Paying the Price
Habs ink goaltender to 8-year deal
Carey Price never wants to wear another hockey jersey other than Montreal’s red, white and blue.
The Montreal Canadiens signed Price to an eight-year contact extension that reportedly carries an annual cap hit of US$10.5 million.
That will make the 29-year-old the highest-paid goaltender in hockey. Price’s new deal doesn’t kick in until the 2018-19 season and won’t expire until the summer of 2026.
“I never thought about playing anywhere else,” said Price, who spoke to reporters from his summer home in Kelowna, B.C. “It’s a great place for me. I never thought about putting on another uniform. I just thought it would be too weird, I guess.
“There’s no better place to play hockey. I’m honoured to be able to wear a Canadiens uniform for the rest of my career. This is all I’ve ever known and it’s all I ever will know, I hope.”
Price, a native of Anahim Lake, B.C., has one year left on a sixyear deal signed exactly five years earlier which carried an annual cap hit of $6.5 million. He was due to become an unrestricted free agent next summer.
Getting him signed before that was among the top priorities for general manager Marc Bergevin, who called Price his “franchise player”.
“It was five years ago when we extended Carey Price,” said Bergevin from the team’s suburban practice facility in Brossard, Que. “Now, five years later, we’re going to make sure he finishes as a Montreal Canadien.
“We have, in my opinion, one of the best (goalies) in the business, if not the best. We want to keep him and make sure he’s here for the rest of his career.”