St. Louis Blues Cap Crunch: Could Jake Allen Replace Brian Elliott?

The St. Louis Blues might still be in the playoffs, but it’s time for us to prepare for the summer signings that loom ahead.

Tarasenko is coming to the end of a rather pitiful deal, considering his skill level and the points he’s brought to the team, as well as Barrett Jackman’s contract ending and a number of shorter contracts coming to a close (Butler, Goc, Bortuzzo, Porter, Jokinen, and Michalek plus Elliott and Allen).

The Blues are known as a “salary cap team,” or a team that runs very close to the salary cap ceiling. The floor, at $51 million, is roughly $17 million below St. Louis, who are only a million or so below budget. While no one will argue that GM Doug Armstrong is getting the most out of his money (as long as the Blues make it out of the first round of the playoffs, at least), the fact remains that they have approximately $57 million committed to the 2016 salary cap.

To add a little pressure to that fact, at last glance, it didn’t look like next season’s cap would reach the oft-touted $71 million. At the rate the Canadian dollar is going, it’s looking closer to holding steady at $69 million, maybe with an increase to $70 million.

That leaves the Blues only $12 million to work with, assuming the cap doesn’t budge an inch up or down. And trying to re-sign eight players, one of whom is a burgeoning star, on $12 million simply doesn’t seem feasible.

Where can the Blues cut the fat? They may need to look at their goaltending situation when it comes down to it.

Apr 11, 2015; St. Louis, MO, USA; St. Louis Blues goalie Brian Elliott (1) cannot stop a shot by Minnesota Wild left wing Zach Parise (11) as it gets by him for a goal during the third period at Scottrade Center. The Blues won the game 4-2. Mandatory Credit: Billy Hurst-USA TODAY Sports

A 2014 study from the UCB business school titled, Estimating the Effects of Age on NHL Player Performance did just what it said on the tin: examined the fourteen regular seasons between 1997-1998 and 2011-2012 for evidence that age did indeed have an affect on players’ abilities to stay at the top of their game. The three authors, Yeung, Egan and Brander, specifically looked at the breakdown between positions (forwards, defenders and goaltenders) and peak scoring years as well as peak performance.

As you can imagine, goaltenders did not rate well in the scoring metric but did surprisingly well with regards to peak performance years. While forwards and defensemen respectively peak around 28 and 29, goaltenders displayed no such inclination and instead, the study found, “display little systematic performance variation over most of the age range from the early 20s to late 30s.”

They also discovered for goaltenders, the save percentage varies little by age. At all ages between 20 and 37, the average save percentage is between 90% and a small fraction over 91%.

If this is the case, then why shouldn’t the St. Louis Blues look at retaining Allen at a lower cost to replace their starting goaltender in the lineup?

It’s not outrageous to consider. Both Allen and Elliott have contracts that will see them through the end of the 2014-15 season, and no further than that. It’s not a great market for goaltenders out there and the St. Louis Blues are sitting dangerously close to the cap ceiling. The problems we ignored once the excitement of the postseason haven’t gone away; as fans we simply don’t have to deal with the reality of the salary cap situation on a day-to-day basis.

Why Choose Allen Over Elliott?

There are a number of reasons why the Blues are the place for Allen to stay and take a first-string position for less rather than taking a second-string position elsewhere. The Blues have a great goalie coach in Jim Corsi who, aside from his fancystats fame, is a darn fine goalie coach.

Believe it or not, Allen is posting better playoff numbers than Tokarski did during that famed series.

But on the Blues side of things, the numbers seem to work out. While Allen’s not putting up elite numbers, just yet he does rank top 28* goaltenders in the NHL with regards to his regular-season save percentage of .913.

(*This was calculated using only goaltenders who had played 30 games or more in the season as Allen played an unusually high amount of games for a second-string goaltender.)

Obviously this isn’t what we’re looking for, but we have to take into account Allen’s relative youth in the NHL and the development he’s had over the year. His playoff stats have been unbelievable, given his lack of NHL seasoning, so to speak, and is reminiscent of Dustin Tokarski’s rise to Montreal fame during last season’s playoffs when he stepped in for Carey Price after the infamous skate-on-knee incident involving Price, New York Rangers forward Chris Kreider and some very bad blood between MTL and NYR.

If you followed that playoff series, you watched something special indeed, and the announcers made sure you knew it.

But believe it or not, Allen is posting better playoff numbers than Tokarski did during that famed series, with the former holding at .933 at the time of writing and Tokarski ending at .916.

Money, Money, Money

In the end, it comes down to this: how can St. Louis can get the most for their money?

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