I'm a baseball catcher turned goalie.

[Wallzy41 9]

Obviously, i'm going to be wearing leg pads, a blocker, and have a stick along with specialized skates. What should I work on in terms of stopping the puck? I've thought maybe using the leg pads in the pro-fly, and using a lot of glove saves. Any help here?

[dcdot377 0]

work on skating. it is THE most important skill. everything else progresses from there. if you cant skate there is no chance of you being good or even enjoying the game.

[CH Goalie 39 0]

Be very smart and focused when you first start playing to therefore develop as little bad habits and possible.

Angles are very important. Use the rest of your body aswell, don't be a retard who catches everything. Throwing your glove across your chest is not allowed. ever.

[greyraven8 9]

when i first started playing goalie a couple of the first things i had to work on/ adjust to were

getting used to skating in goalie skates (blades are a lot flatter than player skates) and keeping my goal stick on the ice (also make sure you get a goal stick lie that works for you).

[camhockey16 5]

i'm sure you will have a good glovehand - but try not to use your glove 100% of the time

i knew a guy that when it was a long shot on the blocker side he would always try to catch it with his glove and would end up letting in goals

[fatwabbit 93]

i'm sure you will have a good glovehand - but try not to use your glove 100% of the time

i knew a guy that when it was a long shot on the blocker side he would always try to catch it with his glove and would end up letting in goals

I second what camhockey16 has said. I played baseball for a few years before eventually starting hockey as a forward. When our goalie couldnt play (or didnt want to play against the top team), I would gear up and play between the pipes. Did alright, but relied too much on my glove side. Anything on my glove side I would catch easy, but when it was on my blocker side I was a little slower as I was trying to catch it with my glove as well.

Work out with just the blocker and stick, and practice on that, have someone shoot just to your blocker side for a while and try to get used to using the blocker and stick... slowly incorporate the glvoe back into it

[Law Goalie 147]

Generally, dcdot's advice is the way to go: improvements in goalie-specific skating will yield the biggest improvements in both quality of play and enjoyment of play. If you can find a reputable goalie instructor in your area who either runs adult clinics or will give you a single lesson, that's a great investment to get a grounding in the basics you need to work on. Look for the guy with the best teaching resume, not the best hockey resume; being a great hockey player does not make a great teacher, and you're looking to learn, not to be impressed with some semi-retired blowhard and his dwindling skills.

Focusing on the pro-fly (though to be frank, most still just call it the butterfly) is fine, but the mechanics are a little different than blocking down as a catcher. As a catcher, from what I've seen, if there's a pitch in the dirt to one side, the catcher makes a short low hop over in front of the ball, landing on both knees at once. In the pro-fly, unless the shot is coming right between your feet (ie. five-hole), one knee always hits the ice first: the knee of the "front-side" leg, closest to the direct of the shot or to the movement of play in general. When that knee drops, the "back-side" leg drives off the edge of the skate to push your whole body over into the shot or towards the play; only after completing this push down the back-side knee come down to seal the pad to the ice. The complete movement is a bit like a controlled fall onto your front-side knee which is completed with the strong back-side push into the slide. Forgive me if this sounds a little rudimentary.

Again, the essential point to this is that even for the purest butterfly goalie around, skating drives everything.

Oh, and make sure you use a relatively deep hollow when sharpening your goalie skates, no matter what anyone says. Start at 1/2" and play around from there. Without a deep edge, you'll have difficulty performing the strong lateral pushes that are required for butterfly mechanics. Granted, shuffling (in your stance) will take a lot more effort with a deep hollow, but as your leg-strength and balance improve it gets much easier.

Pursuant to cam's point, there's a very good rule about how one should limit glove use.

First, turning the glove over with the thumb point down like a baseball catcher is a great way to catch shots that are going to hit between your nipples and above your belt-line (sometimes called "The Kipper Katch").

But if the shot is past your blocker-side nipple, DO NOT reach across with your glove. At around that point, you'll start to twist your torso away from the puck in order to keep reaching across your body to grab it -- and keeping your body in front of the puck is the single most important aspect. On a shot like that, or on any shot that's going to hit your torso before you can catch it, turn the glove palm-up (like a scoop) and trap the puck against your body when it hits. Reaching across your body like this shouldn't twist you much if at all, and will prevent the rebound from popping out.

The old tennis-ball (or better yet, India-rubber ball) off the wall game is a good way to get a feel for this. Wear your C/A with both gloves and a stick when doing it and you'll get the most benefit. Think about controlled direction with the blocker, precise but limited catching, and trapping to the body on shots you can't catch.

Keep us posted on your progress! Should be an interesting transition. Grant Fuhr went through the same one (he was actually drafted by the Pirates, but opted for hockey), and found it pretty rewarding to have done both. One thing's for sure - you'll have a much different style than someone who switched from being a soccer goalie!

[RonLopez 0]

I figured this would be appropriate here. (If you're on the GSBB, chances are you've seen it like 800 times before)

[Big Glove Save 0]

Pursuant to cam's point, there's a very good rule about how one should limit glove use.

First, turning the glove over with the thumb point down like a baseball catcher is a great way to catch shots that are going to hit between your nipples and above your belt-line (sometimes called "The Kipper Katch").

But if the shot is past your blocker-side nipple, DO NOT reach across with your glove. At around that point, you'll start to twist your torso away from the puck in order to keep reaching across your body to grab it -- and keeping your body in front of the puck is the single most important aspect. On a shot like that, or on any shot that's going to hit your torso before you can catch it, turn the glove palm-up (like a scoop) and trap the puck against your body when it hits. Reaching across your body like this shouldn't twist you much if at all, and will prevent the rebound from popping out.

The old tennis-ball (or better yet, India-rubber ball) off the wall game is a good way to get a feel for this. Wear your C/A with both gloves and a stick when doing it and you'll get the most benefit. Think about controlled direction with the blocker, precise but limited catching, and trapping to the body on shots you can't catch.

Keep us posted on your progress! Should be an interesting transition. Grant Fuhr went through the same one (he was actually drafted by the Pirates, but opted for hockey), and found it pretty rewarding to have done both. One thing's for sure - you'll have a much different style than someone who switched from being a soccer goalie!

I like this little pep talk.

Greetings everyone. I am a new member here so you all will be aware of old, inactive topics being brought to daylight by yet another new poster.

In simple terms in addition to some of those mentioned, a catcher playing baseball has a reasonable idea of where the ball should travel in respect to his body. He is more or less giving the pitcher a target to hit the ball with and should expect comparitively little variation. Almost the exact opposite with goaltenders of any kind but specific to hockey goaltenders. The objects course is always directed to avoid your contact. That is why you should also learn to use your body as one of the biggest obstacles between the puck and the net.

[sickwilly 37]

One tip that I found to be helpful (when I dabbled in goal) was to watch for the shooter's bottom hand to move down the stick a bit as a cue for when the shot might be coming.

A lot of pickup skates/groups let goalies play free... so play a lot and have fun with it!

[Law Goalie 147]

BGS, that's a neat observation. Cheers!