Musings and Quick Hits: Simmonds, Prospects, Ashbee and More July 28, 2018, 1:45 AM ET [181 Comments] Bill Meltzer

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MUSINGS: DOES WILSON CONTRACT IMPACT SIMMONDS?



While Washington Capitals right winger Tom Wilson and Flyers right winger Wayne Simmonds are not quite comparable players -- Wilson is six years younger, his deployment has been different, and his career highs of 14 goals and 35 points have been far superseded by PP1 netfront fixture Simmonds, who had reached 30-plus goals and 60 points twice apiece in his NHL career -- the six-year contract at a $5.17 million cap hit contract to which Washington signed Wilson on Friday does nothing but increase agent Eustace King's leverage in negotiating Simmonds' next contract.



Simmonds is entering the final season of a six-year deal that pays him $3.975 million per season. He's been one of the NHL's biggest bargains over the bulk of the deal. In a past (pre-salary cap) era, when renegotiations were allowed in replacing an existing contract with a new one, the Flyers and the Simmonds camp probably would have come to terms on a new multi-year deal about three years ago.



Now that Simmonds is about to turn 30 and is coming off an injury-plagued down year by his standards, the Flyers seem understandably leery about going ultra long-term on a new contract for the alternate captain in his likely open market-value cap hit. Equally understandably, agent Eustace King and Simmonds want to maximize his next contract, which will take him through most or all of his remaining NHL career. Apart from the goals he scores, Simmonds brings a whole lot of intangibles to a team. When putting a real-life team together, there are human elements such as locker-room leadership group dynamics and individual character as well as statistical trends to consider. The question is how much and how long to pay for those if the stats are at risk of trending downward.



Flyers general manager Ron Hextall was forthright in saying that all the considerations involved in the Simmonds negotiation makes it a tough call. Although, Hextall didn't mention specific players, he is well aware that the Simmonds camp is going to look at the seven-year contract at a $7 million cap hit signed by Evander Kane in San Jose, the Flyers' own signing of James van Riemsdyk at a $7 million cap hit for five years, the six-year term for Wilson, the five years at a $5.75 million cap hit that James Neal got to go to Calgary and realize they can likely get both a longer term and a higher or comparable salary as an unrestricted free agent.



"I'm not sure where that's going to go. It's a tough one for both sides. Obviously, there's long-term deals out there and when you look at what other guys have signed for, Simmer could be there with them. For our part, we've got to think long and hard about term -- not only on Simmer but on a lot of players. So that's something we'll continue to monitor and we'll see where we go as we go along," Hextall said.



Simmonds has had a mid-line pelvic tear since the start of training camp in September, which explains why he was taking maintenance days in the preseason. The issue will likely require off-season surgery. Playing through the injury, Simmonds nevertheless managed to score a hat trick on opening night and compile six goals and nine points through the first eight games of the season. However, overcompensating for the pelvic tear left him vulnerable to other injuries, and his play dropped off dramatically as other injuries (some of which were unrelated, some potentially related to overcompensation) piled up.



Early in the season, Simmonds suffered a groin pull on Oct. 17 against the Florida Panthers. This was almost certainly related to overcompensating for the pelvic tear, and the combination injury noticeably compromised his skating speed and power. To make matters even worse, Simmonds sustained an ankle fracture when he took a Shayne Gostisbehere shot off his ankle ("but it wasn't a weight-bearing bone" Simmonds said by way of explanation on Wednesday).



Unrelated to his litany of lower-body issues, Simmonds was sitting on the bench between shifts during the Flyers' Oct. 19 home game against the Nashville Predators when the Preds' Mattias Ekholm accidentally caught him flush in the mouth with an errant high stick. The result was broken teeth that required a four-hour ordeal of dental surgery, including multiple root canals. During the All-Star break, multiple now-dead teeth had to be extracted. If it seemed like Simmonds' speech was affected in interviews in the latter part of the season, it was because he was minus about six teeth in the front of his mouth.



At another juncture of the season, Simmonds took another stick to the mouth that required stitches on and near his bottom lip. For a time, the injury site had a raw, nasty-looking infection before it healed. Nevertheless, Simmonds did interviews when asked.



