Avs trade for a goalie from Rangers, what’s it mean for Darcy Kuemper?

The Colorado Avalanche acquired a goalie from the New York Rangers on Thursday morning in exchange for three draft picks.

Alexandar Georgiev is headed to the Avs for a third-round (No. 97) and a fifth-round pick (No. 161) in the 2022 NHL Draft and a third-round selection in the 2023 NHL Draft.

Georgiev, 26, posted a 15-10-2 record this past season with New York, including an 8-1-0 run with two shutouts in his last nine starts of the campaign. He finished the season with an .898 save percentage and 2.92 goals-against average. Georgiev backed up Vezina winning goaltender Igor Shesterkin for most of the season.

Obviously, with Stanley Cup winning goaltender Darcy Kuemper a free agent, this trade has huge implications for the future of the Avs in net. And several reports are saying the trade for Georgiev means Kuemper is as good as gone.

Darcy Kuemper out in Colorado with the Georgiev trade. The @Avalanche didn’t have the cap space to keep Kuemper.

— Darren Dreger (@DarrenDreger) July 7, 2022

Sources also confirm Darcy Kuemper is out in Colorado. Pending UFA was too expensive to retain. He’s headed to market Wednesday. https://t.co/wu5gkcfWLv

— Pierre LeBrun (@PierreVLeBrun) July 7, 2022

I'm told by sources that Darcy Kuemper will officially move on. Not enough cap space to get deal done @ColHockeyNow

— Adrian Dater (@adater) July 7, 2022

LeBrun reported that Avs GM Joe Sakic met with Kuemper’s agent on Wednesday, but obviously those talks didn’t go well enough to reach a new contract. Or Kuemper was simply too expensive to retain based on what he’s going to get on the open market.

Kuemper was great for the Avs in the Stanley Cup Final. Outside of a shaky Game 3, he posted a Game 2 shutout, helped Colorado steal Game 4 in OT and outplayed Andrei Vasilevskiy in the Game 6 clincher.

He will be missed, but Sakic clearly has faith in Georgiev as well as backup Pavel Francouz, who was a dazzling 6-0 in the postseason. Francouz is under contract for the 2022-23 NHL season.

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