Worsteverything writes at length about the Sens fourth line, but I’m only interested in one thing he said:
I couldn’t help but find it odd that the whole reason Dorion brought in Chris Kelly was to provide “much needed veteran stability to the 4th line”. When I initially heard the news I thought, “Yeah that make sense”
I remain mystified (as I was at the time) why so many Sens bloggers embraced the move to bring back Kelly. He’s been exactly as disappointing as I expected. I suppose most people are more nostalgic than I am.
There’s a great quote from Ryan Lambert amidst a great piece talking about the Sens:
At the absolute most, you’d have to say they’re a largely untalented but moderately well-coached team that is mediocre or a little worse.
Exactly. This is why all the short-term thinking is counterproductive, but Melnyk’s desperation for playoff cash makes it difficult for any GM to let reality sink in. These comments apparently irritated the fan base, but Nichols calmly breaks it down for those who were rustled by the piece.
Former BSen Patrick Mullen attempted to return to the team from the KHL, but was claimed off of waivers by the Amerks. This move would have made a lot of sense if it had gone through. The BSens followed it up with an odd trade, sending future considerations to acquire Iowa Wild to acquire forward Marc Hagel (it seems Hagel asked for a trade). The 28-year old, undrafted NCAA winger has spent four seasons with Iowa (including this one) and is on a declining arc (PPG in brackets):
2013-14 46-8-7-15 (0.32)
2014-15 67-12-21-33 (0.49)
2015-16 53-4-15-19 (0.35)
2016-17 26-2-5-7 (0.26)
He’s been playing fourth-line minutes on the punchless Wild, which is likely where he’ll slot on the BSens. Either Kleinendorst will go back to dressing six defensemen or else scratch someone like Alex Krushelnyski to fit him into the lineup. Either way, Kleinendorst is familiar with Hagel, having coached him for parts of his first two professional seasons.
In other news the Albany Devils will move to Binghamton to replace the Senators next season.
Joel Vanderlaan writes a splash piece about the move from Binghamton to Belleville, but as sources includes a broken link, an indirect link, and no link at all–things easily fixed. It doesn’t appear as though there’s any new information here, as the majority of the substance comes from an old Intelligencer article (March 24, 2015) that explored the loss of the OHL Bulls (cf my original story about it).
This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)
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