Bishop peaking at right time for Lightning

Sell high.

The Tampa Bay Lightning now have the opportunity to do as such when it comes to goaltender Ben Bishop and his future with the club.

A pending unrestricted free agent, Bishop is a candidate to be moved before the March 1 trade deadline, with the Lightning sitting outside of the playoff picture and prepared to turn over the keys to young goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy.

Part of Bishop's eventual move from the Lightning is tied to his contract. The lanky netminder has been one of the league's best in recent seasons and should cash in on that performance this summer.

That doesn't work for the Lightning, already in a cap crunch and with a host of restricted free agents to entertain this summer, namely forwards Tyler Johnson, Ondrej Palat, and Jonathan Drouin, who will cost a bundle to retain.

The writing was on the wall for Bishop when the club opted to re-sign Vasilevskiy to a three-year contract that kicks in next season, when the 22-year-old will hold a $3.5-million cap hit.

Last offseason, the Lightning were prepared to move Bishop to the Calgary Flames only for the deal to fall apart in its latter stages.

Bishop has persisted despite the trade noise. After slugging through the season's early goings, where he came away with just nine wins in 19 outings, his game has turned around since returning from injury Jan. 12.

Since then, Bishop has been one of the Lightning's best performers, winning seven of 10 games, while his save rate has climbed to .922. As a result, the Lightning are back in the thick of the playoff race, four points back of a wild-card position as of Thursday.

But Bishop's play likely isn't enough to preserve his time in the Tampa Bay crease, and with the trade deadline less than a week out, he's now on borrowed time with the Lightning.