NHL Draft 2011 Recap & Free Agency
I’m back boys and girls…………….no need to explain my absence, let’s just rejoice in the return of the greatest hockey mind in Keeping It Real Sports history. Congrats to the Bruins for winning an exciting 7 game series against the Canucks for the Stanley Cup. The NHL Draft has just completed recently and on July 1st the unrestricted free agent market will open.
A few quick notes about the draft:
For the second year in a row the Edmonton Oilers got the number 1 overall pick. This past season Taylor Hall played in 65 games, had 22 goals to go with 20 assists, and spent very little time in the penalty box. However, his season was cut short after injuring his ankle in a fight. He, like this year’s top pick Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, had impressive junior league stats and I see him being a prolific scorer as his career blossoms in the coming years. Same goes for Nugent-Hopkins; I’ve just finished watching a video of him, and I’d like him to play on my team if I was rebuilding with youth as the Oilers are.
Check him out here, he’s number 9:
The Colorado Avalanche and Florida Panthers rounded out the top 3 by selecting Gabriel Landeskog and Jonathon Huberdeau, both forwards. In the limited coverage of the draft I got to watch and listen to I heard many people say Landeskog is the best NHL-ready player of the draft. For those of you new to the NHL hockey works similar to baseball, most players go to minors, colleges, or back to their junior league teams for more seasoning before coming to the NHL, not like in football or the NBA.
However, what I was most excited about was the 4th overall pick, defenseman Adam Larsson from the Sweedish Elitie League….the #1 prospect from Europe. Where did he go? The New Jersey Devils, the team that was one of the NHL’s worst in the first half of the past season. As we all know, they were one of the top 5 teams of the second half, but they still missed the playoffs for the first time since 1996. The Devils won the NHL’s version of the draft lottery; they could only move up 4 spots, which is why they picked fourth and not first, but they got the man they wanted. He’s the team’s highest overall pick since another defenseman, Scott Niedermayer in 1991. The team has hopes he’ll be their next great defenseman.
The NHL draft is hard to handicap, for the reasons stated above, we’ll check back in 3-5 years and see how the top 4 are doing. Now it’s time for some fun beginning Friday July 1st, free agency. Brad Richards hits the market as the biggest free agent. The Rangers were looking into acquiring him at the deadline, but his injury and the inability to work out a deal kept that from happening. Other prominent forwards hitting the market are Jason Arnott, Michael Nylander, Mike Modano, Corey Stillman, enforcer Donald Brashear, Kris Draper, Teemu Selanne, Jamie Langenbrunner, Mike Knuble, Stanley Cup Champion Mark Rechhi, and Rob Niedermayer. Many of these guys are in the latter stages of their careers and some, like Selanne, Modano, and Rechhi, may hang up the skates after many long years of service in the NHL
Some notable free agent defensemen are Ed Jovanovski, Bryan McCabe, Roman Hamrlik, and the best one out there, Tomas Kaberle. Nicklas Lindstrom, at 40 years old, has re-signed with Detroit for a year instead of retiring. Kevin Bieksa, who was to become a free agent, re-signed with Stanley Cup runner-up Vancouver.
The best goalies that will be available are Jean-Sebastien Giguere, Tomas Vokun, Dwayne Roloson, and Johan Hedberg. Roloson, at 40, did a greta job with Tampa Bay after they traded for him, but he won’t be a long term solution to anyone’s goaltending situation. Ilya Bryzgalov, who was suppose to go to free agency, signed a 9 year, $51.5-million contract with the Flyers after they made a trade with Phoenix to acquire his rights before the draft. The Flyers also did a lot of other trades, which we’ll focus on next time. This contract is proportionally close to the one Ilya Kovalchuk signed with the Devils last year. The Flyers have been looking for consistent goaltending, and they hope Bryzgalov will help lead the team to its first Stanley Cup since the 70’s. Tomas Vokun is 33 years old, and along with J.S. Giguere who is the same age, could be the best goalie available for a team that needs a stable veteran goaltender. Johan Hedberg, could also work out, but the man they call Moose is 37, and many teams may be looking to go young. Hedberg was a big part of the Devils turn around last year, and his season (15-12-2 2.38 GAA .912 SV%) was actually better than future hall-of-famer Martin Brodeur (23-26-3 2.45 GAA .903 SV%)
Next week, we’ll see how the first dominoes fall in free agency, and also examine just what the Flyers are thinking making a lot of trades this off-season. Also, we’ll see how different the Chicago Blackhawks look from when they won the Stanley Cup in 2009-2010, and how they are structured now.
