Here are the top 64 goalies to own in your salary cap league – May 26^th, 2024 edition.

Just like the skater list the goalie rankings have been updated into offseason mode, so we're looking at contracts beginning with games in the fall. The new contracts (and projected new deals) cause slips down the rankings for Jeremy Swayman, Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen, Ilya Sorokin, and others. Meanwhile, Thatcher Demko and his two remaining years on his bargain deal, jumps up all the way to second, but he's still nowhere near the value of what Thompson is producing as a platoon starter on a playoff team at a cap hit that is right now under the league-minimum that can be signed.

I also wanted to note this month that in updating the rankings I noticed that I have been doing this for so many years now, that I started when there was a different number of teams, yet I didn't up the length of the list to adjust for the addition of Seattle. The list length covers an average of two goalies per team, meaning it should be 64 names long, and this month is the first time it is. Enjoy.

Standard pre-rankings note:

Cap hit is used for the player cost, so if your league uses salary or AAV, please account for that, as it can greatly change the impact of entry-level deals. The rankings are set up so as to provide the most value in the current season, while providing some value in future years, based on modeling for predicted salary increases and production growth.

The stats used for the goaltenders attempt to balance both ratio stats as well as volume. For those of you with variations towards either end of the spectrum, leaning more towards volume or rate stats, you will want to account for that change in value. Same thing goes for setting variations such as: number of teams, salary space, or roster positions. This list is made to be a baseline guide for player evaluation, and to promote discussion and understanding of how to optimize rosters in a cap league setting.

The goalie list comes not only with a value system, but with value tiers. The tiers (also computed by a formula of mine) represent a more general view on a goalie's value taking into account a few overarching factors. Cheap backups can have higher ratings but show up lower down the tier rankings. The high ranking is due to their low cap hits coupled with an established floor with some possible upside. The lower tier is a result of them having uncertain volume, and the lower likelihood of hitting their upside in any given year. In general, aim to have the highest rated players if you are looking to be most cap efficient, but use the tiers if you just want to focus on having the best goalies and you are comfortable paying a little more for that security (my preference is usually to lean towards the more cap efficient options because of how variable goalies can be).

If you note a mistake, or have any further questions about the ranking system, please let me know. You can find me on Twitter here @alexdmaclean.

Comments help with optimizing the values, because they're not perfect and they never will be.

We're sticking with the +/- 5.0 rating that Dobber uses on all of his rating schemes as the range for approximately equivalent value. The skater and goalie rankings are synched so that the value of a skater against a goalie can be compared, though the scale of the ratings has changed a little since the last update.