Editor’s Note- In the hockey world, there are degrees of off-season. For a non-playoff team like the Ottawa Senators, there are those two months where playoff hockey is on but you don’t really care who wins. It’s primarily spent enjoying the failures of others. We’ll call that the pre-off season. Then once that wraps up, you have those thrilling few weeks where it’s almost non-stop announcements. Rumours, trades, signings, draft picks, development camp. There’s a lot going on towards the end of June and into July. See, that’s the fun off-season. Now we’re into the real off-season. As in, nothing happening. As in, all of hockey media is at the same cottage and even if a story broke, there would be nobody around to cover it.
It’s going to be a long and mostly uneventful couple months. I have a few ideas of ways to keep things interesting around here but this is prime-time for a run on ChirpEds. For those of you that may be new around here, the ChirpEd is a reader contribution on just about any hockey-related topic you like. I work with you on editing and timing for the post but otherwise, anything goes. If you have any idea for an article, send me a message at the contact form above or email me directly at info@senschirp.ca.
With that in mind, I’ll turn it over to a ChirpEd veteran. Stefan Wolejszo has submitted a couple articles over the years (Thoughts on Losing Erik Karlsson; Hope) and this time he stops by with some reflections on a surprisingly calm summer in the Nation’s Capital.
WRITTEN BY- STEFAN WOLEJSZO
The summers of 2018 and 2019 could not be any more different from Senators fans.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that the summer of 2018 reached an historic level of suckage for the organization. Stories surfaced about a dispute between the wives of Mike Hoffman and Erik Karlsson, and rumours were floating around about dysfunction in the dressing room. There were massive question marks about whether the team would be able to re-sign star UFAs such as Karlsson, Stone, Duchene, and even Dzingel.
As trade rumors swirled the team also had to deal with a scandal involving the Assistant GM and potentially lethal children’s wear bearing the team’s logo. By the time the team traded both Hoffman and Karlsson for bags half-filled, at best, with magic beans, a lot of fans were pretty much beaten down. Things did not get any better as the season progressed and ended with a last place finish. I will be kind and not re-hash what happened at the trade deadline.
So far the summer of 2019 has been very different in that it has been, for the most part, calm.
Sure, the Senators galaxy brained their draft picks and selected players that were ranked lower than where the Senators picked them, but many fans were content to take a wait and see approach and not get too upset about draft pick optimization. It is a pretty safe bet that the mood of Sens fans on draft day was helped tremendously by the fact that Colorado did not win the draft lottery with the pick the Sens sent their way in the trade for Duchene.
Even Free Agent Signing day on July 1st was improved. Over the past few years Sens fans have become accustomed to a low budget approach where instead of blowing their brains out overpaying star players in both cash and immovable contracts, the Sens would overpay aging 3rd tier vets in both cash and immovable contracts. This year the team managed to re-hash the glory days of the Phaneuf trade in a deal that featured moving Ceci and Harpur in exchange for the much longer terrible contract of Zaitsev. On the plus side the Senators managed to move the two D fans loved to hate the most, and Connor Brown could be a useful addition in the middle part of the lineup. Although this trade reflected the same short term thinking that has burned them in the past, it seems as though Sens fans were generally ok with it (at least for now).
The team ended their UFA day shuffling by signing Hainsey for one season at $3.5M (!?!?!?!) for the sake of leadership, mentoring young players, and not learning from past mistakes where they overpaid for over the hill players for similar reasons. I would have preferred hiring a locker room greeter for 50- 60k who shakes player’s hands as they come in and says things like “looking good” and “great job out there tonight”, but that is just me. I’m pretty sure leadership is important, but I am also pretty sure you don’t want to pay $3.5M for it. Regardless, although the Hainsey signing led to at least a couple of raised eyebrows Sens fans seemed generally fine with how the day played out.
And, of course, it absolutely could have been worse with players like Tyler (Can’t Teach Big!) Myers on the UFA board. Myers’ height and wing span has been known to cure erectile dysfunction among NHL GMs, and I am reasonably sure Dorion would have loved to be able to sign him, so the limited budget worked in the team’s favour this time around.
One of the biggest shifts between 2018 and 2019 is with the coaching staff. Among the many low points in 2018 was Dorion dragging Boucher in to his office to explain some of his hockey decisions. The team never had the resources to replace him so it came across as a shaming exercise that must have been humiliating for Boucher. Regardless, Boucher and his staff are now gone and D.J. Smith was been brought in as his replacement.
I generally like the idea of D.J Smith because, from what I understand, he may be more open than Boucher ever was to the idea of giving young players a larger role on the team. Young players are at the heart of any rebuild, so this type of shift in philosophy is absolutely necessary to pull it off reasonably well. Even if he doesn’t live up to this expectation when the season starts, for now he still has that new coach smell and there is some reason to hope that lineup selections and player deployment will improve. Also, if nothing else, we will not have to hear about “The System” anymore.
The biggest non-troversy so far this summer was a sitting MP saying things to Melnyk that many of us would also say if given the chance. Good Lord, was that Borowiecki interview last summer? There were so many low-lights in 2018 I straight up forgot about that one until I was writing this section. In any event, we haven’t heard much from Melnyk this summer which is always a very positive thing for Sens fans. He even took a break from attending the draft, which made the event infinitely more watchable.
So in most respects the summer of 2019, so far, has been a bit of a break from the onslaught of negativity that has been unleashed upon Sens fans for a while now. Expectations for the team are going to be very low this season. Sean Tierney’s model has them at 82 points, which is probably above where most other models will put them:
Sucking isn’t entirely negative if fans can see a larger plan for the future in motion. The Sens have their 1st round pick in 2020 and it will likely bring another great player into the fold. If they do manage to win the draft lottery it would provide a bit of excitement about the team moving forward.
The calm of the summer of 2019, and heading into next season, may end up being the eye of the hurricane. If the Sens do not re-sign Chabot to a long term deal in the next 12 months there could easily be a very rough road ahead next summer. And, of course, if Melnyk retains ownership of the team we could see other budget-related moves that rankle an already frustrated fan base. But, for now, at least we have the chance to catch our collective breath for a few months.
A few people out there may dare to dream and even allow themselves to get a little bit excited about the future of the team again.
