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Archives for December 2021

Metropolitan Notes: Penguins, Georgiev, Hofmann, Kotkaniemi

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The Penguins received some good and bad news on the COVID front today.  The team announced (Twitter link) that winger Evan Rodrigues has been removed from protocols but center Jeff Carter has been placed in COVID protocol.  Rodrigues is in the middle of a career year for Pittsburgh with 23 points in 30 games while seeing regular minutes on the top line so he’ll be a welcome return.  Meanwhile, it’s the second time this season that Carter has been placed in COVID protocol.  The veteran is having a nice year in a top-six role, notching 17 points in 27 games so far.  Pittsburgh currently has eight players in COVID protocol.

More from the Metropolitan Division:

  • While Rangers goaltender Alexandar Georgiev isn’t thrilled about his current lack of playing time, Arthur Staple of The Athletic suggests (subscription link) that the team is unlikely to trade the netminder in advance of the March 21st trade deadline. With Igor Shesterkin’s injury history and the fact that Keith Kinkaid is their next best option, Georgiev may very well be more valuable to New York as an insurance policy than as a trade chip.  Accordingly, a move in the offseason when their cap situation gets trickier and more replacements are available seems like a better time for the netminder to be moved.
  • Blue Jackets winger Gregory Hofmann has taken a leave of absence for personal reasons, notes Brian Hedger of the Columbus Dispatch (Twitter link). The 29-year-old has seven points in 24 games in his first NHL season after his rights were acquired from Carolina last season.  His wife is expecting the birth of their first child soon so there is no firm date yet for his return.
  • While there was plenty of speculation at the time that Jesperi Kotkaniemi signed his one-year, $6.1MM offer sheet with Carolina that the framework of a longer-term extension was also discussed, GM Don Waddell told Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic (subscription link) that there have been no discussions on that front as of yet. The 21-year-old is eligible to sign an extension as of Saturday but is off to a quieter start than he and the Hurricanes were hoping for as he has 14 points in 30 games this season while playing just 12:15 per game.  As a result, finding a price tag that both sides are comfortable with for a long-term contract may be difficult at this point.  Carolina will need to tender a $6.1MM qualifying offer this summer if no extension is reached by then.

Senators Place Tyler Ennis And Josh Norris In COVID Protocol

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The Senators are set to return to action tomorrow against Toronto but will be doing so without two of their forwards as the team announced (Twitter link) that center Josh Norris and winger Tyler Ennis have been placed in COVID protocol.  While not every Canadian province has adapted their quarantine protocol to the shorter period, Ontario has which means the two could be back after five days of isolation.

Norris, in particular, is a notable loss for Ottawa as he sits second on the team in scoring with 22 points in 28 games while logging nearly 19 minutes a game of ice time which puts him third among Senators forwards.  Ennis, meanwhile, had a successful training camp PTO and while he has only scored once this season, he has also picked up 11 assists in 26 games, providing a decent return on his $900K price tag.

Earlier this morning, the team announced (Twitter link) that forwards Clark Bishop and Logan Shaw were added to the taxi squad, likely as the corresponding moves for the COVID news. Bishop played in 13 games with Ottawa last season but injuries have limited him to just five games this year, all with AHL Belleville.  As for Shaw, he has a goal and two assists in 16 games with Ottawa this season and just one helper in six AHL contests.

What Your Team Is Thankful For: Ottawa Senators

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In the spirit of the holiday season, PHR will take a look at what teams are thankful for as the season passes the one-quarter mark. There also might be a few things your team would like down the road. We’ll examine what’s gone well in the early going and what could improve as the season rolls on for the Ottawa Senators.

What are the Senators thankful for?

The future.

While the rebuild might not yet be completely over like GM Pierre Dorion had hoped, many of the long-term building blocks are in place.  Up front, Tim Stutzle, Drake Batherson, Josh Norris, Brady Tkachuk, Shane Pinto, and Alex Formenton form a quality group of players that are 23 and under.  All are signed or under team control for at least the next four years while the recently-signed Tyler Boucher, as well as Ridly Greig, are first-round picks that might not be all that far away from being ready for NHL duty.

