The rumors were apparently true: forward Dale Weise has reportedly signed with the Philadelphia Flyers.
TSN’s Bob McKenzie said on television that the deal is a four-year deal worth more than $2 million per season. Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet confirmed that it’s a total of $9.4 million per year, or $2.35 million per year.
Michael Del Zotto, who played with Weise in New York, welcomed his friend on Twitter:
@daleweise22 welcome to the fly guys. @NHLFlyers. #reunited
— Michael Del Zotto (@MichaelDelZotto) July 1, 2016
Weise likely replaces Ryan White on the fourth line, which is surprising if for no other reason than that we thought White would certainly be back. He seemed to like the organization and both Ron Hextall and Dave Hakstol seemed to like him. It’s possible, however, that he simply asked for too much money and the two sides couldn’t make a deal work. That forced the Flyers to look elsewhere.
But that’s the thing here: was White asking for that much? I mean, $2.35 million per year on a fourth liner is a lot of cash, even though the Flyers do finally have money to spend against the cap. It’s a lot of money for a fourth line player, and the term is questionable — but at the same time, it’s not like this will kill the Flyers or anything.
Contract aside, Weise is a good option on the ice. He’s a better player than White in just about every way and certainly better than the average fourth line player — I mean, scoring nearly 30 points as a fourth line player in back-to-back years is certainly better than the average. Like White, Weise can also play on the second power play unit. He’s even a few months younger than White! The downside is that he’s coming off of an up year, and I guess there’s no guarantee that he repeats that performance for the next four.
In 329 NHL games with the Rangers, Canucks, Canadiens and Blackhawks, Weise has 37 goals, 49 assists and 260 penalty minutes.
