With the writing on the wall after the Vegas Golden Knights announced the signing of Robin Lehner to be their long-term goaltender, many have wondered what general manager Kelly McCrimmon plans to do with their former franchise goaltender, Marc-Andre Fleury, who still has $7MM AAV on the team’s books for the next two years. Sportsnet’s Chris Johnston reported Saturday evening on Sportsnet’s Hockey Central that they are currently looking into finding a third team that can help retain some of Fleury’s salary before finding a new home for the veteran netminder.
“I think one of the options that I think Kelly McCrimmon and the Vegas Golden Knights have at least started to explore,” said Johnston, “is whether they may be able to use an intermediary team as part of their three-way deal in which that team is the one that retains part of Fleury’s salary in order to make this kind of transaction work.”
The Golden Knights did something similar at the trade deadline in February to acquire Lehner when they had the Chicago Blackhawks first trade Lehner to Toronto for prospect Martin Dzierkals first, while retaining half of Lehner’s $5MM salary ($2.5MM). The Leafs then retained $1.1MM and received a Vegas 2020 fifth-round pick for the transaction for sending Lehner to Vegas at a much cheaper price, which came out to just a $1.4MM cap cost for the Golden Knights. Now Vegas is trying to do that once again.
Of course with a up to 20 goaltending candidates who could move to a new location this offseason, Vegas might have more of a challenge than most offseasons. Fleury, who only appeared in four games during the Golden Knights’ playoff run to the Western Conference Finals, did fare well in his limited time, suggesting he still has quite a bit to offer a team, looking for a veteran tandem goaltender. He finished the playoffs with a 2.27 GAA and a .910 save percentage. However, his regular season was a little less impressive with a 2.77 GAA and a .905 save percentage in 49 games.
What teams might be interested remains unknown, although The Athletic’s Rob Rossi reports that while it’s unlikely, the Pittsburgh Penguins haven’t given up on the possibility of bringing Fleury back as a tandem with newly signed Tristan Jarry. However, the transaction would likely require quite a bit of creativity to make a move like that work, considering the delicate state of the Penguins’ cap situation.
Vegas, of course, could still opt to buy Fleury’s contract out as the buyout window doesn’t close until Tuesday afternoon, but then would leave the Golden Knights stuck with $2.58MM in 2020-21, $3.08MM in 2021-22 and $2.08MM in 2022-23 and 2023-24, something the team would prefer to avoid.
Like I said before I don’t see the flower going anywhere… BUT if a third teams gets involved then how about this trade to help out a future star goalie. Fleury and Sikura to Detroit. Detroit retains about 3.5 Mil of Fleury’s salary then Fleury is traded to philly for the ghost. This then helps philly in nets with Carter Hart’s development for 2 years… Vegas gets salary relief and Detroit gets a good d-man and maybe a good bottom 6 forward… Win win… Vegas needs help badly from somewhere…
This is a pass on both sides. 3.5 to help facilitate a trade would be a 2nd from Vegas to dump him and then to a team like edm, calg or carolina for another 2nd. It might even cost more then this, but this is about the price.
Philly doesn’t need a backup goalie for that much and Fleury wants to start. Wings want picks, not mediocre hockey players as a return. We eat 3.5 for 2 years for 2 2nds makes a ton of sense to me
Ghost has been atrocious. Why would DET take him on along with 3.5 of Fleury?
I agree with this
They just signed Elliot for another year
Why would Detroit have any interest in guy like Ghost? The only thing they should be looking for are draft picks, prospects, and young players.
Love to see Fleury back in Pittsburgh. Trade Murray and open up money from him, makes it a little more realistic.
I love Marc. Would love to have Marc back in Pittsburgh. Am sure Marc would like to come back if he has to move because his kids are his main concern.
But, even at half his salary, it doesn’t make sense for the Pens. That money would be better spent on a 3rd pair RHD or a 3rd line center/wing.
Also, Marc has two years left on his deal and a NTC, which means the Pens would either have to expose Jarry to Seattle or have an agreement with Marc to waive next year, which defeats what would be his purpose in coming back here…stability for his family.
I don’t see it.
Enter the leafs
The question is who had the cash leading around to spare ? Fleury will be 36 and he is coming off a pretty bad season, it’s true otherwise we wouldn’t be having this discussion. GMGM did not need to give Fleury that extension when he did. He kinda screwed the team by doing that.
Detroit could actually use Fleury, what would it take for Wings to pay full salary? They got a second round pick for Staal’s one year contract. This would allow Yzerman to draft Askarov and give him two years to get NHL ready.
Actually I would like to see that. Does he have a no trade clause to prevent it ?
If I’m Yzerman, I call VGK and propose two deals.
Trade 1: Anthony Mantha & Jonathan Bernier -for- Marc-Andre Fleury, Paul Stastny, & 2020 & 2021 First Round Picks or one of those picks and Cody Glass, VGK’s choice.
Trade 2 (If Stastny blocked trade): Anthony Mantha & Jonathan Bernier -for- Marc-Andre Fleury, Alex Tuch, and 2020 or 2021 First Round Pick.
Why it makes sense for Vegas: It would free up between $2.75 and $4.5 million on their cap, assuming Mantha is resigned to a $6 million AAV deal. It also gives them a quality backup, at a discounted rate, to the newly resigned Lehner and a player capable of scoring 30 goals on their second or even third line.
Why it makes sense for Detroit: They get their starting goaltender for the next two seasons, acquire a veteran presense (Stastny) or a young core player (Tuch) as well as first round asset(s).
If Vegas rejected both offers, they can attempt to find a better deal with another team or wind up buying out Fleury, which won’t help them acquire another asset in their quest for the Cup and will also hurt them in future seasons due to a Cap penalty. What say you VGK?
Why it doesn’t make sense for Detroit: I would argue that Bernier outplayed Fleury last season. He had a better save percentage than Fleury, and when you take into account the quality of the teams that played in from of the two, that is saying a lot. So Detroit would be trading the better, younger, cheaper goalie, plus one of their core players, and for that, we get two guys who are clearly on the downslope of their careers who will make a combined $13.5 M this season and Tuch, who is probable no better than equal to Mantha – probably a little less so, and a first round draft choice. No thank you……not even close.
This is going to be a huge task. There are very few teams in a position to take on a bunch of cap hit and salary.
Ottawa should be, but of course they won’t because it involves spending money. The Rangers perhaps? Well, if they’re not willing to qualify Strome, I can’t see them taking on salary for this. Florida, NJ, and Buffalo should be interested, but are any of them willing to spend the actual money?
Can you imagine if it’s Colorado acting as the intermediary? As if that team isn’t loaded enough with assets.
Thanks for the input guys.. Shake things up a little…