200px-MartinBrodeur VOKOUN, BRODEUR LOOK HEADED TOWARDS RETIREMENT
Marty Brodeur received one official offer this summer all the way back on July 1, within the first 30 minutes of free agency.
That offer came from the Pittsburgh Penguins, a one year contract in the neighborhood of $1.5 million but the two sides were unable to bridge a gap of over $1 million and Pittsburgh quickly moved on, agreeing to a one year deal with Thomas Greiss worth $1 million.
It remains unclear what incentive the Penguins saw in trying to add Brodeur but the 42 year old whose play has severely declined the last two years, has claimed all summer he still wants to play, yet, his demands have been a contract of over $2.5 million and he only wants to join a contender.
The Tampa Bay Lightning were also interested in Brodeur on July 1 but were turned away by the asking price and instead signed Evgeni Nabokov.
At Brodeur’s age, you can’t be picky if you truly still want to play. It’s why the odds are stronger for him being forced to retire than playing in the NHL this season.
Brodeur now falls into a situation where the only way he returns to the NHL this season is if a playoff contender loses their starting goaltender for a significant period of time like Minnesota did last year and went out and signed Ilya Bryzgalov.
38 year old Tomas Vokoun is another goaltender whose agent Allan Walsh says Vokoun still wants to play but claims he’s declined multiple opportunities because of the fit not being right. Walsh went to twitter a few days ago to put that word out.

Not all but agents almost always have a motive and stretch the truth at times when going public, as the reality is Vokoun who didn’t play last season and looked very poor in practices, just doesn’t have any options, at least when it comes to earning a NHL contract.
Decision to sign Greiss impact on Penguins salary cap
The Pittsburgh Penguins publicly claim there is open competition between goaltenders Thomas Greiss and Jeff Zatkoff. That’s really not the case, though, as management has all intentions of opening the season with Greiss as the No. 2 goaltender.
The Penguins will likely be able to slip Zatkoff through waivers whose one-way contract guarantees him a $600,000 salary at the AHL level.
Greiss counting just $400,000 more against the cap than Zatkoff might not seem like much but there is an impact on the Penguins salary cap.
Pittsburgh currently only has $930,000 in cap space with 12 forwards, 7 defensemen and 2 goaltenders counting against the Cap.
Replace Greiss with Zatkoff and Pittsburgh’s cap space is around $1.35 million, giving them a lot more breathing room when it comes to making roster moves during the season.