Comets Acquire Actual Top Line Centre

For the first time this season, the Utica Comets are going to have an actual AHL top line centre. The Comets announced today that they had acquired T.J. Hensick from the Charlotte Checkers (affiliate of the Carolina Hurricanes) in exchange for Blair Jones. This is strictly an AHL deal: Jones’ contract remains with Vancouver while Hensick’s contract remains with Carolina, while the two players have been loaned to their acquiring teams.

This is an excellent deal for the Comets. Hensick is a legitimate first line centre at the AHL level, something the Comets have been missing since losing Cal O’Reilly in the off season. The Comets are on a hot streak right now and look to be headed back to the Calder Cup playoffs. This move will strengthen them down the middle should they make the cut.

The move is also in conjunction with the Dane Fox deal that the Canucks made with Carolina yesterday. Fox has been reassigned by Carolina to Charlotte, where he will join Blair Jones. While Fox had gained a bit of notoriety for his 64-goal OHL season at the time of his signing, the new regime has shown little interest in him, keeping him in the ECHL for both of his professional season. They have shown very little willingness to see what he can do at the AHL level, preferring to sign players to PTOs rather than promote from within.

As such, I find this trade to be of greater  interest, as it will actually have an effect on some Canucks prospects.

Hensick has been nearly a point-per-game player in his AHL career, potting 137 goals and adding 319 assists for 456 points in 484 AHL games.

This season Hensick has 25 points (seven goals, 18 assists), which was sixth on the Checkers at the time of the trade. The Comets, who are sitting in fifth place in the AHL’s Eastern Conference, will hope that they can get as much or more offence out of Hensick than the Checkers did, who are in tenth place in the Western Conference.

At even strength, the numbers indicate that Hensick has struggled this season, posting a goals for percentage of just 40 per cent. Even on Charlotte, a team that has struggled to control play, this is a low number, demonstrated by a -5.90 GF% relative to the team.

Just in terms of point totals, this seems to be a bit of a down year for Hensick, so hopefully shifting to a strong possession team like Utica will help reignite what has been a largely successful AHL career. Hensick is a four-time AHL all-star, participating in the 2008, 2010, 2011, and 2012 all-star games.

Hensick has also spent some time in the NHL. After being drafted 88th overall in 2005 by the Colorado Avalanche, Hensick played in 112 NHL games, collecting 38 points (12 goals, 26 assists) with Colorado and St. Louis. He last saw NHL action in the 2010-11 season.

Jones has had an injury riddled season to this point. Acquired to offset the loss of Cal O’Reilly, Jones ended up playing primarily right wing for the Comets, particularly on a line with Wacey Hamilton and Carter Bancks, forming an energetic, forechecking combination that managed to chip in a respectable amount of offence before Jones went down with an injury. He missed 14 games with a lower body injury before returning in early February, only to injury something else and miss an additional seven games.

Jones started the season off nicely for the Comets, scoring seven goals in his first 19 games. At the time of his first injury on New Year’s Eve, he trailed only Hunter Shinkaruk in goals. Jones had an even strength on-ice goal ratio of 55.7 per cent, indicating that his team was scoring more than being scored on while he was on the ice at 5-on-5.

The Comets began the season with Linden Vey as their first line centre, and he performed the job well, putting up 15 points in 26 games. He was a far cry from Cal O’Reilly however, and he doesn’t have the resume that T.J. Hensick has, who has been doing the job for more the half a decade. Moreover, Vey has been gone since December, up with the Canucks, where he is now their first line centre (yeah, you read that right).

While the stats suggest that the Hensick/Jones trade is a bit of a wash at even strength, the real benefit of acquiring Hensick is on the power play. While Blair Jones actually has more power play goals, with three to Hensick’s two, Hensick has nine first assists on the power play and an additional five secondary assists, while Jones’ has had no helpers on the man advantage of any type.

The Comets could certainly use his set up ability. Their power play has been clicking at 15.2 per cent on the season, which is 24th in the league. Conversely, Charlotte’s power play in second in the AHL with a 22 per cent conversion rate, of which Hensick has been a major part.

Hensick should factor immediately into the first power play unit, which of late has been centered by Alex Friesen. The loss of Hunter Shinkaruk (who had a team leading 10 power play goals), and the call up of Brendan Gaunce (another first unit mainstay who has seven power play points this season), has left an already struggling power play even more deprived.

This will certainly grant an immediate improvement to the Comets, though it still would have been nice to grab additional reinforcements. As the Canucks neglected to paper down any waiver free players at the deadline, the only addition they will see from this point out is the return of Brendan Gaunce, who is up in Vancouver for the time being. Additionally, injuries to Henrik Sedin and Jannik Hansen may force another forward call up in the near future, further weakening a shallow Comets forward pool.

Then again, count me among the people who thought that the Comets might have been dealt a finishing blow after the Shinkaruk trade and Gaunce call up. Yet they are 5-1 since losing Shinkaruk, and last weekend they beat the Eastern Conference second best team on Saturday and the AHL’s best team on Friday and Sunday, without Shinkaruk or Gaunce, all the while continuing to outshoot their opponents. Just one more reminder to never count this team out, especially with Travis Green at the helm.