Now it’s July 6th, and I’m coming out of a burnout-induced sickness haze, but I’m going to post this take on Patrick Kane’s value from Detroit Hockey Now’s Max Smith, and suggest that he may know something that we don’t:
The list of [free agent] names that remain unsigned includes forwards Patrick Kane, James van Riesmdyk, and David Perron alongside defenseman Travis Hamonic and goaltender Cam Talbot. For the Red Wings UFA class, it seems to be a case of trying to read if the winds will be able to carry them where they want to go.
Highlighting the top of the list, of course, is Kane. The mercurial winger is in his age 37 season, and came to Detroit after what could have been a career-ending hip resurfacing surgery hoping to cup chase.
Since then, Detroit has suffered three March collapses and missed the playoffs, while his hometown Buffalo Sabres have finally broken a 14 year playoff drought. Kane cares a lot about his family, and while he did express a desire to return to Detroit in his post season press conferences, that was before Dylan Larkin’s trade request went public.
Re-signing with Detroit could mean more playoff misses, and it’s not like Kane is getting younger, or healthier. Injuries limited 88 to just 67 games, though he still managed 57 points and crossed the 500 career goal mark. There’s certainly a market for Kane, but it seems for the moment that he’s more than willing to let the dust clear a bit more before he makes any decisions about where he plays next season.
Continued; there is a LOT of unofficial speculation that Kane is going to sign with Buffalo, but I’m contending that he may be waiting to see what happens with Dylan Larkin before making his decision. After all, the two players have the same agent in Pat Brisson…
But I guess what raises my eyebrow here is that I’m not sure we’d call Kane “mercurial,” nor would I suggest that he’s brittle. He suffered what was probably a broken wrist in a collision with the end boards and missed a bit chunk of time there.
No, he’s not quite as durable as he was prior to his hip resurfacing procedure, but he’s still 80% of what he used to be, and 80% of Patrick Kane is a hell of a lot better than most players in the NHL.
