Tampa Claims Ritola as Detroit Waives Three

  The Detroit Free Press has reported that the Tampa Bay Lightning have claimed forward Mattias Ritola off waivers from the Detroit Red Wings, just after the Wings waived Ritola, Kirk Maltby, and Derek Meech. Tampa will pick up the remainder of Ritola’s contract in full, as the Swede re-signed with the Wings May 20th for three years at $516,667 per-year on a one-way deal.

  The beneficiary, general manager of the Tampa Bay Lightning Steve Yzerman, had the advantage of seeing Ritola’s play quite a bit in his tenure with the Detroit Red Wings in an assistant manager-type of role after his glorious career as a player came to an end. The first time GM has made a plethora of improvements to his Tampa Bay roster in a very short amount of time, and chances are he’s just gone and made another one.

  Ritola was waived by the Red Wings purely for the purpose to get the team under the NHL salary cap, with which the guidelines of, mandate every team to be under the cap by 3:00p.m. Wednesday. The stipulations to the rules also call for each team to be no more than 23 one-way contracted players on their NHL club, and after the free-agent signing of Mike Modano, return of Jiri Hudler, and emergence of Justin Abdelkader the Wings were three players over the top. It’s never an easy task to make the Detroit Red Wings’ roster, especially as a 23 year-old, but in this case Detroit would liked to have kept him as the three-year contract renewal suggested, but his play in the pre-season wasn’t enough to convince GM Ken Holland he was the man to stay. The one-way deal he signed in May left Holland no other option than to waive him per the contractual rules in the NHL.

“We liked him, we think he’s got potential, he’s what, 23 years of age, but we felt he didn’t show quite enough for us to make a decision to move somebody else,” general manager Ken Holland said. “I’m happy he’s getting an opportunity somewhere else. If he’d gone through waivers, we had him on a two-way contract this year, so we’d have been happy to have him in the organization. But certainly, when we put him on waivers, we knew there was a risk he was going to be claimed.”

  Ritola, 23, was drafted in 2005 by the Detroit Red Wings in the 4th round, 103rd overall. Despite being picked late, the fact that Detroit drafted him was proof enough that he was a worthy player as the Wings have one of (if not the) best scouting systems in the NHL, and have a very keen eye particularly for developing Swedish-born players.

  Ritola spent last year with the Grand Rapids Griffins, Detroit’s AHL affiliate, in his third season as a member of the team. In 73 games he tallied 19 goals and 23 assists for 42 points, a -3 rating, and 50 PIMs. His 2009-10 numbers were good for a tie for 3rd in points on the team, and 4th in goals scored. In December and May he was recalled from the Griffins and appeared in 5 games for the Red Wings, including once in the playoffs, all in which he was held off of the score sheets.

  Ritola has improved every year with the team, shaping into a player well worth a one-way deal, even at such a young age. In his total 211 AHL games played, Ritola has accounted for 41 goals and 65 assists for 106 points, a -6 rating, and 144 penalty minutes. Prior to his arrival in North America Ritola spent his time in various leagues in his home country of Sweden, with his best numbers coming from the Junior and Under 18 divisions. In International play, Ritola appeared in the World Junior Championships in 2005-06 where he posted two goals and two assists in six games.

  Ritola has shown to be a good, creative player thus far, and could get a good look at some NHL ice time with the thinned out 3rd and 4th lines of the Tampa Bay Lightning following their training camp cuts over the past couple of weeks. Ritola is a good skater with soft hands that is looking to be a more consistent finisher. For his age and experience level Ritola plays a fairly smart game, and has solid penalty killing ability which Tampa can benefit from.

  Also to be waived by the Red Wings was veteran winger Kirk Maltby. Maltby, 37, signed a one-year two-way contract renewal with the Wings in an effort to stay with the organization he has spent 13 and a half years with, collecting four Stanley Cup Championships. His deal was at a bargain price of $525,000, and the two-way clause allowed for the team to start him in the minors. There is no doubt he is in the twilight of his career, but Malbty still has very strong effectiveness on the penalty kill, which became his repertoire with the Red Wings all of these years. As I don’t see Holland doing it for any other reason, there must have been a recognition that Maltby can still be effective at the NHL level, and the waive (barring a trade) is the only way to give him that shot as the Wings’ roster is full-up as mentioned.

  An interesting scenario would be if Steve Yzerman had (or does on re-entry waivers) claimed the veteran forward he won 3 Stanley Cups with on the ice. The move would have even more ties to it than meets the eye, and could really benefit Tampa’s struggling penalty kill unit that finished 22nd in the league last season.

  Derek Meech, 26, is just another one of Detroit’s long list of casualties due to a consistently stacked roster. Meech has undeservedly been absent for almost exactly half of the NHL games he could have played in since signing a three-year, one-way contract worth $1.5 million in 2007 with the Wings.

  Meech by no means is a superstar defenseman, but throughout his AHL and NHL appearances has shown an ability to play well. Meech works incredibly hard, and is versatile as he has even played on the wing for Detroit at times. He is by no means a serious offensive threat in the NHL, but his defensive play and due diligence in the minors deserves notice. 

  In 2009-10 Meech appeared in (a career high) 49 games for the Wings where he tallied 2 goals and 6 points with a -12 rating and 19 PIMs. Total in the NHL, he has played 126 games going 4-12-16 with a -28 rating and 39 PIMs. His total AHL numbers are much better, playing 230 games, all for the Griffins, posting 17 goals and 48 assists for 65 points, a-6 rating, and 165 PIMs.

  In Meech’s case, the waive comes due to a full roster of one-way contracts, and the simple and unfortunate truth that in terms of numbers, he is the odd man out. No matter how it shakes out for Meech this year, it is the last of his existing contract. There’s no certainty as to what team or what level he will play in this year, but it is certain he will be working as hard as he can to earn a contract for 2011-12.

  In Maltby’s case, I believe he spoke with Ken Holland, and requested the waive for one last shot to play up in the NHL in what is likely his last year. Holland and all of Detroit respect what Kirk has done over the years for that franchise, and on the odd chance someone takes him, will in return be paying homage and respect to the veteran. As surreal as it may be, the room does not exist up in Detroit’s ranks for the battle tested Maltby.

  Teams have until 12:00p.m. Wednesday to claim either player off of waivers, but should either (or both) clear waivers, they will report to Detroit’s AHL affiliate, the Grand Rapids Griffins. The demotion for Maltby will be bitter/sweet and come as no surprise, having stated that he would love to mentor the kids in the minors and help build them as players and people on and off the ice. The move for Meech, however, would be very, very sour.

- Kendall Grubbs