23 former Red Wings will be UFAs this offseason. Who might make a reunion with their next contract?
23 former Red Wings will be UFAs this offseason. Who might make a reunion with their next contract?
Of the 34 players who played for the 2020-21 Detroit Red Wings, just four played for the team in 2023-24: Dylan Larkin, Michael Rasmussen, Joe Veleno and Robby Fabbri. Such turnover illustrates just how many players came in and out of the organization over the most recent stretch of Detroit’s rebuild.
Here’s another example: 23 players who have played for the Red Wings in their career are unrestricted free agents for other organizations this offseason. That’s not including the Red Wings’ 11 UFAs this season who have played at least a game for the club in the past. It’s not unusual for a rebuilding team to send players here, there and everywhere, but it does mean there are a lot of players with Detroit ties floating around the league.
Might there be some reunion tours?
Here are the 23 former Red Wings up for free agency, and whether they might fit the current team’s needs.
Forwards
Tyler Bertuzzi
The former 29-year-old power forward spent last season with the Toronto Maple Leafs, and he reportedly wants to stay put in Toronto. But if he and Maple Leafs management can’t nail down an extension, the close friend of Dylan Larkin could be a useful addition to the top six as THN Detroit’s own Sam Stockton outlined here. He finished with 43 points split nearly even across 21 goals and 22 assists. He also had four points in the playoffs, tied for the Maple Leafs’ team lead. That scoring is one of the lowest totals in his career, especially when the injury prone winger played a career-high 80 games. However, Bertuzzi is more than his scoring.
Bertuzzi’s heavy, checking game could be a great fit with Detroit coach Derek Lalonde’s goal of becoming a better defensive, more structured team. The issue here will be Bertuzzi’s interest, as well as the cap hit he might demand. In a landscape where sandpaper forwards are highly coveted by teams across the league, there might be competition to land Bertuzzi.
Anthony Mantha
After some struggles in Washington, Mantha went on sale at the trade deadline and landed with the Vegas Golden Knights. He finished off his season with seven goals and 10 points across 18 regular season games, then went scoreless in three playoff games, missing games as a healthy scratch. Even with the postseason struggles, his 2.5 points per 60 made 2023-24 the most productive season of his career since his final year in Detroit.
While Mantha is a solid scorer, he’s not always the greatest at meeting defensive expectations. Even if he’s never finished a season with a negative Corsi percentage, he often gets beat on the back check. That has gotten him healthy scratched when he’s been unproductive on the other end. Earlier this year when Washington coach Spencer Carbery scratched Mantha, he addressed this issue rather directly, “There's no secret he's an offensive player. He's not a penalty killer; he's not a defensive specialist. He's an offensive player that needs to create and needs to score.”
Given Lalonde’s desire to play better defense, Mantha would be a step in the wrong direction without significant improvement. However, he could be a solid scoring option for a team that’s willing to make up for his defense.
Jakub Vrana
Vrana and Detroit have a turbulent history — GM Steve Yzerman waived Vrana when he returned from the Player Assistance Program in December 2022-23, then traded him at last year’s trade deadline. It doesn’t seem likely that Vrana would be considered as a free agency add, especially since the Red Wings already have their top six sniper in Alex DeBrincat.
Such a situation would be a similar sentiment to what St. Louis GM Doug Armstrong said when he put Vrana on waivers in December. "I've talked to the player, I've talked to the representative, and there becomes a point where you start to feel like you're hampering a guy's career," Armstrong said. "He wants to play hockey, and it wasn't working here for whatever reason, and I just felt I'm gonna see if I can find you a new home where you're going to get that fresh opportunity to play...It felt like we were derailing Jakub's career...and I hope he goes and plays well somewhere."
Vrana will want to go somewhere he can earn a larger role. Even if the past few stops have been turbulent, he's still a talented player, and the right landing spot could help him prove it.
Dominik Kubalik
Kubalik played some of his best hockey in Detroit as a frequent linemate of Dylan Larkin. He was part of the package sent to Ottawa for DeBrincat, but things didn’t work out in the Canadian Capital and it looks as though the Senators aren’t going to re-sign him. Detroit could get a low-budget scorer in Kubalik, as well as someone who can run the flank on the power play, but again he runs into the territory of defensive liability that Detroit doesn’t want to deal with. On the right contract as a depth option, Kubalik might make sense, but it seems more likely that Detroit steers clear of a reunion here.
Tomas Tatar, Sam Gagner. Tomas Nosek, Adam Erne, Criscuolo, Mitchell Stephens, Turner Elson
None of these players feels like an especially relevant upgrade for the roster. Perhaps as low budget depth, these players could make a return, but it doesn’t seem like a useful transaction for Detroit.
Defensemen
Dennis Cholowski
Cholowski couldn’t crack the Red Wings’ defense as-is, but perhaps the former Red Wings first-rounder could rekindle his career as depth in Grand Rapids. He’s a skilled skater, but he struggled to make an impact at the NHL level outside of some light scoring. At this point of the rebuild and with a crowded blue line in Grand Rapids, a reclamation project isn’t the best use of roster space.
Still, we've seen Yzerman attempt these sorts of projects earlier in the rebuild, and perhaps for the right price Cholowski could be a worthwhile investment.
Gustav Lindstrom
Much like Cholowski, Lindstrom was mostly an AHL player last season who would be more of an investment than a useful player. He was traded to Montreal in the Jeff Petry trade, and his offensive play made an impact before he was sent down on waivers. Anaheim picked him up, and his impact diminished on that roster. Detroit has better young defensemen than Lindstrom would offer.
Brendan Smith, Troy Stecher, Marc Staal, Steven Kampfer, Xavier Ouellet, Daniel Renouf
At this point in their careers, whether for age or ability, these defensemen are depth and not a whole lot else. Detroit has better defense options internally, and it shouldn’t sign this group.
Goaltenders
Alex Nedeljkovic
Alex Nedeljkovic saw his Red Wings career change rather rapidly. He went from goaltender of the future to goaltender of the past, ending his career in the AHL after being sent down during a tenuous 2022-23.
Nedeljkovic rekindled his career with Pittsburgh, becoming a source of playoff hopes late in the season for a Penguins team whose goaltending wasn’t always that sound. For a Red Wings team that could use goaltending security with Ville Husso returning from injury and Alex Lyon taking on a lot more work than he is accustomed to, Nedeljkovic could offer some depth.
I wouldn’t expect Nedeljkovic to be interested in a move back to Detroit, however. Given his season in Pittsburgh — where he posted an 18-7-7 record with a 2.97 goals against average and .902 save percentage — it seems as though he’d want at least a spot where he’ll be a backup goaltender. He doesn’t fit the bill of a third goaltender of the type that Detroit would want.
Calvin Pickard
Pickard has been a solid backup for Edmonton, even splitting a pair of playoff starts in Game 5 and 6 against Vancouver. He could be a solid goaltending option with a return to Detroit, but he seems much more likely to find a spot where he can be a backup, perhaps even sticking with the Oilers.
Eric Comrie, Magnus Hellberg
Both could be cheap third goalie options, but at this point it’d be a better option to use Sebastian Cossa as the third goalie than to sign one of these two to a contract.
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