The Red Wings released their 23-man roster on Monday promptly at 5 PM, but Detroit coach Todd McLellan cautioned both the Free Press’s Helene St. James and the rest of the Red Wings’ fandom that it may not be the roster we see hit the ice vs. the New York Rangers on Friday:
“Often see a roster submitted, and it’s made public, and then all of a sudden things change two or three days down the road,” coach Todd McLellan said. “We’re one of the late-starting teams this year. There’s games tomorrow already, and I think when we do play the Rangers, if I’m correct, that’ll be their third game already. So we are a late starting team. We have a little more time to shuffle things around, and we’ll use that time.
Gibson was excused from practice Monday because he was sick, per McLellan. Larkin practiced, but was still not part of a regular line. He has been nursing an upper-body injury since before camp began, and his availability for games remains unknown.
“He has, I believe he has a doctor’s appointment today at some point, and we’ll get more of a feedback from the physicians at that time to see where he’s at,” McLellan said.
McLellan also said this to MLive’s Ansar Khan about the unsigned Simon Edvinsson:
“He’s fit, he’s ready,” McLellan said. “He knows the guys. He’s been working systematically with us, so if that happened, yeah, we would (play him). Providing he’s mentally and physically ready to go, we would have no problem playing him quickly.”
Edvinsson, 23, is coming off his entry-level contract. He can sign for a maximum of seven years under the new CBA that took effect on Sept. 16, though there is speculation the Red Wings would prefer a bridge deal (two or three years).
Vancouver inked Zeev Buium to an eight-year, $75.04 million deal ($9.38 million average annual value) before the previous CBA expired. That’s one comparable to Edvinsson.
“The business part of the game sometimes takes a while,” McLellan said. “I know that Horc is working really hard and we’ll continue to do that. Simon’s an important part of our team and we’d like to have him here. But business is part of the game.”
