The Goalie Market & Excuses

A fella named Triumph commented at Tyler's blog:

Don’t get me wrong, I think the Khabibulin deal stinks, but remember that the Biron deal was made because of the Khabibulin deal - Biron found himself totally out of a job, and with absolutely no suitors, it’s tough to drum up a big contract. Since the Islanders aren’t a playoff team, they can sit on the sidelines for a Biron to come along - the Oilers, ostensibly competing for the playoffs, do not have that luxury.

The new excuse for the Khabibulin contract defense team is that the Oilers had no idea that Biron would go so cheaply. That it was impossible to guess what would happen with these goaltenders and their contracts.  The above quote is but one example that's being put forth in the 'Sphere, on the boards, in the mainstream media.

Put simply, this is nonsense.

Tyler saw this coming a full year away.

If Philadelphia goes ahead and signs Emery, by my count that leaves two teams without a clear starting goaltender: Edmonton and Colorado. Otherwise, it’s backup jobs available, unless some team is willing to eat a pile of money. There are a ton of competent or better goalies available: Craig Anderson, Nikolai Khabibulin, Dwayne Roloson, Martin Biron, Manny Fernandez and Manny Legace probably top the list. You can probably toss Scott Clemmensen onto the list, although I don’t find him that interesting. All of those guys presumably want to be starters.

I saw this coming at the beginning of June and I'm a bit more ostentatious than Tyler, so I made some predictions and even threw some numbers out there.

Secondly, Tambellini should not dole out multi-year deals unless he can get an exceptional price. Thirdly, Tambellini should not have to spend more than Roloson's $3,500,000 salary in finding two goaltenders. Remember, the Ivey stare, Steve. Don't blink, don't change your expression. In short, Tambellini should be able to spend less in goal than the Oilers have spent at any point since the lockout, and the Oilers should start the season with their strongest situation in net in this decade.

Obviously no one could foresee this. Especially a group of highly-compensated men in charge of a multi-million dollar organization.