Brian39
Registered User
- Apr 24, 2014
- 7,158
- 13,139
Not a chance I bring Hutton back for that kind of money. There isn't another contending team in the NHL that I can find shelling out that kind of jack for a backup goalie in case their starter gets injured. The teams that have two goalies making more than $2.5M are either a 1A/1B situation (which is not the case here) or have been stuck with a guy (like Dallas has) and they just haven't been able to move him.
If you're doing it to protect against your starter going into a funk, well, then I would say you have the wrong starter.
I wouldn't give Hutton $2.5 mil, but a lack of other contenders doing it isn't the reason. Our starter is on the cheap side of things and paying a backup $2.5 mil would put our total goalie expenditure in line with plenty of good teams and still lower than about half the league. Most contenders have a very good backup, so I think price of your tandem is a better metric than price of your backup.
If Chicago misses the playoffs this year, the loss of Darling will likely be the biggest reason. There are other issues, but there is zero doubt in my mind that they would currently be a playoff team with Darling backing up Crawford this season. Chicago loses in the 1st round instead of winning the Cup in 2015 if Darling hadn't bailed out Crawford against Nashville. The Pens aren't back-to-back Cup champs without Murray AND Fleury. 3 straight seasons of Cup winners getting 'saved' by their #2 tells me that a quality backup is about more than insurance against injury or lack of confidence in the starter. Crawford is among the league's best and had a bad few nights. It happens. If spending $2.5 mil is the only way to get a quality backup, then I think it is worth it.
I wouldn't give Hutton that contract because I don't think we need to in order to get a quality backup. Elliott and Hutton were both unheralded UFAs that flourished on our team. Our D is pretty darn good and it will likely get a bit better next year. I also just don't trust "elite" backups to stay elite year to year. He had a .913 last year, which included a stretch where he posted above a .950 in 6 of his last 9 starts. Without a hot finish, he would have been a below average backup last year. He is a career .914 goalie at 32 years old and will almost certainly finish this season with significantly better numbers than he's ever had. That is a recipe for regression. I'm not saying he regresses to his career average next season, but there is a very good chance that he is 12th best backup in the league instead of being arguably the best. With our D and system, we can get that in free agency for half the cap hit.