On the back end, there aren’t as many younger options that are established but the pipeline is still strong.  Jake Sanderson appears to be a candidate to turn pro at the end of the year and should be able to jump into the NHL right away.  Jacob Bernard-Docker and Lassi Thomson have shown some promising signs while Erik Brannstrom is still young enough to be a part of their long-term plans still despite his struggles.  Those are all 22 and younger and under team control for at least five years after this one.

The present may not be all that fun in terms of wins and losses but the future is coming quickly and it looks promising.

Who are the Senators thankful for?

Thomas Chabot.

With the state of Ottawa’s current back end, they have asked an awful lot out of their number one blueliner and he has delivered.  He leads the league in ice time per game by nearly a full minute after just finishing second in that category last season (and he led the league in that category in 2019-20 as well).  They ask for him to be their top offensive threat from the back end and while he only has one goal, he leads all Ottawa blueliners in points.  Despite the heavy workload – including a 35:39 outing last game – the 24-year-old has been able to thrive and emerge as a legitimate number one defenseman.  While he’s slightly older than those listed above, he’s signed for six more years after this at an $8MM AAV, a price tag that is already below market value and growing more team-friendly by the day.

What would the Senators be even more thankful for?

Matt Murray playing at a level that’s at least somewhat close to his contract.  The one element the Sens don’t truly have yet in their pipeline is a legitimate starting goalie; there are some youngsters with some upside but none that are sure-fire starters of the future.  Murray was supposed to lessen the need for that right away when he was acquired and quickly signed a four-year, $25MM contract, giving him the sixth-highest AAV among all NHL goaltenders.  For that money, he has played to a 3.35 GAA with a save percentage of just .892.  Goaltending was a big question mark before and even after this commitment, it’s still a big question mark.

What should be on the Senators’ Holiday Wish list?

With the Sens being 13 points out of the last playoff spot already, a trip to the postseason isn’t in the cards.  As a result, the wish list will be more draft picks and prospects.  At this point, Chris Tierney, Zach Sanford, and Nick Holden are the veterans they’re likely to move but with how each has performed this season, they’re not likely to bring back much.  In an ideal world, those underperforming veterans improve their play over the next couple of months to give them some better trade chips to work with.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Snapshots: QMJHL, Balcers, Niemela, Highmore

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The QMJHL announced that they have extended their holiday break through to January 14th with the season set to restart no earlier than January 17th.  With most teams not permitted to have any fans plus an increase in positive COVID tests, the move doesn’t come as much of a surprise.  With several games in the OHL and WHL being postponed as well plus more restrictions on attendance in recent days, it wouldn’t be surprising to see those major junior leagues hit the pause button on their seasons as well.

Elsewhere around the hockey world:

  • The Sharks are hoping to have winger Rudolfs Balcers back in the lineup on Sunday against Pittsburgh, relays Curtis Pashelka of The Mercury News. The 24-year-old has missed the last three weeks due to a lower-body injury after getting off to a decent start with 10 points in 24 games (a career high in points per game) while also averaging nearly 16 minutes a game, a mark that would also be a career best if maintained.
  • While it was a disappointing day for players at the World Juniors following their cancellation yesterday, there was a silver lining for Finnish defenseman Topi Niemela. Karpat of the SM-liiga announced that the Maple Leafs prospect has signed a one-year extension through the end of next season, meaning his arrival in North America will have to wait.  The 2020 third-rounder (64th overall) leads all Liiga blueliners in scoring with 24 points in 31 games this season.
  • The Canucks announced (Twitter link) that they have activated winger Matthew Highmore off long-term injured reserve. The 25-year-old had missed the last 23 games due to an upper-body injury.  Highmore had two assists in eight games before being injured and is in his first full season with Vancouver after they acquired him back at the trade deadline in April.

2021 Year In Review: March

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2021 has certainly been another eventful year, both on and off the rink.  Over the coming days, PHR will take a look back at the top stories from around the game on a month-by-month basis.  Next up is a look at March.

New TV Partner: After a lengthy run with NBC that dated back to 2004, the primary television rights holder in the United States changed following the announcement of a seven-year rights agreement with ESPN.  The deal is believed to be worth around $400MM per year which is double what they were receiving on their last contract (and that’s not even factoring in the secondary rights which were announced later on).  The increased revenue is subject to HRR calculations (which set the salary cap) and will go a long way towards stabilizing league-wide revenues which have been reduced during the pandemic.

