I can’t help but raise my eyebrow at this declaration from Detroit Hockey Now’s Max Smith:
The Red Wings, meanwhile, have yet to make another signing or trade of significance for the main roster since Day 1 of free agency. Patrick Kane remains unsigned, and by all reports seems to have moved on from Detroit, even if he has not yet settled on a new destination.
With a deep Atlantic division and the Metropolitan getting more top heavy, the Red Wings will need to find a way to get competitive in the marketplace fast.
I have PuckPedia’s signing tracker and EliteProspects’ “confirmed transfers” page bookmarked and open among the sea of tabs that I use on Firefox.
Aside from minor free agent signings and the Senators’ imminent re-signing of Claude Giroux and the Capitals re-upping Alex Ovechkin, teams have pretty much been signing their own players since July 1st, Leo Carlsson offer sheet excluded. Nobody’s been that proactive over the past 6 days (in my opinion).
I would suggest that, at this point, the Red Wings fan base’s target signing would be Eeli Tolvanen, the Seattle Kraken sniper whose up-and-down production has him testing the free agent marketplace (as a potential bargain signing).
I’d be interested as to which player or players you’re still looking toward as potential Red Wings signings, because I’m hoping that the Wings manage to add another Keegan Kolesar-type checking forward with some size, speed and pace to his game…
At this point, however, I would argue that this quip from Smith is what we’re all really waiting for in Red Wings land:
The question is where [Simon Edvinsson’s] contract will land in comparison to Mo Seider’s at this point.
Heading back over to PuckPedia’s Red Wings page, I would gather that Edvinsson wants to equal Moritz Seider’s $8.55 million cap hit, if not to exceed it, but we all know that Steve Yzerman drives a hard bargain here.
I’d expect Yzerman to dig in at the Seider benchmark unless a Friedman-rumored offer sheet from Carolina comes Edvinsson’s way (which Detroit would match).
