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Archives for January 2022

Joel Farabee Out Four Weeks With Upper-Body Injury

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The Philadelphia Flyers’ nightmare season continues, this time with an injury to Joel Farabee. The young forward had been placed on injured reserve and is expected to miss up to four weeks with an upper-body injury. Kevin Hayes has also been placed on injured reserve following his adductor procedure earlier this week. As replacements, the Flyers have recalled Wade Allison and Jackson Cates to the taxi squad.

Interim head coach Mike Yeo told reporters including Giana Han of the Philadelphia Inquirer that something happened to Farabee last night, but didn’t get into the specifics of whether or not it is related to his previous injury. At any rate, he’ll be out for the next few weeks as the Flyers continue to spiral down the standings. The team has now lost ten straight and barely sit ahead of the New Jersey Devils and New York Islanders, who have each played fewer games.

Farabee, 21, is one of the few bright spots in Philadelphia, even though his overall production still hasn’t been outstanding this season. The 2018 first-round pick has 11 goals and 18 points in 33 games, enough to put him fourth on the team in scoring so far. While there are many players on the roster who might not be with the team after this dreadful season, it seems unlikely that Farabee would lose his spot as a building block. The young forward signed a six-year, $30MM extension in September that will keep him under contract at a reasonable $5MM cap hit through the 2027-28 season.

In terms of replacements, Cates has played just seven games at the NHL level this season and 11 since signing out of the University of Minnesota-Duluth as an undrafted free agent last spring. Allison, a second-round pick from 2016, scored seven points in 14 games last season for the Flyers but has missed a huge chunk of this year with an ankle sprain. In seven games with Lehigh Valley, Allison had four points.

Taxi Squad Shuffle: 01/21/22

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The NHL schedule is filled with eight games this evening, including the Florida Panthers trying to keep up their incredible goal-scoring pace against the Vancouver Canucks. After last night’s 6-0 debacle in Edmonton, the Panthers have scored at least five goals in eight of their last ten games, averaging 5.7 over that stretch. As they and others prepare for tonight’s action, we’ll keep track of all the minor league and taxi squad shuffling.

Atlantic Division

  • The Buffalo Sabres have assigned Brett Murray to the taxi squad, meaning he won’t be available to the Rochester Americans this evening after all.  Unfortunately, it’s because top prospect Jack Quinn suffered a lower-body injury in last night’s game and is undergoing an MRI today. Bill Hoppe of Buffalo Hockey Beat reports that GM Kevyn Adams expects Quinn to miss some time.
  • The Toronto Maple Leafs have recalled Joey Anderson and Carl Dahlstrom to the taxi squad, suggesting that there could be another change coming on the back end. The team is without Jake Muzzin and Justin Holl at the moment and face the New York Islanders tomorrow night. Alex Biega, playing for Holl, saw just 12 minutes of ice time in the team’s last game.
  • The Detroit Red Wings have recalled Calvin Pickard to the taxi squad, giving them another goaltender as they prepare for the Dallas Stars tonight. Detroit will be hitting the road after the game to play again tomorrow night in Nashville.

Metropolitan Division

  • The Washington Capitals have returned Axel Jonsson-Fjallby to the Hershey Bears of the AHL, after playing just eight minutes last night. The 23-year-old has one point in nine games this season, his first in the NHL.

Central Division

  • The Chicago Blackhawks have removed both Kirby Dach and Brett Connolly from the COVID protocol, while recalling Mike Hardman from the AHL. To make room, Cale Morris has been sent to the AHL. Hardman, 22, has drawn the ire of some fans this season after failing to score a single goal in 20 appearances with the Blackhawks but remains an option for the bottom-six.
  • The Dallas Stars have sent Thomas Harley, Ty Dellandrea, and Rhett Gardner to the AHL, where they’ll join the Texas Stars ahead of tonight’s game against the Rockford IceHogs. Harley, a top prospect for Dallas, has played in eight games for the NHL squad this season.
  • Calen Addison, Matt Boldy, Connor Dewar, and Andrew Hammond have all been recalled from the taxi squad ahead of the Minnesota Wild game against the Chicago Blackhawks this evening. Boldy, 20, has four points in four games for the Wild so far this season.
  • The Nashville Predators have reassigned Matt Tennyson to the taxi squad, as they take a day off from a busy schedule. The Predators will be back in action tomorrow, meaning Tennyson could be back.

Pacific Division

This page will be updated throughout the day

Oilers Have Shown Interest In Joonas Korpisalo

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With Mike Smith injured once again, Mikko Koskinen struggling, and the Oilers in a tailspin at the moment, they’re on the lookout to try to shore up their goaltending.  To that end, Pierre LeBrun of TSN and The Athletic reported in the latest TSN Insider Trading segment that Edmonton has kicked the tires on Blue Jackets goaltender Joonas Korpisalo.

