Last week Tuomo Ruutu’s name was not surprisingly among those mentioned as available for trade by the Canes. It was not a big surprise, as his 2013-14 just has not gone as hoped, and he has seen his ice time decreasing of late.
Here is my assessment of the situation:
An aside to start: I am on record awhile back now as suggesting that Ruutu get a trial in the 3rd-line center slot that seems to be the biggest area for potential upgrade for the Canes. Theoretically, maybe his mobility just is not what it once was for being an aggressive wing forechecker who covered the ice end line to end line, but maybe in a center role with a couple aggressive wings, he can play more of a read and react role that requires a tiny bit less mobility. By no means am I certain this would work, but I would at least try it.
Assessment: During the 2013-14 season, Tuomo Ruutu just has not found a way to be a regular difference-maker in the top 9 forwards. His 82-game pace is roughly 25 points. While scoring is not all that matters, for a $5M price tag for a top 9 forward, it has to be part of the equation. But for me the bigger thing is that he just does not seem to be able to be a difference-maker on the forecheck, creating havoc in front of the net or turning his physical play into winning hockey.
Important to note: This is nothing about heart, desire, intangibles, character or any of that. Tuomo Ruutu has demonstrated an ability and willingness to play hard and do things the right way. Even during past scoring slumps, you could see the effort level. I do not think that is any different right now. I do not see any reason to question whether Tuomo Ruutu is doing all he can. The question is very simply whether that is enough and I guess more significantly whether it will increase.
Important to consider: He had hip surgery both prior to and after the shortened 2012-13 season, so that is 2 fairly major mobility-related surgeries in the span of just less than a year. Then he had a lower body injury (if my memory was correct the team said it was something different) in training camp that slowed his start to the 2013-14 season. For me the burning question that would make deciding what to do with him much easier is whether his mobility is currently impacted temporarily by recovery times stacked on top of each other? Or whether years of a rugged style combined with the recent injuries/surgeries have permanently changed his mobility. I think his ability to cover a huge amount of ice and play physical from end to end is what was special about his game, and it just continues to look much more limited this season. If you tell me that this is permanently gone, it is not that he still cannot play and contribute in the NHL in some capacity but that his game will never get back to what it was certainly in terms of style and very likely in terms of production.
Where I am with regard to trading Ruutu if I were GM can best be framed by a question. If I had my choice to either keep Ruutu’s contract or walk away from it, what would I do?
--Financially: He is scheduled to make about $2.5M more this season (a little less but roughly half of a season) and then $5M each of the next 2 years.
--Level/role: He is a player with the potential to be a physical top 6 with enough offensive skill, but his current role is really only that of a depth forward.
--Risk: With an injury-shortened 2012-13, the 2 surgeries plus another injury and his struggles in 2013-14, there is significant risk that he does not make it back to that top 6 status.
When you net it out, he is a bit of a reclamation project 2 years removed from his last decent season in 11-12 and 3 years removed from the last season that you hope for to justify a $5M salary. So there is the mismatch. With a full summer off, Ruutu might find a higher gear again and be a good physical top 6 forward worth about…well $5M/year. Or it might be that at age 30 after a number of years of rugged play and then the couple injuries that he is just permanently more limited at this stage of his career. Either way as a more limited player at this stage of his career or as a risky “maybe” better player, it sounds like about $2M or $2.5M to me. Next summer might be higher with the salary cap inflation, but this past summer there were a number of pretty good “might work,” “could work,” players with decent NHL resumes who mostly priced out in a $1-2M range.
This is the harsh reality of the salary cap NHL in which it is not about how useful or good a player is, it is about how useful or good a player is relative to their cost? GMs who ignore the $, do so at great peril.
So back to my question, if you asked me if I would sign Tuomo Ruutu right now for 2 ½ years for $5M/year and my only choice was keep him or let him go (not trading him), I would let him go. Again, potentially risky players with some upside if works price out in a $1-3M range, not $5M which is full price if it does work and offers no discount for risk.
But the Canes are not forced or even able to just choose if they want to keep the contract or walk from it. Instead they have some ability to choose between keeping him or trading him (if there is a market).
There are 4 basic categories of trades for a player like him with a big contract. He can be traded:
1) For a decent (even if lesser return) if another team values him enough and is willing to assume the risk to get a player whose skills fit their needs.
