Why Antti Niemi will not solve any team’s short-term goaltending problems

Fool the Pittsburgh Penguins once, shame on you. Fool them twice, shame on them. Fool them three times? To waivers you go. Such was the case for Antti Niemi, who lasted just three games in a Penguins uniform before getting waived by the team on Monday.

Niemi’s time with the Penguins hasn’t been what Pittsburgh’s management hoped it’d be. In three games, Niemi posted a .797 save percentage after allowing 16 goals with an 0-3 record to open the season. When Niemi was acquired in the offseason, there were hopes he would play 30-40 games with the team to relieve pressure off Matt Murray.

Instead, Niemi’s tenure with the team was a disastrous and chaotic endeavor.

Now, the Penguins have to fill the hole Niemi left behind with very few options on the table. The easiest, and most likely, option is to dip into their AHL well for support. However, according to our friends at Pensburgh, the Penguins finding goaltending help from their minor league team isn’t as straightforward as you’d think:

22-year-old Tristan Jarry is the top prospect and has the pedigree (and 1 NHL game last season) but he hasn’t been terribly sharp himself in the AHL this year with a 1-2-0 record, 3.496GAA and a .883 save%.

26-year old Casey DeSmith is playing much better with a 3-0-0 record and 0.98 GAA and .965 save%. DeSmith though doesn’t have much pedigree as an undrafted player who at 6’0, 180 is hardly sized for modern day NHL goaltending. As great as DeSmith has played in Wilkes-Barre, AHL goaltending doesn’t always translate perfectly to the NHL...

The Penguins will need Niemi to clear waivers tomorrow — or be taken — before they can make a move to plug the hole in their ship. Within the next 24 hours, it’s very likely Pittsburgh will take the path of least resistance after Niemi clears and call up Tristan Jarry despite the unknowns in his game this year. Pittsburgh, at least, has prospects to spare in their goaltending pipeline.

For a few other NHL teams, solving their goaltending problems will not be so easy.

Vegas, for instance, is without both their starter and backup goaltender just weeks into the new season. The Golden Knights have lost both Marc-Andre Fleury (concussion) and Malcolm Subban (lower-body injury) in the last two weeks, and will have to go with 23-year-old Oscar Dansk for the time being.

Considering the state of Vegas’ goaltending, Niemi could possibly be claimed as a last resort. Nobody thought the Golden Knights would lose both their starter and backup to injury in the opening month of the season, and for many teams those losses would be crippling. Considering their incredible 6-1-0 start to the season, management may get desperate in trying to keep the ship from sinking quickly.

Other alternatives offered for Niemi have been the Boston Bruins, who are dealing with life without Tuukka Rask. Anton Khudobin started out this season well, but has since allowed eight goals in his last two starts. Also suggested were the Arizona Coyotes, as starter Antti Raanta has been battling injury and backup Louis Domingue has an .868 save percentage through five games played.

Overall, Niemi has the pedigree of a fine stopgap netminder. Over the course of his 10-year NHL career, Niemi has a .912 overall save percentage in 426 games played. His recent stats, however, showcase an inescapable downward spiral. Since the start of the 2015-16 season, Niemi has put up an .896 save percentage in 88 games. Remarkably, Niemi’s even-strength save percentage during that time was somehow worse, at an .885 clip over the last three seasons.

While the veteran presence of Niemi is certainly a lure for a few NHL teams down on their goaltending luck to start the year, the addition of the netminder in his current state of mind won’t be a help to anyone. Time in the AHL will probably do Niemi good to get his confidence back up to par without the pressures of coming in as a stop-gap on a NHL team looking to reverse their fortunes.

There may still be good goaltending left in Niemi, but that shouldn’t be for another NHL team with short-term problems to discover.