A deal that likely made both goaltenders happier
Sportsnet: Elliotte Friedman on the Edmonton Oilers and Pittsburgh Penguins goaltending swap. Both Stuart Skinner and Tristan Jarry were ready for a change of scenery.
** NHLRumors.com transaction
Ron McLean: “What about Stan Bowman? What was his thinking?
Friedman: “Okay, so obviously, night, we’re watching Tristan Jarry make his debut. Many of you for Edmonton against the Toronto Maple Leafs.
And I think it was pretty simple, like, one of the things talking to some of the Oilers today is that, you know, Stuart Skinner could he was in a good streak, by the way, when he got traded, but the moment it went bad, or he had a rough game, or anything like that, all the old questions and concerns came up.
And it was weighing on Skinner. It was weighing on the team. It was weighing on the organization. And I think everybody here felt it was just time. And I think ultimately, Stuart Skinner would probably agree it was just time. Like, it was weighing on everybody too much.
NHL Rumors: Calle Jarnkrok, and NHL Trade Tiers
The thing that made Edmonton comfortable with Jarry is that he apparently, behind the scenes, made a very clear, Ron, that if he knew his time in Pittsburgh was getting tight, and he made it clear he wanted to go to Edmonton. He has a place outside of Edmonton. He comes back there in the summer. He played Junior there. And the Oilers did their research into him, and they felt they were comfortable with him, because he’s an, he’s an Edmonton happy guy.
The thing about (Brett) Kulak is that, I don’t think they wanted to trade him, but they had to do it to make the money work. And that was kind of like the final step, but it was a big shocker. You could tell those players were surprised. I heard Skinner was woken up with the phone call yesterday that he was going to be traded.
And the funniest story I heard today was from Adam Henrique. He said that Kulak, it was his responsibility on the road to make the dinner reservations. So the players were like, I know Lulak has been traded, but do we still ask him to make our reservations tonight in Toronto?”
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