Detroit Hockey Now’s Bob Duff continues the thread of comments from Red Wings coach Derek Lalonde’s appearance at the team’s “Summer Hockey in the D” event earlier this week. Duff notes that neither Raymond nor Seider should expect their respective workloads to get easier any time soon:
There’s no questioning how vital both Seider and Raymond are to the success of the Red Wings. Raymond was a 31-goal scorer last season. His 72 points were leading the team in scoring.
Seider led the Red Wings in time on ice (22:22) and shorthanded time on ice (2:33) per game. He’s logging those minutes in hard situations against the opposition’s best players.
“He’s going to be seeing that the rest of his career,” Lalonde said.
The big German defenseman also wound in a tie for eighth among NHL defensemen with 211 hits. He was second among NHL rearguards with 212 blocked shots.
While it might seem like the Red Wings are running out of time to get restricted free agents Seider and Raymond under contract, Lalonde is entirely confident that they will find common ground a get a deal done prior to the opening of training camp next month.
“I’m not worried,” Lalonde said. “It’s all part of it. I’ve had a little experience with this with past RFAs. I think it’s all part of the process.”
Continued; the deeper the Red Wings are on defense, the better-prepared they are to spell Seider from time to time. It may take until the trade deadline for the team to acquire a shut-down defenseman for the team’s second pair, presuming that Simon Edvinsson and Albert Johansson don’t take that workload on this season.