With Elvis Merzlikins inking a five-year, $27MM contract extension at the start of the season, he cemented himself as the starter of the present and future in Columbus, basically making Korpisalo expendable.  The 27-year-old is also on an expiring contract with a $2.8MM AAV and while Edmonton’s salary cap situation doesn’t exactly give them much in the way of flexibility, some retention and some good fortune on the injury front could make a move doable.

Prior to this season, Korpisalo’s track record had been decent with a .905 SV% and a 2.90 GAA over his first six NHL campaigns.  Those aren’t numbers that scream a sizable upgrade but mediocrity would still be an upgrade on what Edmonton has had at times over the past few years, Smith’s strong 2020-21 campaign notwithstanding.

However, this season has been another story.  Korpisalo has a 3.95 GAA and a .882 SV% in 14 games, the worst numbers of his career by a significant margin.  Edmonton’s goaltending has struggled this season but the trio of Smith, Koskinen, and youngster Stuart Skinner have done better than that.  In that sense, there’s some question on how much he’d move the needle for the Oilers and whether or not that’s the best use of their very limited cap room.

While Edmonton needs a longer-term upgrade, affording one with their cap situation would be a significant challenge.  Even a higher-end rental starter would be tricky with the Oilers in a money-in, money-out situation and the fact that few are available; TSN’s Darren Dreger noted in the same segment that Chicago’s Marc-Andre Fleury wouldn’t be a great fit for that reason.

In the end, all that GM Ken Holland may be able to afford is a nominal improvement at best and when you factor in Korpisalo’s track record, that’s about all he’d be.  While there wouldn’t be a ton of upside with such a move, he’d at least give them some insurance between the pipes and with Holland not being interested in moving top young assets, this would be a move that could be made without moving those future pieces.  With Edmonton not in a position to accrue cap space since they’re well into LTIR, it’s also a move that they wouldn’t have to necessarily wait until closer to the trade deadline to try to make and with the Oilers struggling, Holland may be forced to try to do something sooner than later.

2021 Year In Review: December

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2021 was certainly another eventful year, both on and off the rink.  Over the past few weeks, we’ve taken a look back at the top stories from around the game on a month-by-month basis.  We wrap things up with a look at December.

Changes In Vancouver: After a disappointing start to their season, the Canucks opted to clean house.  Head coach Travis Green was let go with veteran bench boss Bruce Boudreau taking over.  The hope was the change would give them a spark and it’s fair to say it did as they’re 10-3-1 since then.  Meanwhile, GM Jim Benning was also fired with Jim Rutherford joining Vancouver soon after.  However, he’s not in his usual GM role but is instead president of hockey operations.  Their search for Benning’s permanent replacement continues.

Fabbri Sticks Around: Red Wings winger Robby Fabbri could have been an intriguing trade candidate closer to the trade deadline as a rental player.  Instead, he’s off the market after inking a three-year, $12MM contract extension.  After struggling towards the end of his time with St. Louis, Fabbri has become a reliable secondary scorer for Detroit, reaching the double-digit goal mark in his first three seasons with the team and has a shot at hitting the 20-goal plateau this season, a target he has never reached.

Bishop’s Career Ends: After missing all of last season due to knee trouble, Stars goaltender Ben Bishop was hoping to return this year.  He practiced regularly with Dallas at the start of the season and got to the point where he was ready to test things out on a conditioning stint in the minors.  Unfortunately, that didn’t go well and soon after, it was revealed that Bishop’s playing days have come to an end as he’ll remain on LTIR for the duration of his contract which runs through next season.  His playing days end with 413 games played for five different teams while he was a three-time Vezina Trophy finalist and posted a 2.32 GAA along with a save percentage of .921 and 33 shutouts.

Coaching News: Vancouver wasn’t the only team to change coaches as the Flyers parted ways with veteran bench boss Alain Vigneault and assistant Michel Therrien after a slow start to their season.  Mike Yeo, who had been serving as an assistant, has taken over on an interim basis.  The Jets also made a coaching change although it was one initiated by Paul Maurice who surprisingly resigned partway through his ninth season with the team.  He had been the second-longest tenured coach in the NHL prior to his decision, one that was made as he felt a new voice was needed and that he had led Winnipeg as far as he could.  On the other end of the spectrum, Minnesota has been quite pleased with Dean Evason’s performance as head coach and he was rewarded for his efforts with a multi-year contract extension.  Now in his third season in that role, the Wild have played to a 65-30-8 record under his tutelage so far.

