In the wake of the long term injuries to Alex Edler and Brandon Sutter (again), the Canucks announced today that they have called up Yannick Weber and centre Alex Friesen.

We all know Weber’s story already. He’s had a largely disappointing season with the Canucks so far, and as a result, he was waived and announced to Utica when the team gained full health. Alex Friesen, on the other hand, is new blood. This is Friesen’s first call up to the Canucks and is in concert with this season’s trend of giving every Comets player who is technically a prospect a look-see in the NHL.

Yannick Weber had only just arrived in Utica, and had yet to play a game with the Comets, before he has to get right back on a plane and rejoin the Canucks. I’m sure he won’t be complaining though – everyone would rather be in the NHL than the AHL.

There was some speculation that Andrey Pedan might be the defenceman that got the call. That would’ve been nice, but given what we know about how Willie Desjardins selects his lineups, it’s likely that whoever received this call up will be sitting out as the seventh defenceman, until another injury comes about. If this is to be the case, it might as well be Weber in the press box and Andrey Pedan might be better off logging big minutes in Utica.

Weber’s season has been well chronicled recently, due to being waived and reassigned within the past week. Here’s what you need to know: he’s an offensive defenceman with zero goals this season, and only five assists, all of which came on the power play. This is highly disappointing given his production at the tail end of last, when he looked like the key to making Vancouver’s power play click. His lack of offense wasn’t from lack of opportunity – he’s been given fairly regular power play time throughout the season, including a decent stint on the first unit. He wasn’t able to make it work, and he eventually lost his lineup spot altogether to Alex Biega.

There’s plenty of evidence to suggest that Yannick Weber is a better defenceman than Alex Biega, or even Matt Bartkowski and Luca Sbisa. His even strength numbers are more palatable, plus he has the added benefit of being a power play weapon. Unfortunately for him, this is a results driven league (especially with old school coaches and management), and it seems pretty unlikely that Desjardins is consulting WARRIOR charts while filling out his lineup card (how awesome would that be though).

While this call up may seem like nothing but a bunch of unnecessary flights for Weber, it’s likely a much bigger deal for his counterpart, Alex Friesen.

Friesen was drafted in the sixth round, 172nd overall, in 2010. Despite being a fairly late pick, if Friesen manages to sneak into a game during his promotion, he will be the first member of the Canucks 2010 draft class to play in the NHL. Why? It’s the Ballard year. Loading up for a season in which they went to the Stanley Cup Finals, the Canucks had no first, second, or third round picks in 2010. And, somehow, Patrick McNally, Adam Polasek, Jonathan Iilahti, and Sawyer Hannay never managed to beat the odds either.

Friesen is a bit undersized, coming in at 5-foot-10 and 186 pounds, but he plays as though he’s considerably larger. He’s got a fair bit of bite to his game. He’s spent the vast majority of this season as the Comets second line centre, with Alex Grenier, Brendan Gaunce, and Nicklas Jensen among his most frequent wingers. He also gets plenty of special teams time. He’s a fixture on the power play: typically he’s centred the second unit, but of late he is often on the first unit, a four forward set that always includes Grenier, Gaunce, and Hunter Shinkaruk. He is also one of Utica’s more prominent penalty killers, frequently paired with Mike Zalewski.

Friesen is seventh on the Comets in points this season, with 18 points (eight goals, ten assists) in 41 games. His 88 shots on goal are third on the Comets among players on an NHL contract. He’s also managed 55 penalty minutes this season, being a bit of a firecracker.

As for the #fancystats, Friesen is just in the black in terms of even strength goals-for ratio, with a mark of 51.1 per cent. His even strength production numbers are fairly middle-of-the-pack on the Comets. In all situations, he has an estimated points per 60 minutes of 1.52, with an eTOI of a little over 17 minutes per game.

Alex Friesen has had a decent year in Utica, but the timing of his call up is a little off. He’s been in a bit of a slump, with no points in his last six games, and only one goal in his last 18 games. That being said, he’s still been a solid reliable player throughout the season. He probably deserved a call up in the middle of December, when he had four goals in four games between December 5th and 13th, so maybe he gets one now in part because he’d earned it earlier. Travis Green is also known for looking beyond the stats sheet when recommending call ups, so this isn’t that unusual.

Given that the Canucks still have five other centres on the roster, and Jared McCann can’t even get into a goddamn game, it’s unclear is Friesen will see any game action on this trip, or if he’s just here for the fancy meals and mentor time. Then again, I wondered the same thing about Mike Zalewski, and he managed to play twice.