As the title states today is a rather eventful day for goaltenders in the NHL.
1st…
Jonathan Quick shutout the New Jersey Devils 4-0 to take a 3 games to 0 lead in the Stanley Cup Final.

How is this news? J-Quick’s been killing it all playoffs. They might as well be given the Stanley Cup now. Seriously! Although, Marty’s been playing like the Marty Brodeur of old (the legendary one), but Quick is playing better and the rest of the Kings aren’t playing as well as the Devils (who couldn’t put the puck in a soccer goal). Not saying it’s over! But it might as well be.
2nd…
The Washington Capitals trade Tomas Vokoun to the Pittsburgh Penguins for a 7th round pick in the draft.

In an attempt to clear their three-way logjam at the goaltender position (as well as get some value for an asset they won’t be their asset come July 1st), the Washington Capital traded last year’s steal (1-year $1.5 million) of free agency, Tomas Vokoun to the Pittsburgh Penguins for a 7th round pick in this year’s draft. Now anyone that doesn’t know what’s going on would ask, why trade a perennial NHL starting goaltender for a draft pick? Well, the answer is to get value (any value) for a pending free agent. The next logical question for the person who doesn’t know what’s going would be “why trade him if he’s going to be a free agent?”. The answer to that is simple, they traded the rights to negotiate with Vokoun to the Penguins because right now, the rights to get a headstart on negotiating a new contract with Vokoun belongs to the Caps. They gave it to the Pens. Now the Pens can negotiate with Vokoun about being a Penguin nxt year before anyone else makes their offer for him. Almost instantaneously, Vokoun’s stint at free agency ended. The Penguins signed hin to a 2-year, $4 million contract. So in essence, he’ll be making more this year to be Marc-Andre Fleury’s backup (or be a guy who could challenge Marc-Andre Fleury to play better).
… and of course…

Tim Thomas announced he’s taking a year off.
Ok! There’s crazy, there’s eccentric, then there’s utterly nuts. This might be a little bit of all of them. I mean, come on, Timmy! There are a lot of Bruins fans who will depend on your exploits to help the team next year. We all know that you are a man of conviction and integrity who has a strong opinion on “more important things” that also happens to be a great goaltender, but you’re 38 years old and on the last year of your contract. You could just play it out and retire because let’s face it, hockey is the last thing on your mind right now and you said it yourself, you’ve already accomplished more than you’ve dreamed. So why not play out your contract, save that money, and retire afterwards? Just a thought.
Despite all this, Tim Thomas is still my favorite NHL goaltender and as respectable his reasons are, I believe it’s just plain rude to leave your team hanging like this (and I get that his relationship with the Boston Bruins is sour or souring). I’d rather that he just asked to be traded to a team of his choosing. That is my say. It is a little ridiculous and the further it goes, the more strange it becomes.