Canucks Acquire LaBarbera

The Canucks made a splash last night in the trade front, as they picked up Box 15 goalie, Jason LaBarbera from the Kings in exchange for a late round draft pick.

		2008-2009 Stats		2009
To Vancouver	Age	MIN	Points	Cap Hit
Jason LaBarbera, G	29	995	14	$825,000
---
To Los Angeles	Age	GP	Points	Cap Hit
2009 7th Round Pick

It's rather remarkable that this deal goes down on the same night that Curtis Sanford goes down with injury. It was originally thought that LaBarbera would come in and the team would be able to send Cory Schneider down to the minors to get some more quality starts with the Manitoba Moose, but that isn't going to be the case now.

LaBarbera is currently on the last year of his current deal and the Kings were not likely to re-sign the keeper, since they have a backlog of good goalkeeping, especially with the emergence of Jonathan Quick of late. The move will also free up the starting role in Manchester of the AHL for Jonathan Bernier, who is the next big thing in Los Angeles and he will earn a good number of starts down the stretch here.

As for fantasy value, LaBarbera goes up considerably, as he joins a team that can win more games up front with some decent goalkeeping, which LaBarbera never really had with the Kings, so that's an immediate rise to his share price. Look for LaBarbera to likely get the start on Thursday in Nashville.