Senators sign D Marc Methot to four-year, $19.6M contract extension
The Ottawa Senators are keeping veteran defenseman Marc Methot after signing him to a four-year, $19.6 million contract extension Monday morning.
By
Adam Gretz
•
1 min read
Another potential trade chip is officially off the market before the NHL trade deadline.
The Ottawa Senators announced on Monday morning that the club has signed veteran defenseman Marc Methot to a four-year, $19.6 million contract extension that will not only prevent him from hitting the open market as an unrestricted free agent in July, but also pretty much eliminate him from trade talks over the next two weeks.
The new contract carries an annual salary cap hit of $4.9 million, a raise of nearly $2 million dollar per year from his current contract ($3 million) and also has a modified 10-team no-trade clause.
In 17 games this season Methot has zero goals and five assists.
Offense is never going to be a huge part of his game -- he has topped 20 points in a season just one time in parts of nine seasons in the NHL -- but he has become a steady defensive defenseman who makes up half of Ottawa's top pairing alongside Erik Karlsson, a duo that has been one of the few bright spots for the Senators this season. Originally drafted in the sixth round of the 2003 NHL draft by the Columbus Blue Jackets, Ottawa acquired him on July 1, 2012, in the trade that sent Nick Foligno to Columbus.
With Tyler Myers going to Winnipeg as part of the Evander Kane trade, Cody Franson traded to Nashville on Sunday and Methot signed to an extension by Ottawa on Monday, the most attractive defensemen on the trade market would now be Edmonton's Jeff Petry, Carolina's Andrej Sekera and Arizona's Zbynek Michalek.
