I'm just going from memory here, but I recall that while Aebischer as Roy's replacement got a vote of confidence from the Avs FO and Roy himself, either the fans, the hockey media or both were skeptical about whether promoting him was the right choice after Roy kind of abruptly decided to retire. Aebischer was coming off kind of an up and down year where he had a losing record on a team that won it's division.
In reality, the Avs didn't have much of choice but to simply promote Aebischer, since Roy picked the absolute worst offseason to decide to hang them up. There weren't any big ticket starters available like there were the prior summer (Belfour and CuJo), and the goalies that were or would eventually be available for trade either got moved before Roy made his decision (Cechmanek) or had no chance of being dealt to Colorado (CuJo). Jeff Hackett was going to be the best available UFA, but it was already speculated he was likely to end up in Philly to replace Cechmanek (which he did on the first day of free agency). Otherwise, you had guys like Garth Snow or Felix Potvin among a whole bunch of guys that were clear back ups or depth goalies.
I remember at one point it was speculated the Avs could go after Hasek if the Wings declined his option year and he was interested in playing for another team. Then it was speculated the Avs were trying to lure Roy out of retirement using the highly touted additions of Kariya and Selanne. Eventually, Lacroix's justification for not bringing in an experienced goalie and gambling on Aebischer and Sauve was that an already potent offense bolstered by Kariya and Selanne could cover for any goaltending deficiencies.
I kind of remember Aebischer got a lot of blame for the teams failure in the playoffs that year, when it really had more to do with Granato, the Kariya/Selanne reunion catastrophically failing, guys getting hurt or disappearing in the Sharks series, and the ridiculous pylon shopping spree Lacroix went on before the deadline.
In 2006, his only other season as an NHL starter, he was terrible. The Avalanche's goaltending was a huge problem that entire season, and rookie Peter Budaj started getting a bunch of Aebischer's starts. Then, Pierre Lacroix saw the opportunity to trade for Patrick Roy 2.0 and traded for Jose Theodore and his bloated (iirc) $6M contract. The only thing curious about the trade timing was that Aebischer was in the midst of his best stretch of the season, if I recall correctly.
That's kinda what I remember too. By the time December rolled around, they got sick of the inconsistency and something with losing in the shootout with Budaj and Aebsicher and called up somewhat highly touted undrafted free agent Vitaly Kolesnik and gave him the bulk of the starts for 2-3 weeks while the other two rotated sitting on the bench or hitting the pressbox. Aebischer got better through January and February, but the Avs had basically already made up their mind on getting someone else.
Aebischer for Theodore was a trash for trash trade that could've gone either way, but obviously worked out better for the Avalanche. Aebischer seemed to fall off a cliff after that. Obviously wasn't going to displace Huet right after the trade, but still could've salvaged a decent NHL career the next year. Instead he lasts only about a month in 1A/1B with Huet, before settling as back up. Then when Huet misses time long term with an injury, Aebischer quickly loses the starting (and then back up once Huet returns) job to Halak.
Roy retires in 2003, and they trusted Aebischer enough to only call up another prospect Philippe Sauve up to be his backup. That trust was gone by the '04 deadline, as they traded for veteran Tommy Salo. Aebischer managed to hold off Salo, and did alright in the '04 playoffs.
The trade had less to do with Aebischer and a lot more to do with Sauve. At the time of the trade, Aebischer had a .926SV% and was still seen as the Avs starter. Sauve on the other hand had allowed 16 goals in his last 3 starts. They needed somebody that could be an insurance policy in the playoffs and give Aebischer some rest down the stretch where they basically had a game every other night.
Salo was pretty much damaged goods after the 2002 Olympics debacle, hence why the Avs were able to get him and a draft pick for a prospect.
