The Canucks may not be back on the ice until Thursday, but on Monday, the front office put in a half-day at least, inking depth defenceman Alex Biega to a two-year, $1.5 million contract extension.
Biega will earn $700k in the first year of the deal and $800k in the second, and that's a guarantee: it's a one-way deal for both years, so Biega gets an NHL salary regardless of whether he's sent down to Utica or not.
That has to feel pretty good for the defender, who was waived by the Canucks in training camp, then returned to the big club as an injury replacement early in the year and played well enough to keep the job. Now, the team that was willing to let Biega go for nothing just five months ago is paying him for two more years of his service. That's a big win for a guy who made his NHL debut this time last year, at the age of 26.
The question, of course, is whether this is a win for the Canucks, and that depends. Are you looking at this deal in a vacuum? Or are you comparing it to the Eli Roth movie that is Luca Sbisa's $3.6 million contract? Because only one of these approaches is going to make you happy.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ pic.twitter.com/sDvif72BKU
— Catherine Silverman (@CataCarryOn) February 2, 2016
Safe to say that if you compare Sbisa and Biega, Biega comes out on top. Based on this chart, he creates offence at a borderline top-four level, and defends well enough for a top-six role. Quality depth defender. Exactly the type of guy any team needs. Sbisa, on the other hand, struggles all across the board. Although I've heard he's good at being in the defensive zone, and that's definitely an important place to have defenders.
So yeah. Sbisa outearns Biega by a sizeable amount, and probably won't outplay him very often. But we knew that well before Monday night's signings, so it sure seems like a waste of emotional energy to bemoan the Canucks for last year's bad deal on the day they made a good one. Plus, as Louis C.K. once said, “The only time you look in your neighbor's bowl is to make sure that they have enough." Luca Sbisa has more than enough, clearly. Stop looking into his bowl.
The deal leaves the Canucks with three blueliners unsigned for 2015-16: Dan Hamhuis, Matt Bartkowski, and Yannick Weber, and at this point, one wonders if any of the three will return. Hamhuis seems likely to be trade bait, provided he can use this month to convince potential suitors that he's ready to be back on the ice following his ugly facial injury. There are teams that would take him if he is. CSN Mid-Atlantic suggested the Capitals, home of Hamhuis's former coach Barry Trotz:
I could see [GM Brian MacLellan] going hard after Vancouver Canucks pending free agent Dan Hamhuis, who spent the first six years of his NHL career under Barry Trotz in Nashville. Now 33, Hamhuis is recovering from facial fractures suffered on a Dan Boyle shot he took to the jaw back in December. Hamhuis needed extensive surgery to repair the fractures and is expected to return to the Canucks’ lineup in the next week or two. The Canucks are five points out of a wild card spot and could be willing to move Hamhuis, a reliable, two-way, 6-foot-1, 209-pound defenseman from Smithers, B.C. Hamhuis has a full no-move clause in his contract but would likely agree to be dealt to a Stanley Cup contender coached by Barry Trotz, who has a great deal of respect for Hamhuis on and off the ice. Hamhuis is in the final year of a contract that carries a cap hit of $4.5 million and could be slotted anywhere in the Caps’ top six. To get a player like Hamhuis, who has 841 games of NHL experience and 62 more in the playoffs, the Caps might have to part with their first-round draft pick, which could be the 30th pick overall, along with a prospect or roster player such as Stan Galiev.
A prospect and a late first? If Hamhuis pulls that kind of return, the Canucks will probably be inviting him to move on, tank or no tank.
As for Weber, the right-hander has lost his job twice this season -- first to Ben Hutton, and now, clearly, to Alex Biega. One assumes neither Weber nor the Canucks are pleased by that, and with the Biega signing (not to mention Jordan Subban, another righty, playing well in Utica), I'd say the Canucks have already made the choice to move on. With Bartkowski, it's hard to say right now. The Canucks seem more enamored with Bartkowski than we are here at PITB. His lefty status will help him too, since it means his primary competition for a third-pairing role is Luca Sbisa.
And I've got a chart that suggests Sbisa's not very effective.
