Make sure to follow Mark on Twitter!
Baby Steps
As expected, the Wings’ only eligible player for salary arbitration, defenseman
Danny DeKeyser chose not to file by yesterday’s 5:00pm ET deadline. Given the slow start the Red Wings management has experienced in free agency, such an item registers as the best news of the summer to date for Detroit. DeKeyser and
Tomas Tatar are Detroit’s two remaining restricted free agents. The team will get deals done with both players by the time training camp opens in September.
The Wings have already re-signed
Riley Sheahan (2 years @ $950k per) and tendered qualifying offers to those they plan on keeping within the organization.
Players that are eligible for salary arbitration must have either:
1) ---Four years of NHL experience
OR
2) ---Two years of NHL experience if they signed their first NHL contract after the age of 20
Tatar signed his initial ELC at the age of 19. Currently, Tatar has less than 4 years of NHL experience and as a result is not eligible to elect for arbitration. Meanwhile, DeKeyser meets the second criteria in that he has two years of NHL experience and signed his first NHL contract at the age of 22.
The deadline for player-elected arbitration came and went yesterday and DeKeyser was not one of the 20 players in the league who chose to take their clubs to arbitration. The top name on that list choosing arbitration is right-hand shooting defenseman,
P.K. Subban of the Montreal Canadiens.
DeKeyser filing for arbitration would have taken a rather normal situation and made it much worse. It’s no secret that the arbitration process can lead to disharmony between players and teams who disagree on what a salary should look like. Not surprisingly, listening to your own boss (general manager) list in an arbitration hearing all of your warts can definitely leave a bad taste in the player’s mouth. The process can potentially damage relationships between players and teams, and often that relationship never fully heals.
What will be interesting to watch going forward is how much DeKeyser and Tatar come in with their cap hit. Given the performance bonus overages the Wings are carrying over to this season in the amount of just over $3 million, the Wings cap number is actually just under $66 million instead of the league imposed $69 milllion. As a result, Detroit has about $6.5 million in cap space.
The expectation is that the Red Wings preference is to sign both players to two-year bridge deals that would eat up about half of that cap space. That would leave around $3 million + to add another roster player, whether that is
Daniel Alfredsson OR if it is extra cap space needed to accommodate a right handed shooting top four defenseman (i.e.
Tyler Myers and his $5.5 million cap hit).
The roster could certainly change as the Wings could attempt to move
Jakub Kindl and his $2.4 million cap hit in order to free up additional cap space.
***
Previous Posts
Will Jurco get the "Nyquist" treatment
Trying to find the positive in the return of Kyle Quincey
Calm before the free agency storm
Christmas morning on a Friday night in June
Trades galore at the Draft?
Hockey U?
What the Tootoo buyout means for Detroit on July 1st
Detroit Red Wings Blogger • 
Join the Discussion:
»