, aka loading and unloading. Neither of these make you more accurate, which is why Glenn Hall would often step out of the net in practise, and why Dennis Hull was lucky to hit the end of the rink when he shot.

A stationary shot, no matter how hard or accurate, from that range will never beat a capable goalie: ever. The only way a puck will end up in the net is if you A) flub the shot, and produce a knuckle-puck or off-speed shot, or B) simply shoot where you didn't intend by accident, or C) the goalie accidentally trips on his stick, or gets distracted by a bird or an antinomy or something. If you took two or three on-ice strides launching into a 100+mph slapshot (Skills Comp. time), you might have a chance, but most goalies would just project a passive butterfly forward into the shot and take away 98% of the net by the time the puck was released.

Changing the position of the puck through the release is important: not only to shoot around defenders, but to A) change the shooting-triangle by an even greater degree for the goalie (hopefully making him deform his stance and balance with a lateral movement), B) move the puck across the defender's body in the goalie's visual field, disrupting his visual attachment to the puck. That said, even if you had a friend stand there instead of the rock in the video, you're going to add a tiny number of goals against a capable goalie, most of them due to accidentally hitting your buddy in the shin and causing a deflection.

The only goals that get scored on capable goalies via straight shots (unscreened, undeflected, off unbroken plays in which the puck-carrier approaches the net and shoots) are those where the player convincingly preserves other scoring threats. If you use high north/south speed to force the goalie to retreat, you take away some of his balance and mess with his depth; if you use E/W movement, you force him to open up to track you laterally, which probably messes with his angle, depth, and balance; if you use compelling deception to make the question doubt your release, you can eat him up; if you have backdoor (ie. off-angle) passing options, and you 'sell' those to the goalie as viable options, he has to sacrifice depth to cover them, and you've got more net to hit; if you incorporate all of these with tactical visual interference (screens) and a quick, disguised, or otherwise non-obvious release, designed to disrupt the goalie's ability to read the puck off your stick in the crucial fraction of a second identified by Vickers and Panchuk in their 'Quiet Eye' studies, combined with strategic scouting reports on how the goalie behaves in relevant situations, you're an elite goal-scorer with a seven-figure, multi-year contract.

That's not to say that shooting pucks off plywood, concrete, or plastic in your garage/other functional area won't help; it does. It means that when you're working on these kinds of shots, you'd best be thinking about more than 'dude I just lasered that'.

That, ultimately, is the only value this video really has: for all of its inaccuracies, it at least gets people thinking about moving the puck as they shoot, rather than 'ooo what a pretty trajectory that had.'

[flaming_june 2]

Hockey, a game of vectors.

[hellaavangard 33]

Props to Jags for puttin it out there too

[Chadd 916]

Yeah, but Jagr isn't doing it right. He doesn't pull the puck, let it slide away, load the shaft and then shoot the puck. He'll never get anywhere making mistakes like that.

[Law Goalie 147]

Silly superstars. They don't do anything right. That Gretzky kid needs to hit the gym.