Jeff Petry: Already In The Dog House With Red Wings?
Things were starting to look so positive for Jeff Petry heading into the 2023-24 NHL Season. Petry was part of the Erik Karlsson trade and eventually found his way back to Detroit. Petry was thrilled to be traded back to his hometown team. However, if you were paying attention, you knew Petry was a shell of his former self years ago. The guy has been on the decline and Detroit is finding out that lesson the hard way.
Petry has already been healthy scratched two games into the season. Head coach Derek Lalonde has basically confirmed that Petry is now the team’s 7th defenseman.
“Jeff Petry is the odd D-man out. Probably similar to Olli Maatta (who sat out the season opener),” said coach Derek Lalonde. “Don’t like it, but it’s a good luxury to have with our seven D. I’m sure he’ll be right back in on Wednesday, but you never know. Someone like Jeff, who’s obviously a little bit older in his career, hopefully he can take this as a little rest, and when he’s back in, he’s playing at a high level again. He’s given us two good games also so far.”
“Based on performance, he has been the No. 7 D man after two games.”
Big yikes! Petry carries a $6.25 million cap hit for this year and next year. The only good news is Pittsburgh is paying a touch over $1.5 million while Montreal is eating roughly $2.3 million. Still, I’m not sure Petry is worth more than the league minimum, at this point.
It’s fair to question the Yzerplan on this one. Given all the blue line help that Detroit added, why even go down this road for a player aging in dog years?
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