Carey Price is the face of the Montreal Canadiens and was paid as such, but he and Sergei Bobrovsky have had a stinging impact on the goalie market.
The Montreal Canadiens walked into the summer of 2017 with one goal in mind: extend Carey Price. The 2015-16 season made it clear that the team couldn’t be as successful as they wanted with Price in net as a year full of injuries tanked their season. And if there was still room for further evidence, the 2005 first-round pick saw 62 games the season posting a .923 save percentage leading the Habs into first in the Atlantic Division.
Summer came and went, and Carey Price had a new eight-year extension worth $84 million starting in the 2018-19 season. Coincidently, the year before was one full of Price injuries and uncharacteristically poor play, which saw the Montreal Canadiens finish low enough to win the right to select third at the 2018 NHL Draft.
The first year of that new $10.5 million cap-hit saw Price bounce back from the poor year with some hiccups along the way. It still wasn’t enough to get the Habs into playoffs. The same tune came for the Canadiens this season as injuries, and inconsistent play cost them game after game.
There is one glorifying difference. In the past, when the Montreal Canadiens would lose games, it would still come with Price making three or four god-like saves to keep them in it as long as possible. That was still present this season, but you could tell Price wasn’t his usual series-stealing self.