Did the Bruins play hardball in signing Lindholm and Zadorov? Other players see those UFA’s coming in getting huge deals. Swayman is the key to their club’s success. Other top goalies are going to be signing new contracts over 80 million. Swayman knows this.
Other top goalies will be signing new contracts over 80 million ?
Which goalies ?
Swayman knows that Askarov will be signing a new contract over $80M in a few years ?
Almost all the current top goalies are already signed long term and/or will be too old to sign such contracts when theirs expire.
Vasilevskyi, Hellebuyck, Sorokin, Saros won’t be having +$80M contracts.
Demko ? Unlikely given his new health situation.
Oettinger ? Possible, but no one can say for certain that Dallas will give him $10M per year, let alone know that he will without a doubt get a contract over $80M.
Shesterkin. We know that NYR are willing to give him a bigger salary on average per year than Carey Price. That’s as sure as we can be for a goaltender to have a +$80M contract, but it’s still not certain. Who knows if Shesterkin asks for +$13M and NYR refuse to go that far and won’t get a deal done… Which team will give him $80M ?
But let’s say for arguments sake that we are certain Shesterkin will make +$80M; that’s only one top goalie.
There are no others. So maybe Shesterkin and Oettinger will make north of $10M per year. So what ? Bobrovski and Price have been paid $10M on average annually on contracts given 6-7 years ago, and the rest of the league did not follow that trend with other top goalies in the years that followed, except for Vasilevskyi who came pretty close.
They still haven’t in part because starters in today’s game only play 55-65 games and backups are more relied upon than before.
