Canucks Re-Sign Linden Vey
By Rhys Jessop
8 years agoThe Vancouver Canucks have announced that they re-signed Linden Vey. The 23-year old forward tallied 10 goals and 14 assists in his rookie season, and was set to become an unrestricted free agent had he not been tendered a qualifying offer this afternoon.
Let’s briefly unpack it after the jump.
On the surface, Vey didn’t have too poor a season offensively. His 24 points were T-15th among all NHL rookies, but many of them came while playing on the first powerplay unit with the Sedin twins. At even strength, Vey’s production was fairly weak as his 1.09 points/60 ranked him 232nd out of 262 NHL forwards with over 750 minutes of 5v5 time on ice.
Vey was also among the poorer players in generating shots and controlling the puck last year too, raking among the bottom quarter of the league in ShotsFor/60, ShotsFor%, CorsiFor/60, and CorsiFor% per Stats.Hockeyanalysis.com. Part of this is spending most of his season with Derek Dorsett and Luca Sbisa, but Vey wasn’t very strong last season.
Still, $1 million for one year is hardly a large financial commitment in terms of term or dollars, and was just marginally more than the qualifying offer Vey was due. Vey is also just entering his 24-year old season, and has a track record of producing at a high level offensively at each level he’s played at. He was a top player on a very, very strong Manchester Monarchs team in the AHL, and it wouldn’t be prudent to give up on him at this point in his career.
He may still have middle-6 upside, but a 1 year deal is very much a put-up-or-shut-up contract. He will have to take some steps forward as a sophomore to warrant a longer commitment from Vancouver.
Recent articles from Rhys Jessop
