LA Kings place Christian Ehrhoff on waivers
The Los Angeles Kings have placed defenseman Christian Ehrhoff and his $1.5 million salary cap hit on waivers.
The Kings signed the 33-year-old Ehrhoff in the summer to add NHL level depth on their blueline. At times he’s been a healthy scratch this season and recently found himself buried on the team’s depth chart with the acquisition of Luke Schenn in January.
The left-handed Ehrhoff has two goals and nine assists in 40 games played. He’s averaged 15:10 of ice-time per-game, the lowest in his NHL career. Ehrhoff hadn’t averaged under 17 minutes of ice-time since his rookie year.
Before the season, the 6-foot-2, 201-pound Ehroff believed he still had something to give at the NHL level. Last season with the Pittsburgh Penguins he was derailed by a concussion and limited to 49 games played.
The year before with the Buffalo Sabres he was a minus-27. The team bought him out of his 10-year $40 million contract the following summer. He signed that deal before the 2011-12 season.
“You’re getting older, physics are maybe slowing you down a little bit,” Ehrhoff said in September. “But I think I still have lots in the tank left. I think that’s something that can benefit my game and the Kings game moving forward.”
Throughout his career, Ehrhoff has been a positive puck possession player. According to War on Ice he’s at 52.8 percent CF% 5-on-5. And at $1.5 million salary cap hit, he may be considered a bargain by some teams looking to bolster the bottom-six of their defense. This year with the Kings he’s at 54.9 CF%.
According to General Fanager, if Ehrhoff clears waivers his salary cap hit will be $550,000, which would give the Kings some flexibility to make another move. If a team claims Ehrhoff, they will owe him $475,806 in real dollars. The Kings have $2,709,829 of salary cap space according to General Fanager.
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Josh Cooper is an editor for Puck Daddy on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at puckdaddyblog@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @joshuacooper
