If Carey Price never plays again, he'll still retire as a legend

It was all there in the post-game presser. Most of us knew in our heart of hearts. Including Carey Price. After the Montreal Canadiens concluded their last-place 2021-22 season with a 10-2 victory over the Florida Panthers with Price in goal, he admitted to treating that night as if it might be his last in the NHL as a player. He described April 29 as an “A+ day” and added, “So if this is it, then that would be a great way to do it.”

His season ended on an uncertain note. A chronic knee injury threatened to end his career before his upcoming age-35 campaign. After several months of uncertainty over whether Price would be able to rehab an injury that cost him most of 2021-22, Habs GM Kent Hughes took no joy in delivering a sledgehammer Thursday afternoon: Price’s knee did not improve during the rehab process, the injury isn’t fixable without surgery, and Price is not expected back this season. He’ll be placed on LTIR, creating space for the cap hit of newly acquired center Sean Monahan.

And we must all accept the truth: barring a miracle, it is the end for Price. That’s why he approached his final game of 2021-22 with a soak-it-in mentality.

It will feel like a career gone too soon. Yet it is not like Price, the 2005 draft’s No. 5 overall pick, came and went like a supernova. He played 15 seasons in the NHL. The Canadiens are the sport’s most storied franchise, the club that berthed Jacques Plante and Bill Durnan and Ken Dryden and Patrick Roy, and it’s Price who leads the Habs in career games, wins, saves and minutes played. But it somehow still feels like he will leave us wanting more, does not it? It is not that he didn’t give the game enough. It is that he had the talent to be unquestionably the best goaltender of a generation. Instead, he will “only” be heralded on a roughly equal plane with the likes of Henrik Lundqvist, Marc-Andre Fleury and Tuukka Rask.

That will certainly put Price on a Hall of Fame track, perhaps even as a first-ballot selection. His 361 wins place him 21^st all-time. Among the goalies with 350 or more victories, 18 have reached Hall of Fame eligibility, and 11 have been inducted. Price won the 2014-15 Vezina Trophy, was a two-time finalist and cracked the top five in voting four times. He was virtually invincible for Canada in the nation’s runs to 2014 Olympic Gold and the 2016 World Cup.

Perhaps most significant when considering his resume: Price was indisputably the best goaltender in the world during his peak. In 2014-15 he became just the second goaltender this century to win the Hart Trophy as league MVP, and he is one of three goalies in the past 50 years to do so. From 2013-14 through 2016-17, Price won the Hart, Vezina and Ted Lindsay Award, posted a .928 save percentage and saved 83.7 goals above average. He was so cool, so unflappable, so efficient in his movement that he got into shooters’ heads. In the first three editions of the NHL Players’ Association poll, which began publishing in 2017-18, he was voted best goalie or hardest goalie to score on, and he was well past his prime then. He was that revered by his peers.

But we will still place him in an unofficial career-cut-short category that includes the likes of Bobby Orr, Cam Neely, Pavel Bure, Eric Lindros and Peter Forsberg someday. We will always wonder what Price could’ve accomplished had his body co-operated in his 30s. Across five seasons and 203 appearances from that age onward, he held a .908 save percentage and often struggled to be an above-average NHL netminder.

That did not stop him from delivering occasional magic, of course. He will always have the incredible 2020-21 playoff run, in which he helped a Montreal team with NHL’s 18^th-best record reach the Stanley Cup Final. Posting a .934 save percentage in the first three rounds, he led Montreal to an upset over first-place Toronto and he outduelled Vezina winners Connor Hellebuyck and Fleury to help the Habs knock off Winnipeg and Vegas. He and the Habs finally ran out of pixie dust in the Final against the Tampa Bay Lightning, but watching vintage Price during that postseason was unforgettable.

We know now, though, that the 2021 run came at, no pun intended, a price. Once the season ended, it was announced a few weeks later that he required knee surgery. As the summer progressed and rumors of him being selected by the Seattle Kraken in the expansion draft came and went, it became apparent Price would not be ready for the start of 2021-22. Then, in October, he entered the NHL’s player assistance program, and in November he revealed it was for substance abuse – pain killers.

Perhaps making it back to the ice before the end of 2021-22, which helped earn him the Masterton Trophy for his perseverance, was more about defeating his demons than it was about getting his body ready for starting NHL goaltender duty again. Even though it was sad to see Price returning as a shell of his former all-star form, it was absolutely a victory to see him emerge from a dark place.

It is also part of what will add to Price’s legacy. He was an elite goaltender, yes, but he also broke down a barrier for mental health. It’s one thing when a marginal player opens up about his personal struggles, but it makes waves when an idol does. Price, like his contemporary Robin Lehner, set a precedent for players to be more open and inspire others to seek help.

Price accomplished more than enough as a player to forge a Hall of Fame career. But he also put the ‘Fame’ in Hall of Fame. He was never the loudest person in the room, but he was usually the coolest and often the kindest, a representative for First Nations athletes who has put a lot of time into his charity work alongside his wife, Angela, building ‘The Carey and Angela Price Foundation.’ Price’s play peaked years ago, but he ended his career still making important contributions to the sport.

That’s why, even if this is the end, Price can retire knowing he gave the game a lot.