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P.A. Parenteau returns to New York Islanders
Unrestricted free agent P.A. Parenteau is returning to the New York Islanders for one year at $1.25-million, as reported by Arthur Staple of Newsday.
Parenteau spent two seasons with the Islanders between 2010-2012. Since then he’s been a part of the Colorado Avalanche, had his contract bought out by the Montreal Canadiens, and experienced a career renaissance of sorts with the Leafs.
In Toronto, Parenteau hit the 40 point plateau for the first time since the lockout shortened season.
Parenteau scored 20 goals for the Leafs last season, tying a career high he set with the Islanders back in 2010-11. He’s historically been a positive (or near positive) corsi player, and finished with a 5v5 CF% of 53.7 last season on a Toronto team that was not so good (numbers via corsica.hockey)
This, in addition to the possibility of playing alongside one of the best players in the league, helped him come to the decision to return to the Isles.
Parenteau thrived in his first Isles go-round on the right side of the top line with John Tavares … Parenteau may get a crack to resume his role as Tavares’ wing man this coming season.
“I got a chance to play with him my first year when [Jack Capuano] took over and we had a good thing going,” Parenteau told Newsday on Saturday night. “I’m not assuming I will play there again but if I do it will be awesome. He’s one of the best in the league, the best on some nights. It’s a big reason why I decided to come back.”
New York has experienced significant turnover since the opening of free agency. The team lost Kyle Okposo, Frans Nielsen, and Matt Martin. In addition to Parenteau they added Andrew Ladd and Jason Chimera. It doesn’t quite equal out in the offensive side of the ledger, but the team is hoping their younger talent like Brock Nelson and Anders Lee are ready to fill in for what they lost.
Per General Fanager, Garth Snow has about $5.6-million in cap space to work with. The GM backed himself into this cap limit conundrum handing out huge, long-term contracts to players like Nick Leddy and Johnny Boychuck.
The team still has the RFA contracts Ryan Strome and Alan Quine to take care of. They also have four goaltenders on the big league roster; Christopher Gibson and Jean-Francois Berube are restricted free agents while Thomas Greiss has one year left on his contract and Jaroslav Halak has three more years (at $4.5-million).
(Is it too early to mention Tavares will be an unrestricted free agent at the end of the 2017-18 season?)
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Jen Neale is an editor for Puck Daddy on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email her at puckdaddyblog@yahoo.com or follow her on Twitter!
