Canucks Army Free Agent Profiles: Andrew Ladd

7 years ago

Andrew Ladd is the only captain the second incarnation of the Winnipeg Jets have known, but this wasn’t enough to keep him in town past the February 29th trade deadline as the two sides faced unrestricted free agency and a hefty pay raise on the other side. The Jets, an internal budget team, read the tea leaves and bit the bullet.

Now Ladd, a pending unrestricted free agent, is a month away from finding a third home in five months. As the Jets learned and the Blackhawks anticipated upon Ladd’s arrival, securing his services going into next fall could prove an expensive exercise. One Nations Network writer, Ryan Lambert, concluded that the price likely falls in $6.5-million range, with term.

That’s a hefty ask, but not without precedent. Ladd has proven himself as one of the premier left wingers in the league, capable of contributing in all phases of special teams and from the locker room as a vocal leader. Look closely and you’ll find Ladd’s name on the Stanley Cup not once, but twice, with two different teams, too. The importance of a winning pedigree is likely overstated but still plays a role in determining the haves and have nots in the market. Ladd’s comfortably in the former of those two camps.

HERO Chart:

Career Statistics:

(Source: TSN.ca)

The Fit

Between Daniel Sedin, Sven Baertschi, Anton Rodin and Brendan Gaunce the Canucks appear set on the left wing. And that’s operating under the assumption that Chris Higgins, a natural left winger, is dealt or bought out over the course of this off-season. Doesn’t account for Derek Dorsett, either — he’s played (poorly) on both wings during his time as a Canuck.

All the same, I don’t think the Canucks should be ruled out as suitors for the Maple Ridge, British Columbia natives services. They were reportedly interested (though to what degree is unknown) in acquiring Ladd at the trade deadline. Nothing’s changed since, so one might reasonably posit that the Canucks could still have some level of interest in Ladd.

Ladd, who turned 30 last December, is good for somewhere in the neighbourhood of 25 goals, per 82 games since joining the Jets organization in 2010-11. Over that same time span, Ladd leads all Jets forwards in shorthanded and power play ice-time and appears at first glance to have a generally positive impact in both phases of special teams. He’s also been a positive possession player in all but his rookie season, since coming into the league as a 19-year-old in 2005-06.

There isn’t a box that Ladd doesn’t check off. Which is suiting for a club like the Vancouver Canucks, that genuinely need to improve nearly everything if they hope to return to the playoffs next season — as it appears they do. If the Canucks pursue Ladd it will be worth the roster juggling to accommodate him. Depending on the term, it might not even prove too detrimental to their long-term prospects, either.

The Scouting Report:

The list of left wingers better than Andrew Ladd is a short one. So too is the list of better forwards period. Ryan Lambert tried to establish the company he’s kept in the league by several often cited metrics to find out where exactly he sits in comparison to his peers, and it’s quite the ringing endorsement.

From 2013-present, Ladd has an impressive 68-102-170 in 220 games (0.77 points per game). In terms of overall points, that’s 29th in the league over that time, which is a mighty impressive number. In terms of points per game, it’s tied with Derek Stepan for 34th, which is still pretty good.
But of course production doesn’t always tell us everything about a player. To that end, we have the War On Ice Similarity Scores calculator to help us in evaluating Ladd’s value. And because we can also filter that kind of thing for age, we can perhaps guess at where his production not only has been, but will go in the next several years. Last season, he compared most closely to the age-28 season of Erik Cole (2007-08), age-29 Ryan Callahan’s 2014-15, and age-29 Kristian Huselius (2008-09). In 2013-14, it was guys like Scott Hartnell and Chris Kunitz (who were aided by Claude Giroux and Evgeni Malkin in the comparable seasons). Before that, it was Anze Kopitar, Giroux, and Jamie Benn.

Ladd’s also proved to be a valuable penalty killer for the Jets over that time, starring on their first unit. The Jets surrendered 70.4 FA60 with Ladd on the ice over the course of these last five seasons, which is good for 35th among forwards with 500+ minutes over that time span. It’s fair to wonder, though, if that mark undersells his impact, given that he’s spent many of those minutes with Mark Stuart, who one could very reasonably argue is the league’s worst penalty killer.

I doubt Ladd has many first line years left in him — some might argue he’s already heading in that direction — but at the very worst, all signs point to another several very productive years in a team’s top-six. You combine that with his special teams chops, winning pedigree and leadership and it’s an attractive package, to be sure.

Conclusion:

The Canucks have some level of interest in Ladd. You would like to think that Ladd, a Maple Ridge native, has some level of interest in the Canucks, too. Whether the two come together or not remains to be seen, but I wouldn’t rule it out by any stretch of the imagination.

If the goal of the Canucks is to compete for the playoffs next season, and everything they’ve done and said to this point suggests that is very much the case, then Ladd should be near the top of their list of unrestricted free agents going into this summer. He’ll bring the same kind of size, production and leadership qualities that other premier wingers in this year’s market, without the deteriorating foot speed that a player like Milan Lucic is already suffering.