The Calgary Flames have made another addition, signing veteran forward Brad Richardson to a one-year contract. The deal will carry a salary of $800K.
Richardson, 36, has 825 games to his name in the NHL and will join a Flames forward group that is suddenly full of experienced bottom-six options. Trevor Lewis, Tyler Pitlick and Blake Coleman were all brought in this offseason, giving head coach Darryl Sutter several physical, veteran options to fill out the lineup. Richardson represents the latest example of that trend towards hard-nosed, defensively responsible forwards, and adds another center to the mix for Sutter to work with.
In fact, Sutter should know exactly what he can get out of Richardson, since they were together with the Los Angeles Kings in 2012, winning the Stanley Cup after the coach took over partway through the year. While he wasn’t even a playoff regular–Richardson played just 13 games that postseason–the veteran forward will understand what he’s getting himself into with the defensive-minded coach.
Richardson could serve as a replacement for Derek Ryan on the penalty kill this season, but shouldn’t see a ton of ice time at even-strength whenever he does get into the lineup. Though he did score 19 goals in the 2018-19 season with Arizona, that was an obvious outlier for a player who has just 107 in his long career. He won’t be asked to score, but Sutter teams have always relied on the bottom six to check more than contribute offensively. Given he took just 18 shots on goal in 17 games last season, that shouldn’t be much of a problem.
Sorry for being slightly picky, again, @Gavin, but maybe Richardson needs a HockeyReference link?
@Gavin – Thanks! (Next time, I’ll try to wait a few more minutes…)
or try Google. it’s really not that tough to look up ourselves.
@wreckage – Normally, @Gavin and Co. have the H-Ref links in the articles right from the get-go. Google, which you should never use for searching, is below the last place to go, unless you use alternative privacy-focused search engines that can tunnel to Google/Yahoo/Bing without being tracked. BTW, somebody new to PHR might not have arrived through HockeyReference and may not know about its existence.
@Mac- DuckDuckGo and Brave are a nice combo for privacy and keeping the Google’s of the world out of your business. :)
@Gbear – Excellent choices! Another browser to go along with Firefox is LibreWolf, with even more privacy. BangSearch with DuckDuckGo, if you think there might be something missing in your search results (rare).
@Mac – I could never use Firefox after what they did to Brendan Eich, who started the company. But Eich then started Brave, so that’s even more reason why I like it!
Brendan Eich is a homophobic bigot.
No, he believes in traditional values as do hundreds of millions of people around the world and every generation prior to this current one. Your silly comment speaks more to your own intolerence than it does to anything else.
@The Mistake of Giving Eugene Melnyk a Liver Transplant – Brendan Eich isn’t required to throw away his religious tenets, due to leftist belligerence on the planet. Religious rights are far older than the contrived privileges created over the last 60-ish years for militant leftist-extremists. This applies to hockey players, as well. They have an absolute right to stand firmly by their beliefs. Once again, we refer to the pro Free Speech adage – “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”
So we all agree that he is a homophobic bigot. Y’all just think he is justified.
@The Mistake of Giving Eugene Melnyk a Liver Transplant – No, you agree with that, not the rest of us.
Well said, Mac.
Funny how tolerence and diversity seem to only run one way with some. That they don’t see the irony in their hypocrisy is telling.