EHM The Blue Line

I've been trying to scour the net and this forum for a concrete answer, but I'm still uncertain. It's been a pain of a time finding any goalies (and frankly, anyone at all) who have more than a 7 or 8 in Anticipation from the CHL, so I have to wonder and ask, does that stat grow with age and experience? Is 8 the top-end for a CHL-level player? Do other mental stats grow significantly for goalies/D-men?

I'm now going to start tracking prospect growth to find this out myself anyway, but I felt the need to ask now to be 100% clear.

Anticipation does usually grow (albeit slowly) with experience. Bravery, influence, team work and work rate can grow, but the goalie needs to be talented to begin with, and he needs a lot of experience and years for you to see a useful difference in those attributes.

When choosing a prospect goalie, the most important attributes IMHO are (in no particular order) positioning, anticipation, bravery, determination, work rate, speed, stamina, agility. The technicals need to be decent, but those ones can improve a whole lot between age 18 to 25. The mentals and physicals don't grow as much so those need to be in good shape on your prospects. But, IRL size is a very important characteristic for goalies in this day and age - I don't know how well that aspect is simulated in the game, but if I was you I'd pick the bigger guy out of two similar prospects.

With all that said though, I find that the most reliable way of telling if a prospect gaolie will be any good is his history. Save percentage, and most importantly the steady improvement of it as he grows up from 16 to 18-19 y/o. Naturally you have to take into consideration the league in which the guy plays, but if his avg.rating is also sky-high along with the save %, you can usually bet he's gonna do fine in a tougher league too. Just like a 3-star guy who scores a hundred points a year in OHL - the same goes with goalies - trust the numbers more than the scouts.

For example, an 18-year old NHL draftee had yellow technicals when drafted, but at 23 years of age they are between 12-19 and mostly towards the higher numbers. He's a starting goalie in NHL now and ranked within top ten in the league. (And he was quoted as a three star prospect when he was 18, so the scouts give you only guidelines...)

.....and to answer your question about anticipation - if the guy is 18 y/o, a number of 8 might just be OK depending on the league you're playing in. If the guy has talent, anticipation might well be at 12 when he's 24.

professorscribbles wrote: Sun Feb 10, 2019 11:19 pm I've been trying to scour the net and this forum for a concrete answer, but I'm still uncertain. It's been a pain of a time finding any goalies (and frankly, anyone at all) who have more than a 7 or 8 in Anticipation from the CHL, so I have to wonder and ask, does that stat grow with age and experience? Is 8 the top-end for a CHL-level player? Do other mental stats grow significantly for goalies/D-men?

I'm now going to start tracking prospect growth to find this out myself anyway, but I felt the need to ask now to be 100% clear.

The attributes you see in scout reports aren't necessarily the real attributes of the players so don't worry about them too much.