Hughes Schmidt
Elder Benn
Juollevi Myers

Well, who do you replace? Also harmonic will be back at some point on the right side...
- MisterBrown

Are they playing well or do they just look good on paper? Hopefully for Vancouver they can gel, but thus far they’ve been a terrible mix.

I read that he’s taking a long time to heal or some such. If the LTIR requirements are what you say, then we’re stuck like Chuck. 😤😤. Could buy him out, but his hit & Abbey’s wouldn’t be palatable in a rebuild. Could dump him in GR, but due to his tenure I believe all we can write off is around $1.2m...not a big deal for us right now. Be nice to open up a slot for Lindstrom, Hicketts, Dylan Mac, maybe even Cholo (get him some ice time, maybe generate some interest across the league - probably have to retain $$ because he’s a reclamation project...).
- mcmastermike1968

Yeah, again I’m not 100% sure here. It seems like a really gray area with DeKeyser — that blurry line between “yes he has a bona-fide injury” but also “yes he can still play.” Unfortunately I think the fact that he has already played 10 games this season without any apparent setbacks in terms of playing fitness would make putting him on LTIR at this point more than a little suspicious.

Now, if at some later point both the team and the player decided “yeah, it’s not worth playing through this” and DeKeyser was committed to being LTIRetired, would it be approved? I think probably yes? According to the CBA, the club physician is the one who makes the call on whether or not a player is “fit to play,” and in practice I think that means they have pretty broad discretion whenever players fall into the fairly wide “could go either way” gray area with respect to injuries. Everybody plays hurt from time to time; if a player decides the hurt is no longer worth it and the team agrees I suspect the club physician will defer to that preference.

On the other hand, if DeKeyser himself thinks he is fit enough to play and wants to continue playing, he is within his rights to seek an independent second opinion (CBA 17.7b). And the commissioner can "investigate" if there's a suspicion that the system is being used improperly. So everybody really does need to be on the same page and keep their stories straight.

I also think Detroit is still holding out hope at this time that DeKeyser will still make a more complete recovery, although I tend to agree with several other posters here that he is not a particularly good NHL defender even without his back issues.

Yeah, again I’m not 100% sure here. It seems like a really gray area with DeKeyser — that blurry line between “yes he has a bona-fide injury” but also “yes he can still play.” Unfortunately I think the fact that he has already played 10 games this season without any apparent setbacks in terms of playing fitness would make putting him on LTIR at this point more than a little suspicious.

Now, if at some later point both the team and the player decided “yeah, it’s not worth playing through this” and DeKeyser was committed to being LTIRetired, would it be approved? I think probably yes? According to the CBA, the club physician is the one who makes the call on whether or not a player is “fit to play,” and in practice I think that means they have pretty broad discretion whenever players fall into the fairly wide “could go either way” gray area with respect to injuries. Everybody plays hurt from time to time; if a player decides the hurt is no longer worth it and the team agrees I suspect the club physician will defer to that preference.

On the other hand, if DeKeyser himself thinks he is fit enough to play and wants to continue playing, he is within his rights to seek an independent second opinion (CBA 17.7b). And the commissioner can "investigate" if there's a suspicion that the system is being used improperly. So everybody really does need to be on the same page and keep their stories straight.

I also think Detroit is still holding out hope at this time that DeKeyser will still make a more complete recovery, although I tend to agree with several other posters here that he is not a particularly good NHL defender even without his back issues.
- Sven22

Good info, Sven. That really does clear it up. All falls to the team Doc who’s had the experience with the player’s health history. DKs had back issues for a while, and with the history of Zs issues, I wonder if this whole thing boils down to pride. If he thinks he can still play, but the teams wants to LTIRetire him, I’d see him fighting...it’s not worth it for a D-man whose best days are long since past, whilst his injury record is more impressive than his stats record.
The only way he goes anywhere is if he agrees to LTIRetired (that’s a great term, btw!!). $5m in cap relief would be a blessing to some teams.
I was excited to see him sign w/DET, and he was a pretty good D-man, but those days have passed....

Good info, Sven. That really does clear it up. All falls to the team Doc who’s had the experience with the player’s health history. DKs had back issues for a while, and with the history of Zs issues, I wonder if this whole thing boils down to pride. If he thinks he can still play, but the teams wants to LTIRetire him, I’d see him fighting...it’s not worth it for a D-man whose best days are long since past, whilst his injury record is more impressive than his stats record.
The only way he goes anywhere is if he agrees to LTIRetired (that’s a great term, btw!!). $5m in cap relief would be a blessing to some teams.
I was excited to see him sign w/DET, and he was a pretty good D-man, but those days have passed....
- mcmastermike1968

Blashill made a comment that Dekeyser was basically playing on one leg at the beginning of the season. He’s just not able to engage both. If this is it, my heart breaks for the guy. Injuries derail some players. There are some that are really tough to come back from

DK is best used as a LTIR dump, which could be alluring for a cap-strapped team. Finding a dance partner for a LTIR dump could be done, but he thinks he’s still a desired entity.... He’s a decent back-end guy, but his time’s passed and his injuries are more frequent and time consuming to heal from.
- mcmastermike1968

DK is not tradeable. He is somewhere between healthy and LTIR.

DK is not tradeable. He is somewhere between healthy and LTIR.

- HenryHockey

Another great Holland contract.

Another great Holland contract.
- Feds91Stammer

It really was the perfect example of a GM being unable to objectively evaluate his own players.

At his mid-20s peak DeKeyser was, in my opinion, a serviceable second-pair shutdown defenseman. Above-average defensively, below-average offensively. Overall average, but useful if deployed correctly.

But he was never ever worth even close to $5m AAV even in his very best seasons, and his play was already trending in the wrong direction before his back issues started getting more serious.

At least with, say, Nielsen (another extremely bad judgment signing) you could make an argument that $5.25m was in the ballpark of market value when it was very first signed; the problem was that it went on way too long past the point where his level of play (predictably) fell off a cliff. With DDK you can't even really argue that. He was massively overpaid from the start and it went on for six years. Unbelievable really.

Still feel for the guy. Regardless of how I feel about his contract, tough way to go out for a guy who clearly gave his heart and soul. At this point I'm just hoping he's able to have a healthy post-career quality of life with his family.

The Montreal Canadiens forward Paul Byron and Carolina Hurricanes winger Alex Galchenyuk were among the players to clear waivers on Monday.

Danny DeKeyser of the Detroit Red Wings, Columbus Blue Jackets defenceman Gabriel Carlsson and Boston Bruins forward Par Lindholm also cleared after being waived Sunday.

New blog is up

https://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog.php?post_id=109897