Vesa Toskala's Bad Season: Too Much Effort?

Over the course of the season, a lot of people have said that Vesa Toskala has been overworked by Ron Wilson, forcing him into a GAA of just 3.06, and a terrible save percentage of .890.

However, you may have noticed that Wilson has a history of overworking his goalies.

Every year that Ron Wilson coached Vesa Toskala and Evgeni Nabokov in San Jose, they pretty much split time—which is understandable, considering that they are both great goalies.

But as soon as Toskala was traded to the Maple Leafs in the summer of 2007, Nabokov began to receive a lot more work.

Last season in San Jose, Ron Wilson played Nabokov in all but five games. So far this season, their backup Brian Boucher, has already started seven games, and Nabokov is playing just as well as he was last season.

My point: Ron Wilson will overwork his starting goaltender if he is really good, and it won’t affect the goalie(s).

So if being overworked is not affecting the Maple Leafs' starting goalie, then what is?

Is it the fact that the Leafs are allowing too many shots each game? Is it the fact that the Leafs have turned the puck over too much? Or is it that he is trying too hard, so he can impress Brian Burke enough to keep him in town?

Well, I don't think that it’s because the Maple Leafs are allowing too many shots. And it’s not because the Maple Leafs turn the puck over too much. A starting goalie should still be able to stop those pucks.

So the only explanation that I can think of would be that Toskala is trying too hard to impress Burke.

Last season, and during his tenure in San Jose, I believe that Toskala felt like his job was safe because he played so well. But now that he has had a bad start to the season (under Cliff Fletcher), and that he has a new GM (Brian Burke), he must feel like he is back in his first NHL season, trying to stay with the team.

And we all know that sometimes if you try too hard, you end up making too many mistakes.

So then how do we explain Toskala's good games?

Well, maybe because he is normally trying so hard, he has some "off games," so to speak. Meaning that if he was playing normally, during an off game, he would let in too many goals on a small amount of shots.

But now that he tries too hard, an off game would be a normal game. So really, for Toskala, an off game is a good game, and a good game is an off game. Make sense?

In these "off games," Toskala has been able to show off some of his strengths. Strengths that include his abilities to allow just two or less goals every night, play the puck, and forget about a bad goal and shutout the opposing team for the rest of the night.

A good example of that would be last year's game against the Islanders. Rob Davison scored a goal from his own goal line, and Toskala would not allow another one the rest of the game.

So really, if Toskala can manage to figure out that he just needs to play normally, then the Maple Leafs will get some better play out of him.

I think that it won't be too long until Toskala discovers that and his numbers get much better.