Panthers Do Good, Ink Seidenberg
Get ready for not-last place, Florida! Wooo!
Getty Images
Our relative hero! One Dennis Seidenberg.
On the day the Panthers start training camp in Nova Scotia (welcomed, in all due respect, by a sign featuring a player no longer on the roster) comes word of a pretty great signing: free agent and former Carolina Hurricane Dennis Seidenberg has signed a one-year, $2.25 million deal.
Seidenberg, 28, helps reinforce a solid, if not exactly glamorous, defense that includes Keith Ballard, Bryan Allen, Ville Koistinen, Bryan McCabe, and veteran trade-in Jordan Leopold. That's a downright respectable patch-up crew to make up for Jay Bouwmeester's bolt to Canada. (Or try.)
Of course, here's the good news in context of the last several months:
Lose Jay Bouwmeester.
Lose stellar backup goalie and no. 1 Ice Girls fan.
Decide against having a general manager.
Lose $100 million.
Have a player decide he'd rather play in Russia than Sunrise.
Fail to complete possible trajectory-saving sale when bad owner refuses to cede control.
Keep double-dutying assistant GM from spending any money.
Ruin the concept of "viral campaign" by copping to the sham before it takes off.
Sign solid defenseman.
Uh, Hooray? Actually, yes. If the off-ice product is going to be a oozing, gangrenous mess, a team whose high point of the year was almost making the playoffs will take all it can get on the ice, thanks. Seidenberg's no slouch, and he's fresh off a career year with the Carolina Hurricanes that saw him notch 5 goals, 25 assists, and 30 points while averaging 22 minutes on the ice. (It isn't just Jay-Bo's talent the Panthers have to replace -- he tallied more playing time than anyone in the NHL last season.)
A German citizen, Seidenberg still has to get a visa to play in Florida, so we'll table our feelings until we make sure Panthers brass can actually pull off routine bureaucratic paperwork without losing another million or forty.
And then? Tempered excitement, a slight measure of hope, and the bottle of bubbly that relativity demands.
Copyright NBC Owned Television Stations
Posted Monday, Sep 14, 2009 - 2:13 PM EST
