Down the Frozen River

Tag: Tobias Lindberg

  • Picking Up the Pieces in Net

    Shortly after the Vegas Golden Knights claimed backup goaltender, Malcolm Subban, off waivers from the Boston Bruins, they traded Calvin Pickard to the Toronto Maple Leafs for Tobias Lindberg and a 2018 6th round pick.

    Hindsight is 20/20– considering Marc-Andre Fleury and Subban are both on the injured reserve and Vegas is down to their last hope (well, before they really get desperate) in Oscar Dansk— but should they have been so quick to pull the plug on Pickard? Should any team, including the Maple Leafs, be so quick to bury him as they have in the American Hockey League with the Toronto Marlies?

    The short answer is no, Vegas maybe shouldn’t have traded him (considering depth in goal is imperative when at least one goalie is injured) and Toronto could probably still utilize some life out of him. The obvious answer is the Golden Knights made a pure-business decision (and it paid off, despite Subban’s current status– they got a player and a pick for one player), while the Maple Leafs added depth that comes in handy, a la Vegas’s current situation.

    Pickard is a 25-year-old goaltender who was rushed in for too large of a role with the organization that drafted him 49th overall in 2010– the Colorado Avalanche.

    Last season, Pickard went 15-31-2 in 50 games played (48 starts) with a goals against average of 2.98 and a .904 save percentage. He had never seen more than 20 games in a season at the NHL level and was destined to be a career-long backup goaltender– until Semyon Varlamov went down with a season-ending injury last season.

    If you think Pickard should take the blame for the Avalanche’s lack of success last season, you probably also think there might be a goaltending controversy in Boston right now and should reconsider your status as a fan of hockey.

    For one thing, Colorado was a mess in more than one aspect of the game last season. For another, Tuukka Rask is still the Bruins starting goaltender and there’s no question about his certainty as a statistically elite goaltender who is once-in-a-generation for his time (other than Braden Holtby, who might be the only other candidate for consideration as “once-in-a-generation” currently).

    Anyway, back to Colorado.

    Carl Soderberg had 14 points last season. Fourteen. Fourteen points for a player who was expected to shake things up in light of the Ryan O’Reilly trade that the Buffalo Sabres soundly won.

    Last season’s Avs had a league-worst -112 goal differential, which also happened to be the worst in the salary cap era since the 2004-2005 season long lockout (maybe even further than that, though the game has changed significantly since the season that wasn’t in 04-05).

    Everything was working against a backup goaltender, turned default starting goaltender overnight with no offense and no defensive support.

    In Pickard’s two seasons as a backup, his goals against averages weren’t spectacular (a 2.35 in 16 games played in 2014-15 and a 2.56 in 20 games played in 2015-16), but they were consistent with that of what you’d expect from a backup goaltender seeing time in only about a quarter of an 82-game season.

    His .932 and .922 SV%’s in 2014-15 and 2015-16 respectively paint a clearer picture of a young backup with a seemingly reliable potential for developing into a full-time backup that could take on up to 30 games a season, significantly reducing the workload for Varlamov.

    Then came last season, where the pressure mounted and the Avalanche’s next backup goaltender of the future, Spencer Martin, rose up the depth charts.

    Golden Knights GM George McPhee identified his starting goaltender months before June’s expansion draft, given the contract situation in Pittsburgh, as well as their needle in a haystack luck in finding, developing and unleashing the wrath that is Matthew Murray in goal on the rest of the league.

    Marc-Andre Fleury had been penciled in on everyone’s mock Golden Knights roster from puck drop last season with the backup role left unfilled for Vegas to unveil in June.

    When Colorado left Calvin Pickard available, Vegas swooped in, hoping a change of scenery would work in addition to providing the 25-year-old with a defense, let alone some scoring production that could help balance the scoreboard in a pinch, should Pickard let in a goal or two. At least, that’s what the plan seemed to be.

    Until the Golden Knights had a chance to get a top-AHL goaltender who had yet to really break out in the NHL with a clogged pipeline of goalies in Boston.

    Malcolm Subban will be a goaltender in the NHL. He might just be a backup, but he’ll be a good one, given enough time and the right guys in front of him.

    Calvin Pickard got the short end of the stick, but sometimes taking a step back in your career leads you forward again.

    Are NHL GMs guilty of looking at one bad year and sentencing a player for life because of it, especially if that bad year was last season? Yes– it happens all the time in hockey and it’s frustrating as hell.

    Pickard once had a 2.47 GAA and .918 SV% with Lake Erie in 47 games played in his first full season of professional hockey (2012-13). That was when he was unrealistically projected to become a starting goaltender after never posting a goals against average below 3.05 with the Seattle Thunderbirds in four years of major junior hockey.

