Sens Off-Season

Team: 2021-22 Ottawa Senators

Initial Creation Date: Jul. 4, 2021

Published: Jul. 14, 2021

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

Warning: I accidentally wrote an essay lol. I tried to split it up into different sections (Introductory Comments, Forwards [2C], Defense [1RD], Goalies, Draft, Pierre McGuire, Expansion) if one of those interests you. This is my full take on the off-season as things stand right now.

This off-season isn’t as pivotal for the Sens future as last year was, but there are still some items on the to-do list to support the development of this team. After the disastrous start we had a pretty competitive season the rest of the way (3rd in the North after the 1st month), including a .500 record against the Leafs and a 6-3-1 record against the Habs, who stay in our division next year. Norris/Batherson/Stutzle/Brannstrom will be going into their 2nd full season, Pinto’s made it and JBD will likely earn a spot quickly (TDL), and Sanderson will join after the college season, so the long term core of this team is arriving and gaining experience, and that’s a good thing. All we need are a couple pieces to add depth and make them earn their way onto the team to keep them hungry.

Forwards:
The main priority here is to get Tkachuk and Batherson signed. Tkachuk should be locked up for 8 years imo, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see Batherson bridged (either 2 years at ~3mil or 6 years at ~4.5mil for him I reckon). Only real need is a 2C. The Tkachuk-Norris-Batherson line is great, Stutzle and either C. Brown or Dadonov are solid 2nd line wingers. The remaining RW along with White/Pinto/Paul/Formenton/Watson/Bishop/Amadio makes for a decent bottom six, you can mix and match a lot of those guys at different positions. White’s still an enigma, he might come out of camp earning that 2C role, or he might settle in as a 3rd liner, maybe even on the RW (Dadonov can slide to the left). It’s about time he established what he is, and I think one way or another that’ll happen this year. He needs to force his way into the long term plans of this team if he doesn’t want to become just an expendable depth piece. Luckily he’s got all the tools to play different styles (good skill, good defense, etc.) but he needs to find a line, stick on it, and prove himself. Logan Brown’s probably done as a Senator, wouldn’t be surprised to see him dealt this off-season in a Lias Andersson type deal, or maybe as the closer in a package, there’s just no room for him. Same deal with Tierney but he’s actually an established 3C, he’s probably Seattle bait or dealt for a pick, can’t imagine him sticking around to play 4C again and Pinto/White are better.

On the 2C:
There are some decent options here. The worst is probably just give it to White, he might earn it in camp, but he hasn’t earned the right to just be pencilled in there imo. If they don’t bring in someone else and go into camp assuming that’s where he’ll play that’s probably a disappointment. In free agency there are a couple decent options, there are some veteran guys like Stastny or Krejci, or we could get a little spicy and pursue Danault to be a big minute muncher. Via trade there are some interesting options as well. Eichel’s the big fish, but we shouldn’t sell the farm (like, I wouldn’t deal Tkachuk, Norris, Batherson, Stutzle, Chabot, Sanderson, JBD, or Gustavsson, but as long as it’s not outrageous I’d be willing to entertain a package including pieces like Pinto, Brannstrom, 10oa, etc.). Could definitely put a deal together with 5 or 6 interesting futures and not have to send any cap back, which might be interesting to Buffalo (seems like most teams in on him want to include at least one active piece, and it’s not generally a U23 NHLer, it’s a guy with some cap). Don’t think we’re a frontrunner there though. Reinhart’s a guy that’s very interesting though, I could see him being a fit (apparently we don’t want to give 10oa for him though, which kinda makes sense, so Buffalo might try to find a team willing to give up their 1st this year, they like this draft). Other guys potentially on the trade market include Monahan, Kadri, Henrique, and Johansen, who are all decent options (I’d probably have Kadri ahead of Monahan ahead of Henrique ahead of RyJo for those 4, mainly because of term, last 2 are probably dumps where we pick up more assets). TyJo could also be interesting—but only if we can pick up one of Joseph or Foote (maybe add a pick too) for taking on his contract. Finally, there’s Giroux and Stamkos. As a massive Stamkos fan I’d love to have him on the team, and I think he’d mesh very well with Stutzle and act as a good mentor with plenty of playoff experience for all of our young guys. Giroux is in a similar boat, albeit with less playoff experience and no rings, although I’d probably prefer Stamkos tbh.

