Quote:
Originally Posted by gargamel
I hope you're right, but I'm skeptical. I fully expect Gaudreau (and maybe Sven) and Wotherspoon (and maybe Sieloff) to outplay Raymond and Engelland at camp and in the pre-season, but I don't think there's any way that we're going to put our newly signed free-agent acquisitions on waivers to make room for more deserving guys.
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For guys like Gaudreau, Wotherspoon, and Sieloff, this is not an issue, since only one of these players has played a season in the AHL, and he is likely not to suffer for another year there. Baertschi played his way onto the team last year, and I would expect it is likely that he does so again this year. So if all four end up playing in the minors with Engelland and Raymond in the NHL all year, this doesn't really have any sort of negative impact. Even Baertschi is still a work in progress with room to grow.
But in the end, all of these players are still young enough that this shouldn't become an issue for at least another year. Since the UFAs signed this year were all given short deals, I would suggest that management is working under the proviso that several of these young players will be on the team in two years. Sieloff will only be 23-years-old in the final season of Engelland's deal. Still very young, and still with lots of room to grow for a defenseman.