So you want to talk about the future of NHL goaltending? Good luck.
No really, good luck. You’ll need it. Predicting what will happen with NHL goaltenders in the next game is tough enough, let along looking years down the line. As just one example, have a look back at how NHL GMs ranked the league’s goaltending tiers just three years ago, when Darcy Kuemper was better than Igor Shesterkin, and Jusse Saros and Linus Ullmark couldn’t even crank the top 20 because they were trailing behind Elvis Merzlikins and MacKenzie Blackwood. Over half the players on that list aren’t even starters anymore. A lot can change in the crease, and quickly.
So sure, somewhere out there, right now, a goalie you’ve barely heard of is getting ready to have an out-of-nowhere star turn that will earn him Vezina votes, while somewhere else, a highly paid star we all consider a sure thing is about to face plant and take his team’s season with them. You just can’t predict this stuff with any certainty.
But that doesn’t mean you can’t try. And it doesn’t mean that you can’t put together a snapshot of where the league stands right now. That’s what three of us have set out to do, with a summer project that looks to rank each team’s goaltending outlook.
The basic question here: How good should each team feel about their goaltending situation, both for right now and peering into the future?
Here’s how this will work. We’ve given each of the 32 teams a ranking in three categories:
Current goaltending: How good is their goaltending at the NHL level right now? How good does it project to be in the near-term, which we define as the next three years? This section includes the two goalies who are expected to start the 2024-25 season, as well as anyone else in the system who can be projected to play games. The Athletic’s goaltending expert, Jesse Granger, handled this section.
Future prospects: This section ranks each team’s goaltenders in the system who’ve yet to establish themselves as full-time NHLers, with a focus on ceiling and upside. Prospect guru Scott Wheeler weighs in here.
Note that in theory, there can be some overlap between the first two sections. Yaroslav Askarov is a prospect, but will almost certainly spend meaningful time in the NHL over the next three years. Jake Oettinger is the Stars’ starter now, and at just 25 years old he’s also their future. That’s OK, because Jesse and Scott are looking at those players from two different perspectives: How good they are now (Jesse), and how good they can be and for how long at their eventual peak (Scott).
Cap and contracts: Who makes what, and for how many years? Ideally, a team will have the security of having their good goaltenders locked in at a reasonable price and term. In a hard cap league, a good player making too much for too long may be a negative asset, so contracts matter. There’s going to be some guesswork here, as some key players need new deals. For example, Igor Shesterkin hasn’t signed an extension with the Rangers yet, but that doesn’t mean we just assume that he walks as a UFA in 2025. The key is that this section is about getting value from good players for as long as possible, not simply having the lowest cap hit you can. Sean McIndoe handles this section, with cap info from Puckpedia.
For each category, teams were ranked from 1 to 32. Those scores were then weighted, with Current getting a 1.0 weight, while Future was given 0.75 to recognize the difficulty in peering too far into the future. Cap was weighted at 0.5; it’s important, but history shows us that there are ways to wiggle out of bad deals, although it may be painful.
This will be a three-part series. Today: The bottom ten.
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