Are waiver claims becoming RFA offer sheets?

NHL preseasons are fun to watch. Sure, the quality of hockey isn’t the best, and the NHL regulars that are playing aren’t necessarily playing at top speed, but it’s still good hockey. I can see though how fans would be bored with the on-ice play.

Off the ice though, it’s a wondrous thing. Analysts, reporters, armchair GM’s, and fans pour over rosters, line combinations, injuries, and prospects to see what fit makes sense for any given team. Games of “What If?” are played regularly, creating scenarios that may never happen in order to get excited for the season.

I can only imagine that it isn’t so much a great thing, however, for those directly affected by training camps. Young players come to camp looking for an opportunity to showcase that they belong as part of the team’s future. Veterans on professional tryouts or two-way contracts fight for limited ice time, in an effort to support their families and play the game they love. If they’re successful, the fruits of their labour can be bountiful. If not, it provides uncertainty to what comes next. Coaches and GM’s have to make tough decisions based on team needs, locker room influence, and overall on-ice performance to get their team to the promised land.

A big part of the uncertainty and tough decisions are those fringe NHL players that are waiver-eligible. Those are the players that can’t necessarily crack the opening night roster, yet are too valuable to offer to teams via waivers. The 24 hours that passes before a player clears waivers can only be stressful. You’re either packing your bags for a trip to a local minor league affiliate, or heading to a new NHL city for a new opportunity and more uncertainty. It’s a stress I’m glad I don’t have to deal with.

for GM’s, the stress lies in that they could potentially lose a player that they have future plans for, however no room on their current roster. We’ve seen so far this year a number of former first-round picks that have been placed on waivers because they’ve crept over the played games limit and/or the waiver-eligible age cutoff. Some teams, like the Toronto Maple Leafs with Josh Leivo, choose to keep a player in the fold on the big club rather than risk him. other teams, like the Detroit Red Wings with goaltender Jared Coreau, successfully risk it to make room for other players. Sometimes when a team risks it, they end up losing a piece that could benefit them in the future, as we saw today when the Vegas Golden Knights claimed Malcolm Subban from the Boston Bruins.

Subban is one example of a team improving their position through nabbing a player unconventionally. Is this example slowly dying though?

It seems like teams aren’t claiming players on waivers like they used to. Is it simply because those waiver players aren’t good enough to crack a roster this year? Or does it come down to fear of “poach our player and see what happens”?

According to CapFriendly, of the 192 players placed on waivers this preseason, only three were claimed – Subban, Patrick Nemeth (by the Colorado Avalanche), and Jordan Nolan (by the Buffalo Sabres). That’s a percentage of 1.5% In 2016 the players on waivers were slightly higher – 204 – however the claims doubled to 6, which equates to 2.9%.

Some of the players who successfully cleared waivers this year include Calgary’s Hunter Shinkaruk and Emile Poirier, Detroit’s Ryan Sproul and the aforementioned Coreau, Toronto’s Garret Sparks and Kerby Rychel, and Colorado’s Duncan Siemens. These are players who, though relatively unproven, could provide an upgrade over certain players on certain rosters.

This leads me to question: Are teams not making waiver claims for the same reasons that GM’s don’t sign players to offer sheets?

When a GM attempts to sign a restricted free agent, they’re looked down upon by their comrades. Offer sheets have become taboo, looked at as underhanded ways of improving a team. It’s not like a team completely loses if lose an RFA; they’re given compensatory picks from the signing team. That doesn’t change the fact that teams simply don’t try to improve their team in this manner; the last time it happened was with Ryan O’Reilly in 2013.

There’s a good chance I’m overthinking this, but I don’t think so. Vegas pulled the trigger on the Subban claim, but for a brand new team looking to stock up a barren development system (save for their draft picks this year), Why not also put a claim in on Shinkaruk or Poirier and see what happens? What about in Florida, where they’re in such a need for bottom-six players they give away top-four right-handed defensemen to get them? Rychel could have finally played regular NHL minutes for the Panthers.

Waiver claims aren’t the sexiest way to improve their team; however, they’re an underrated way to upgrade the bottom-half of a team, as well as a way to give players another opportunity. Here’s hoping that they don’t go the way of RFA offer sheets.