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A Plausible Scenario Where the 18-19 Senators are a Good Team

January 14, 2019, 3:26 AM ET [21 Comments]
Trevor Shackles
Ottawa Senators Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
You can follow me on Twitter @ShackTS

Everybody knows where the Senators sit right now as an organization. Eugene Melnyk even said they’re “in the dumpster” and that was before some initial optimism towards this season. The “funny” thing about where they sit though is that it’s not impossible to imagine their team being quite good in 2018-19, actually. Obviously, any potential scenario where they are good would have to stretch reality a bit because of Melnyk’s spending habits, but if we’re talking purely about hockey trades and signings, Ottawa could easily have a good team right now.

So what I want to do today is see exactly how the 18-19 Senators could have been good. No, of course all of these things were never going to happen, but each individual item is not far-fetched at all. The point of this is to show that Dorion and the Senators have made so many wrong steps along the way that have severely hurt the team’s chances of winning. Hindsight is always 20/20, but many of these moves (or lack thereof) looked bad at the time too. You’ll have to use your imagination for some because of external factors but let's just go with it. Let’s take a look at how Ottawa could have a playoff team, and perhaps even a contender right now:

1. Erik Karlsson trade reversed

Look, we know that if Dorion worked for an owner with deeper pockets, he would not have traded Karlsson. But for the sake of this article, let’s assume that ownership is a lot more flexible and Karlsson could have stayed. The trade might not turn out horribly bad if Josh Norris and Rudolfs Balcers continue their promising development, but I’d still rather have the future hall-of-fame defenseman.

With Karlsson back in the fold, that instantly brings up the floor of the team.

2. Mike Hoffman trade reversed

This is another situation that isn’t black and white, and context is needed to understand why he was traded. I’ll still argue that Dorion could have gotten a better return for Hoffman, but that’s a discussion for another day. Let’s assume that the alleged harassment never occurred, and the Hoffman’s and Karlsson’s had no bad blood. The Senators would have a top-six sniper, giving them another threat on the left wing.

3. Don’t re-sign Craig Anderson/Mike Condon, trade for Philipp Grubauer (or sign UFA goalie)

Craig Anderson was re-signed in 2017 before the season even began. If Ottawa had waited a few months to see how he was holding up at the age of 36, there’s no way that they would have wanted to re-sign him (or perhaps a one-year deal would have been signed). As much as I feel bad for him due to the horrific team in front of him, he isn’t a quality starter anymore. Furthermore, Mike Condon did not need to be signed for three years either, so this past off-season Ottawa would have been looking for a goalie.

A good way to get a goalie if you have not developed one is to trade for an elite backup who appears to be on the cusp of a breakout. Philipp Grubauer was a hot name in the off-season, and Ottawa could have acquired him for a 2nd round pick (plus a bit more since Washington dumped Brooks Orpik’s salary as well) as the Avalanche did. He hasn’t gotten off to a good start with just an .895 SV% in 20 games, but his overall track record of a .918 SV% in 120 games is much more impressive and I think he will bounce back. On a rate basis, he has been worse than Anderson this season, but I’d much rather have Grubauer moving forward, plus in any random 20 game sample on a different team he could look good like he always is.

If you're not a fan of Grubauer, then one of Robin Lehner or Mikko Kosinen could have been signed as a free agent instead. The point is that there were options out there and they should not have shackled themselves to Anderson and Condon. For simplicity’s sake, I’ll say that the Anders Nilsson trade still happened and that he is the backup.

4. Trade Cody Ceci+ for Taylor Hall

Last January, Darren Dreger reported that Ottawa was in talks with Edmonton regarding a Taylor Hall for Cody Ceci trade in 2016:




I’m sure the Senators would have been giving up a bit more like a pick or a prospect, but then again, the trade with Adam Larsson was straight up. Even if the Senators had to give up their future 2017 first round pick or a good prospect, it would have easily been worth it because Ceci doesn’t bring any positive value. It was pretty clear that he wasn’t a good defenseman after the 2015-16 season too, so this isn’t some “only in hindsight” hypothetical. Taylor Hall has always been fantastic, and he could’ve easily been a Senator.

5. Mika Zibanejad trade reversed

Dorion recouped some good assets in the second Derick Brassard trade by turning him into Filip Gustavsson, Jacob-Bernard Docker, Johnny Tychonick, and a 3rd round pick, but there was no reason to move Mika Zibanejad in the first place. He is still just 25 years old and was 23 at the time of the trade. You could have maybe made the case that Brassard was slightly better at the time, but it wasn’t much of a difference, plus Ottawa gave up a 2nd round pick, and Zibanejad is also six years younger.

Now Brassard looks dreadful in Pittsburgh, and Zibanejad is enjoying a career year in New York with 37 points in 45 games. A Duchene/Zibanejad one-two punch would be tremendous.

6. Sign UFA defenseman

After moving Cody Ceci in the summer of 2016, Ottawa would have been looking for a right-handed defenseman on the second pairing. I wasn’t planning on giving a specific name, but Jason Demers would have been a perfect fit. He signed with the Florida Panthers for 5 years at a cap hit of $4.5M, which is certainly reasonable for a quality second pairing defenseman who was only 28 when he signed the deal.

