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Breaking: Sens extend Condon - Don't expect much in FA for the Senators

June 28, 2017, 9:35 AM ET [98 Comments]
Jared Crozier
Ottawa Senators Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
Breaking: The Ottawa Senators have signed pending UFA goalie Mike Condon to a 3 year contract extension worth $7.2M. It is a cap hit of $2.4M per season for the player who essentially saved the Senators season in the wake of the trials and tribulations that Craig Anderson unfortunately went through this season. This signing makes Ottawa have a stable 1-2 punch for the coming season, and perhaps, depending how 27 year old Condon performs, a cheap starter as the 36 year old Anderson winds down his career



July 1st tends to be the date where more mistakes are made in the NHL than any other day. The opening of free agency creates a major brain cramp among NHL GM's who think that they need to overpay drastically in order to make their team better, and in most cases it becomes a case of buyer's remorse.

When it comes to the Senators, for better or worse they have usually been relatively quiet in recent years, with the last July signing of any real significance being Clarke MacArthur 4 years ago, and prior to that might be Alex Kovalev in 2009 (if you don't count Guillaume Latendresse in 2012, and I am sure you don't). In 2008, they went crazy and brought in the trio of Jarkko Ruutu, Brendan Bell and Alex Auld. And a full 10 years ago, their big free agent acquisition was Luke Richardson. This is not a franchise that has chosen to make big splashes on July 1st.

Especially in a year where the free agent crop is slim pickings at best, the Senators will most likely remain quiet when it comes to the big fish, and rightly so. The top end guys (Alzner, Radulov, Shattenkirk, Williams, Kulikov among them) will land contracts far bigger and far longer than should be realistic, because it is really a case of supply and demand. Ottawa could tinker like they did last year with Tom Pyatt, who was a pretty under the radar signing that turned out great. Is there a Sam Gagner out there, who signed for the league minimum in Columbus only to put up 50 points? Perhaps, but that was more of an exception rather than the rule. Gagner is available again this summer, but you can bet his price tag will have gone up significantly.

The Senators won't likely be handing out many multi-year contracts for big money despite the almost $5M hole that was left in Marc Methot's departure. Sure, it might be burning a hole in Eugene Melnyk's pocket, but that will certainly be eaten up next year when Erik Karlsson, Mark Stone and Kyle Turris will all be looking for contract extensions (Stone and Turris can sign new extensions as early as Saturday as they are entering the final year of their current contracts).

You are more likely to see veterans come in on short deals, such as Kris Versteeg or Drew Stafford, guys that can give you 30-40 points over a full season but won't cost much at this point in their careers.

And, they still hope to re-sign Mike Condon and Viktor Stalberg before too long to bring them back for another stint.


While a lot of the focus will be on the coming season, the future of the franchise is also in town for the annual prospect development camp that started yesterday. All of the Senators 2017 picks are attending, as are top prospects Thomas Chabot, Colin White and Logan Brown.

On-ice workouts are open to the public at the Bell Sensplex, and the camp wraps up with the annual 3-on-3 tournament on Monday morning.

I am heading out of town tonight, probably one of the few people leaving the biggest party in Canada for Indianapolis for the next 5 days, and I am not even taking my computer with me this time...

So that being said, the Senators are pretty much guaranteed to make a big splash, trade Dion Phaneuf, sign Joe Thornton and Patrick Marleau for Selanne/Kariya in Colorado-type deals and also get Shattenkirk and Alzner for cheap just because they want to play with Erik Karlsson.

But none of that is likely to happen, and it will most likely be a pretty quiet day in the Capital, at least as far as free agency goes.

On Parliament Hill, it will be another story altogether, so enjoy the big 150th birthday party for our Nation, wherever you are, and most importantly, stay safe!
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