Your favorite sticks from the last ten years?

[Radien55 6]

Your favorite sticks from the last ten years (or ever). Pick a top 3, or top 5 if it's hard to narrow it down.

I thought this would be a fun topic, sticks have developed a lot, sometimes maybe too much where they become very light and fragile and don't last very long. Some might like the latest tech or prefer an older model, or somewhere between. Naturally, professional players get theirs for free, so durability is less of a concern for them. I even heard an NHL player said he used a new stick for every game. A luxury most of us don't have.

Many Pros stay with an older model dressed as something new. The reasons for that could be many; consistency, don't like the changes made, etc..
If you could also order your favorite (discontinued) model instead of switching to the latest release, what would you pick and why?

[Westside 259]

I loved the Bauer 1x Lite and ADV. For me they just worked

[xstartxtodayx 348]

Past 10 years all seem the same to me stickwise, not much has changed other than hype, maybe 25+ years ago into the 2 piece generation I'd say the Z-Bubble for sure, the classic green one was my go-to.  Before that in the wood generation of the mid 90's I'd have to say the Victoriaville 4050 since it was one of the first sticks I could flex since it was one of the more whippy sticks.

[flip12 738]

I'm with @xstartxtodayx. Most of the latest and greatest is just rearranging the deck chairs. Great for marketing, but the ship is still the same. The viability of Pro's lineup is strong evidence if not proof of this. If the technology were clearly superior between 2005, 2015, and 2025 sticks, Pro's OG lineup would show it. The big inflection point remains packaging the T-Flex + composite blade as a unit in the Synergy. Since then, any changes have been more subtle than substantial.

To answer the main question, though I haven't tried a ton of different lines, the one stick did just work for me off the shelf a bit better than anything else I've had was RibCor2. It just had a combination of soft blade feel when puck handling with good pop on shots and, most importantly, perfect balance.

 

Edited 20 hours ago by flip12

[stick9 908]

14 hours ago, flip12 said:

I'm with @xstartxtodayx. Most of the latest and greatest is just rearranging the deck chairs. Great for marketing, but the ship is still the same. The viability of Pro's lineup is strong evidence if not proof of this. If the technology were clearly superior between 2005, 2015, and 2025 sticks, Pro's OG lineup would show it. The big inflection point remains packaging the T-Flex + composite blade as a unit in the Synergy. Since then, any changes have been more subtle than substantial.

To answer the main question, though I haven't tried a ton of different lines, the one stick did just work for me off the shelf a bit better than anything else I've had was RibCor2. It just had a combination of soft blade feel when puck handling with good pop on shots and, most importantly, perfect balance.

 

Meh, I'm not sure I agree. PROs lineup is their thing not necessarily a snapshot of the greatest playing or selling sticks. I think they did a really good job at creating a line up to suite a wide variety of users. JMO though.

The best stick I've laid hands is the Jetspeed FT5 Pro. Great feeling and shooting stick with excellent durability and it looks fantastic. I like em so much Ive considered order some customs. 

Runner up goes to the Nexus 2N. Not as good as a shooter as the FT5 Pro but it holds its own. Really nice feel and pretty durable too. 

[flip12 738]

5 hours ago, stick9 said:

Meh, I'm not sure I agree. PROs lineup is their thing not necessarily a snapshot of the greatest playing or selling sticks. I think they did a really good job at creating a line up to suite a wide variety of users. JMO though.

The best stick I've laid hands is the Jetspeed FT5 Pro. Great feeling and shooting stick with excellent durability and it looks fantastic. I like em so much Ive considered order some customs. 

Runner up goes to the Nexus 2N. Not as good as a shooter as the FT5 Pro but it holds its own. Really nice feel and pretty durable too. 

Opinions vary yes, but I never said Pro's lineup was that good, just that it was evidence that there's not some steep climb from their sticks, which are more like top sticks of yore (circa 2015 say), to the top sticks of today. If their sticks were clearly inferior, it wouldn't be all that tempting to buy them, no matter the price. If a product is no fun to use, the price feels like a rip off, even if it's not much in raw currency. Pro's sticks might not have that extra oomf of whatever Bauer, et. al. are selling for $400, but the oomf doesn't really justify the $200-$300 price difference, especially when you have more individuality baked into Pro's offerings. That's the evidence I had in mind.

To be fair, I will also say I'm fairly biased towards Pro at the moment as well. I still have my misgivings about Geppetty, but the sticks play nice and hold up better than others; True I'm looking at you. I'm a sucker for just about any PM9-based curve, which are becoming harder and harder to find, but he offers several that all work better for me than my preferred retail curve, P28: Kovalchuk Thrashers (my favorite at the moment), Kovalchuk New, Malkin, P46, and PM9 itself. I'd much rather buy a marginally less than stick with an a lot less than price tag with a curve that much better suits me than some really expensive cookie cutter (read profit maximizing) piece mass produced and mass marketed by the overlords.

[Radien55 6]

On 12/28/2025 at 6:40 PM, Westside said:

I loved the Bauer 1x Lite and ADV. For me they just worked

I have tried some older Vapor sticks, but I can't say for sure if it was the 1X lite. However looking at the specs, it's 397g. That's the sweet spot of light enough and still durable. You don't need more and I rather have that, than a new $400 stick that shoots great for 10 shots then dies.

Sticks have fallen off a cliff in the chase of being light, I've never seen sticks break so often as they do now. There are 1-3 sticks breaking almost every NHL game I watch, which is pretty crazy because it is a new stick for basically every or every few games, it's not high mileage sticks that have been worn down.