About a month ago, the speculation was that former Ottawa Senators captain Daniel Alfredsson would be returning to the Detroit Red Wings for another season, and the Wings were told that if he was going to play, it would be in Detroit. As has been his custom the last few seasons, Alfredsson has asked for, and been granted, some longer than usual time to make the decision on what he wants to do the following season.
Well, almost a month after the free agency period and all is quiet on the Alfredsson front. Is it just a fact that he still hasn’t made his decision, or is he going to quietly fade into retirement?
The Wings can still fit him under the cap, but it will mean a bonus-laden contract that will lower the cap for the Wings in 2015-16, so they don’t want to eat into that too much. The Wings, according to capgeek.com, have just a touch over $8M to spend, but also have to re-sign restricted free agents Danny DeKeyser and Tomas Tatar.
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It looks like the Red Wings are holding a spot for Alfie, but at some point soon he is going to have to make his decision and tell the Red Wings (if he hasn’t already) as well as publicize it.
Alfredsson led an injury-plagued Red Wings club in scoring last season with 49 points (18 goals & 31 assists) in 68 games and represented Sweden at the Olympic games, bringing home a Silver medal. He missed 2 of the Wings 5 games in the first round loss to the Bruins and was held without a point.
Alfredsson will turn 42 years old in December and if he does indeed retire it would make his decision to leave the Ottawa Senators after 17 seasons an unfortunate one because he got just 3 games closer to a Stanley Cup than he would have in Ottawa. With the emergence of Tomas Jurco and Tatar, Alfredsson might be a little bit worried about what his role on the team will be should they stay healthy all season.