Out Of Olympics: The enthusiasm for NHL players going to the Olympics was short-lived when the league jointly announced with the NHLPA that they were officially withdrawing from Olympic participation.  The announcement came as little surprise as a result of the league having to postpone so many games due to COVID-19 positive tests and attendance restrictions so the drought of a true best-on-best tournament continues.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Atlantic Notes: Namestnikov, Juolevi, Dichow

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Vladislav Namestnikov’s second season with the Red Wings has been a more productive one as the 29-year-old has 11 goals and nine assists through the first 40 games, already surpassing his point total from last season.  As a result, he could be one of Detroit’s more intriguing rentals heading into the trade deadline.

However, if Namestnikov has his way, he won’t be going anywhere at all as he told reporters including Ted Kulfan of The Detroit News that he’s open to an extension and that “it would be great to stay”.  Namestnikov has a $2MM cap hit and should be looking at a similar price tag on his next deal.  A short-term deal to stay with the Red Wings is certainly plausible although if they can get a decent future asset in a trade over the next couple of months, they may prefer to go that route over signing an extension now.

More from the Atlantic:

  • The Panthers have placed defenseman Olli Juolevi on injured reserve, relays George Richards of Florida Hockey Now (Twitter link). The 23-year-old has had a tough first season in Florida as he has struggled to stay healthy, playing in just nine games.  He had been on a nice little stretch as of late, averaging nearly 16 minutes per night on the third pairing in his last four games but that has been put on hold for now.
  • Canadiens prospect Frederik Dichow is expected to transfer to Frolunda of the SHL next season, reports Johan Svensson of SportExpressen although his agent wouldn’t confirm the report. Dichow – who was recently named to Denmark’s Olympic team – has posted a .929 SV% in 20 games in Sweden’s second division this season.  Montreal has until June of 2023 to sign the 20-year-old.

Prospect Notes: Wright, Holloway, Golden Knights

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TSN’s mid-season rankings for the 2022 draft have come out and though Shane Wright remains at the top, it’s a tenuous position. Bob McKenzie, who compiles the list based on a poll of active scouts, writes that the Kingston Frontenacs captain has been underwhelming in the few of many this season after missing all of 2020-21 because of the OHL’s COVID-19 shutdown.

Wright had been a unanimous selection from those scouts in the pre-season ranking but was now listed first by only nine of ten with Russian forward Ivan Miroshnichenko getting the other top vote. In 25 games for Kingston this season, the 18-year-old center has 12 goals and 31 points after scoring 39 goals and 66 points as an exceptional status player in 2019-20.

  • Dylan Holloway, the 14th overall pick in 2020 and a member of the Edmonton Oilers, has yet to play in a professional game since signing out of the University of Wisconsin. That will soon change as Holloway has reached a point in his injury recovery that he will soon report to the Bakersfield Condors for game action. A brilliant sophomore campaign with Wisconsin led to an entry-level contract last April for Holloway, one that will see the first year burned whether he plays in the NHL or not this season. Multiple wrist surgeries (and a stint in the COVID protocol) have kept him out so far, but Hollway is now medically cleared for action.
  • Scott Wheeler of The Athletic continued his prospect pool rankings with the Vegas Golden Knights at No 22, but noted that this is the first team in what he would call the third tier, closer to the middle third of the league than the bottom. With no Peyton Krebs to take the top spot after he was sent to Buffalo in the Jack Eichel deal, Brendan Brisson of the University of Michigan sits first for the Golden Knights. Brisson is one of several Wolverines that will be suiting up for Team USA at the upcoming Olympics, an impressive accomplishment for a player that nearly slipped out of the first round two years ago. In 2020, Brisson was selected 29th overall by the Golden Knights and has followed that draft with two very strong college seasons.

Early Postponements Could Provide Salary Cap Opportunity

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Today marks the first day of the second half of the season, whether it feels like it or not. The 2021-22 campaign began on October 12, 2021, which was 100 days ago, half of this year’s 200-day NHL season. Despite that, teams like the New York Islanders and Ottawa Senators have played just 32 of a scheduled 82 games, less than 40 percent of their season. In fact, only the Tampa Bay Lightning, Nashville Predators, and Anaheim Ducks have reached the halfway point in terms of games played, with most teams falling somewhere between 35-38 because of the hundred-plus postponed games in the early part of the season.

With that in mind, there is actually an interesting opportunity for teams that have a condensed schedule in the coming months. Since a player’s cap hit is applied to a team’s finances on a daily basis, anyone acquired today would be added at half of their original average annual value. That is to say, as PuckPedia explains on Twitter, a player with a full-season cap hit of $5MM would only need $2.5MM in cap space from here on out. With more than 60 percent of the games left for some teams, that offers some increased value for any acquisition—basically, they’ll play in more games for the new team than they’re paid for.

