Around The Net: Goalie Time Shares

 

One of the things I try to stay away from when managing my fantasy team are goalies who are not the clear cut number one starter for their team.  There are quite a few teams that have yet to announce a goalie that will play 60 plus games.  If you have one of these netminders, then you are playing roulette with your fantasy team.  You need to have that Goalie that teams are going to ride throughout the season, stopping shots, and piling up wins.  Let’s take a look at the teams that have a platoon in net.  They are in no particular order.

New York Islanders:  Dwayne Roloson and Martin Biron.  Due to the state of the Islanders organization, neither one of these two should be starting for your team unless your league is minimum 14 teams deep and starts two goalies.  The Islanders are a team devoid of offense and will have to tough time scoring enough goals to reward their goalies with wins.  Another problem is the Islanders still have Rick DiPietro on their roster.  You remember him, the man with the 15 year contract who hasn’t played for what seems like a few years.  Well he is rehabbing from offseason hip surgery and should be ready to play by the end of November (insert joke here).  That will leave three goalies vying for playing time unless one is traded.  Not a situation you want your fantasy team to be involved in.

Toronto Maple Leafs:  Vesa Toskala and Jonas Gustavsson.  Kind of the same situation for these two netminders that the Islanders are in.  The team is not very good and each will face a whole bunch of rubber.  That being said, Toskala is just a caretaker until the Leafs feel Gustavsson is ready to take on the full time role, which should be sometime this season.  Gustavsson is worth a roster spot in dynasty leagues, but not so much in redraft leagues as he just won’t be able to put up consistent wins for you.

 Washington Capitals:  Jose Theodore and Semyon Varlamov.  Now here is a situation that fantasy owners should be following very closely.  The winner of this battle could put up quite a few wins for your fantasy team.  It was thought that Varlamov would be the starter entering the season due to his strong playoff run in 2008-09 and the decline in play of Theodore down that same stretch, yet Theodore started the opener and played very well, while Varlamov has had a rough first two starts.  It seems Theodore has the upper hand right now, but one bad game or two may be all Varlamov needs to get another shot.

 Nashville Predators:  Pekka Rinne and Dan Ellis.  Once again it was thought going into the season that Rinne would be the starter after his coming out party last season where he posted 29 wins, a 2.38 GAA and a 91.7 save percentage.  Apparently that wasn’t good enough as a strong preseason by Ellis has sent them into a time share.  This is a killer for those owners that drafted Rinne thinking he would be the starter.  Not much you can do at this point except ride it out and hope Rinne outplays Ellis enough to be named the starter. 

 Anaheim Ducks:  Jean-Sebastian Giguere and Jonas Hiller:  Like the Capitals it was assumed during the offseason that Hiller would be the starter after his strong playoff run.  That was not to be the case as Ducks Coach Randy Carlyle stated about a week before the season that the battle for number one goaltender would extend into the regular season.  The Ducks are a strong offensive team that could reward either goalie with plenty of wins.  Of course, trading Chris Pronger to the Flyers also means they are not as strong defensively as they used to be.  The Ducks seem to realize that Giguere has a bad season in 2008-09 due to personal reasons and want to give him every chance to win the job.  So far this season neither Goalie has stood out, so the battle still remains.

This post was written by George Kurtz