In what appears to be a nod to the new coaching staff, Ottawa signed former Ranger pick (4-107/05) Tom Pyatt, younger brother of Taylor, who spent the last two seasons playing for Geneva in the Swiss league. Prior to his time in Europe he spent four unproductive seasons in the NHL (mostly for Tampa Bay, 205-25-24-49 PPG 0.23). Unquestionably he’s Binghamton-bound and if there’s a potential silver lining in his middling career AHL numbers (156-32-51-83 PPG 0.53) it’s that in his final half-season in Hamilton he was on a torrid pace (41-13-22-35). It’s worth pointing out the 09-10 Hamilton roster was stacked, so that impacted his production. Realistically Pyatt is a borderline second-liner in the AHL and seemingly not the kind of asset Binghamton really needs, but I’ll hold off calling it a bad move until the roster is filled out.
I’m not sure what WTYKY as a site is anymore, but Luke P decided it was a good idea to attack the fanbase as a preamble to praising Chris Phillips (who not long after retired). I don’t want to dwell on it too much, but let’s go over it briefly:
Essentially Sens fans have adopted the worst qualities of the fanbases that surround us
Luke’s evidence for this is…he offers none (just anecdotal references to radio show call-ins and social media). The characterization is meant as a backdrop for praising the Big Rig, but it seems an odd sort of crutch to use. I also remain puzzled by his inability to separate criticism of someone’s performance as a professional (in this case, as a hockey player) and who they are as a person (we’ve seen this in recent discussions of Luke Richardson and Mark Borowiecki, for instance). Phillips might be a saintly human being, but that’s inconsequential to who he was as a player. Ross A has praised the post without explanation (presumably referring to the comments on the Big Rig rather than the description of the fanbase–after all, The Silver Seven can’t get too negative).
Not surprisingly we hear that the Sens are likely to move Alex Chiasson, one of the poster-boys for how badly Murray has been beaten in trades during his time in Ottawa. Nichols goes through his time with the team, including perceptions and organisational hype, but it can be summed up best this way:
He was given ample opportunity to play on the power play and play even strength minutes alongside skilled players. He just didn’t get the job done.
Amen.
[A late add: Mikael Wikstrand signed a four-year extension with Farejestad; that his future with Ottawa was over was never in doubt, but with the length of the contract means the Sens have surrendered any ability to make use of him as an asset short-term (they continue to control his rights, but with no out-clause in the contract they can make no use of it until it ends. A suitably botched end to a ridiculous situation.]
More free agent signings: Tim Heed was signed by San Jose (identified on my FA list from a year ago), as was Yohann Auvitu by New Jersey.
This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)
eyeonthesens 