Will the St. Louis Blues move on from Jordan Binnington this summer?
Dave Pagnotta of The Fourth Period joined Sirius XM NHL Network Radio on Wednesday with Steve Kouleas and Carter Hutton on the Power Play. There, he was asked about the St. Louis Blues and whether they are passing the torch from Jordan Binnington to Joel Hofer?
NHLRumors.com Transcriptions
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Carter Hutton: “And you know, Pags, for me, the one team that me and Kools were touching on it earlier about, a big shutout night for Joel Hofer, sixth this year. He’s one behind Ilya Sorokin with 10 less games played. What happens in St Louis now? Because he’s got one more year at $3.4 million. Binnington’s got one more at $6 million. Like, is the torch passing or is it already passed? And what did they do there?
Dave Pagnotta: “I think it’s passing. I think it’s going and I know they really like Hofer. They obviously like Binnington well. But he’s older. They want to kind of pass this off a little bit, and he becomes a very valuable trade commodity come the summer for teams that are going to look to shore up their goaltending?
Is it going to be in Edmonton? Is it going to be Carolina? Is it going to be another team? Philadelphia? Is it going to be another club that’s looking to solidify their goaltending and have an opportunity to bring a guy in that you can sign to an extension after the fact?
Now, Binnington has no trade protection. He’s got a modified no-trade, so he will have to say where he goes. But one of those teams is Montreal. Is it another, like, they’re going to be options in the market for a player like Jordan Binnington. What happens in Florida? Can they re-sign (Sergei Bobrovsky)? If not, maybe that’s an option and so on. Although I do think they’ll figure that out.
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But there’s going to be a little bit of a market for goaltending, and I think St. Louis understands that. They didn’t want to rush into anything ahead of the deadline. There were some teams that certainly poked around. I do expect that to pick up.
And I think Hofer is going to be the guy moving forward, in a longer-term sense, with the Blues, and they’re going to have to figure out an extension on his end as well. As you mentioned, he’s entering the last year of his deal.”
NHLRumors.com Note: The St. Louis Blues were looking to make major moves at the deadline, moving Jordan Kyrou, Robert Thomas, and Jordan Binnington. None of them were traded, though teams inquired about Binnington.
However, with the Carolina Hurricanes moving on from Frederik Andersen at the end of the season and the Montreal Canadiens needing a goalie, there will be a ton of interest in him this summer. With the games now leaning more in Joel Hofer’s favour, it appears he is the guy moving forward in St. Louis as the Blues look to get younger across their roster.
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