The Tampa Bay Lightning have liked what they’ve seen from backup goaltender Brian Elliott. The two sides have agreed on a one-year contract extension for 2022-23 that will carry a salary of $900K.
When you have Andrei Vasilevskiy starting almost every game, you don’t need a lot of work from your backup. That actually makes the role harder than it looks though, as Tampa Bay netminders often go weeks without seeing any game action. Elliott, 37, has acclimated well to that role, and is 9-3-3 this season with a .921 save percentage in his 16 appearances.
A veteran of more than 500 NHL games, “Moose” has proven he can still hang at the NHL level in his reduced role. A netminder who twice led the league in save percentage–finishing fifth in Vezina voting in 2012 and ninth in 2016–Elliott appeared to be on his way out of the league before he signed in Tampa Bay. In a more substantial role for the Philadelphia Flyers he had posted two straight sub-.900 years, though he was still able to win more games than he lost during those difficult campaigns.
Now he’ll be asked to play around 20 games again in 2022-23, and offer veteran support to one of the best goaltenders in the league. At $900K he will earn the same amount as this season and comes with basically no risk for the Lightning.
While he isn’t likely to see much action, a dozen starts could easily push Elliott up into the top-50 for all-time wins. He currently sits at No. 55 on the list, just one win behind Felix Potvin and six from Kelly Hrudey and Bernie Parent, the gatekeepers of the top-50.
Elliott has been great this year considering how his starts have been so infrequent. But at 37, I was really hoping the Lightning would go with a younger backup next season. Age does matter, especially in goal. And there are usually good deals after the playoffs when some teams part ways with goalies due to underachieving in the playoffs.
@blueavenger77 – Maybe Julien and Co. looked at that Craig Anderson guy in BUF and thought that Elliott would be able to be more of the same, only in a sunnier location.
Who?
They carry more risk in that you don’t know what you got.
@fljay73 – The “old think” of pitching over-35 netminders overboard isn’t shared by all organizations. Some guys can be a 5-alarm crapshoot (see EDM). Other guys, like Anderson, can be seen as valuable veteran presences, even though it’s a huge long shot to have them post a GAA of, say 2.5 or less and a SV% of .900+. When teams are rebuilding, they’d like to have some strategically-placed veterans to help the kids along.
You cannot compare stars in different eras but Bernie had….ties.