An Arbitration hearing may still be required as the Ottawa Senators have just two days to sign forward Ryan Dzingel.
On July 21st if Dzingel is not signed then there will be an arbitration hearing. What this means for those who are unaware is a neutral party will award Dzingel a one or two year contract. The Ottawa Senators will then choose to either sign Dzingel to that contract or let him become an Unrestriced Free Agent. As of now the two parties are 0.95 million apart. The Sens are offering one million and Dzingel is asking for 1.95 million. There is no word currently on how long a contract each side wants the contract to be.
Discerning Value
The question revolving around Dzingel is that of his value. It’s uncertain how strong an offensive threat he can be. He’s a player with ridiculous speed but hands of stone. It seems that he can rival Michael Grabner for the player with the most unconverted breakaways. It’s also possible that his stats were inflated by a very strong first half. He scored 32 points last year but 21 were in the first half. He then only added three points in his final 20 games of the season. It could be possible that he’s just a player who got out to a hot start and will never repeat a similar performance.
However, the points that he got at the beginning of the season should not be discredited. After all he still got those points. Now the Ottawa Senators must evaluate the value of this late bloomer. With just two days to get him signed the power might be out of their hands.
Next: Ottawa Senators: The Brassard Zibanejad Trade One Year Later
Final Thoughts
Getting Pageau signed before his hearing was fantastic, but that was only half of the job. The Ottawa Senators had two players set for arbitration and one is yet to be signed, Ryan Dzingel. Although he will not be paid a huge sum of money, overpaying any player in inadvisable, especially as a budget team. The Sens need to get as much out of their money as possible. Getting Dzingel signed to a reasonable contract is an important step in managing their money properly.