Defense:
Chabot’s the 1LD. I really like the Brannstrom-Zub duo as the 2nd pair, I’d hope that stays together for a full year, I think Zub’s skillset complements Brannstrom’s excellently, allowing him to be creative offensively while not worrying about the D zone as much, because Zub can handle it. If this is our 2nd pair I’d be fine with it. Mete at 3LD is fine, good spot for him, don’t think he’ll get any higher but he can be an everyday guy on that 3rd pair. The spare LD isn’t of too much concern, I’d probably have Alsing there but I didn’t get to see any of the games he played this year so if he sucked then just bring in a random spare guy or get one off waivers (guys like Rosen, Kylington, or Sbisa would be fine). This leaves us with 3 RD (Zaitsev/J. Brown/JBD) and holes at 1RD, 3RD, and spare RD. Perfect fit right? Unfortunately not exactly. I’d probably start JBD on the top pair in Belleville next year to get him some big minutes at the pro level, it would be better for his development than sitting in the press box or playing 10 minutes a night. J. Brown I’d prefer to have in the spare RD slot but it’s not the end of the world if he’s on the 3rd pair. Zaitsev is a weird one. I would personally have him on the 3rd pair (he had a good start, but he’s really not that good. I didn’t think it was too horrendous when he was paired with Mete though, especially if they only get like 14-16 minutes a night). The Sens seem to really like him for some reason though, and will probably play him in the top pair, likely with Chabot, if nothing changes. That would be bad I think. This leaves us with our 2nd major hole—1RD, a partner for Chabot.

On the 1RD:
There are once again several options here. The worst is plugging Zaitsev in there. There are some decent options in free agency though. Savard or Larsson on a 1-2 year deal would probably be fine. Hamilton is the big fish, if he was willing to come to Ottawa that would be excellent. Chabot-Hamilton is an elite first pair that only Vegas could really match. If we split them up in a couple years like Vegas has done with Theo and Petro (Chabot-JBD Sanderson-Hamilton Brannstrom-Zub) we could have one of the most dominant and deep D corps in the league. He’d be an excellent target. I’d give him the Pietrangelo deal to entice him to come here (sounds like his value is probably a little lower than that, but we’re not gonna be contenders for a couple years so if he doesn’t get enough money from a good team because they can’t afford it, we might be able to get him here on a max term 8.5mil+ deal). Via trade, I’m not really sure how much there is. We could get Jones I suppose, but I’m not a huge fan of his, if we’re giving out massive contracts I would like them to at least be to players who have been good analytically and in Norris conversations recently. Doubt Tampa considers moving Cernak but if they do I’d be first in line. Foote from Tampa would be a piece I’m interested in too (could ask for him as compensation for dumping TyJo). Maybe Dumba, but I don’t think he fits too well, and with the Suter buyout he might not be available anymore.

Note: If a left-shot defensive defenseman becomes available, I could see them pursuing that as a short-term fix as well, at the end of the day we just need better guys on our blueline ASAP. A guy like Ryan Graves springs to mind immediately, Dorion should definitely be pursuing him, either from Colorado or Seattle. If Oleksiak can be had for a good price in free agency he could be an option too, but I expect him to attract a lot of interest.

