The Coyotes have bought-out Antoine Vermette.
It sucks because Vermette has played most of the past five seasons for the Coyotes and for most of that time he has been a part of the core. He has been popular player in the desert during a (mostly) bad period.
The thing is, Vermette is one of those classic "third line defensive centres" whose stats don't really back that up. Going back to 2010, he has never been a player who made those he played with significantly better or who suppressed a lot of shots.
For a while he put up decent offensive numbers and second line worthy possession numbers, but his decline has been going on almost since he joined the Coyotes. Which makes sense- he didn't join the team until he turned 30, and his best years were in Ottawa and Columbus.
Never the less, he was a serviceable player who performed decently and was important part of the team.
The thing is, he's no longer that. His decline has reached the point where, sadly, it's becoming quite clear he doesn't have much left to offer at the NHL level.
Last year he scored 17 goals, which is decent, but only 8 where at even strength, where his team was outshot and out possessed when he was on the ice to the point where his linemates did better when he was on the bench.
A lot of people have criticized this move, assuming that Vermette is a victim of a cheap team. That isn't the case though. Since the Coyotes got new ownership, they have shown a willingness to spend money - whether that is buying out Mike Ribeiro or taking on contracts to build up assets for the rebuild, they've spent when needed.
The fact is, the Coyotes have enough veteran leadership in Michalek, Smith, Doan, OEL and Hanzal. At this point, better to let a kid play than clog the roster with a replacement player.
And I know this sucks because people like Vermette - he's a professional, he's a class act, and to my knowledge is one of the best players for helping out the local community, being available and friendly to fans etc.
Basically, it's easy to look at this and say it's a good move because he's 34, on the decline and the team has better guys to replace him. However, from a human perspective, it is sad that a guy has potentially reached the end of his career. I think it's so easy when doing my job here to think of players as things and not people.
Sure, I urged the team to cut him in every other blog, but it's still a bad feeling to actually go through with firing one of hockey's nicest guys. Let us take solace in the fact that he's a millionaire and will, thanks to his name cache, probably catch on with another team.
All that being said, anyone who thinks the Coyotes made a bad move here isn't watching enough Coyotes games. You can make a stats based argument that Vermette isn't very good, but all you really had to do was watch the games last year. He just isn't effective at even-strength anymore and the stats indicate it's not because he isn't playing with good players.
On a positive note, the Coyotes have cleared room to have one of their many exciting young forwards make the team.
Thanks to ownthepuck.blogspot.ca for the chart.