    Through two games with the Marlies, Pickard has a 3.59 GAA and a .901 SV% this season, but it’s still early for the goaltender who amassed a 1.49 GAA and .938 SV% in seven games with Canada at the 2017 IIHF World Championship this spring.

    Splitting time with Toronto’s best prospect in goal, Garret Sparks, won’t be easy, but it’s perhaps the greatest thing that could happen to Pickard. After all, he’s back in a system with lots of support and is a pending restricted free agent at the end of the season– free to regain his confidence and take his talents elsewhere in the league as a backup goaltender.

    He’s better than a backup like Jonas Gustavsson, but not everyone’s a Philipp Grubauer in a league that’s more reliant on their number two goalie than everyone thinks. Calvin Pickard should be just fine.

  • Down the Frozen River Podcast #74- Participation Trophies After One Game (Part II)

    Down the Frozen River Podcast #74- Participation Trophies After One Game (Part II)

    Jaromir Jagr signed with the Calgary Flames this week, the regular season started (though the Pittsburgh Penguins might not have been told yet that the games matter now) and former players tend to be GMs in the NHL, the Original Trio confirms. Also, we gave participation trophies without even watching the rest of the season for the second year in a row.

    Subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts (iTunes) and/or on Stitcher.

  • NHL Trades Since January 1, 2016

    NHL Trades Since January 1, 2016

    By: Nick Lanciani

    Here’s a quick recap (and I mean really quick recap- more like a brief refresher) of every trade made in the league since January 1st. For anything before the 2016 calendar year, check out NHL.com’s Trade Tracker.

    This year’s trade deadline is Monday, February 29, 2016 (in other words- tomorrow). All trade calls must be made by 3:00 PM EST on Monday in order for any deal to potentially go through.

    On January 3rd, the Chicago Blackhawks traded F Jeremy Morin to the Toronto Maple Leafs in exchange for F Richard Panik.

    January 6th saw two trades made across the league with the Philadelphia Flyers having traded F Vincent Lecavalier and D Luke Schenn to the Los Angeles Kings in exchange for F Jordan Weal and a 3rd round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft.

    That same day, the Columbus Blue Jackets acquired D Seth Jones and sent F Ryan Johansen to the Nashville Predators in a one-for-one trade.

    The Anaheim Ducks traded F Max Friberg to the Montréal Canadiens in exchange for G Dustin Tokarski on January 7th.

    On January 8th, the New York Rangers dealt F Emerson Etem to the Vancouver Canucks in exchange for F Nicklas Jensen.

    The league saw several days off from trade action until January 14th when the Nashville Predators acquired D Patrick Mullen from the Ottawa Senators for D Conor Allen.

    January 15th witnessed two trades in the NHL, first with the Nashville Predators trading D Victor Bartley to the Arizona Coyotes in exchange for D Stefan Elliott. This trade became part of the now infamous, John Scott trade, in which the Coyotes then traded D Victor Bartley and F John Scott to the Montréal Canadiens for D Jarred Tinordi and F Stefan Fournier.

    On January 16th the Pittsburgh Penguins traded F David Perron and D Adam Clendening to the Anaheim Ducks for F Carl Hagelin.

    The Chicago Blackhawks sent D Ryan Garbutt to the Anaheim Ducks for F Jiri Sekac on January 21st.

    Then on February 9th the Toronto Maple Leafs sent D Dion Phaneuf, F Matt Frattin, F Casey Bailey, F Ryan Rupert and D Cody Donaghey to the Ottawa Senators in exchange for D Jared Cowen, F Colin Greening, F Milan Michalek, F Tobias Lindberg and a 2nd round pick in the 2017 NHL Entry Draft.

    February 21st played a part in the day that the Toronto Maple Leafs traded F Shawn Matthias to the Colorado Avalanche in exchange for D Colin Smith and a 4th round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft.

    The Toronto Maple Leafs followed up with another trade on February 22nd, sending D Roman Polak and F Nick Spaling to the San Jose Sharks for F Raffi Torres, a 2nd round pick in the 2017 NHL Entry Draft and a 2nd round pick in the 2018 NHL Entry Draft.

    That same day (February 22nd) the Calgary Flames acquired F Hunter Shinkaruk from the Vancouver Canucks in exchange for F Markus Granlund.

    The Washington Capitals sent a 3rd round pick in the 2017 NHL Entry Draft to the Buffalo Sabres in exchange for D Mike Weber on February 23rd.

    On February 24th the Edmonton Oilers traded the rights to RFA D Philip Larsen to the Vancouver Canucks in exchange for a conditional 5th round pick in the 2017 NHL Entry Draft.