Seabrook Hangs Them Up: Then-Blackhawks defenseman Brent Seabrook had attempted to come back at the beginning of the 2020-21 season from hip and shoulder injuries but was unable to do so.  In the end, after consulting with doctors, he announced the end of his playing career, a way of retiring without formally filing the paperwork as he’s under contract through the 2023-24 season with a $6.875MM AAV.  Seabrook’s career ended with 1,114 career games (all with Chicago) with 464 points and three Stanley Cup championships.  He was traded to Tampa Bay in the offseason and will sit on LTIR with them for the duration of his contract.

Binnington Extension: The Blues didn’t let their starting goalie test unrestricted free agency in the summer as they agreed to a six-year, $36MM contract extension with Jordan Binnington.  The $6MM AAV is a small raise on the $4.4MM AAV he had on his bridge deal and ties him for the eighth-highest cap hit in the league among goaltenders.  Binnington was a significant part of St. Louis’ Stanley Cup run in 2019 and while he hasn’t been able to quite back to that level of performance since then, posting a .911 SV% with a 2.64 GAA (including games from this season), numbers that are around the league average for starters.  However, the deal gives them some certainty on the cap front and ensures that an important position is locked up for years to come.

Coaching Changes: With March representing close to the midway point of the abbreviated regular season, a pair of teams opted to shake up their coaching staffs.  First, Calgary fired Geoff Ward, a move that had been speculated as a possibility for a while so it may not have come as a big surprise.  On the other hand, his replacement was a big surprise as Darryl Sutter was brought on as their new bench boss.  It’s Sutter’s second stint in Calgary after coaching there from 2002 through 2006 and as he had last worked in the NHL back in 2017 with Los Angeles, his name wasn’t really on the radar as a potential coaching candidate.

Meanwhile, not even two weeks later, Buffalo shook things up as well, dismissing Ralph Krueger with the team mired in a 12-game losing streak.  Assistant coach Don Granato took over on an interim basis for the rest of the season.  While that losing streak lasted another six games, the Sabres were much more competitive with Granato running things with the team hovering close to a .500 points percentage after that streak came to an end.

Peel Out: Following a ‘hot-mic’ incident that had referee Tim Peel caught indicating he had wanted to assess a make-up penalty to Nashville, the league announced that he would “no longer will be working NHL games now or in the future”.  Peel worked over 1,400 games between the regular season and the playoffs in a career that spanned more than 20 years and was in his final season before retirement.  However, this incident meant that his career came to an end a little sooner than he planned.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Blue Jackets Activate Patrik Laine And Adam Boqvist

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The Blue Jackets will have some help in the lineup tonight against Nashville as the team announced that winger Patrik Laine and defenseman Adam Boqvist have both been activated off injured reserve.

Laine has been out of the lineup for nearly two months with an oblique strain.  Prior to the injury, he was off to a nice start to his season with ten points in nine games.  With Laine being eligible for one more trip through salary arbitration in July, a big year would go a long way towards giving him a raise and potentially a long-term contract but missing 19 games won’t help his chances of that.

Meanwhile, Boqvist returns after missing three games due to an upper-body injury.  It has been an interesting first year for him in Columbus; after being one of the centerpieces of the Seth Jones trade, the 21-year-old has been held out of the lineup at times and is logging just 15:59 per game.  Despite that, he has done relatively well offensively, notching nine points in 18 contests.

Columbus had one roster spot available before these activations while defenseman Gavin Bayreuther was officially designated as non-roster due to his recent placement in COVID protocol to free up the other.

New York Islanders Make Several Roster Moves

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Dec 30: Brock Nelson entered the protocol on December 28. He joined Beauvillier, Clutterbuck, Wahlstrom, Parise, Salo, and Martin at that point but the latter three have now cleared. Today, Sebastian Aho has been placed in the protocol, while Cole Bardreau, Austin Czarnik, and Michael Dal Colle have all been recalled from the taxi squad. Grant Hutton has also been recalled from Bridgeport, while Kyle Palmieri has gone on injured reserve.

Dec 26: After their roster was decimated by COVID cases earlier in the season, the New York Islanders placed Anthony Beauvillier, Cal Clutterbuck, Zach Parise, and Oliver Wahlstrom into the NHL’s COVID-19 protocol today.

