Kimmo Timonen will be in Philadelphia for one more season, but it’s likely that it’ll only be one more season. The 37-year-old defenseman will almost certainly retire in the 2014 offseason when his contract expires.
“99 percent sure that’s my last,” Kimmo said after Thursday’s loss to the Florida Panthers. “I talked with Paul before the season started and he wanted to know where I’m at with playing one more year.
“And I said, well, coming off the lockout, coming out from back surgery, give me about 10 games. I want to see how I feel. I want to still feel like I can play at top level, and a couple days ago I talked to him. I said I feel pretty good and it was pretty easy after.”
The one curious thing about this, at least from Kimmo’s perspective, is how hesitant he was before this season. He reconciled that a bit in the quote above, but still. Here was his take just a month ago, via the Courier Post, regarding the condensed schedule and the shortened season:
“It won’t be that easy,” said Timonen, a native of Finland who has been living in South Jersey during the lockout. “That’s going to be probably four or five games a week sometimes. That’s way less than (the usual) 82 games, but 48 in a short period of time might be even worse for me.”
Now, just 10 games into that season, he’s willing to commit to another year. Bit of a head-scratcher.
In any event, Kimmo’s still the Flyers‘ best defenseman, and even if the $6 million salary is a little high for next season given the lowered cap and the Flyers’ proximity to that cap, it’ll be nice to see him retire in orange and black. Let’s hope he gets a Cup before then.
