The Case for Feds coming back to Detroit
Feds hasn’t been the offensive force he once was
This summer Red Wings fans started to ponder the return of Sergei Federov. When the Blue Jackets hired Scott Howson as general manager there were reports he might consider buying out Federov’s contract. The former Red Wing will earn $6.08 million in the final year of his contract. It doesn’t appear that Columbus will buy him out prior to the start of the season, but if it looks like the team isn’t going to compete for a playoff spot the odds are pretty good that they’d look to dump that contract and try to get something in return.
There’s no question his production has started to trail off. Here are his topline stats over the past two seasons:
2006-07: 18 goals, 24 assists, -7, 7 PPG, 11 PPA
2005-06: 12 goals, 31 assists, -2, 3 PPG, 14 PPA
The one thing that really stands out is that he gets a lot of his points on the power play. Let’s check out Behind the Net and see how he looked last season in even strength situations in 5 on 5 play.
Games played: 73
When on ice: 2.18 GF, 2.72 GA per 60 minutes = -0.54
When off ice: 2.06 GF, 2.39 GA per 60 minutes = -0.32
TOTAL: -0.22
This actually isn’t bad considering he was playing against the top forwards on the opposing team. If his offensive contributions were greater he’d be a plus player. The team only scores 0.12 goals/60 minutes more with him on the ice than with him off. Now let’s take a look at his penalty kill stats from last season.
Minutes: 164.2
Short-Handed Goals For: 4
PP Goals Allowed: 17
TOTAL: -4.75 goals allowed per 60 minutes
Again, those are decent defensive numbers. As I pointed out the other day, Dallas Drake was on the ice for 27 power play goals while the Blues were playing short-handed. And he only played 27 more minutes on the PK than Fedorov.
Finally, taking a look at the power play stats, this is where Fedorov’s offensive numbers really appear to be in decline.
Minutes: 305.6
Goals for: 23
Short-handed goals allowed: 2
TOTAL: 4.12 goals scored per 60 minutes
Let’s take a look at a few Red Wings forwards who will likely play on the power play next season.
Samuelsson: 6.60 goals/60 mins
Zetterberg: 6.13 goals/60 mins
Datsyuk: 6.08 goals/60 mins
Cleary: 5.70 goals/60 mins
Holmstrom: 5.57 goals/60 mins
Hudler: 5.01 goals/60 mins
The one guy who is likely to get power play time but hasn’t shown much production is Valtteri Filppula, who averaged 0.90 goals/60 minutes last season. But he also only received 66.6 minutes with the man advantage. So I think we’ll get a much better feel for his offensive contributions this season.
So at this stage of his career it looks like Federov’s main contribution would be as a defensive forward. It definitely makes sense that Ken Hitchcock used him on defense at times last season. Fedorov didn’t appreciate playing on the blueline though. That defensive capability as a forward is valuable, but not at $6 million per year. That’s particularly true on a team like Detroit, where the majority of the forwards are solid two-way players. With that being the case, I’m not sure it would really make sense for the Red Wings to trade for Federov if the Blue Jackets were to put him on the market during next season.
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[…] The rumors are getting hot and heavy that the Wings are going to trade for Sergei Fedorov. I’ve been pessimistic on the return of #91 for a long time now but it has nothing to do with the way he left Detroit or with the utterly retarded way some Red Wings fans boo him whenever he touches the puck at Joe Louis Arena. […]