Goalies:
Pretty straightforward. Murray is the starter, Forsberg is the backup. Gustavsson is the AHL starter, splitting time with Daccord. Forsberg likely gets flipped at some point (Ryan Kennedy of THN theorized that it could be this week, to a team without a signed goalie to meet exposure requirements for the expansion draft, but I figure as a deadline depth rental is more likely, especially if he has a decent season) and Gustavsson would then come up to be the full time backup from then on. Mandolese and Sogaard will likely split time in the ECHL. Merilainen will stay in Finland for a couple years, he should be splitting the net with Blomqvist in Karpat next year (it’ll be interesting to see if they do an even split or if one of them takes control, I think Blomqvist is higher rated at the moment but Merilainen’s been very good in the U20 league).

Draft:
If we don’t trade the 10th overall pick for Eichel, I reckon we hang onto it. I would target Mason McTavish or Chaz Lucius, both forwards fit our timeline and at least one should be available by the time we pick. McTavish would be a real good 2C that fits our heavy style of play, and Lucius is a pure sniper (and most importantly a right shot) that excels at faceoffs, but even if he shifts to RW you can never have enough pure snipers, he should complement Stutzle very well. If Gustavsson is selected by Seattle because we foolishly protected Murray I would say our focus should shift to drafting Wallstedt or Cossa, Sogaard looks good but we can’t place the entire weight of goaltending for our franchise long term on his shoulders alone. I think McTavish has pushed his way into the top group of skaters and I would expect him to be gone by the time we pick, making my selection Lucius. In the 2nd round we have two early picks (38 and 41) and I’d probably just go with two more forwards. If L’Heureux slips I’m jumping all over that, same with Othmann (I see some mocks having him slip to the late 1st or lower, I reckon he should go top 25 at worst). More realistic picks (maybe) would be guys like Pinelli, Pastujov, Samoskevich, Olausson, Chibrikov, Johnston, Coronato, Boucher, Kapanen, and Stankoven. Obviously I think most of those guys should go in the mid- to late-1st, but a couple should slip and I’d be happy with any of these guys. In the 3rd I’d go for a high upside pick like Heimosalmi or Kirsanov (again, some rankings have them higher, some have them slipping, making them real wildcards and probably nice value picks in the 3rd). We don’t have a 4th or 5th, and I don’t go deep enough into the draft to know all the good 6th and 7th rounders out there, so I’ll just say I expect one of them to be used on a goalie (Boyko or Bartoszkiewicz spring to mind as potential high upside steals), or a guy that’s impressed on an international level (like Florian Elias, an overager who had good chemistry with Stutzle at the WJC for Germany and performed well in the DEL, or Danila Klimovich, who had 6 goals in 5 games at the U18s for Belarus this year.

Pierre McGuire:
I cannot believe we hired this clown. At arguably the most important developmental period in the history of our franchise, we hire a TV personality who is widely regarded as the absolute worst head coach in NHL history and a terrible, annoying analyst, to lead our player development department. It’s unfathomable how stupid this hiring is. He has not worked in an NHL franchise in 25 years, literally since before I was born, and his way of thinking has not evolved since he was let go from his last gig. A guy who is as against analytics as Mr. McIdiot is not a guy I want anywhere near my team. There are so many negative things to say about this hiring, I just have no idea how having a guy that knows the team Benoit Pouliot played for when he was 9 years old is helpful to the direction this franchise is going. I am 100% convinced this is a Melnyk hiring to try and either force Dorion to take less money on his extension next summer because there’s the threat of a replacement (*shudder*) in-house, or actually be that replacement and assume the GM job within the next year (I might actually cry if this happened). I had long assumed that everyone had collectively agreed that Pierre would be interviewed for every job just so he could leak it and feed his own ego, but never actually get offered any of the positions, and now MY team is the one that broke that unwritten rule, and I am incensed. That being said, I have decided to give him the benefit of the doubt (and I stress, this is ONLY because I have no choice in the matter, and not because I believe any good will come from this) and I have reached so far to try and come up with a few reasons why this could turn out okay:

