Everything Else

Trickling Down Into Some Tragic Casual Corner – Free Agency Shopping List: Calvin de Haan

By Sam Fels 1909 0

As we continue to take a tour of the NHL’s free agency market, we come to a d-man that has been rumored to be high among the Hawks’ wishlist. He’s also one that’s not going to get the pulse racing for any fans, and that just might be why he’s on the Hawks’ radar.

Short of trading for Justin Faulk or Erik Karlsson, the Hawks aren’t going to be able to find a top pairing d-man. Which means they can’t fashion a typical top pairing. Which doesn’t sound great, and it isn’t. But that doesn’t mean it has to be fatal. The Hawks might be better readjusting their sights to raising the floor of the blue line instead of the ceiling. The Caps just won a Cup with two pairs at the top that were basically the same. So while the Hawks might not have a your normal #1 and #2, maybe they can figure out three second pairings or something like it.

Nothing stands out about de Haan, other than he’s got some funky capitalization. He’s got decent size at 6-1, 198, but isn’t a plodding bruiser. For that size, he’s a plus skater though that doesn’t translate into dynamic offensive play. He probably would infuriate some in the Hawks’ front office by not playing to that size, but his skating ability and good eye for a first pass diffuses a lot of that. He’s not going to jump in the play and blast home slappers on the break, but he can spring the team the other way.

There also might be some diamond-in-the-rough possibility here. Last year, de Haan only played 33 games last year, and spent most of his season with Adam Pelech. Pelech is all kinds of promising but had some growing pains, and they were both playing under Doug Weight whose defensive system would be politely described as “anarchy if it was even that existent. Two years ago de Haan had to drag around the corpse of Denis Seidenberg for a whole season. If you go back three seasons when he was paired with a still useful Travis Hamonic, he was a pretty useful player taking on top assignments for a playoff team. He wasn’t dominant possession-wise but ahead of the team-rate with the hardest assignments. It’s been a while, but it’s still there.

de Haan is only 27, so he’s not out of his prime yet. As for cost, he made $3.3M against the cap last year, and coming off an injury-ravaged season he might be hard-pressed to get more than that. There’s also plenty of other mid-range defensive options for teams, which also might keep his price down, like Toby Enstrom, Mike Green, Jack Johnson, John Moore, and others. He’s certainly not getting more than $4M, which the Hawks can fit.

It’s still something of an odd fit. de Haan is lefty but has played the right side, so you could conceivably pair him with Keith. He’s certainly got the mobility to cover for the mobility that Keith has lost. If he doesn’t play there, he could play with Murphy though it would lack a little get up and go, though might look something like his pairing with Hamonic from the past. But then there’s no one to play with Keith, without another move. Conceivably you could pair him with Gustafsson if you’re buying Goose as a top four on this team, but boy is that a leap.

It’s not the sexiest option, but it’s an option.

Everything Else

Trickling Down Into Some Tragic Casual Corner – Free Agency Shopping List: Paul Stastny

By Sam Fels 2108 0

Your most ambitious/erotic hockey free agency dreams are dead. The Hawks will not get John Tavares. They will not get John Carlson. Those were the biggest pieces out there, and one is staying put while the other won’t entertain the Hawks into his sewing circle. And while the consensus is still that it will be via trade through which the Hawks make changes, that doesn’t mean there aren’t things to be found on the free agent market.

One name that hasn’t been linked to the Hawks is Paul Stastny. Now, maybe he really is a good St. Louis boy and would never dare pull on the red of the dreaded Blackhawks, Maybe he just wants to stay in Winnipeg because he has massive brain damage or something. But they’re going to struggle to find the space to keep him, and if they were going to they probably would have already. He’s out there, he’s better than serviceable, and he solves a lot of problems.

Is Stastny a dynamic scorer? No, and the thing is he never really was. His 28 goals as a rookie are the most he’s ever managed. He hasn’t eclipsed more than 20 in five years. But he consistently gives you 50-60 points if he’s got the talent around him (which he didn’t really in St. Louis as he didn’t play with Tarasenko or Schwartz much and it’s the Blues). He still has a 200-foot game and can kill penalties for you, and while not being the biggest he can play the role of “Annette Frontpresence” pretty effectively as his performances in the playoffs showed.

Under the surface, there are some concerns. Stastny had been a dominant possession player n the past, while taking on the tougher zone starts in St. Louis. But that changed last season, as he started more shifts in the offensive zone than before, and his Corsi went down, even on Winnipeg which itself was a dominant possession team. At 32, that doesn’t figure to get better. He’s also left-handed, and we know that right-handed centers tend to do better with Patrick Kane, which is probably where you’d slot him. But he’s a smart enough player to make that work.

The question is, as always, the money. Stastny just came off a deal that paid him $7 million per season and he’s coming down from that. The issue for the Hawks or anyone else is that any of the teams that get close to John Tavares but don’t get him are going to view Stastny as a Plan B. He makes sense in San Jose. He makes sense in Dallas. Going back to Colorado makes some sense. Quite simply, any team that feels it has to do “something” after losing out on JT is going to drive his price higher than you want.

Second problem is term. At 32, you ideally don’t want to be handing Stastny anything more than three years if you can help it. But as this is almost certainly going to be his last BIG DEAL, he’s going to want to get as many years as possible. Looking at some comps from the past, Martin Hanzal last summer got a three-year deal for $4.7M a year. He was two years younger than Stastny is now. Anisimov’s $4.5M hit seems a decent comparison as well. But given what some teams are going to want to do, you feel like Stastny’s number is going to puncture $5 million, and he may get four or five years.

As for where he fits on the Hawks, he wouldn’t displace Toews as a #1 center and maybe not even Schmaltz as a #2. If you just want a third center, someone that allowed Schmaltz to get the hammock shifts, then there are probably cheaper options. If you want something a little more dynamic and just have three really good centers, Stastny can probably still give you that.