2009 NHL Free Agent Preview: Alex Tanguay
The Montreal Canadians are a team full of history, Stanley Cups, and unrestricted free agents. This year they are losing a few key players but one of the most intriguing will be Alex Tanguay. The 29year old winger was picked up by the Canadians from Calgary last year and he was quite productive. Tanguay is expected to draw some serious attention this year as well, boy I say that every time don’t I? Regardless onto his stats.
Tanguay has an injury ridden season this year playing in just 50 games. But in those 50 games he recorded 16 goals and 25 assists for 41 points. This was his most disappointing year statistically in his career, although this was his first season with serious injuries. Tanguay isn’t a big goal scorer, he has never recorded 30 goals in his 9 NHL seasons, and he only has 32 goals his last two seasons. Tanguay wouldn’t be the finisher on the power play, he’s only notched 21 power play goals his last 4 seasons; but he would be able to feed some of the other scorers.
Tanguay’s best asset is probably the fact that he has considerable playoff experience. Tanguay was on the Colorado championship team in 2000-2001. In his career he has played in 98 playoff games notching 19 goals and 40 assists for 59 points. The Rangers could most definitely be helped out by his playoff savvy.
Tanguay doesn’t really have too many negatives. He isn’t really injury-prone and he would probably fit into Tortorella’s system because of his speed. The problem that I see is that he is just another version of Scott Gomez, which the Rangers already have.
But I am not the GM, and although neither are you, let’s pretend we are. What would you do with Tanguay? Would you sign him to a deal and see if adding another prime feeder can help take some pressure off of Gomez? Or would you let him walk because the Rangers should be spending their cap on scorers not set-up men? Would you give Tanugay a shot, his speed would definitely help, or is he not worth it? As usual have at it in the comments!