1. We don’t have to hear him on TV anymore. Admittedly this is mostly for the American audience, thankfully I only hear him at the world juniors sometimes or in highlights (when I was watching some first round action of American teams on NBC though I had to listen to him, needless to say I watched those games on mute), but still, it’s better than nothing. At least he won’t ruin any more iconic goals with his obnoxious voice spewing word vomit.
2. We hired SOMEONE. Melnyk is widely known to be extremely thrifty, so at least we hired another member to our staff. That’s a slightly encouraging sign. Would I have preferred literally anyone else not named Slava Voynov or Anthony DeAngelo? Yes, obviously. But at least it’s a start (hopefully).
3. This is a favour Melnyk is doing for him as a stepping stone. I assume he took this job because he couldn’t get a TV gig at ESPN or TNT. Ideally, he uses this opportunity to say “See? I got hired and did some stuff for an NHL team this century, I know what I’m talking about” and gets picked up later by one of those networks, or better yet springboards into a GM job, a position that he’s long been rumoured to be a candidate for for some reason, somewhere else (as long as it’s not Ottawa or Calgary I’m fine with it).
4. He can public speak and I would like to hear him talk slightly more than Melnyk. Obviously one of the knocks on Dorion is that he’s not a great public speaker, and that’s unlikely to change at this point. If there’s one thing McGuire can do, it’s yap on endlessly, I’m convinced he’s in love with the sound of his own voice. Would I rather hear what Dorion has to say at any given moment? Of course, I think Dorion’s a very good GM and the way he’s built up the future of this team is admirable in my opinion, his insights are generally interesting at least. Would I rather hear Melnyk talk than McGuire? Absolutely not, under no circumstances, ever. McGuire may cause physical damage to my eardrums as he pretends to be the smartest person in the room every time he opens his mouth, but that is slightly preferable to Melnyk causing me months of stress every time he makes the news as he invariably says something stupid that makes me completely lose faith that anything good will ever happen to this organization.
5. He does know a lot of things. Many of them useless, he’s basically EliteProspects combined with HockeyDB: the person, but our pro scouting does leave something to be desired (if he even sniffs the amateur scouting department he should be punted to the door immediately), so if there’s any chance he could help with the pro scouting a bit, that might be a positive impact he could have. Unfortunately I don’t hold out too much faith given his anti-analytics stance (which is outdated and archaic, obviously) but I figured it could still get listed as a maybe.
6. His 7 player plan bs might actually convince Melnyk to dole out some cash for a big fish. First of all, I want to say that the whole concept of the 7 player plan or whatever the hell it’s called is pretty stupid. It basically boils down to have good centres, defensemen, and a good goalie and you win. Like, wow. Such good insight. I am so amazed. Sarcasm aside, if I’m remembering correctly from a podcast I heard discussing it (I couldn’t bring myself to watch the actual press conference/interview or whatever yet, maybe in a couple days) he thinks that Ottawa has like 4 of the 7, and thinks more can be developed internally. The way I see it, one of the two centres is Josh Norris. The power forward is obviously Brady Tkachuk. The elite offensive defenseman is Thomas Chabot. I would hope these are 3 of the guys he sees right now. In the system, the utility/specialist forward could either be Shane Pinto or Ridly Greig (Pinto may be the 4th player already as a guy that can play both ways and is good at faceoffs, could also say Connor Brown as a PP/PK guy, or maybe even have Tim Stutzle there as an offensive/PP specialist). The defensive defenseman should be filled internally by Jake Sanderson or Jacob Bernard-Docker (both also candidates to be the 4th guy mentioned). The elite goalie could potentially be Matt Murray (if he bounces back), Filip Gustavsson (if his development continues and he builds on a solid showing this year), or Mads Sogaard (arguably the highest potential, and he’s massive, still raw though, and needs at least 2-3 years in the AHL). Those are the 3 main guys I’d look at in net, Daccord is kinda just there, I don’t think his upside is as high but he could be a solid backup maybe. I’d expect them to draft another goalie this year (guys in the later rounds like Boyko or Bartoszkiewicz come to mind). At the end of the day, our prospect pool is pretty solid at every one of the positions save for one—elite centres. I believe Norris is one, although I think he’d be best served as a 2C (Tkachuk-Norris-Batherson is a LETHAL 2nd line, and Stutzle should be on the first line eventually, preferably with a better centre). We don’t exactly have another can’t-miss centre though. Pinto might be, he improves every year, but that would definitely be more of a pleasant surprise, rather than something we can bank on. Chaz Lucius (or McTavish, or maybe even a guy like Sillinger or Svechkov if they value them highly and reach for them) may be the guy in the draft this year. But if the organization has this discussion and thinks they’d like something better to fit McGuire’s plan, I can see two potential paths coming about as a result, both of which I’m a fan of. The first is trying Stutzle at centre. If this works, and Stutzle becomes an elite first line centre, that would be fantastic. It didn’t seem like the organization was too keen on trying this at the end of the season, it seemed like they were pretty satisfied with having a dominant LW with him and Tkachuk, but McGuire may push them to try Stutzle up the middle, and if it works that would be great. The other option is to pursue Eichel. Now we shouldn’t sell the whole farm, but if we put together a package of futures (Pinto, Brannstrom, 10oa, L. Brown, Thomson, etc. come to mind as potential pieces to include, could also throw in a young guy like Colin White with some upside who might just need a change of scenery but has a pretty decent floor regardless), we might be an appealing Eichel suitor. The Sabres are very unlikely to find a futures package as good as the one the Sens could put together from anybody else (the Rangers could probably match, but they don’t have a young C as good as Pinto imo, which Buffalo should definitely be looking for, and they also have a lower 1st. Some teams, like LAK and ANA, can offer a higher 2021 1st, but likely won’t include other top level assets like Zegras, Drysdale, Byfield, etc. so Ottawa might be able to outbid them by including more very good prospects thanks to the extreme depth of our pipeline. LAK could outbid if they throw up Turcotte+Kaliyev+8oa but like, will they? And will they be willing to not throw in any cap?). So basically this point boils down to McGuire may influence the Sens to play Stutzle at centre or pursue Eichel vigorously, which would be nice.

