Bridge Traffic: Parenteau claimed off waivers by New Jersey

Following up yesterday’s surprising move with an unsurprising one, the Islanders have lost forward P.A. Parenteau on waivers to division rival New Jersey.

The 33-year old winger thereby completes what is known as the Pat Conacher Triangle (at least, that’s what I’m calling it), by playing for the Islanders, Rangers and Devils. Parenteau was originally drafted by Anaheim in 2001, then traded to Chicago, then to the Rangers in 2007. He signed with the Islanders in 2010 before leaving as a free agent in 2012. He went from Colorado to Montreal to Toronto before re-signing with the Islanders this summer for $1.25 million. Now he goes to New Jersey on waivers.

All those moves don’t mean that Parenteau is a bad player. Far from it. It’s had good possession stats throughout his career and scored reliably on some bad teams. He’ll no doubt add (at least) one more to the list by joining the Devils. He’s surely good for a couple of goals against the Islanders whenever they play New Jersey this season.

As Arthur Staple of Newsday told us on last night’s Islanders Anxiety podcast, the Islanders put Parenteau on waivers specifically to move his contract, rather than keep him in the AHL making the same amount of money. The idea seems to be to make room for youngsters Mathew Barzal, Anthony Beauvillier and/or, maybe, Joshua Ho-Sang. But there are still a few hours to go before the 5 pm roster finalization deadline so who knows.

In the meantime, we wave goodbye once again to the colorful Parenteau. The good news for him is he gets to keep his house on Long Island and play relatively close by. The good news for us is we can use his signature catchphrase one last time.