    The Winnipeg Jets traded F Andrew Ladd, F Matt Fraser and D Jay Harrison on February 25th, to the Chicago Blackhawks in exchange for F Marko Dano, a 1st round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft and a conditional 3rd round pick in the 2018 NHL Entry Draft (if the Blackhawks win the Stanley Cup in 2016).

    The Chicago Blackhawks then traded D Rob Scuderi to the Los Angeles Kings for D Christian Ehrhoff on February 26th.

    Not to be outdone, the Montréal Canadiens sent F Tomas Fleischmann and F Dale Weise to the Chicago Blackhawks in exchange for F Phillip Danault and a 2nd round pick in the 2018 NHL Entry Draft also on February 26th.

    February 27th began a long list of trades, first with the Edmonton Oilers sending G Anders Nilsson to the St. Louis Blues in exchange for G Niklas Lundstrom and a 5th round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft.

    Next the Toronto Maple Leafs traded G James Reimer and F Jeremy Morin to the San Jose Sharks in exchange for G Alex Stalock, F Ben Smith and a conditional 4th round pick in the 2018 NHL Entry Draft (can become a 3rd round pick in 2018 if the Sharks reach this year’s Stanley Cup Final).

    The third trade on February 27th sent D Jakub Kindl from the Detroit Red Wings to the Florida Panthers in exchange for a 6th round pick in the 2017 NHL Entry Draft.

    The Calgary Flames then sent F Jiri Hudler to the Florida Panthers in exchange for a 2nd round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft and a 4th round pick in the 2018 NHL Entry Draft. 

    Also on the 27th, the Edmonton Oilers acquired a 3rd round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft and sent D Justin Schultz to the Pittsburgh Penguins.

    The sixth trade of the day saw the Oilers send F Teddy Purcell to the Florida Panthers for a 3rd round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft.

    Finally, the last trade on February 27th witnessed the Buffalo Sabres trade F Jason Akeson, F Phil Varone, D Jerome Gauthier-Leduc and a conditional 7th round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft to the Ottawa Senators in exchange for D Michael Sdao, F Eric O’Dell, F Cole Schneider and F Alex Guptill.

    On February 28th the Carolina Hurricanes dealt F Eric Staal to the New York Rangers in  exchange for F Aleksi Saarela, a 2nd round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft and a 2nd round pick in the 2017 NHL Entry Draft.

    The New York Rangers traded F Ryan Bourque to the Washington Capitals in exchange for F Chris Brown.

    In the third trade of February 28th, the Carolina Hurricanes acquired F Valentin Zykov and a conditional 5th round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft and sent F Kris Versteeg to the Los Angeles Kings.

    Finally, the Washington Capitals closed out trading on February 28th by sending F Brooks Laich, D Connor Carrick and a 2nd round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft to the Toronto Maple Leafs in exchange for F Daniel Winnik and a 5th round pick in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft (previously acquired from the Anaheim Ducks).

     

  • TRADE: Phaneuf sent to Sens in nine player deal

    By: Nick Lanciani

    With the trade deadline approaching on February 29th, I figured it’d be a good idea to recap the deals that are made before then and give you my two cents. So to start, thank you to the Ottawa Senators and Toronto Maple Leafs for giving me the first major trade before the deadline to write about while I’m in between classes.

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    On Tuesday, the Toronto Maple Leafs sent captain Dion Phaneuf to the Ottawa Senators in a large nine-player trade. Toronto also sent forwards Matt Frattin, Casey Bailey and Ryan Rupert, as well as defenseman Cody Donaghey to the Senators in exchange for defenseman Jared Cowen and forwards Milan Michalek, Colin Greening and Tobias Lindberg. The division rival Sens also included their 2nd round pick in the 2017 NHL Entry Draft as part of the deal.

    This trade seemed inevitable, but comes as a bit of a surprise in its quick occurrence. The Senators have been known to have inquired about Phaneuf’s availability in the past, however given how the Phaneuf trade rumor mill had been relatively quiet in the public eye this season, it’s not surprising to be surprised.

    That all might sound like a bunch of nonsense, and in a way it was supposed to not make sense, but listen folks, the Maple Leafs don’t have much hope for the rest of this season. They’ve got room to wheel and deal and have plenty of pieces to offer this season approaching the trade deadline.

    While Toronto shipped Phil Kessel to the Pittsburgh Penguins in the offseason, many were left wondering when the next domino to fall would come in a potential Phaneuf trade, given how Kessel and Phaneuf were high priority assets to move.

    Now the time has come.

    Dion Phaneuf joins the 25-23-6 overall (56 points) Ottawa Senators who are currently sixth in the Atlantic Division, trailing the New York Islanders by four points in the race for the second wild card position for the 2016 Stanley Cup Playoffs. Phaneuf is expected to be paired alongside Cody Ceci on Wednesday night as the Senators take on the Detroit Red Wings.

