Why acquiring goaltenders at the NHL Trade Deadline is risky

With less than two months until the 2024 NHL Trade Deadline March 8, we’re delivering at least one deadline-focused story every day at Daily Faceoff.

Today, we examine the pitfalls of trading for a goaltender late in the season.

2024 NHL Trade Deadline Countdown: 49 days

This time of year, playoff hopefuls are always on the lookout to improve their teams with the vision of punching their ticket to the postseason and potentially making a deep run.

With that, general managers are always ready to improve at every position, including the most important position sports. However, even when appealing options are available, teams should be forewarned about acquiring goaltenders at the trade deadline.

The common notion that the job of a netminder is to simply stop the puck might be true, but there is an extra layer to the formula that leads to a successful goaltender: how the team plays in front of them.

When a skater is with a team heading into the season, they have an opportunity to learn the systems and build a better relationship with their teammates. Same goes for goaltenders. How the team plays dictates how they prepare for a game, especially when it comes to how teams set up defensive zone coverage and the penalty kill.

A goaltender only gets to certain level of comfort by being with a team for an extended period of time. This is why acquiring one of these masked men a couple months at most before the playoffs can be risky.

There are many examples in which teams have traded for netminders right before the deadline and it has not paid off. The St. Louis Blues, for instance, have made multiple boo-boos when it comes to getting goaltenders late in the season.

In the 2002-03 season, the Blues were looking to improve their situation in goal, as Brent Johnson and Fred Brathwaite were not going to lead a talented team deep into the playoffs. So, they acquired (at that time) two-time Stanley Cup champion Chris Osgood from the New York Islanders. Osgood never got comfortable and went 4-3-2 in nine starts, with a 3.05 goals-against average and .888 save percentage. The playoff veteran was better in the playoffs but was not good enough, as St. Louis fell to the Vancouver Canucks in seven games.

Eleven years later, GM Doug Armstrong made a big swing, trading for Ryan Miller. While Miller had been a great goaltender on a middling Buffalo Sabres team (who was tanking hard that year), it did not make sense for the Blues to add another puck-stopper. They were atop the Central Division, playing like a potential Cup contender with Jaroslav Halak and Brian Elliott standing out as one of the best tandems in the league.

Halak ended up being one of the pieces that went the other way before quickly getting flipped to the Washington Capitals. It did not pan out for the Blues. Despite winning seven of his first eight starts, Miller went 3-7 in his last 10 regular-season starts, including losing his final five appearances. Then, he fell apart in the team’s first-round series against the Chicago Blackhawks, as they were eliminated in six games.

What came to to light after that season, in Matt Larkin’s interview with then-Blues coach Ken Hitchcock, was Miller’s inability to get comfortable communicating with his defensemen, a D-core that included Kevin Shattenkirk, Alex Pietrangelo and Jay Bouwmeester. The trade paid no future dividends, as Miller was off to Vancouver in the offseason.

Other teams have become infamous for late crease buys that did not lead to playoff success.

Back in 2000, the Ottawa Senators were a team on the rise, poised to become the class of the Eastern Conference. However, GM Marshall Johnston did not like his tandem, thinking Ron Tugnutt was too old, and Patrick Lalime was not ready for the big stage. So, he sent Tugnutt to Pittsburgh, taking in 35-year-old Tom Barrasso.

Putting this gently…Barrasso’s prime was long gone, and it showed. In seven starts with the Sens, the two-time Stanley Cup winner went 3-4 with a 3.16 GAA and .879 SV%. He was unable to turn his game around in the playoffs, as he and the Sens were knocked out in an entertaining first-round series against the Toronto Maple Leafs.

It would not be a goaltender disaster piece without mentioning the Philadelphia Flyers. The team wanted more assurance heading into the 2018 playoffs, so they went out and got Petr Mrazek from the Detroit Red Wings. The Czech netminder posted a poor .891 SV% in 15 starts and was not even good enough to start in the playoffs, as Brian Elliott and Philly were eliminated in the opening round by the Pittsburgh in six games.

Last season, the Los Angeles Kings appeared to catch lightning in a bottle when they acquired Joonas Korpisalo from the Columbus Blue Jackets. He went 7-3-1 with a .921 SV% after coming over at the deadline. But he faltered when it mattered most, posting an .892 mark in the Kings’ six-game loss to the Edmonton Oilers in Round 1 of the playoffs. The Kings let him walk as a free agent.

Now, yes, there have been good in-season trades that have paid off for some teams, most famously the deal that sent Patrick Roy from the Montreal Canadiens to the Colorado Avalanche. However, that transaction occurred in early December 1995, giving Roy plenty of time to acclimate himself with the Avs before helping the team go on to win the franchise’s first Stanley Cup.

While no one likes to overthink moves like this, simply cutting and pasting talent onto another team, and expecting them to play exactly the same, can be a recipe for disaster. Defensive schemes might allow different scoring chances compared to what the goaltender’s previous team might let through. D-men might move differently down low while on a penalty kill, forcing a netminder to play unfamiliar angles. Not to mention the fact that not every team breaks the puck out the same, which could be a difficult transition for a netminder, depending on how good they are with playing the puck.

While goaltenders are able to adjust to new systems, it takes time from them to get 100% comfortable. Months of time, not weeks.

History shows that buying assets between the pipes might look good on paper, but when the puck drops, and the game is on the line, things don’t always work out. For every win, like the Edmonton Oilers landing Dwayne Roloson in 2006, there’s a loss, like the San Jose Sharks’ ill-fated Ed Belfour acquisition in 1997. Either way, with goaltending talent potentially on the move this season and GMs still desperate to make a splash, history is bound to repeat itself.