Silver Nuggets: Development camp finished; Petersson coming to North America
July 1st came and went, and the Ottawa Senators stayed sensible and didn't give out wild contracts like the Florida Panthers among others. The only one-way contract the Senators gave out was to backup goaltender Alex Auld. With a likely top six of Jason Spezza, Nikita Filatov, Bobby Butler, Daniel Alfredsson, Milan Michalek and one of Peter Regin, Stephane da Costa or Mika Zibanejad, the only roster play the Senators might add is a bottom six forward. Even then, assuming Bobby Butler gets a one-way contract, Ottawa will have 10 forwards on one-way deals, and Nikita Filatov should figure in the NHL too. That only leaves one other spot, and I would rather it be a two-way deal to allow flexibility for call-ups. On defence however, starting next season, the Senators have a lot of options, with only Sergei Gonchar and Chris Phillips under contract. For this season, there are already too many in contention.
Here are today's links:
General Sens News
- The Ottawa Senators development camp wrapped up this morning with a 3 on 3 tournament. Peter will have a report on this later as he was in attendance, but here is a list of the teams. (Ottawa Senators)
- Jakob Silfverberg, who has been impressing both fans and management, is flattered with the attention. However, if he came to training camp and didn't make the Ottawa team, he would have missed the first six weeks of the Swedish League. For this reason, he chose to stay in Sweden rather than risk playing in the AHL. Next season, he will have to come to North America. (Ottawa Citizen)
- Mark Stone's main handicap is his skating. In fact, Randy Lee went as far as to say that his skating is below average. Meanwhile, Andre Petersson is coming over to North America and will be playing either in Ottawa or Binghamton. (Ottawa Citizen)
- I am not sure I agree with the Sun that we have two openings on defence, or up to three if Filip Kuba is traded. In either case, Patrick Wiercioch isn't giving up on being part of Ottawa's defensive future despite the number of players ahead of him. There are going to be openings starting in 2012-2013. (Ottawa Sun)
More after the jump.
General Hockey News
- As most of you may have heard by now, Dany Heatley was traded to the Minnesota Wild in exchange for Martin Havlat. As Havlat was my first favourite player, I sure would have loved this trade two season ago. (Silver Seven Sens)
- Brian Burke of the Toronto Maple Leafs marched in Toronto's Pride Parade yesterday, wearing a Leafs jersey with his son Brendan's name on it. (Toronto Star)
- While Brad Richards' ridiculous deal was perfectly fine with the NHL, Max Talbot's 5 year $9 million deal apparently was not. The problem? In year three, the salary drops to $1 million from $2.25 million in the first two years. The salary drop in year three can't be more than 50% of the lowest salary in the first two years. (Yahoo!)