Sunday, February 24, 2013
Luongo: Olympics and salary cap
By Tom Carpenter
Both Roberto Luongo and Matt Duchene have revamped their images on and off the ice during the past year, and there are some who believe both should receive serious consideration for Team Canada in next year's Winter Olympics, according to Mike Ziesberger of the Toronto Sun.
“If you are Steve Yzerman and his staff, why wouldn't you be talking about these two guys,” a Western Conference scout recently told the Toronto Sun. “Name me two other guys in the league that have made such complete turnarounds and are playing at such a high level. I would argue that you can’t.”
Of course, Luongo was the goalie when Canada won the gold in the last Olympics, but there has been much debate about whether that was because of or despite the netminder. Regardless of that debate, there is no debating his red-hot netminding of late. Luongo has won five of his past six games, including a shutout Friday and another shutout to start that stretch of games.
Still, the most pressing question regarding Luongo is whether the Vancouver Canucks will trade him, a move that could be hastened by a decreased salary cap next season under the new CBA:
Craig Custance
Friday Mailbag"I think we're going to see more movement than usual because of the drop in salary cap next season. But the players holding out in the final days during CBA negotiations to keep that number at $64.3 million is big for teams that are up against the cap. It would have been a lot worse if the league got the number it wanted, something much closer to $60 million. There might be a couple ambitious GMs who try to move the money during this season, but my guess is that we'll see more of that movement in the summer and around the draft. The interesting name to me is Roberto Luongo. The Canucks believe they can keep him all season, and so far there's been no pressure to move him. They've benefited from keeping him around. But when that cap number drops, having that much money invested in goal isn't a sound move for the Canucks. The question becomes whether or not they lose leverage by waiting until the summer to move Luongo."
