Ales Hemsky signs with the Montreal Canadiens

The Montreal Canadiens have agreed to terms with Ales Hemsky on a one-year, $1 million contract. With Alexander Radulov heading to Dallas, Hemsky is a decent replacement to fill that void.

The Montreal Canadiens have signed right wing Ales Hemsky to a one-year, $1 million contract. The signing of Hemsky is likely an attempt to fill the void left by Alexander Radulov, who signed with the Dallas Stars today.

Hemsky, 33, spent the last three seasons playing in Radulov’s new home with the Stars. He was only able to play in 15 games last season, but he was still able to score four goals and add three assists to his point total.

In the two seasons before that he proved to be a solid bottom six winger for the Stars. In 2014-15 Hemsky had 11 goals and 21 assists in 76 games. And in 2015-16, Hemsky had 13 goals and 26 assists in 75 games. The Canadiens will be hoping they can get this 35-or-more point production for the bargain price of $1 million.

Hemsky is a solid veteran addition to the Habs roster, playing in 838 NHL games to this point. In those 838 games he has scored 174 goals, with a career-high of 23 that came back in the 2008-09 season with the Edmonton Oilers. Hemsky also has 398 assists over the course of his career, with his single season high coming in 2005-06 when he had 58, also with the Oilers organization.

The analytics also point to Hemsky still being an effective and efficient signing. In 2015-16, when the sample size is big enough to be significant, Hemsky had a Relative Corsi-For percentage of 1.91, which was good for sixth on the Stars roster.

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To put this into perspective, Radulov carried a 1.95 Rel.CF% in 2016-17 in 76 games with the Habs. And while you shouldn’t expect Hemsky to produce points at the same rate that Radulov did, having a winger that is as useful in possession as Radulov for more then $5 million less is a great deal for the Canadiens.