There could even be more savings if a team waited until the optimal time. Take the Islanders for example, who like the rest of the NHL had their February Olympic break filled up yesterday with the revised schedule. The team has seven more games before the All-Star break, at which point they will be off for another week. As they head into their February 9 game against the Vancouver Canucks, 120 of 200 days will have passed in the NHL season—60 percent—yet they will have played only 39 games out of 82, not quite 48 percent of the schedule.

While the Islanders are still struggling to even get above .500 and may not be the most likely to take advantage of this opportunity, it is present for other contenders as well. The Minnesota Wild have played just 35 games to this point, the Carolina Hurricanes and Boston Bruins just 36. With some smart maneuvering, these teams could get more than half a season of performance from a new player, while paying him quite a bit less.

This opportunity is most apparent for teams that have been able to stay out of long-term injured reserve, accruing cap space all season. The Wild, for instance, are on track to have more than $15MM in deadline cap space according to CapFriendly, obviously enough to add several impact players. The Bruins meanwhile will have more than $8.2MM in deadline cap space, and have played fewer games than all of the other contenders in the Atlantic Division.

In a league where every single dollar has come into focus during a flat-cap period, any advantage is important. For some teams, adding reinforcements for what will be a war of attrition down the stretch could come at a considerable financial bargain.

Colton White, Dillon Heatherington Clear Waivers

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Jan 20: White and Heatherington have both cleared waivers, according to Friedman. They can now be assigned to the taxi squad or the minor leagues.

Jan 19: The New Jersey Devils have placed Colton White on waivers today according to Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet, but he won’t be alone. The Ottawa Senators have also placed Dillon Heatherington on waivers. William Lagesson of the Edmonton Oilers, on waivers yesterday, has cleared and can be sent to the minor leagues.

White, 24, already cleared waivers at the beginning of the season but has spent enough time on the active roster to need them again. In eight games with the Devils this year, he has two points while averaging just over 12 minutes a night. A fourth-round pick from 2015, the minor league defenseman is headed for Group VI unrestricted free agency in the summer, given he only has 19 NHL games under his belt to this point. After Lagesson cleared, it seems unlikely that White would earn a claim, meaning he’s probably headed to the taxi squad or minor leagues.

In Heatherington’s case, waivers is nothing new. He cleared at the beginning of this season and twice in previous years, as a depth defenseman without much NHL experience. In fact, nine of his 20 career games have come this season with the Senators, though none of those have been since the middle of December. With so many younger players fighting for playing time on the Ottawa back end, Heatherington’s time on the active roster is likely over.

He too will be an unrestricted free agent in the summer after signing a one-year, two-way contract with the Senators in July. That deal carries a league-minimum $750K cap hit, meaning he at least could be a target for a team dealing with COVID-related absences that needs a short-term replacement.

Stone, Hague Added To Protocol; Pacioretty Nearing Return

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The Vegas Golden Knights had a few absences and one notable addition to the morning skate today, as both Mark Stone and Nicolas Hague were missing due to COVID protocols. Neither will play tonight against the Montreal Canadiens, according to Jesse Granger of The Athletic. Still, it wasn’t all bad news as Max Pacioretty was on the ice taking part and will travel with the team–and could even play–on their upcoming road trip. Vegas heads to Washington for a match on Monday, the first in a four-game road trip.

Losing Stone is obviously a huge blow, as the 29-year-old is arguably the team’s most important forward. Named captain just over a year ago, the two-way winger brings point-per-game production while being one of the most celebrated defensive players in the league. He’s finished in the top five for Selke Trophy voting in each of the last three seasons, including being a finalist in the shortened 2020-21 campaign. With seven goals and 26 points in 23 games this season he’s off to another strong start, even with the missed time due to injury.

Hague too is an important piece, though he was already out with an injury and hasn’t played since December. The 6’6″ defenseman has developed into a reliable option for the Golden Knights, averaging more than 18 minutes a night behind the team’s top options. In 32 games Hague has even collected 13 points, all of them coming at even-strength.

It’s Pacioretty’s appearance that will raise some eyebrows though, as the Golden Knights continue to approach a tricky cap situation. Jack Eichel is skating and scheduled to return to the lineup in another month or so, by which point the team will need some extra cap space to activate him. Pacioretty’s injury would have afforded them some additional time if he was still out when Eichel returned, but that obviously won’t be the case if he’s ready to play on the upcoming road trip. The 33-year-old winger scored 12 goals and 21 points in his first 16 games, but underwent wrist surgery in December. At that point he was ruled out indefinitely; now just three weeks later he appears on the brink of a return.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

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