Around the NHL 2019-2020 | Offseason Edition

[HisNoodliness]

Vasilevskiy just signed an 8 year ×9.5 AAV contract-that's a big cap hit. I'm starting to be of the opinion that you're best off underpaying two mediocre goalies and hoping one gets hot instead of investing in an elite Vasi, Bobs type with the money they're getting.

 

[Bench]

Vasilevskiy just signed an 8 year ×9.5 AAV contract-that's a big cap hit. I'm starting to be of the opinion that you're best off underpaying two mediocre goalies and hoping one gets hot instead of investing in an elite Vasi, Bobs type with the money they're getting.

This has always been a popular opinion since the advent of the salary cap. But I believe if you can get one of the consistently elite goalies, ala Lundqvist, it's worth the expense. Vasilevskiy looks to be that player. I wouldn't have given the same deal to Bob that Florida did, though.

Jimmy Howard's of the world run you 5-6 million. For the cost of one Justin Abdelkader, you can turn that into a top goalie - is the hope. Remember, before this year, St. Louis was throwing a lot of goalies at the wall hoping something would stick. And failing year after year. They got lucky a 25-year-old stepped up out of literally nowhere. And who knows if he can maintain that for a year or more.

Obviously 8 years is a lot of commitment. That's where so much of the risk is tied up to these goalie deals, more so than the cap hit. But if I was going to gamble on any young goalie, Tampa picked the right one. That kind of consistency in net is ridiculously valuable to the defensive posture of your team.

 

[MBH]

Vasilevskiy just signed an 8 year ×9.5 AAV contract-that's a big cap hit. I'm starting to be of the opinion that you're best off underpaying two mediocre goalies and hoping one gets hot instead of investing in an elite Vasi, Bobs type with the money they're getting.

I'd rather run with a reclamation project like Mrazek at $2/3M than pay a goalie $10M a year.
I don't think we've seen a goalie consistently worth that kind of coin since Lundquist at his prime. Before that? Hasek.

 

[HisNoodliness]

This has always been a popular opinion since the advent of the salary cap. But I believe if you can get one of the consistently elite goalies, ala Lundqvist, it's worth the expense. Vasilevskiy looks to be that player. I wouldn't have given the same deal to Bob that Florida did, though.

Jimmy Howard's of the world run you 5-6 million. For the cost of one Justin Abdelkader, you can turn that into a top goalie - is the hope. Remember, before this year, St. Louis was throwing a lot of goalies at the wall hoping something would stick. And failing year after year. They got lucky a 25-year-old stepped up out of literally nowhere. And who knows if he can maintain that for a year or more.

Obviously 8 years is a lot of commitment. That's where so much of the risk is tied up to these goalie deals, more so than the cap hit. But if I was going to gamble on any young goalie, Tampa picked the right one. That kind of consistency in net is ridiculously valuable to the defensive posture of your team.

Honestly answering the question for sure would not be very hard. I'm not going to actually do the analysis, but it really should have been done already. First you say "I'll pay $11 million to goalies, Vasi + a backup I won't play in the playoffs or two $5.5 million guys that I'll choose between." Then all you need to do is identify the likelihood of Vasilevskiy having a solid performance in goal versus the likelihood that either of your starters is particularly hot and how well you can identify the hot goalie if there is one. It's that variation and how well you can guess that matters. I think the problem is that it's very hard to accurately predict a hot goalie, and thus you rarely get the benefit from having your choice between them, being better off with just riding the guy that's best on average. However if you could choose well I think it goes the other way immediately.

To use extrema to demonstrate my point: choosing between a starter that stops 95% of shots every game vs two guys that stop 100% of shots 70% of their games, but let in every goal the other 30% (so a terrible 70% save percentage overall) . Your hot cold tandem will have a guaranteed shutout 49% of the time, a guaranteed 0 save game 9% of the time and 42% of the time you'll have to choose the correct goalie, so choosing at random you recover that 70% win rate (49 + 42/2). However if your coach can identify the hot goalie well then you can get up to a 91% win rate.

Of course no goalies are actually like my extremely consistent, very good starter that lets in 1 goal per 20 shots no matter what, nor my extreme goalies that get absoluely blown out a third of the time. They're all on a consistency spectrum, so you'd have to identify goalies that are inconsistent, but easy to identify when they're likely to play well. If someone crunched the numbers on how streaky goalies actually are and how predictable their streaks are, I bet you could design a bunch of tandems of mediocre goalies that are better than Vasi + backup for the same cap, but I haven't so I can't say for sure.

 

[MBH]

This has always been a popular opinion since the advent of the salary cap. But I believe if you can get one of the consistently elite goalies, ala Lundqvist, it's worth the expense. Vasilevskiy looks to be that player. I wouldn't have given the same deal to Bob that Florida did, though.

Jimmy Howard's of the world run you 5-6 million. For the cost of one Justin Abdelkader, you can turn that into a top goalie - is the hope. Remember, before this year, St. Louis was throwing a lot of goalies at the wall hoping something would stick. And failing year after year. They got lucky a 25-year-old stepped up out of literally nowhere. And who knows if he can maintain that for a year or more.

Obviously 8 years is a lot of commitment. That's where so much of the risk is tied up to these goalie deals, more so than the cap hit. But if I was going to gamble on any young goalie, Tampa picked the right one. That kind of consistency in net is ridiculously valuable to the defensive posture of your team.

