BREAKING: The Ottawa Senators have extended centre Mika Zibanejad for 2 years at a cap hit of $2.625 M per season (breaks down as $2M year 1 and $3.25M for year 2).
As with the announcements prior to the season of Bobby Ryan's extension and Erik Karlsson's captaincy, there was the "but wait, there's more" and they also announced that Mark Stone has signed a 3 year extension, with a cap hit of $3.5M per season ($2.25, $3.75, $4.5).
When I did my cap budget last week I had Zibanejad at 2 yrs X $2.5M and Stone at 3 yrs x $4M per season, so the Senators are well on pace to get these guys signed and still have a bit of flexibility.
Great value for these players who are on the upswing and nobody is sure really how good they will end up being. These bridge deals make sens for both sides, both players will still be RFA after these contracts run out, and the backloaded deals means their qualifying offers will be decent as they will look for long-term deals next time around.
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The 2014-15 Season officially came to a close in Vegas last night, and the Senators were front and center for a lot of the evening.
In addition to having 3 nominees and one winner, probably the most touching moment of the night was the attention given to Jonathan Pitre, whose story had previously been known to local fans and then a national audience for his battle with a rare and debilitating skin disease. The NHL expanded the reach of that story by re-airing the James Duthie TSN piece on the awards show as well as bringing Pitre to the show and having the Senators representatives in attendance honour him with a trip to the All-Star game in Nashville next season and a donation to the DEBRA foundation.
Erik Karlsson captured his second Norris Trophy , beating Drew Doughty by 75 points despite Doughty having 53 first place votes as opposed to Kalrsson's 44. The Senators' captain was also named as a First Team All-Star and was 9th in Hart Trophy Voting as the league MVP.
Mark Stone finished a close second to Florida's Aaron Ekblad in the Calder Trophy voting, in a tight race between all 3 nominees (Johhny Gaudreau being the third place finisher). Stone was also named to the NHL's All-Rookie team. Mike Hoffman finished 6th in Calder Voting.
Andrew Hammond, who was a finalist for the Bill Masterton Trophy lost out to fellow feel-good goaltending story Devan Dubnyk, in what I personally thought was the biggest surprise of the night, in that Kris Letang didn't win. Hammond also finished 7th in Vezina voting (1 3rd place vote), and finished 15th in Hart Trophy Voting, despite playing just over 1/4 of the season.
Coach Dave Cameron finished 6th in voting for the Jack Adams award for coach of the year after taking over for Paul MacLean in mid-December, while unfortunately Bryan Murray oh so close was close to being a finalist for the GM of the Year voting, just 4 points behind 3rd place finisher Bob Murray of the Ducks.
The big winner of the night, as expected, was Montreal goalie Carey Price. He will need to rent a U-Haul to bring home his hardware, capturing the Hart, Vezina, Jennings (shared with Corey Crawford) as well as the Ted Lindsay Awards as the Player's pick for most outstanding player.
With that, the season draws to a close and looking at the past is over and we turn our attention to the future. And a quick turnaround it is, as the League picks up and moves from Vegas to Florida (its a tough life indeed) for Friday's first round of the NHL draft.
Ottawa is still looking to move a goalie prior to the draft, with one of the prevalent rumors circulating yesterday that Ottawa was going to ship Robin Lehner, along with their 18th overall pick to San Jose for the Sharks' 9th overall pick. Moving up 9 spots in the draft will get them a better player, and I know there are two camps on what Lehner is worth, but I am not sure that is enough return for a player that 2 weeks ago the Senators wanted a top 6 forward AND a high draft pick. With the abundance of similar type goalies available around the league, it is a buyer's market and the offers simply aren't there that will match the asking price.
Murray must balance the fine line between getting it done in order to avoid the distraction and the questions all summer, and getting what he feels is as close to appropriate value as he possibly can.