Ottawa Senators Sign Tyler Ennis To PTO

Sep 21: Thomas Drance and Rick Dhaliwal of The Athletic report that the Vancouver Canucks also offered Ennis a PTO and will “continue to monitor” his situation with the Senators. It is important to note that a tryout with one team does not stop a player from signing an NHL contract with another, meaning at any point Ennis could decide to join the Canucks if an offer is put on the table.

Sep 19: The Ottawa Senators are bringing back a familiar face. The Ottawa Sun’s Bruce Garrioch reports that the team will bring veteran forward Tyler Ennis to training camp on a PTO after he spent time with the team in 2019-20.

Last season with the Edmonton Oilers, Ennis struggled to stay in the lineup consistently and was limited to just nine points in 30 games. But while Ennis isn’t the 20-goal scorer of yore, he’s still shown the ability to be a valuable depth contributor at the NHL level. He maybe demonstrated that most during his time in Ottawa, scoring 14 goals and 33 points in 61 games. He was dealt to the Oilers at that year’s trade deadline, but now the Edmonton native will have another chance to show he can make an impact in Ottawa.

It’s hard to imagine Ennis receives anything more than league minimum based on his production last season. Still, Ennis remains a reliable play-driving forward who’s good at helping chance generation in the bottom six. Ottawa’s forward depth may have gotten a slight boost with the signing of Logan Brown yesterday, but the team still needs more bodies to fill out depth roles. Ennis could very well help alleviate this weakness for Ottawa at a bargain-bin price. It’s hard to argue with most any professional tryout contract, but Ottawa could see some serious dividends here if Ennis performs similarly to his 2019-20 numbers.