Welcome to the Hotstove! As always, I'm your host, Travis Yost.
I kind of wanted to open a discussion about all of the moves made on July 1, and gauge what people considered to be the best/worst moves of the day. We'll focus on the best moves today, and touch on the worst moves a few days from now.
For a quick refresher, check
TSN's Free Agent Tracker (there are four pages here of signings, remember).
I'll break up my best signings into three different parts: forward, defenseman, goaltender.
At forward, I really liked what Winnipeg did with center Mathieu Perreault. I consider the Ducks a pretty smart organization, but I was sort of surprised they decided to let Perreault walk here. Granted, Anaheim has a ton of young talent sort of pushing their way through.
Winnipeg was in dire need of a center, and every shred of evidence we have suggests that the shot-share falls favorably when Mathieu Perreault gets on the ice. He's not a first-line center obviously, but here's something to consider: of forwards who have played at least 1000 TOI at even-strength over the last three seasons, Perreault is eighteenth (!) in scoring per sixty. His comparables here are James Neal, Max Pacioretty, Patrick Sharp, and Patrick Kane. So, not only is he winning the game territorially, he's getting his hands on quite a few points.
The contract (3Y/$9MM) was excellent, excellent value.
I'm torn at defenseman, because there were two excellent signings. Pittsburgh absolutely stole first-pairing defender Christian Ehrhoff from the market at one-year, $4MM, but I'm guessing they largely sold him on the chance to compete for a Stanley Cup. This, of course, is a competitive advantage, but to the better teams go these opportunities.
Value-wise, though, I still think Tampa Bay did wonders to get Anton Stralman at five-years, $22.5MM. Stralman's a first-pairing defender, and there is
zero evidence that he was being insulated by a pairmate like Marc Staal. Tampa Bay, who is very quickly becoming a threat in the Eastern Conference, picked up one of the sixty-best defenders in the league for a very reasonable price under the cap. And a couple of years from now, he'll be making an even smaller percentage of total salary allocated under whatever the cap ceiling is.
(Tom Gilbert to Montreal was also quite good.)
At goalie, the options aren't as savory, but I thought Calgary did well to grab Jonas Hiller as a stop-gap of sorts for whatever future goaltender they decide on. And on the value front, you have to like Thomas Greiss to Pittsburgh at just $1MM for next season. I'm not entirely convinced he's much worse than their starter in Marc-Andre Fleury.
You?
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