Over the last few weeks, I've made it no secret I think the Calgary Flames would be better off going with a cheap and/or young goaltender as opposed to chasing a big name whose perceived value outweighs his actual value.
One interesting name that fits the bill of what I'd be looking for is Juuse Saros, whose name Elliotte Friedman speculated we may start hearing more of in the coming weeks (Friedman talked about Saros ~19 minutes into Monday's radio hit with the Fan 960).
"Another name I think you're going to start hearing out there in terms of what the plans are going to be for him is Juuse Saros, who is the backup in Nashville. I wonder if these teams looking for goalies are going to look at him and say 'what's his availability?'
Dating back to 2013-14 in the SM-liiga, the 22-year-old has posted at least a .920 save percentage every season. That's pretty impressive given he's played for three different teams and in three different leagues during that span.
This season marks the first of Saros' NHL career and realistically it couldn't have gone any better. He appeared in in 21 games, including a couple against the Flames, and posted a .923 save percentage while leading the Preds to at least a point 13 times.
I don't know what the cost would be for Saros or what the Flames have to give -- they are short on picks, don't have many forwards to spare and the Predators are absolutely loaded on defense -- but it is certainly worth finding out.
Saros could be a long-term solution in goal and, given his salary (he's signed through next season for less than $700K), the Flames would have plenty of money remaining to spend elsewhere.
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