5 players the Red Wings shouldn’t bring back next season
The Detroit Red Wings have been going through a long rebuild since Steve Yzerman returned to the organization, so now it’s time to take the next step.
With a prospects pool that should see some of the top talents become full-time Red Wings next season, there won’t be room for everyone currently in the lineup to return. But that’s the way things should be if the Yzerplan is to continue to steadily work its magic.
This doesn’t mean every player in a contract season should go, as someone like Patrick Kane has proven to be a valuable asset for a team that could evolve into a championship contender next season and beyond. Kane may be 36 next season, but if he keeps producing like he’s in his prime and continues to play a primary role throughout these last three weeks, he needs to return.
But not every pending unrestricted free agent has enjoyed the same high-end productivity as Kane. The names listed in the following slides have been serviceable, but if Yzerman brings them back to the organization in any capacity, he runs the risk of them getting in the way of some high-performing prospects who could otherwise start making their mark in the NHL.
There should be a small exodus from the Red Wings this offseason
If Yzerman believes multiple players are ready to make the jump, they need to be in the Motor City and not in Grand Rapids. Yzerman has built this current squad thus far through stopgaps via free agency and trade, which were necessary if his plan involved properly developing his young talent.
As with the Kane signing, there are other outliers here whom Yzerman traded for, most notably Alex DeBrincat. Others haven’t worked out to the same extent, and they deserve to be gone following the 2024-25 season, meaning you won’t just see pending unrestricted free agents gracing this list.
Which players must Yzerman part ways with to free up room for who should be quite a few incoming prospects? Here are five who need to continue their respective careers in a different uniform.
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Justin Holl has been done in Detroit for a while
Justin Holl has not been a regular face in the Red Wings lineup for months, and while the 32-year-old is signed through the 2025-26 season, he would be a prime trade candidate in the offseason. Holl’s contract shouldn’t be an issue for most clubs, thanks to the $3.4 million AAV. But it could be tough to make a sales pitch regarding a blueliner who has been a healthy scratch for a while now.
We have seen Holl play in just 37 contests this season, a far cry from the number of games he suited up for last season when he was a member of the Toronto Maple Leafs. Over the past three seasons, Holl regularly logged top-four minutes, but his average total ice time per game has dropped to a meager 15:07.
This indicates Holl was either a bad fit for the Red Wings, or his overall play has simply regressed. He’s still been a physical player, landing 57 hits and blocking 38 shots, and he still contributed a fair 39.0 short-handed minutes.
Despite struggles with Detroit’s goaltending and defensive play, Holl’s 5-on-5 metrics weren’t bad, with a 91.8 on-ice save percentage and just 21 goals allowed. His Corsi was well under 50 percent, but the Red Wings also had a plus-6 goal differential at 5-on-5 when he was on the ice.
The Red Wings need an upgrade over James Reimer
It wasn’t tough to have a high opinion of James Reimer, as the 36-year-old wasn’t performing that badly during his previous stop in San Jose. Over the past two seasons, the Sharks goaltending has been as poor as the rest of the team, but Reimer still managed three shutouts despite the 0.898 save percentage and 3.48 GAA last year.
But with a better team in Detroit, you would think Reimer would have resembled the player he was in 2021-22 when he had a 2.90 GAA and a 0.911 save percentage. Reimer also had a 0.652 quality starts percentage as the top guy in the net for a franchise that had seen better days.
Despite above-average numbers this season - 0.907 save percentage and a 2.98 GAA, you can attribute them to Reimer’s most recent performances. Throughout most of the season, inconsistency has been the best way to describe the aging netminder, as 10 of his 22 appearances were in the 0.889 save percentage range or worse.
Per QuantHockey, he struggled to just a 3.09 GAA before his three wins between March 16th and March 21st. Reimer may be the “hot hand” in the net right now, and hopefully, he keeps that pace up. But he’s been way too inconsistent to keep around the Motor City for another season.
Olli Maatta has been serviceable, but there are better, younger options
Shayne Gostisbehere is in the final year of his contract, and while the Red Wings should be committed to getting younger, they should seriously consider hanging onto the 31-year-old blueliner, who is fourth on the team with 47 points at the time of this writing. Had Gostisbehere not played such a stellar game, then he would have been easy to let walk, but that hasn’t been the case, and someone else needs to leave this logjam.
Unlike Gostisbehere, Olli Maatta has another year left on his contract, so like Holl, he would also factor in as trade bait. Maatta has also been a serviceable member of the Red Wings defensive rotation, playing short-handed minutes and logging a stellar on-ice save percentage of 93.3 percent at 5-on-5.
Detroit’s 11.8 on-ice shooting percentage while Maatta is on the ice is another testament to how well he’s played for them in both zones, which would make it tough for the team to part ways with him via trade.
Maatta isn’t a bad fit, but the Red Wings already have a decent six-man rotation brewing with Simon Edvinsson coming along and Moritz Seider having established himself as a top blueliner. This would likely drop Maatta down to the seventh man in the rotation. But at an AAV of $3 million, even for another year, it’s best to trade him, get compensation, and bring in a cheaper rotational piece.
Daniel Sprong has been a great stopgap, but it’s best to let him walk
Regardless of which team they play for, there are some players you can’t help but root for, and Sprong is one of them. But players like Sprong aren’t meant to be any more than stopgaps who fill a position for a season or two until a prospect is ready to take over.
This is the situation the Red Wings find themselves in with the 27-year-old, despite his follow-up to what was a breakout year with the Seattle Kraken last season. Sprong has enough time to snag a career-high in goals scored if he gets five more, and he’s only seven points from setting a new career-high in points.
Such production will undoubtedly raise Sprong’s value, even if he’s likely to sign nothing more than a “bridge deal” regarding an overall contract length. Since the focus should be to get younger in the Motor City and to sign such players to long-term contracts, it makes little sense to keep Sprong around.
He’s one of those players you don’t want to see walk away, thanks to the productivity he’s put in. But if Yzerman is thinking ahead, there is no way he could justify bringing Sprong back on a multi-year deal, even if it’s for two or three seasons at a higher price if it means getting in the way of a younger prospect.
Yzerman needs to finally cut his losses with Ville Husso
Ville Husso is the classic example of why you don’t trade for a player following just one good season. Luckily for Steve Yzerman, the price to bring in Husso from the St. Louis Blues only cost him a third-round pick, but it also ended up with an AAV of $4.75 million regarding wasted cap space.
Husso is nowhere close to the goaltender who finished seventh for the Vezina following the 2021-22 season, and to be blunt, he’s been terrible throughout his nearly two seasons in Detroit. In 74 starts and 75 appearances, Husso has just 35 wins, an 0.895 save percentage, a 3.22 GAA, and a quality starts percentage of just 0.432. To be fair, he has logged four shutouts, but the consistency is nowhere near worth the price tag - especially with a whopping 22 ‘really bad starts.’
If Yzerman managed to trade him for even a late-round draft pick at this point, he should consider it a win. There are quite a few players in Detroit who shouldn’t return for 2024-25, not because they are bad players, but because Yzerman needs to make room for prospects. Unfortunately, Husso isn’t one of those players, and it’s time to get rid of him.
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(Statistics provided by Hockey-Reference, contract info provided by Cap Friendly)