NHL Rumors: Goaltending Continues To Be Intriguing Especially Around New Jersey

Devils Continue To Poke Around on the Every Changing Goalie Market for Upgrades

Dave Pagnotta of the Fourth Period joined Sirius XM NHL Network Radio Power Play Segment with Steve Kouleas and Carter Hutton on Monday and was asked about what the goalie market could be like at the trade deadline; he had a very interesting answer, especially when it came to the New Jersey Devils.

** NHLRumors.com transcription

Carter Hutton: “Yeah, Dave, Carter Hutton here. Obviously, it’s great having you on and the great feedback we get and staying on the trade market for me. Obviously, I got to touch on the goalie market. This is something that gets me going here, and the fact that this year so many guys have played, right? It’s been a year of just a crazy amount of guys getting minutes, getting time, and now a lot of guys need goalies. Some teams are carrying three.

Like what drops first here? Who gets moved? Is it a Montreal? Is it Markstrom? Is it a big move? What do you think? What’s your temperature on this?”

Dave Pagnotta: “Interesting one because, you know, Montreal would like to move Jake Allen. They are not itching to do it because of their circumstance. If they can make something happen here, they’d like to do it. Like we all know, having three goalies is not ideal. It’s not the best way to have it set up all season. If it has to go beyond the trade deadline, the Canadiens are willing to deal with it. But they would prefer not to.

He has one more year left on his contract, and he’s got some no-trade protection, so there is some say where he can go. But outside of that, if you are looking for guys who are on expiring deals, you’ve got to the two goalies in San Jose that are part of the mix. So you’ve got that as a point of discussion.

With some of these teams that are looking at goaltending, like New Jersey, for example, no secret they’d love to upgrade their position in the crease. But do you go for a short-term fix now and then look at the long-term option in the summer? Or you try to make things all fit now and then deal with things over this month leading into the deadline.

So that is a decision that Tom Fitzgerald is kind of evaluating right now and trying to determine if you got short-term; it sounds like he might be leaning that with either of the two guys in San Jose or perhaps looking at somebody else on an expiring deal. Although I don’t think Detroit’s gonna start moving James Reimer now, especially to a team that’s chasing them in the wild card race.

So, from their perspective, the Devils, is there the right package in place to go after a guy like Markstrom, who we know we just mentioned, that New Jersey has poked around on him? We also know they’ve poked around on (Noah) Hanifin and have had various interests in Hanifin, as well as Chris Tanev.

Is there a marriage there between the Devils in the Flames? Or do they look at (John) Gibson, who they poked on. And (Elvis) Merzlikins, who we know is available. So the goaltending market isn’t as hot as, let’s say, the defensive market or the center market was up until last week. But it’s intriguing to me, the most intriguing market because you have so many variables in play.”