The Pittsburgh Penguins may have shocked a lot of people around the hockey world yesterday when they announced a contract extension for their franchise goaltender, Marc-Andre Fleury, which was worth $23 million over the next four years. Fleury is set to make $5.75 million per season with his new contract, which is 13th highest in the league among goalies. Since he is an average net minder, it sounds about right. Why did the Penguins decide to do it? Let’s take a look at some of the reasoning:
No Better Options
Marc-Andre Fleury was easily the best goaltender on the free agent market this summer, which doesn’t say much. The other options would be Antti Niemi, Jonas Gustavvsson, Michael Neuvirth, Jonas Enroth, Ray Emery, Victor Fasth, etc. That’s simply a really bad list of goaltenders. While Pittsburgh could have taken their chances on one of those goalies, I highly doubt any of those players would turn out as good as Fleury has been since he came to Pittsburgh. In all likelihood, he should be around until he retires as a Penguin.
Prospects Aren’t Ready
The Pittsburgh Penguins have two great goaltender prospects, but the problem is, they aren’t quite ready yet. Tristan Jarry, the team’s best prospect, is 19 years old and is about 3 to 4 years away from being in the NHL. The same can be said about Matt Murray who is also a young goaltender. The best thing about this contract for Fleury and the Penguins is that when the four years are up, the Penguins can actually evaluate the position at between the pipes to see whether or not one of their prospects is ready to take over for Fleury in net. If they are, Fleury would most likely be headed out of Pittsburgh at the age of 35. To me, this is the most probable scenario and the biggest reason the Penguins made the deal for four years.
Players, Management Trust Him
The biggest thing is that not only do the players trust in Fleury, but general manager Jim Rutherford has acknowledged that he trusts in him as well. According to Rutherford, “as long as he’s here, Fleury is my goaltender.” It takes a lot of trust for a general manager to re-sign a goalie just nine games into the season as opposed to waiting until the end of the year, which is what a lot of people wanted to do. Fleury is expected to have a great regular season again as usual, but his big test again will come in the playoffs. Last year, he may have put his bad games behind him as he was not the reason the Penguins lost in the second round against the New York Rangers. I expect him to be as good or even better in the playoffs this season, and I’m sure his teammates along with management expect the same as well.
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