    Phaneuf, 30, has a lengthy term left on his contract at $7 million AAV through the 2020-2021 season. He’s had 3-21-24 totals so far in 51 games with Toronto this season. Given the youth movement in Ottawa over the last few seasons, he should start picking up more assists and see plenty of time on ice, easing the pressure on the Senators largely young presence on the blue line.

    It’s not that the Senators are inexperienced on the back end of the game, with captain Erik Karlsson leading the charge as the Sens best defenseman (even if he is an offensive defenseman). Plus Ottawa has strength in Ceci, Marc Methot, and Patrick Wiercioch (notice, I didn’t say skill, I just said strength- as in these guys can push around the opposing team, but might not be superstars on their own or when they’re caught on a rush).

    Ottawa has a developing presence on the blue line that’s seen some impressive performance at times from Mark Borowiecki, Chris Wideman, Erik Claesson and company and Phaneuf is only going to bring in more experience to help mold the youth movement into a force to be reckon with.

    Phaneuf was a finalist for the Norris Trophy in the 2007-2008 season, a member of the NHL All-Star Rookie Team in 2006, an NHL First All-Star Team member in 2008, and has been part of three All-Star Game appearances in 2007, 2008 and 2012. He was a ninth overall pick in the 2003 NHL Entry Draft by the Calgary Flames where he scored a career high 20 goals as a rookie in the 2005-2006 season.

    On January 31, 2010, Phaneuf was traded to Toronto in a seven-player trade. He had 120 goals and 424 points in 801 regular season games in his career split between Toronto and Calgary.

    Frattin is a 28-year old forward who has spent the entire 2015-2016 regular season with the Toronto Marlies in the American Hockey League, scoring nine goals, 13 assists and 22 points in 47 games. He had 22-26-48 totals in 59 AHL games last season. In 135 career NHL games, Frattin has 17-18-35 totals split between the Maple Leafs, Los Angeles Kings and Columbus Blue Jackets.

    If a change of scenery can help him now, then what went wrong before?

    Bailey is a 24-year old forward who has 4-14-18 totals in 38 games for the Marlies this season. He has one career NHL goal in six games with the Maple Leafs last season.

    Rupert is a 21-year old forward who has split the year between the Marlies and the Orlando Solar Bears of the ECHL, combing for 9-8-17 totals in 36 games.

    Donaghey is a 19-year old defenseman who has spent the year with the Halifax Mooseheads and the Moncton Wildcats in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. He has 5-17-22 totals in 36 games this season in the Q.

    Perhaps the more surprising elements of the deal were what the Senators gave up in Cowen, Michalek and Greening. Cowen is yet to enter his prime as a defenseman, however had a chance to become the leader of the younger blue liners in Canada’s capital. Cohen’s 6’5″, 238 pound build could prove to be a crucial part to Toronto’s defense if they can find a way to better utilize his size than the Senators did.

    He’s 25-years old and has just four assists in 37 games this season, but could see time with Morgan Rielly or other younger defenseman and turn out to be a puck moving, shut-down, pair. It seems as though the Senators tried to rush his development too quickly before fully understanding what they had before them.

    With Mike Babcock as Toronto’s head coach and his plethora of knowledge from the way he ran Detroit’s brick wall defense over the years, Cowen might finally get his chance to come into his own and shine.

    Cowen was the ninth pick overall in the 2009 NHL Entry Draft for Ottawa and had 15-31-46 totals in 249 career games with the Senators.

    Michalek is a 31-year old forward who can contribute both directly on the scoresheet and indirectly with his presence and puck movement on the ice. His 6-4-10 totals in 32 games this season mirror those of a typical glue guy on any NHL roster.

    Michalek had a career high 35 goals for Ottawa in the 2011-2012 season and was a 20+ goal scorer in four consecutive seasons for the San Jose Sharks and Senators from 2006-2010. He was the sixth overall pick in the 2003 NHL Entry Draft and had 206-232-438 totals in 729 regular season games for San Jose and Ottawa.

    Greening, 29, is another glue guy that had been buried in the AHL this season, having scored seven goals and 13 points in 41 games for the Binghamton Senators. He had 38-49-87 totals in 256 games for Ottawa over appearances in the last six seasons.

    Lindberg is a 20-year old forward who has 5-17-22 totals in 34 games for the baby Senators his first professional season in the AHL. He was the 102nd overall pick of the Ottawa Senators in the fourth round of the 2013 NHL Entry Draft. He had 32-46-78 totals in 67 games last season for the Oshawa Generals in the Ontario Hockey League.

    Again, the Senators face the Red Wings on Wednesday in what will be Phaneuf’s debut with his new team. Meanwhile, the Maple Leafs play the Flames on Tuesday night.