In a corresponding move, the Islanders assigned forwards Cole Bardreau and Simon Holmstrom, as well as defenseman Grant Hutton, to the freshly re-introduced taxi squad as COVID cases continue to climb around the league.

It’s not all bad news, however. The team activated center Mathew Barzal from protocol, and general manager Lou Lamoriello says winger Matt Martin and defenseman Robin Salo will be activated on Wednesday.

Beauvillier is in the midst of a truly tough season, like most of the team. The 24-year-old winger has just four goals and four assists through 24 games.

The toughest loss at this point for the Islanders is Wahlstrom, who’s finally been elevated to top-line duties and has eight goals and seven assists through 26 games. Clutterbuck and Parise have combined for six goals and five assists through 26 games each.

Max Pacioretty Out Indefinitely Following Wrist Surgery

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The Vegas Golden Knights will be without one of their top players for the foreseeable future, as Max Pacioretty is out indefinitely following wrist surgery. Pacioretty played just over 17 minutes on Tuesday against the Los Angeles Kings but has been absent from Golden Knights practice as he tried to deal with the injury.

The Golden Knights, of course, are dealing with an impending cap crunch as Jack Eichel rehabs from neck surgery and approaches a return to action. Pacioretty’s injury will solve that issue for the time being, given he can likely be placed on long-term injured reserve as he recovers from his own surgery. The 33-year-old’s $7MM salary would be more than enough to cover Eichel’s cost as long as Alec Martinez stays out, though things would get tricky again if everyone was healthy before the postseason.

While it may seem conspiratorial that Pacioretty is going on LTIR, the Golden Knights would obviously rather have him in the lineup. The veteran forward has been outstanding since arriving in Vegas, with 90 goals and 178 points in 201 games. This year he was scoring at an incredible pace with 12 goals and 21 points in just 16 games. Never a point-per-game player during his time in Montreal, it would be two seasons in a row that Pacioretty reached that mark in Vegas had he been able to continue it through the rest of the year.

Now it’s unclear when he will be back, making this a disappointing season for the winger. With just one year left on his contract and Vegas bringing in more big-money players at every chance, it’s hard to know how much longer Pacioretty will even be with the Golden Knights.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

Coyotes-Stars Game Postponed

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With the Dallas Stars dealing with massive COVID absences, their game against the Arizona Coyotes on January 2 has been postponed. This is the 81st postponement of the season, with more likely coming because of attendance issues in Canada.

The Stars are currently missing Luke Glendening, Jamie Benn, Roope Hintz, Joel Kiviranta, Jason Robertson, Michael Raffl, Radek Faksa, Ryan Suter, Esa Lindell, Miro Heiskanen, and Jani Hakanpaa. Many of those players should be eligible to come out of the protocol in the coming days if they are asymptomatic or their symptoms have disappeared, though they will still need to provide a negative test result. With that anything but a guarantee, the game for this weekend has been postponed.

With other postponements already in the books, Dallas’ next game isn’t until January 6 against the Florida Panthers, a date that should give them a reasonable amount of time to get most players out of the protocol and up to speed. For Arizona, things will resume on January 4 against the Winnipeg Jets.

Boeser, Di Giuseppe, Dowling Placed In COVID Protocol

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Dec 30: The Canucks have put Justin Dowling into the protocol today. Of note, Dowling played last night against the Ducks, though it was fewer than eight minutes of actual ice time.

Dec 29: The Vancouver Canucks have announced that Brock Boeser, Phillip Di Giuseppe, and a member of the team’s support staff have been placed in the COVID protocol. Patrick Johnston of The Province reports that both players tested positive this morning in Anaheim, after traveling to face the Ducks tonight.

Losing Boeser ahead of tonight’s match will make it a lot tougher on the Canucks, who are actually working on a six-game win streak despite having not hit the ice since December 16. The team hasn’t lost a game under new head coach Bruce Boudreau, and a big part of that success has been the rejuvenated Boeser, who has five goals and seven points during that stretch.

While the two players would normally be subject to the league’s recently-reduced isolation period given they’re in the U.S., it certainly won’t help them in this case. The team’s road trip ends on Saturday and with the Canucks heading back to Canada, it is unclear when they will be ready to return to action (or even travel back to Vancouver). For now, the team will have to make do without their sniper or Giuseppe, who could have been the direct replacement for Boeser if he was eligible to enter the lineup.

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