Carolina Hurricanes: Is Calvin de Haan worth the risk?

New Carolina Hurricanes defenseman Calvin de Haan is looking to earn his payday and contribute immediately. But is the injury risk worth it?

After finishing his extremely team friendly contract with the New York Islanders, Calvin de Haan is looking to quickly turn the page. He is embracing his new opportunity in Raleigh with the Carolina Hurricanes.

On July 3, de Haan agreed to a four-year deal at $18.2 million dollars that carries a $4.55 million average annual value. On paper, that number could potentially look like quite the overpayment. But that’s how it is in modern day hockey. Fully developed top four defensemen who can eat minutes are a rare commodity in this league. And they are being paid as such.

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The 27-year-old defenseman has unfortunately dealt with his fair share of the injury bug since his initial tour of duty with the Islanders. In his five seasons with New York, de Haan only managed to play one full 82 game season. Doing some quick math would show he averages to play about 60 games per season.

His current cap hit would put him on par with players such as Anton Stralman in Tampa Bay,  Shayne Gostisbehere in Philadelphia,  Chris Tanev in Vancouver, and John Klingberg in Dallas, just to name a few. You can make your arguments if he should be in that company. The Hurricanes feel he is.

There’s no question that de Haan should round out a young Canes defensive core nicely. With a group of Jaccob Slavin, Justin Faulk, Trevor van Riemsdyk, Brett Pesce, and the newly acquired Dougie Hamilton – they now have a gang who can certainly put some pressure on those aggressive fore-checking teams in the Metro.

Regarding the offensive talent that the Hurricanes now have on the blue-line, de Haan said the following to the Raleigh News and Observer:

“It’s going to make my job a lot easier to give the puck to guys like that…All the experts are saying that we have a great blue-line, and I don’t think they’re wrong. I know [from] playing against the Hurricanes for the past few years [that] it’s pretty stingy back there. It’s not easy to enter that offensive zone.”

Carolina is going to need to step up that “stingy” attitude in the defensive zone in 2018 if they’re going to want to compete for a playoff spot. Last season, the Canes managed to give up the 10th most goals (253) in the league.

To give you some additional perspective, none of the bottom 11 teams in goals against last year made the playoffs. Pittsburgh was number 12 on that list, giving up 248 goals. However, the Pens had the offense to make up for that short-coming, as they buried 270 into the net to offset.

Calvin de Haan should be able to help relieve some of that pressure down low that the Hurricanes struggled with last year. In New York, he was certainly known as a more of a “stay at home” type player. He seemed to shine when he was paired with a more offensive-minded defender. Pairing de Haan with Hamilton should do both of them favors. It would allow Dougie to use his superior skating and get involved with the offense, all while providing him with the anchor in de Haan.

If you’re a plus/minus stats advocate, you’d see that on some terrible defensive Islanders teams, de Haan would put up some decent numbers. In 2016-2017, his best season to date (and only full season played), he chalked up five goals and 20 assists for 25 points, as well as posting a plus-15 plus/minus rating.

Watching a lot of him, he’s a solid player, he really is. He’s a great teammate. de Haan is awesome with the fans. As an example, one of his pre-game rituals in New York would show him signing pucks and tossing them to young fans during warm-ups. They’re going to love him in Raleigh.

When he’s healthy.

The shoulder surgery that he had when he was shutdown last season was described as “major”. Of course with modern NHL injury reports, specifics are hard to come by. It was suggested that it was possibly his right shoulder. Oh, and by the way, it wasn’t his first shoulder injury – the one last year was his third which required surgery.

Yes, you read that right…He’s had three total shoulder surgeries. In 2009, he had to under the knife for his shoulder which cost him a year in juniors. While in 2012-2013, he required surgery on his left shoulder when playing in the AHL for the Bridgeport Sound Tigers.

Now, the Hurricanes obviously did their due diligence. But just the mere fact of de Haan’s track record – his style of play and willingness to lay out to block shots, get into the dirty areas, and bang around if needed – I could see how it would concern the Canes faithful.

Shoulder injuries are always an uncertainty. Modern medicine hasn’t quite gotten to the point with shoulder repair, like where they currently are with knee surgeries. There are plenty of cases of players having major knee surgery, and they come back as good as ever, such as John Tavares.

Yes, he’s been deemed to be 100 percent healthy. His surgery was performed by one of the best in the business. But that’s a good chunk of term and money tied up in a player that may potentially be banged up for a part of a season. At least that’s what his history has shown.

You’re paying good money for a guy that’s averaged playing 73% of his possible games in his career. That would make me second guess myself if I presented that deal. It would especially concern me seeing that four year term that was eventually agreed upon.

There’s still also the question mark of whether or not Justin Faulk will be moved. If Faulk is eventually traded, I guess you could look at it as if Justin’s old money would be de Haan’s money. Justin’s cap hit for the next two season is about $4.8m per.  So Calvin’s cap hit would basically just slip into that spot.

I guess we’ll have to wait and see if it’s money well spent. I don’t think the Canes are done moving players in and out this season. There’s alot of work ahead to be done to get them to compete in an always tough Metropolitan Division.