After my last Free Agent Profile of polarizing power forward Milan Lucic, most other free agents seem a little flat. Today’s subject is Teddy Purcell, and he’s not exactly jumping off the page. He’s not in that upper offensive tier with Lucic or Loui Eriksson or Kyle Okposo, but he is a good middle of the lineup kinda guy who can pitch in about 40 points or so. Is that what the Canucks want this off-season? Who really knows. Let’s check him out anyways.

Teddy Purcell produces like a third liner while driving possession like a second liner. Given that 143 games out of the three years used in that HERO chart were with the Oilers, it’s possible that his production could have ticked up a little bit if he’d been on a better team. Of course, he spent most of his time in Edmonton with Taylor Hall and Leon Draisaitl, and the Canucks don’t exactly have players like that to offer.

The Canucks are a team that needs players that drag others along, not more players that need dragging – assuming you’re dead set on getting a second liner. Otherwise, Purcell would make a respectable third line player – the role he fulfilled down the stretch in Florida following the 2016 trade deadline.

Purcell has maintained roughly even possession numbers over the past few years, which is actually rather impressive for a member of the Oilers. As a result, his relative possession numbers are quite respectable.

(Source: TSN.ca)

Purcell has been good for about a half a point per game over the course of his career. Unsurprisingly, he was stronger in Tampa Bay (2010-2014) than in Edmonton (2014-2016), though he did show an uptick in position following his arrival in Florida, so perhaps there is some that he can at least maintain that 40-point pace over the course of a season. 

Purcell is a right shot winger with plenty of offensive flair, though he doesn’t always have the finishing ability to go along with it. At 6-foot-2, 200 pounds, Purcell has a solid frame and decent size to him, though he doesn’t tend to throw it around much – it does aid in puck protection however. He has the ability to play on either wing. His defensive skills aren’t lauded, but they are passable.

Purcell was roughly average last year in possession statistics, with a Corsi-for percentage of 50.8 (according to stats.hockeyanalysis.com), which has 169th out 405 forwards that played at least 300 minutes. Purcell’s even strength points per 60 minutes (P60) of 1.73 would have placed him fourth on the Canucks last season, following Jannik Hansen and the Sedin twins – just barely behind Henrik’s 1.74. He managed this while averaging just under 17 minutes per game (second line minutes). He averaged more than three extra minutes per game in Edmonton than he did in Florida, though he scored at a much higher rate down in Sunrise.

Acquiring a player like Purcell doesn’t really make a ton of sense for the Canucks in terms of performance. If they’re going to acquire some forward talent, it would make more sense to shoot for the top tier. The Canucks are overstocked on middle six players at the moment, and although few (if any) have hit the 40-point plateau, the hope is that players like Bo Horvat and Brandon Sutter (who have), as well as Sven Baertschi and Anton Rodin all have the potential to this season. Additionally the Canucks have a wealth of bottom six guys that need to cement positions in the lineup like Markus Granlund, Brendan Gaunce, Emerson Etem, and Alex Grenier, while still dealing with veterans like Alex Burrows, Chris Higgins and Derek Dorsett.

For me the ideal situation (in order to create more wins) is to sign a higher quality free agent and bump every one down a rung, but adding Purcell to your middle six to increase depth isn’t a bad option, especially now that Vancouver’s forward depth has been somewhat depleted by dealing away Hunter Shinkaruk and Jared McCann – there aren’t going to be many viable options coming from the minors this year, depending on where Gaunce and Grenier start the season.

There is another angle to view from, and that would be the fabled asset management side. Teddy Purcell is the type of player that teams may pay for at the deadline. Hell, the Florida Panthers just did three months ago. Bringing in players like that, boosting their value as much as possible and then dealing them at the deadline is the hippest thing going right now.

I would say that the Canucks aren’t likely to pursue Purcell this off-season. It doesn’t strike me as the type of move that they would make, although that would be assuming that I have some understanding of what their plan is – and they keep surprising me. From an asset management standpoint, it would be nice if the Canucks grabbed a player like Purcell and then turned and sold him at the deadline, making a nice little draft pick profit in the process. Unfortunately, nothing that we’ve seen to this point would lead me to believe that the Canucks are going to go that route. If they continue to follow their established modus operandi, it’s more likely that Purcell heads off to another organization.