The Stars Have Re-Claimed Remi Poirier — but Getting Him to Cedar Park Takes a Third Trip Through Waivers
Dallas claimed its own former goaltender back off Washington's waivers on Monday. Because a trade sits in the middle of his autumn tour of the Eastern Conference, sending him to the Texas Stars means waiving him all over again.
Remi Poirier is a Dallas Star again, which is not the same as being a Texas Star again — and the distance between those two sentences is one more trip through the waiver wire. Dallas claimed the goaltender off waivers from the Washington Capitals, according to 100 Degree Hockey's file, read in full by this desk. It closes a strange loop: New Jersey claimed Poirier from Dallas on September 27, held him for a month without a minute of game action, traded him to Washington for a seventh-round pick, and Washington waived him without playing him either. Dallas's claim succeeded, and the outlet notes the Stars held no special privilege as the team that originally waived him — the intervening trade had extinguished it.
The catch is the assignment everyone in Cedar Park actually wants. Because of that same intervening trade, Dallas cannot simply send Poirier to the Texas Stars: a source with knowledge of the collective bargaining agreement confirmed to the outlet that he must pass through waivers again before he can be assigned, that the placement could happen as early as Tuesday, and that there is no waiting period between the successful claim and a new waiver stint. If a third team claims him this time, Poirier would land on his fourth roster of the season without having played a single minute of NHL or AHL hockey. At this point last season, the outlet notes, he had already played eight AHL games and been the reason Texas won almost all of the games it took two points from.
There is, for once, no clock forcing the decision. Injuries in Dallas have opened the cap and roster space to simply hold him, and the outlet reports no rush to waive him for assignment until a returning player needs the room back. So the waiting game belongs to Cedar Park: Texas gets its goaltender only if 31 other teams, at the moment Dallas finally waives him, decide they do not desperately need one. The Stars, meanwhile, are home this week — Winnipeg visits Thursday on military and veterans appreciation night, with Buffalo Saturday and Florida Sunday, a homestand this desk previewed Monday — and Poirier's file sits on the front office's desk, one waiver form away from either an ending or another beginning.