I don't think Vasilevskiy has proved he's one of those guys.
He's had two elite seasons in net. But both played behind a star-studded team.

His playoff numbers
.912 2.83 in 33 games.

 

[Claypool]

A team as deep as Tampa does not need a $10 million goalie. They are going to win 50+ games next season no matter who is in net.

 

[obey86]

Not official, but sounds like Gusev to the Devils. Rumored cost is a 2nd and 3rd round pick.

 

[Ezekial]

I wouldn't want to sign a goalie for 8 years or 10 million, but the kid turned 25 a few days ago, locking up a kid who won a Vezina at 24 and has never really had a reason to believe he isn't the real deal ain't bad. 25-34 is a good range to get a goalie playing their best.

 

[obey86]

He's a good goalie, but I feel like his numbers should be more dominant given the team he has played for in his career. He's finished 16th, 13th, and 7th in save percentage the last three seasons as the starter. Even Jimmy Howard had a similar stretch earlier in his career: finishing 4th, 31st (bad year obviously), 10th, and 9th in 4 consecutive seasons.

That being said, Vas is younger, better, and has more room to improve....but they'd better hope he does because I don't think he's a 9.5M/year goaltender right now. Just my opinion.

 

[Ricelund]

Gusev to NJ for a 2021 2nd and a 2020 3rd. Quite an offseason they've had!

 

[Hammettf2b]

Good deal for NJ. I think Vegas will end up regretting this.

 

[The Zetterberg Era]

Good deal for NJ. I think Vegas will end up regretting this.

I think Vegas is probably happier to have Mark Stone. They acquired Gusev before they got Stone.

I am sure they wish they landed more in return, but the overall decision organizationally probably wasn't tough. Losing a Miller and Gusev really speaks to how deep they are already. They have a lot of talent out there, tough decisions are made as a result in my opinion.

 

[obey86]

I think Vegas is probably happier to have Mark Stone. They acquired Gusev before they got Stone.

I am sure they wish they landed more in return, but the overall decision organizationally probably wasn't tough. Losing a Miller and Gusev really speaks to how deep they are already. They have a lot of talent out there, tough decisions are made as a result in my opinion.

They’d probably be happier with both Gusev and Stone though right? It’s not like Gusev was included in the deal for Stone, so they could have potentially found another way to fit him in.

 

[Ezekial]

They’d probably be happier with both Gusev and Stone though right? It’s not like Gusev was included in the deal for Stone, so they could have potentially found another way to fit him in.

With the money they had allocated for next season before they gave Mark Stone 9.5 million a year not really. They extended Alex Tuch early last season at 7x4.75 and that's already seeming like a great move. Gusev became the casualty with a proven top 7 players above him, unless they wanted to move on from one of their D (specifically Shea Theodore), which after losing Colin Miller they couldn't afford and wouldn't do with him being young and locked up for term.

 

[Henkka]

Michael Russo@RussoHockey
BREAKING:
@TheAthleticMIN has learned that Paul Fenton has been fired as #mnwild GM after just one season. EXCLUSIVE STORY>>>

Still Paul Fenton lovers in here?

 

[Ezekial]

That's some real funny stuff. To think, Dorian still has a job.

 

[obey86]

Still Paul Fenton lovers in here?

Did people here especially like him for some reason? Serious question btw, I know nothing about the guy.

 

[Winger98]

Did people here especially like him for some reason? Serious question btw, I know nothing about the guy.

assistant GM in Nashville for quite awhile. Highly regarded as a guy to get a look as a GM somewhere. Some head scratching moves in Minny but it's been a year. I'm not sure what they expected him to accomplish with a team that hadn't been able to make much noise for several years.

 

[The Zetterberg Era]

I was a big Fenton fan, not sure what happened in Minnesota. Ultimately our opening was filled by the guy we wanted anyway last August... err... I mean April yeah we are saying April.

Poile has always given tremendous credit to Fenton and he was believed to have a good eye for amateur dman. But the year in Minny was thoroughly unimpressive and it looks like the relationships off ice fell apart in a hurry as well.

My guess is he winds up back in Nashville. But I would welcome him to our brain trust if Yzerman has interest. Some guys aren't lead guys but great within a role, we should see what he is looking for when the dust clears as I believe in him as a hockey executive still.

 

[ricky0034]

I mean i'd still take Fenton for a non GM role in a second

no excuse for some of the moves he made in Minnesota though,Yzerman isn't going anywhere anytime soon but I wouldn't trust him with a GM spot anymore if the spot were open

 

[ShippinItDaily]

Michael Stone bought out by Calgary. Could have been a good opportunity to acquire an asset with very little downside in the way of future salary cap implications. Calgary was in a bind with Tkachuk and Mangiapane still to sign.

Edit: Acquire an asset, with Stone to either buy him out or absorb the cap hit.

 

[Hammettf2b]

Any chance we can land this guy?

 

[NickH8]

Any chance we can land this guy?

There's no reason not to make a pitch, but it's already a possibility that both Bowey and Kaski play in GR this year. A young fringe NHL right handed dman is the least of our needs right now.

 

[Lil Sebastian Cossa]

 

[Konnan511]

Por Que?