Matt Murray is currently the best goaltender on the Ottawa Senators' payroll; Yes, it's true

The Ottawa Senators thought they had pulled one over on the Toronto Maple Leafs when they dealt an oft injured, underperforming Matt Murray to Toronto for future considerations. The Sens offered up a 2023 3rd round pick and a 2024 7th round pick in exchange for only having to retain 25% of Murray's $6.25M cap hit for this season and next and once the deal was complete there was more than a modest amount of criticism directed at the Leafs for either not getting the Sens to retain 50% or to not be getting a premium asset in return for taking on his contract, even at 25% retained.

Following the completion of the deal, Senators fans rejoiced, thrilled that the Sens were finally able to rid themselves of the majority of Murray's contract. The original reaction on social media was one of mockery towards the Leafs, whom Sens fans thought had downgraded from Jack Campbell to Matt Murray. Leafs fans were lukewarm on the deal itself, not yet knowing who the other half of their new tandem would be. Once the Buds inked Ilya Samsonov on July 13th, that uncertainty largely shifted to a feeling of unease.

That was then. This is now. Fast forward to a November in which Murray finds himself the owner of a 3-1-1 record to go along with a 2.41 GAA and a .926 SV%. Those totals are vastly superior to those of Anton Forsberg AND Cam Talbot, whom Sens fans believed to be a substantial upgrade over Murray at the time of the trade.

So far, Talbot is the owner of a 1-5-0 record, a 2.83 GAA and a .910 SV% in 6 starts (8 total appearances). Meanwhile, his counterpart (Forsberg) has posted a 4-7-1 record with a 3.43 GAA and a .904 SV%. With the Senators still paying a portion of Murray's contract ($1,562,500 per season), he's stilltechnically the best goalie on the Sens' payroll, which is actually pretty funny, considering how fans painted Murray as a scapegoat rather than acknowledging the team's defensive inefficiencies in front of him, which likely led to a lot of his struggles during his time in Ottawa.


As far as Murray's time in Toronto is concerned, yes, his first outing was a tough one, losing 4-3 to the Montreal Canadiens in regulation and posting a .826 SV%, stopping only 19 of 23 shots, but he has gone on to post save percentages above .940 in 3 of his next 4 games, making more than 30 saves in all four starts. He's been an absolute machine for the Leafs. Credit to the Leafs' team defense, which has been pretty good in front of him, but Murray has made quite a few impactful, even game-altering saves during his first 5 games as a Leaf.

Now, we shouldn't get too far ahead of ourselves in declaring the Murray acquisition a resounding success. There is a lot of road left between here and the postseason and plenty of ways for this thing to go sideways. However, if Murray can remain healthy and continue to provide the timely saves that he's been able to provide through his first few games in Toronto the rest of the way, this deal could end up being a real black mark on Pierre Dorion's tenure as GM of the Ottawa Senators - especially because he paid multiple assets AND retained salary to move Murray and got absolutely nothing in return.