NHL insider Eric Macramalla calculated the amount of time Samuel Montembeault has remaining on the Montreal Canadiens roster on Sunday morning.
Macramalla stated that Montembeault’s AAV for the next season is almost twice as much as Jakub Dobes’ and Jacob Fowler’s combined cap hits.
That isn’t a statistic you conceal. That is a front-office problem that writes itself.
This year, Dobes has a cap figure of $965,000. Fowler sits at $923,333.
Kent Hughes paid under $1.9 million for them combined. Montembeault alone costs $3,150,000.
The veteran is also disadvantaged by the production gap.
“Next season, Montembeault’s AAV is nearly double the total cap impact of Dobes and Fowler.
We know that Dobes and Fowler are capable of playing. Furthermore, Montembeault will be valued in the trade market. Gaining that very precious cap space in the process is a sensible thing to do. Not personal.”
Eric Macramalla.
Macramalla, Eric
Montembeault has already been outplayed by Fowler and Dobes this season.
Montembeault had a .873 save percentage over 25 games this season, with a decision record of 5-8-10.
Fowler recorded a shutout and a .908 SV% in 17 starts, going 9-6-2. At the age of twenty-one.
Dobes had a 29-10-4 record over 43 games and a 0.901 save percentage.
The discussion shifts away from loyalty when your two more cheap alternatives outperform the costly beginning in every important statistic.
Montembeault would have trade value, Macramalla said clearly. A genuine cap space benefit would come from moving him. Not intimate.
That framing is perfect. In this formula, sentiment has no place.
The Canadiens ended the season with a record of 48-24-10, earning 106 points and placing sixth in the league. No one outside of Montreal anticipated this team accelerating so quickly.
This suggests that the cap space is about to become extremely important as the window opens.
The Canadiens do not require the luxury of having a $3.15 million goalie in the building while two younger, more affordable, and more productive choices are already there.
The legitimate query is what the market for a 29-year-old goalie with a save percentage of 0.873 looks like. There’s a legitimate worry there.
The demand from buyers for that profile is not guaranteed. However, Macramalla thinks the value is still there, and Hughes has a track record of relocating players before the tide shifts in the other direction.
The leverage diminishes if Montreal waits too long. Dobes and Fowler are currently inside the structure. The audition has already been answered.
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