Happy Trails H00dlum
Happy celebrating with Helm
I joked over at Triple Deke that I hoped Jiri Hudler and his agent would be gentle when they bent Ken Holland over during contract negotiations. After losing Marian Hossa and Mikael Samuelsson this summer my fear was that Holland would sign Hudler to a contract above what he brought to the team rather than lose three players who accounted for 82 goals last year.
Jiri Hudler was obviously a gifted offensive player but his biggest shortcoming was his inability to play the tough minutes in the top 6. He has been given plenty of opportunities to lock down a spot in the top 6 but it never happened. His supporters point out his impressive offensive production given his paltry ice time but they don’t seem to realize that only happened when he was playing on the third and fourth line and was going up against weak competition. When he was bumped up to a scoring line as a top 6 forward his production would immediately dry up.
He will be missed most on the power play, where his points per 60 minutes with the man advantage trailed only Pavel Datsyuk. My guess is both Dan Cleary and Valtteri Filppula will be expected to pot 20+ goals next season to help offset the offense lost this past season. That would go a long way towards offsetting the loss of Sammy’s offensive production. My guess is they’ll be the first two guys to get shots at Hudler’s and Hossa’s power play ice time.
With that being the case I just didn’t see how the team could afford to pay him as much as Dan Cleary (2.8 million per season) or Valtteri Filppula (3 million per year). Both players are fixtures in the top 6, can play on the PK and even contribute on the power play when given the opportunity. They didn’t have the offensive production that Hudler did in Detroit but simply looking at that part of the equation is a failure to look at the whole picture.
Hudler put an end to contract negotiations when he signed a lucrative 2 year deal to play in the Kontinental Hockey League. I really don’t blame the guy and I’m somewhat relieved he put an end to contract negotiations with Detroit. Hey, the guy put in his time playing in Grand Rapids and Detroit. He slipped in the draft because of concerns about his size and his wheels and the Red Wings snapped him up in the second round.
Both sides did what they were supposed to do and the bottom line is Hudler didn’t develop to the point to where he could be an offensive force on a scoring line. If he was truly convinced he would be able to do so he could have signed the deal Ken Holland offered, stayed in Detroit and worked on further developing his game. He’d have a good shot this season with Hossa and sometime top-6 forward Mikael Samuelsson moving on. So Hudler moving on to the KHL works out for both parties in my estimation.
I’d guess that Ville Leino is the guy who will have the best shot at eating up Huds’ ES minutes. Leino can start off on the third line just as Hudler would have done and he’ll likely be given the same opportunity to claim a spot on a scoring line. If he doesn’t he’s the guy who will assume Hudler’s role if not replicate his stats. So I guess the top 6 starts off like this next season:
Zetterberg - Datsyuk - Franzen
Clearly - Filppula - Holmstrom
I’d really like to see Homer bumped down to the bottom six but with questions about whether Leino can cut it in the top 6 my guess is Mike Babcock keeps Homer up there until someone proves they belong on a scoring line. Here’s how I think the bottom six will look:
Leino - Helm - Maltby
Meech-Draper-Abdelkader
Much like the situation with Homer I’d prefer to see Maltby on the fourth line but he seems to have undergone a bit of a revitalization since Dallas Drake joined the team in 2007. My guess is Babcock trusts him on the third and the only way he gets bumped down is if Abdelkader ends up in Detroit and forces his way up the foodchain.
Here’s my guess on the salary cap situation, which as it stands right now likely means Abdelkader makes the team. The salary cap for next season is set at $56.8 million.
Forwards: 11 total
Pavel Datsyuk: $6,700,000
Henrik Zetterberg: $6,083,000
Johan Franzen: 3,954,545
Val Filppula: $3,000,000
Dan Cleary: $2,800,000
Tomas Holmstrom: $2,250,000
Kris Draper: 1,583,333
Kirk Maltby: 883,333
Ville Leino: 775,000
Justin Abdelkader: 740,000
Darren Helm: 599,444
Cap total: 27,853,655
D-men: 8 total
Nicklas Lidstrom: 7,450,000
Brian Rafalski: 6,000,000
Brad Stuart: 3,750,000
Niklas Kronwall: 3,000,000
Andreas Lilja: 1,250,000
Jonathan Ericsson: 900,000
Brett Lebda: 650,000
Derek Meech: 483,333
Cap total: 23,483,333
Goalie: 2 total
Chris Osgood: 1,416,667
Jimmy Howard: 716,667
TOTAL CAP HIT: $54,985,667
REMAINING SPACE: $1,814,333
Detroit has enough cap space to bring in someone who can play on the fourth line for a small amount of money and perhaps fill the role Dallas Drake played during the 2007-08 season. A player like Mike Grier or Manny Malhotra could fit the bill. If Andreas Lilja cannot return to the lineup that would free up another $1.25 million and give Detroit additional salary cap space. Ken Holland has also talked about trading a defenseman as he has said he doesn’t want to start the season with 8 defenseman. So if Lilja can return to the lineup another blueliner will likely be traded which will free up some cap space.
Last year maxing out the cap space during the off-season made sense since the team was able to sign Marian Hossa. With questions about goaltending and scoring I’d like to see the team save themselves a decent amount of cap space so they can afford to address at least one of these concerns if they look like they are a serious problem next season.
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