Flyers taking a serious look at Emery

The Ottawa Sun today reports that the Flyers have made overtures toward former Ottawa Senators goalie Ray Emery, who played last season in Russia after his unceremonious and acrimonious departure from the NHL in 2008.

With Martin Biron and Antero Niittymaki both free agents now, the club would be wise to investigate how to revamp their situation in the crease.

Despite all the BS about Emery's discipline problems two years ago, this makes sense from several standpoints:

1) As he did not play in the NHL last season, he does not have a contract, which means that...

2) The Flyers can sign him to any amount of money, for as many years as they wish, because...

3) They will be rid of some salary because of the cap's shrinkage for next season and with both current netminders slated to be unrestricted, they're going to look for someone to fill at least one spot on the cheap.

4) That means some other goaltenders, who can be gotten in either body-for-body trades or body-for-pick deals, won't get much notice from the club.

It's always been standard operating procedure that fleecing another team equals fair value for the club, but now with Comcast holding the reins, the ledger's gotta be clean and that means Holmgren will be looking at the scrap heap.

Unless Biron really loves it here and is willing to take a pay cut or a new deal with a lot more on the back end, he's gone. I expect the Flyers will begin negotiations by lowballing him, which might grease the skids for his exit.

I also don't think anyone in the front office is dumb enough to try and give Niittymaki a shot to be the starter - not when they apparently think the team is "close" to Cup contention. He may still wind up the number two choice, and a relatively solid one at that.

I like Emery. I like his fire, I like his competitiveness and his drive and his technical but passionate style of goaltending. Plus, he's got Stanley Cup experience

I don't know what really precipitated his fall from grace performance-wise, but the way he structured his exit from Ottawa two seasons ago tells me things were really screwed within the organization and he felt he had to go the dirty path to escape it.

The Flyers may be wise to sign him to either a one-or-two year deal if they are concerned that his passion will get the best of him. Otherwise, I don't see the club making a serious run at anyone else, save Jean-Sebastien Giguere or Carey Price.