Jul 2, 2015
A slew of talented free agents remain
Cody Franson, Johnny Oduya and Christian Ehrhoff are among the players still on the market as Day 2 of free agency begins. TSN senior hockey reporter Frank Seravalli looks at the best of what's left.
TSN.ca Staff
,With the first six hours of free agency dictating market value, three of TSN’s Top 10 unrestricted free agents inked deals in the latter hours of Day 1.
Clearly, the push for Matt Beleskey, Justin Williams and Antoine Vermette was to sign while the getting was still relatively good - even if the terms were not as generous as they might have hoped.
The first day of free agency was filled with restraint for a change. That self-control from general managers also left a slew of talented, next-wave free agents available on Day 2.
Cody Franson netted more points (36) last season than Beleskey (32) and he’s a big, in-demand, right-shooting defenceman still looking for a job.
The Maple Leafs landed a first-round pick for Franson from the Predators in a February trade. That his numbers and minutes dropped off in Nashville is less indicative of his play and more about the overall depth of the Predators’ defence corps. He is still in the prime of his career and can instantly be plugged into almost any team’s top two pairings.
Then there’s Johnny Oduya, 33, who steadied the Blackhawks on two Stanley Cup runs in the last three seasons. Christian Ehrhoff, 32, struggled to stay on the ice last season in Pittsburgh but is still a capable of eating 20 minutes per night.
Then there is the third tier of defencemen, where a possible value buy like Jan Hejda is available. Hejda just turned 37, but he has only 627 games of wear on his tires.
Chris Stewart, Eric Fehr, Jiri Tlusty and Joel Ward all drew significant interest on Wednesday, but weren’t able to settle on any terms.
Here’s a look at the best of what’s left as Day 2 of the rest of the summer begins:
Available UFAs
Player | POS | Age | Team | GP | G | PTS |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Cody Franson | D | 27 | NSH | 78 | 7 | 36 |
Johnny Oduya | D | 33 | CHI | 76 | 2 | 10 |
Christian Ehrhoff | D | 32 | PIT | 49 | 3 | 14 |
Chris Stewart | RW | 27 | MIN | 81 | 14 | 36 |
Joel Ward | RW | 34 | WSH | 82 | 19 | 34 |
Eric Fehr | C | 29 | WSH | 75 | 19 | 33 |
Jiri Tlusty | C | 27 | WPG | 72 | 14 | 31 |
Shawn Matthias | C | 27 | VAN | 78 | 18 | 27 |
Curtis Glencross | C | 32 | WSH | 71 | 13 | 35 |
Mike Santorelli | C | 30 | NSH | 79 | 12 | 33 |
Lee Stempniak | RW | 32 | WPG | 71 | 15 | 28 |
Martin Erat | RW | 33 | ARZ | 79 | 9 | 32 |
Tomas Fleischmann | LW | 31 | FLA | 66 | 8 | 27 |
Stephen Weiss | C | 32 | DET | 52 | 9 | 25 |
Sean Bergenheim | LW | 31 | MIN | 56 | 9 | 19 |
Jarret Stoll | C | 33 | LAK | 73 | 6 | 17 |
Mike Richards | C | 30 | LAK | 53 | 5 | 11 |
Matt Irwin | D | 27 | SJS | 53 | 8 | 19 |
Daniel Paille | LW | 31 | BOS | 71 | 6 | 13 |
Alexander Semin | LW | 31 | CAR | 57 | 6 | 19 |
Erik Cole | LW | 36 | DET | 68 | 21 | 39 |
Lubomir Visnovsky | D | 38 | NYI | 53 | 5 | 20 |
Scottie Upshall | LW | 31 | FLA | 63 | 8 | 16 |
Michael Ryder | RW | 35 | NJD | 47 | 6 | 19 |
Jan Hejda | D | 36 | COL | 81 | 1 | 13 |
Tyler Kennedy | C | 28 | NYI | 38 | 6 | 14 |
Anton Volchenkov | D | 32 | NSH | 46 | 0 | 7 |
Eric Brewer | D | 36 | TOR | 44 | 3 | 11 |
Olli Jokinen | C | 36 | STL | 62 | 4 | 10 |
Matt Cooke | C | 36 | MIN | 29 | 4 | 10 |
Tomas Kopecky | C | 33 | FLA | 64 | 2 | 8 |
Marty Havlat | RW | 34 | NJD | 40 | 5 | 14 |
Marcel Goc | C | 31 | STL | 74 | 3 | 9 |
Ray Emery | G | 32 | PHI | 31 | 3.06 | .894 |
David Schlemko | D | 28 | CGY | 44 | 1 | 4 |
Keaton Ellerby | D | 26 | WPG | 1 | 0 | 1 |
Eric Tangradi | C | 26 | MTL | 7 | 0 | 0 |