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Following up on yesterday’s article on cheap free agent forwards, here are some options at defense and goaltender.
Michal Kempny
Well, I had a whole blurb written about him, but now it appears that he’ll be staying in Washington, which isn’t too surprising:
Brandon Davidson
Davidson has bounced around a bit since the 2017 trade deadline, as he was traded from Edmonton to Montreal, then claimed back by Edmonton in December, and was then traded to the Islanders in February. He’s far from a perfect player, but he’s a good depth option who I think would be an improvement over Mark Borowiecki and Ben Harpur.
Since he’s left-handed, Ottawa’s less likely to look at him, but he will come cheap because he only made $1.425M last season. I don’t think I’d want him on the Senators second pairing, but if they want a Fredrik Claesson replacement, he could be their guy.
Dylan Demelo
Demelo’s name has been talked about on a few of these lists on blogs recently, as he was scheduled to be an RFA but was not tendered a qualifying offer by the Sharks. Demelo is a right-hand shot, which makes him a bit more intriguing.
When looking at Bill Comeau’s SKATR comparison tool, he grades out similarly to Chris Wideman over the past two seasons:
Demelo doesn’t have amazing point totals with just 20 assists in 63 games this past season, but as you can see with the graph above, nothing major sticks out as a negative in terms of his actual on-ice results. Since Wideman will probably already be the everyday 3rd pairing right-handed defenseman, Demelo might not have a spot open. However, as I have to keep mentioning, if Erik Karlsson is gone, then Demelo could easily slot in.
He made just $650k last season, so a new contract is going to be pretty cheap for someone that has 3 career goals.
Carter Hutton
EDIT: Or not:
Hutton isn’t really going to be a starting goaltender, as he’ll be 33 in December and has never started more than 40 games in a season. Despite that, he’s still been a quality backup goaltender throughout his brief career.
He’s played in 137 games since 2013, and has a surprisingly solid .915 SV%. A lot of that has to do with this past season where he posted a .931% mark, and that’s not really the kind of goalie I’d expect to see moving forward. In his career, he ranks 37th amongst 77 goalies in 5v5 SV% at .9233, so he’s been about average. It is interesting though that his expected SV% (
which is a Corsica.hockey stat that takes into account shot quality) ranks 5th, so if anything, Hutton seems like an above average backup.
His cap hit last year was $1.125M, but he’ll be wanting a raise. I think he can get somewhere around $2.5M or so, which wouldn’t be too bad, because he at least seems like a much better option than Mike Condon. Of course, just like with the rest of these goalies, Hutton can’t even be an option if Craig Anderson and Condon both stay.
Anton Khudobin
Khudobin has moved around a lot in his career, and has played a surprising amount of games in the AHL:
After beginning his career quite solid in Minnesota, Boston, and Carolina, Khudobin’s play suffered for three seasons before returning to form last year with the Bruins. Overall, he still has a career .915 SV% like Hutton, and he seems like a boom or bust type of goalie. His last contract had a cap hit of $1.2M, so I’m thinking the 32-year-old will be getting somewhere between $1.5-2.5M per season, just like Hutton.
He hasn’t proven himself good enough to be a full-time starter, but he can be a stopgap or a solid backup.
Robin Lehner & Petr Mrazek
I’m going to group these two together since they’re both 26, both had cap hits of $4M, and are both more costly than the rest and perhaps slightly more unrealistic signings because of that. However, they’re still interesting options if Anderson ends up getting moved. They both have the highest upside amongst free agent goaltenders, and either one or both could prove to be great signings.
Considering Lehner had a .908 SV% last year and Mrazek had a .902 SV% and a .901 the year prior, I’m assuming that they won’t be getting raises. Then again, there could be a bidding war, so who knows. Eerily enough, just like Hutton and Khudobin, Lehner’s career SV% is also .915, but his first two seasons in Buffalo were much better than his final one. He might not be the elite goaltender that we thought he’d be, but he’s certainly not bad. He’s probably just too inconsistent.
Mrazek also has a high ceiling, but we haven’t seen him hit it since 2015-16. His career SV% has dropped all the way to .911, although the strange thing is that we’ve seen him be fantastic at the OHL, AHL, and NHL level:
He has an Ottawa connection because he was on the 67’s, so I do wonder if someone in the organization has an affection for him. Either one of Lehner or Mrazek would be an exciting signing because they have the most potential, but they’re still far from sure things at least as starters.
Perhaps none of these players even get looked at by the Senators, especially if Anderson cannot be traded. However, they are all solid options in my books.
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