He is an underrated player but would slot in nicely as a big upgrade over Ceci. This doesn’t have to be Demers either, Ottawa could have gone after any similar player in free agency or in a trade. They didn’t need a star, they just needed someone quietly valuable like Demers.

7. Keep Chris Wideman

Because he’s been traded twice this season and waived once, people will appeal to GMs authority and assume that he’s washed up already. He certainly wasn’t from 2016-18 and in fact, he was one of the best third pairing defensemen in the league. He’s incredibly cheap at just $1M, and I don’t think you’re getting much better bang for your buck for a depth defenseman. Sure, he struggled a bit early in the season, but so have most of the Senators defensemen, and the longer track record shows that he is a great fit on the third pairing. Plus it’s not as if there are many better options for cheap right-handed defensemen.

8. Qualify Fredrik Claesson

All the Senators had to do to keep Claesson was give him a qualifying offer since he was an RFA. He’s making just $700k this season with the Rangers, and fans have grown to like him despite still getting the short end of the stick a lot of the time. Just like Wideman, he is a good third pairing option and has put up better results than players like Ben Harpur, Mark Borowiecki, and even Max Lajoie. He isn’t going to wow you, but you can’t go wrong for this price.

After all is said and done, their roster could look like this:



The forwards look incredibly lethal, especially that top line. The defense isn’t the best in the league or anything, but I like that group a lot. The goaltending is probably the weakest area, but as I mentioned, Ottawa could have easily signed someone such as Robin Lehner or Mikko Koskinen, so it’s not as if there weren’t options.

The elephant in the room is obviously that this roster would be just $6.1M under the cap. With a Melnyk-owned team, that is not happening. Furthermore, this does not include future raises for Matt Duchene, Mark Stone, Erik Karlsson, and Ryan Dzingel. It would be a tight cap crunch, but some solutions to make this team more palatable could be:

1. Trade Jean-Gabriel Pageau for futures. This would save $3.1M on the books.
2. Buyout Bobby Ryan’s final four seasons. His cap hit would be $3.58M for the next four seasons (including this one), plus $1.83M for the following four seasons after that. That would save $3.66M on the cap right away.
3. Either bury Zack Smith in the minors or package him with a C+ prospect to get rid of his contract. Sending him down would save $2.225M, and getting rid of him completely would save $3.25M.

Let’s assume that Ottawa is able to move both Pageau and Smith, and buyout Ryan. That would save ~$10M, giving the Senators some leeway. That would leave a hole up front, and they could have easily filled that by signing a cheap 4th liner this summer or in 2017. Names like Austin Czarnik, Daniel Carr, Kenny Agostino were out there, and although they aren't significant additions, they would just need to be good enough to be 4th liners. After those changes, here is what a different lineup could look like:



This lineup is definitely a bit thinner in terms of depth and I don’t love having to force Drake Batherson in there, but they also have just over $14M in cap space. Let’s say that Karlsson gets a new contract worth $11M, Stone worth $9M, Duchene worth $8M, and Dzingel worth $5M. That would equal $11.35M in raises, which is definitely a lot. Amazingly though, it would still put them under the cap for 2019-20.

So this is a scenario where the Senators are a great team on paper in 2018-19, but also have enough room to keep all of their impending free agents. In total, here are the “additions” that they theoretically could have had:

-Taylor Hall
-Erik Karlsson
-Mike Hoffman
-Mika Zibanejad
-Jason Demers
-Philipp Grubauer
-Fredrik Claesson
-Chris Wideman
-Kenny Agostino

And the losses would include:

-Mikkel Boedker
-Chris Tierney
-Dylan DeMelo
-JG Pageau
-Zack Smith
-Bobby Ryan
-Mark Borowiecki
-Craig Anderson
-Mike Condon
-Cody Ceci
-Magnus Paajarvi
-(Ben Harpur and Christian Jaros in the minors)

Pageau, Smith, and Ryan don’t necessarily have to be moved for this exercise, but they would have to be moved in order to keep their UFAs in 2019-20. The comparison between these two lists is pretty hilarious though because it’s not even close which one is better.

As I said earlier, I understand that under a Melnyk-owned team, there was no scenario where Karlsson was going to stay, plus Hoffman had to be moved. In addition, it’s not like I’m saying that all of these things collectively should have happened because there are more than just one or two moves. At the same time, none of these scenarios are out of this world like suggesting that they had to win the lottery for Auston Matthews in 2016. Individually, these moves or non-moves could have occurred, which could have definitely made the Senators quite a good team this season.

When you consistently make poor decisions and give yourself million paper cuts, it’s going to add up at some point. That’s what happened with Dorion, and it’s sad this team I have put forward wasn’t even out of the realm of possibility. The butterfly effect means that lots of other things would have changed as well, but that would be a fruitless exercise trying to figure what else would have happened. Oh what could have been...
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