With the 2019-20 NHL season on hold we are going to review where each NHL team stands at this moment until the season resumes. Here we take a look at the long-term outlook for the Anaheim Ducks.
Pending free agents
- Kiefer Sherwood (RFA)
- Sonny Milano (RFA)
- Christian Djoos (RFA)
- Jacob Larsson (RFA)
- Jani Hakanpaa (UFA)
- Michael Del Zotto (UFA)
- Matt Irwin (UFA)
- Ryan Miller (UFA)
The core
The face of the franchise at this point is still John Gibson, and while his numbers took a bit of a hit this season he is still one of the league’s elite goalies. As long as the Ducks have him as their foundation there is always the chance that he can give them a chance.
Is it unfair to put so much on one player to carry a team? Of course it is, but right now he is the reason for hope.
Beyond him, the Ducks have a handful of long-term contracts on their books.
Defenseman Cam Fowler is signed through the 2025-26 season. Forwards Adam Henrique and Jakob Silfverberg are signed through 2023-24, while Rickard Rakell, Hampus Lindholm and Josh Manson are all signed through the 2021-22 season.
Ryan Getzlaf, one of the franchise icons, still has one more year after this one at $8.25 million.
Long-term needs
Offense, offense, and more offense.
Even when the Ducks were still a contender as recently as a couple of years ago they were still only a middle-of-the-pack team offensively. Over the past two years, though, they have plummeted to the bottom of the league.
Since the start of the 2018-19 season they are the second-lowest scoring team in the league (2.47 goals per game, ahead of only the Detroit Red Wings), second-worst in shots per game (again ahead of only Detroit) and third-worst on the power play (ahead of only Nashville and Detroit).
Rickard Rakell and Jakob Silfverberg are still good top-six options, and they do have some young players starting to break into the league (Sam Steel, Max Jones being at the top of the list) but they need to start taking big steps in the coming seasons.
For as promising as those young players may be, they still lack a young franchise player to serve as a long-term building block. Their best hope for acquiring that: Some draft lottery luck. The Ducks have two first-round picks this season (Bostons, plus their own pick which will be a lottery pick) and along with their own second-round pick will have three of the top-40 picks in the 2020 draft.
Long-term strength
For all of their current and long-term flaws, they still have an impact player at the one position that can make a meaningful difference -- goaltender.
Even though Gibson had a down year this season he is still one among the league’s best and is capable of single-handedly changing their short-term outlook.
Since becoming Anaheim’s starter during the 2015-16 season his .919 save percentage ranks eighth in the NHL among 55 goalies that have appeared in at least 100 games.
They have him signed long-term at $6.4 million per season. Given how good Gibson has been, how dominant he can be when he is at at his best, and his age, that is a more than fair number for the Ducks to build around. The issue now is whether or not they have the players and resources to do that.
MORE:
• Looking at the 2019-20 Anaheim Ducks
• Ducks’ biggest surprises, disappointments so far
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Adam Gretz is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @AGretz.