Wings and 29 Other Teams Interested in Free-Agent Prospect
As you may have noticed in previous reviews of Detroit's prospects, we don't have much after Smith. That all could change if the Red Wings sign free-agent prospect Danny DeKeyser.
Jump! (And updated with video!)
A friend sent me this link from DatsyukianDeke that had a quick write-up of DeKeyser. According to DatsyukianDeke and ESPN, DeKeyser is the top undrafted player in college hockey right now and every team in the league is trying to win him over. Is that true or is it just ESPN being dramatic? Don't know, but it made for a fun headline.
Five Fantastic Facts Found:
6'3"
186 lbs
Shoots Left
Sophomore at Western Michigan
Wears #5 (Gee, I wonder why)
Twitter? Yes. @DeKeyser5
Detroit's Chances:
DeKeyser is from Macomb, Michigan and grew up a Red Wings fan. This works out well for Detroit because his family would be a short 50 minute drive away from Joe Louis Arena if they wanted to watch him play. This is likely the least of our advantages. Why? Because as much as fans want to believe that the Winged Wheel is enough to attract players, opportunity to make the team matters more.
That's still an advantage for Detroit, though. As stated earlier, Detroit has few defensemen in the system that have shown enough skill to play consistently in the NHL. This means DeKeyser won't have nearly as much competition in Detroit as he will with some of the other teams.
He already has some connections with the team as he attended the Wings' summer development camp and played hockey with Jim Nill's son before attending Western Michigan.
I like that the Red Wings are putting on a full-court press to sign him and that we have all these things going for us. Still, in the end, it's up to DeKeyser to decide where he wants to play. Let's just hope he picks the good guys.
Chris Edit: Here's TSN video discussing DeKeyser and the Wings' chances:
1 Like
this may sound arrogant but the fact that the red wings front office is taking this kid so serious makes me think he might be the real deal. they have a pretty good reputation for these things. usually when i hear these things i always look at if our front office is interested or not. that usually tells you if the kid is just hype or not. brunnstrom is a perfect example. we weren't putting in that much effort to get him first time around.
I like how there hasn't been much talk about this in the mainstream media, This kid has Wings written all over him, and many say he is NHL ready right now. I would be really bummed if he signed elsewhere, maybe he can look at Brunnstrom's mistake and do the right thing.
@Jordan_Reis Its been written about and discussed on TSN and I believe the Hockey News as well. The story has some traction in Canada. Apparently, everybody from Detroit was at one of his games last month - Holland, Nill, Devellano, Chelios, Fisher, etc.
He'd be a nice signing but I wouldn't get too excited about him. He wouldn't be the first College sophmore to draw the attention of NHL teams only to not live up to expectations when he arrives. Most recently, the best comparison I can think of is Matt Gilroy who signed with the Rangers and now plays for the Lightning. The funny thing about him is that because of his age, contract offers to him weren't limited by the rookie wage scale (like DeKeyser will be). So the Rangers paid him like $3M out of the gate.
I saw something on him on HNIC, but the U.S. media hasn't jumped on it yet. If it doesn't have anything to do with Crosby NBC doesn't care.
He could be hype, but I doubt all the Wings brass would be so up on him if they didn't think he was worth it.@DetCapC19
@DetCapC19@Jordan_Reis I sorta agree, he's not lighting it up like Smith did in college, he's just a solid player.
