Unpopular opinion alert:
What's Anton Khudobin's trade value is right now?
Let me say first, that I would strongly prefer Khudobin to be re-signed and at least become the 1b option to Cam Ward. I'd love to see Ward's albatross of a contract moved so his cap hit could be better spent on a 3rd line C or scoring winger, but that's probably not at all possible. Trading Ward would require an equally ugly contract coming back, so I'd say that Wardo is the de-facto starter for the duration of his deal.
With that out of the way-Khudobin clearly has outplayed Ward this year, and he's certainly made his case for being a "1" goaltender. He'll certainly be looking for a significant raise from the $800k he's making now, and he's earned it. I'd imagine any new deal would be in the $3M a year range, and that's a price tag that I would not want to pay for the Anton plus Wardo's deal.
So unless JR is willing to shell out ~$9M combined for the goalie position next year, the team is at an impasse. If Khudobin were to be made available (in my opinion), he may be as hot a commodity as Miller. I also believe that Khudobin is in fact on the right side of 30yrs old as well.
So, in my hopes, JR has the conversation with Anton's agent in the very near future to see what his client is looking for next year. Based off of that and the unlikely prospect of trading Cam Ward, what kind of return do you think Khudobin could fetch if he were to be dangled as trade bait?