Just days before the start of the NHL season, Corey Crawford has announced his retirement. Yesterday, there was an announcement of an indefinite leave of absence, but this goes to the next step.

The Devils are essentially screwed for this year. They signed Crawford to a 2-year deal for $3.9M per season in October. Though he's 36 now, for that kind of money you have to think the expectation is that he's a 1A or a backup that is going to see considerable action. So with him retiring, the Devils are going to have to go with a tandem of Mackenzie Blackwood and Scott Wedgewood this year. That's not likely a winning recipe.

On top of that, because Crawford is 35+ the Devils are on the hook for the full amount of the cap hit for the full term. In an environment where many teams are facing cap struggles, carrying almost $4M is a lot of dead weight. Per CapFriendly, they do still have about $8.5M in cap space despite already carrying about $4M in dead space from buying out Cammalleri, Schneider and a small cap recapture penalty for Kovalchuk.

I hope that Crawford is all right in terms of his long-term health. He's had some concussion issues and other problems in the past. It's a shock for everybody, and you just hope that the player will be OK.