Quote:
Originally Posted by powderjunkie
The Elliott trade was insane so early in the rebuild coming off a bad year in which your highest pick was #53.
1 year of solid goaltending from a 31 yo pending UFA for a #35 pick? Brutal.
Especially considering we were able to sign 30 yo Chad Johnson a week later, coming off a 45 gp .920 2.36 season for the friggin Sabres.
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Just took a look at who was available as UFA:
Reimer 28 (5x3.4 FLA)
Gustavsson 31
Montoya 31
Zatkoff 29
Hutton 30 (STL signed to replace Elliott)
Khudobin 30
Dell 27
Stalock 28
Enroth 28
26 yo Anders Nilsson was traded for a 5th (put up good numbers in BUF as CJ's replacement)
26 yo Darcy Kuemper could probably have been had for a lot less than a 2nd (was let free as a UFA at the end of that season).
Elliott was certainly better than everyone on the list above (and his regular season performance probably flattered the Flames), but a 35OA pick is an insane price to secure 1 year of a 31 and 30 yo goaltending tandem.
Goalies are voodoo. Must of the guys above are underwhelming. But ultimately so was Elliott. A tandem of any of the above would have been fine at that stage. Or if you spend resources, make it on a younger guy who has a shot at solving the problem long term (and Chad Johnson or any of the above would have been a fine partner).
For me, this was probably worse than the Hamonic deal in terms of timing/philosophy and value. At least that Hamonic deal had a better opportunity to recover assets had he not been injured.