Expansion:
Up front, there are 6 no-brainers for me. Tkachuk, Batherson, and C. Brown are unquestionable, and I reckon Paul, White, and Dadonov are pretty easy to protect as well. The 7th forward would be one of L. Brown, Tierney, Bishop, Amadio, Watson, and Abramov. Abramov signed a 2-year KHL deal so that’s probably his protection (I do like him as a prospect though, I woulda had him protected prior to him signing that deal). Watson isn’t worth protecting, and at this point L. Brown doesn’t hold much value, and likely needs a change of scenery, so he probably gets exposed (I think he gets moved regardless this summer). I would protect one of Bishop/Amadio, whichever the team likes more as the 4C (for me that’s Bishop but I didn’t catch Amadio’s 5 games so maybe they liked him more. Ultimately ekther works. Tierney likely gets left exposed, he just doesn’t fit as a 4C and with the development of Pinto that’s where he’d play.

On D, Chabot is a no brainer, and I’d say Mete is a pretty clear pick too. The organization probably protects Zaitsev and exposes J. Brown, I would personally flip it around because I’m not a Zaitsev fan, but it doesn’t really matter, both scenarios meet the exposure requirements and neither D likely gets taken anyway.

In net is the most interesting conversation. I think the organization probably believes in Murray and protects him as their current starter, but this would expose Gustavsson, who I see as their long term starter (AHL starter next year, moving into the full time backup job either at the TDL or next off-season after a cup of coffee in the NHL, and going up from there). I would personally protect the kid, exposing Murray and hoping his contract acts as pseudo-protection (there are probably 5 better, less expensive goalies that Seattle should take before Murray so it’s a fair bet).

Best players available are Tierney, one of Bishop/Amadio, and Gustavsson (if he’s exposed). I think Seattle takes Tierney to be their 3C, as their centre options are VERY limited, and he could use a change of scenery to bounce back as a solid 2-way 3rd line guy.