Blue Jackets ink Brathwaite to deal

[Shell]

Blue Jackets ink Brathwaite to deal
Canadian Press
6/1/2003

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - Veteran goaltender Fred Brathwaite has signed a one-year deal to be Marc Denis' backup with the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Brathwaite, 30, played last year with St. Louis.

"I'm very excited," he said in an interview with The Columbus Dispatch.

"I've got a chance to go to a young team and hopefully make a difference. In St. Louis, I didn't play too much.

"Hopefully I can contribute a little more in Columbus, push Marc Denis and help them become a better team."


The contract was believed to have a base value of $500,000 US with several performance bonus clauses.

Brathwaite, from Ottawa, was 12-9-4 with a 2.76 goals-against average and a .883 save percentage.

Denis appeared in 77 of 82 games and set an NHL record by playing 4,511 minutes.

Brathwaite estimated he would be called on to play 20 or 30 games to relieve Denis.

Blue Jackets president and general manager Doug MacLean said it was important to grab a quality goaltender because the retirement of Colorado's Patrick Roy last week would likely create a chain-reaction of teams looking for veteran backups.

"We wanted to clear it up as quickly as possible," MacLean said. "With Patrick Roy retiring, there's a lot can happen."

Brathwaite played three seasons with the Calgary Flames before he was traded to St. Louis at the 2001 NHL entry draft in a multi-player deal that sent Blues goaltender Roman Turek to the Flames.

[Turbulence]

Didn't Denis play more games than anyone last year? Maybe this'll relieve that...
Scratch one more name off the list of teams that won't have Irbe next year...

[Shell]

Originally Posted by Turbulence

Didn't Denis play more games than anyone last year? Maybe this'll relieve that...
Scratch one more name off the list of teams that won't have Irbe next year...

yep he did, 77 games. Brodeur was second with 73. Of course, Brodeur had a 2.02 GAA instead of Denis' 3.09. Only 3 people had a worse GAA than Denis (Hedburg, Blackburn, and worst of all in the league, Irbe :sad: who had a 3.19) (by all in the league I really mean all goalies who played at least 27 games)

[Guyute]

good move by Columbus to grab him. there's gonna be a mad scramble for decent netminders if people don't start getting deals done. which would be good for us... er... Irbe.

I'm still curious if our 2 goalies are really going to be Weekes and DesRochers. Maybe it'd be good for Weekes, knowing that he's the ONLY option as starter. He needs to do his job. Who knows though.

anyway... I hope Freddy does well there... always liked him as a goalie and he got a Way raw deal in St. Louis.

[tommy]

Well with all the Irbe to the ECHL talk, and other ideas floating around, by now Kevin must realize that he is being viewed as the starting goaltender... there's just no other way it could be... but I'm seriously not sold on DesRochers... he had two good performances, and people are calling him a better backup than Irbe... sure, he won't complain as much perhaps, but I really don't know if I want him between the pipes for 15 games if Weekes gets injured.

But anywho... that was a good move for the BJ's (sorry... I just think it's funny to call them that).