It was a short-lived time in New York for Robin Lehner. He spent just one season with the Islanders but was a fan favorite during that time and put up stellar numbers finishing third in Vezina voting.
After the season, Lehner and the Islanders did not reach a contract agreement and we learned why that was due to a Robin Lehner podcast appearance.
Lehner appeared on The Cam & Strick Podcast to discuss his career so far in the NHL. When he talked about how things ended on Long Island, it wasn’t necessarily a happy ending for him.
Lenher: "We had Anders Lee and a few other players that were signing deals that year. We kept taking time and went the NHL Awards, and they said everything was going to be fine. We just kept waiting for an offer and then they wanted us to give them a number" (2/2) #Isles
— Rob Taub (@RTaub_) August 10, 2021
Lehner would go on to say that the offer to him was a two-year $4.5 million AAV deal. In Lehner’s mind, he was looking for term and thought he was worth more than $5 million a year. Lehner gambled on himself and unfortunately, lost (in the short-term).
He signed a one-year deal with Chicago for $5 million before getting a five-year $25 million extension in Vegas prior to the 2021 season.
Don’t look at this as a Lehner slandering the Islanders interview. It wasn’t that, and he made sure to say how appreciative he was of both Lou Lamoriello and Barry Trotz. It didn’t work out with him staying long-term, but Lou had a good backup plan.
Semyon Varlamov and Thomas Greiss were a good pair together and now, Varly and Ilya Sorokin make a good pair as well. But, Lehner didn’t go without one more juicy nugget from that 2019 offseason.
Lehner also revealed on the @camandstrickpod that the #Isles plan that free agency -- because Artemi Panarin and Semyon Varlamov shared the same agent -- was to bring them both in on a package deal
— Rob Taub (@RTaub_) August 10, 2021
Supposedly, the plan was to bring in both Artemi Panarin and Semyon Varlamov. Man, what could have been. As we know very well, Panarin chose the Rangers, and Lou is still looking for that big-time scorer to put the Islanders over the top.
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Sure, the Islanders have put up back-to-back successful seasons since the departure of Robin Lehner, but it’s still interesting to go back and see what happened from the player’s point of view.