New York Islanders Sign Dennis Seidenberg to 1.25 Million, 1 Year Deal

Fans waiting for the first move of the offseason for the New York Islanders didn’t have to wait long. The team announced that it re-signed Dennis Seidenberg to a one year, 1.25 million dollar deal. The move was announced by Arthur Staple and came as a surprise.

Some people will see this as a cost effective move to sign a lower depth defenseman. Others will scream into the ethos how terrible of a move this is. Analytics people loathed Seidenberg due to his Corsi while conventional media loved him due to his fantastic +/-. His actual skill set is probably somewhere in between.

Some have stated that this is just posturing for the draft, but that’s highly unlikely. Even if the team team insisted on protecting Travis Hamonic or wanted to move him before the draft takes place, they would still have Nick Leddy and Thomas Hickey to fit the guidelines of the league’s policy that states that one defenseman who has played at least 50 games over the past two years and is still under contract must be exposed. With Johnny Boychuk needing protection due to his no movement clause and the team likely protecting Ryan Pulock, that would mean that they were protecting four to six defensemen once Calvin de Haan is factored in and it would be rather odd if they viewed Hickey as more important to protect than a player that would presumably be Brock Nelson or Ryan Strome.