A couple of teams are going to have some decisions in net this week
Sportsnet: Elliotte Friedman on the 32 Thoughts: The Podcast – Six Seeeeven for Mason McTavish episode, on how it’s likely going to be an interesting week on the goalie waiver wire. There are some goaltenders who could be placed on waivers soon, and if they could get claimed.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
“I think this week Kyle is going to be one of the more interesting weeks on the waiver wire to see which goalies get there and when. Columbus put (Ivan) Fedotov through. I always thought that was a guy who was going to clear. I mean, teams could have had him last summer if they wanted him, and, so I’m not surprised he cleared.
But you know, Toronto’s got a situation with Joseph Woll, and you know, I want to respect his privacy. The only thing I’m going to say about it is I just don’t think anybody knows what the timeline is right now. So they bring Reimer in on a PTO. I assume he’s going to play one of the two games against Detroit this week, and then, you know, we’ll see what they decide to do.
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But there’s at least two goalies who are going to go on waivers this week. Who, or may go on waivers this week. I shouldn’t say that you never know what’s going to happen. I’m really curious to see. Do they pass through? Do they get traded beforehand? Do their teams try to keep three goalies? Do their teams, well, one of them is not going to move someone else, but and those goalies are Michael DiPietro and Clay Stevenson. DiPietro in Boston and Stevenson is in Washington.
Now, the Bruins signed DiPietro to a two-year deal, and I think that’s one of the things they were hoping, is that second year might scare some teams off. But you know, right now, the Bruins have (Jeremy) Swayman of course, and they’ve got (Joonas) Korpisalo. So we’ll see what they do with DiPietro, or what they do in net.
And of course, the Capitals have Logan Thompson and Charlie Lindgren, who were excellent for them last year. But Clay Stevenson is a really interesting player. He’s, they sign him for three years. He’s got two left. You know, last year his minor salary was two-ways. The next two years, it’s $775,000, and I bet you the Capitals are kind of hoping that maybe that may scare some teams off, but I’m not convinced it will.
I’ll say this, that when Clay Stevenson signed with Washington out of college, another team that really liked him were the Rangers. Like, the Rangers were disappointed that he didn’t sign there. So I think Washington knows that it’s going to be hard to sneak him through.
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And so I look at what’s Toronto gonna do. What is some of these other teams gonna do? And I could see the Bruins and the Capitals in particular, being a little nervous about these two guys and trying to figure out, how do we protect them? Do we do something? Ir do we just, are we, are we just, Are we going to carry three or are we just going to be resigned the fact we have to take our chances?
Now, I know last week, Connor Ingram, he cleared. And with Ingram, and I don’t want to make light of this. I root for Conor Ingram. I want him to do extremely well, but he just hasn’t been available all the time over the past couple of years, and I think that scared some teams away. I hope he goes down to the American Hockey League if he’s not traded, and he gets off to an awesome start and intrigues some teams. I hope it works out for him. But I wasn’t surprised at that number that he didn’t get claimed this time around.
DiPietro and Stevenson, I have no doubt teams are going to be looking hard at the, at those two guys.
Friedman: “Also Kyle. I did want to mention, people were surprised that Edmonton didn’t take Ingram. What did we learn when we were in Edmonton about Calvin Pickard?”
Bukaukas: “He may be the most popular guy in that room.”
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Friedman: “Yeah, hugely popular teammate. He’s at a million. Now, obviously, guys like DiPietro and Stevenson would be less. But also Pickard, when he’s played, he’s gotten W’s for the Oilers.
And I could see them looking at the salary for Ingram and saying no. but the way the players to a man, talk about, talk about Pickard. I would be curious to see if the Oilers would be, would want to unseat him.”
Bukauskas: “Oh, yeah, I think the answer is no, there.”
Friedman: “This business. And if you believe in a guy like Stevenson or DiPietro, you have to look at it. But I was very intrigued by what those guys said about him. And the only reason I would even wonder is these guys make less than him. But it’s very, very clear he’s a hugely popular player in that room.
Anyway, I think there will be teams this week curious to see what teams like, what, what, what the Bruins do and the Capitals do.”
Bukauskas: “Yeah. Should also point out, when the Oilers have a combined $3.6 million of their salary cap dedicated to their net.”
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Friedman: “And they they think about that a lot, a lot.”
Bukauskas: “It’s not like the, the goaltending position is weighing down their their cap flexibility right now.”
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