Then who do you want? I am looking around the league and I am either seeing not much better, or a lot more expensive. It'd be nice to pay 3 mill on a backup, but that's not feasible when you may only get a few more wins than an 850k McElhinney.
Only 7 guys did better than McElhinney's .917 with >10 games and <40 games last year: Dell (SJS - .931), Howard (DET - .927), Grubauer (WSH - .926), Darling (CHI - .924), Saros (NSH - .923), Nilsson (BUF - .923), Raanta (NYR - .922)... Quick also only played 17 games due to injury and put up a .917, Budaj came in and played 53 games in relief and put up .917 as well.
Dell was a 28 year old 6'0" rookie last year. Saros was playing his first full season as a backup. Nilsson went on to get a longer term 2.5 mill contract from Vancouver. Darling and Raanta are now penciled as starters with new big money contracts. Howard made like 5.3 mill last year and looks to be the starter for Detroit again this year.
If you take out the Columbus stretch that boosts his numbers a bit, he's at a .914 with the Leafs last year. That adds a few more names, but other than Kinkaid, they all made a ton of money last season or will make a ton of money this upcoming season (Condon, Halak, Luongo, Bernier, etc.). Pretty much the only cost effective guys are Kinkaid (who is about as mediocre as McElhinney) and guys who, last year, were about as unproven as Sparks right now.
So really who is out there. Unless we are talking guys making 2+ mill as a backup, we are talking about guys who are going to be about as effective as McElhinney but who are maybe a few years younger (not that age matters for a backup since you are only giving short-term commitments).