On Feb. 16, in a game at Madison Square Garden against the New York Rangers, Simmonds dropped the gloves with Rangers defenseman Anthony DeAngelo. Simmonds won a lopsided bout but, as DeAngelo went down to the ice, Simmonds' thumb got caught in his opponent's jersey. The result was torn ligaments. This was the only injury that caused Simmonds to miss time during the season: he was out for seven games. The silver lining was that being forced out for that stretch may have helped Simmonds' groin issues to lessen the rest of the season although the torn pelvis remained, of course.



In explaining why he played through all of these things -- and returned from the thumb issue with a surgical pin -- Simmonds said, "I don’t know if it’s the right thing, but I can’t not play. It’s just geared in my head. If I’m not dead or I’m not deathly sick, I’m gonna try to get out there and do whatever I can. Whether the coach is gonna play me, whatever minutes he wanted to play me, that was up to him. I’m definitely gonna sacrifice my body for the team, that’s for sure.”



Simmonds said he no regrets over playing through all the injuries, severe as they were. He'd do it again in the future. Last season, he still managed 24 goals, including 11 on the power play. He has since undergone surgery to repair the pelvic tear is expected to be ready to start training camp on time.



The Flyers don't want to lose Simmonds for nothing as an unrestricted free agent next July. Unless they are out of the playoff chase, though, they also probably don't want to trade him for assets near the trade deadline. But they also don't want to essentially be back-paying Simmonds for his years of being underpaid as he moves into his early 30s (when many, but not all, power forward types begin to break down physically and the returns diminish) and beyond.



It's definitely not an easy decision, because every possible decision entails considerable risk. Such is the business of hockey, though. The one thing that's for certain is that if the Flyers are only willing to go, say, three years in an extension offer even at a slightly higher cap hit, the Simmonds camp probably will wait and aim for a longer-term deal elsewhere because they will most certainly get it if Simmonds has even a reasonably good 2018-19 season.



It's not a question of CAN the player get such a contract on the open market. He almost certainly will. The question that Ron Hextall has to answer is "Are we the team that should be giving that contract to him?"



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Quick Hits



1) Although the first games are not until Monday, the 2018 World Junior Showcase gets underway this weekend in Kamloops, BC.



2) On Friday, USA Hockey announced that NHL Network will have live broadcasts of six games over the final three days of competition at the World Junior Showcase.



Thurs. Aug. 2: USA vs Sweden (4 p.m. EDT) Canada vs Finland (9 p.m. EDT).

Fri., Aug. 3: USA vs. Finland (4 p.m. EDT), Canada vs. Sweden (9 p.m. EDT).

Sat., Aug. 5: USA vs. Canada (5 p.m. EDT), Sweden vs Finland (8 p.m. EDT).



Eight Flyers prospects are taking part in the tournament, at least at the outset before the split USA and Canada squads are each pared down into single teams. Joel Farabee, Jay O'Brien and Noah Cates are trying out for Team USA. Morgan Frost and Isaac Ratcliffe are trying out for Canada. Sweden and Finland's squads are set (no split-squad games), so Flyers prospects Olle Lycksell, Adam Ginning and Samuel Ersson will be on the Tre Kronor roster. It remains to be seen how much action goaltender Ersson will get among the three goalies the Swedes are carrying on their roster, as he enters the tourney third on the likely pre-tourney depth chart as viewed by the coaches and the Swedish Ice Hockey Federation.



3) The now-renamed Hlinka Gretzky Cup (formerly Ivan Hlinka Memorial Tournament) is the annual beginning of the long scouting season schedule that ends at the NHL Draft late the following June. This year, NHL Network is televising four games live.



Fri. Aug .10 (semifinals): Games are at 5 p.m. EDT and 9 p.m. EDT.

Sat. Aug. 11:third-place game at 5 p.m. EDT, championship game at 9 p.m. EDT.



In addition, HockeyTV will provide live streaming coverage of 14 games: the tournament's preliminary round tilts, the fifth-and seventh-place games.



4) Belated July 27 happy birthday wishes go out to Andre "Moose" Dupont (1949) and Steve Coates (1950).



5) July 28 Flyers Alumni birthdays: Garth Snow (1969), Barry Ashbee (1939-1977).