2) For a similarly underperforming player with a comparable enough contract in a “change of scenery” trade like the Gleason/Liles deal.
3) For very modest (or virtually no) return but at least with the new team paying the entire salary.
4) Only if the Canes eat a big chunk of his salary, like the Jussi Jokinen deal that sent him to Pittsburgh for a low pick with Canes eating $900k of his $3M contract.
At this point, I would be very surprised if #1 was an option. I think if Canes GM Jim Rutherford could get a decent return and get out of the contract at the same time, Ruutu would be gone already. The question is what the options are for #s 2-4.
For me I work through them like this:
If I could do a “change of scenery” type of trade AND recoup a significant portion of the $12.5M owed to Ruutu over the next 2 ½ years, I would do it in a heartbeat and not get too bogged down in position, skill set role, etc. of the player received. There would at least be some chance that the received player worked out and even if not the savings could be redeployed to buy a different “maybe/might work” player for a much lower price than $5M. If I could do a deal in which Ruutu could be traded even for modest futures (#3) with the Canes NOT eating any salary, I would also do it. Again, $5M is too big of a bet to place on whether or not he will find a higher gear possibly next season. You can make this bet for about half this cost.
But what if the reality is #4 that the Canes need to eat a significant portion of Ruutu’s contract to move him? This is where I think Canes GM Jim Rutherford needs to avoid being rash and just trying to move on without considering the $. If for example, the only way to move Ruutu was to eat ½ of his $5M salary, the question changes. It becomes “Would you keep Ruutu if his cost is only $2.5M/year?” At this point, I would. I think the potential upside suddenly outweighs the risk. For only $2.5M, he starts to be priced more like a 3rd-line forward not a 1st or 2nd-line forward. And with the potential that a long summer helps him heal and get back to where he was a few years ago, there is upside on top of the $2.5M that you are paying him for him to reassume a larger role or least play his way to having a much higher trade value that does not involve eating contract.
So shorter version:
--I would trade Ruutu in the best deal I can get that does not eat salary. In the salary cap NHL where production/performance as a ratio to salary is the measuring stick, his $5M salary is obviously too high for his current role and not worth the risk that he reaches a higher level next year.
--But if the market is such that the Canes would need to eat a bunch of his salary ($2-2.5M) then the option to keep him at least to see how next season starts for $5M is better than paying him $2M or $2.5M to play somewhere else. With the potential upside that an offseason helps him physically get back to a higher level, I think you at least give it that a look.
As an aside, the Jussi Jokinen scenario that played out similarly last year is a logical point of comparison. I am on record as thinking that the Canes botched that situation horribly helping out division rival Pittsburgh by providing them with a decent, versatile top 9 forward for only $2.1M (because Canes ate $900k of salary). I think the biggest mistake was how stubborn and uncreative the team was trying to instead find an alternative use/role for Jokinen. He was originally slotted to lead a 3rd line staffed primarily with inexperienced players and non-offensive types. Canes Coach Kirk Muller tinkered only very briefly to see if maybe he could help fill a hole on 1 of the higher lines playing with more skilled players (a situation in which he did pretty well previously).
So is the Ruutu situation headed down the same path as Jokinen? If Ruutu were to be traded, I would not consider it so much a mistake in terms of failure to explore options like I did the Jokinen situation. Ruutu has made the rounds with a couple stops each on the 3rd line and 1st line and even a brief stint on the 2nd line, so it is not like Muller has not explored options. But per my comments above, I fear the “we just want to be done with this situation” trade in which an astute GM who gets the production/$ ratio stuff (think Pit, Bos, Chi) takes Ruutu on the cheap with the Canes eating a bunch of salary.
What say you Canes fans?
--Are you fearful like I am that the salary cap world in which cost matters in addition to potential contribution that Ruutu could only be traded in a change of scenery deal or if the Canes eat salary?
--Do you agree that if it comes down to paying a bunch of salary for him to play elsewhere versus waiting to see what 2014-15 brings that it might be better to wait?
--Who thinks that there is a decent chance that a full summer might be what he needs to refind the higher gear mobility-wise? (I do. I just would not pay $5M to test my optimism if I had other options.)
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