The 27-year-old had just returned from an ACL injury which kept him out for 11 months.
The Utah Mammoth have traded defenseman Juuso Välimäki to the Carolina Hurricanes in exchange for future considerations.
Välimäki, 27, has been through the ringer the past 11 months:
- After being selected to represent his country, Finland, at the 4 Nations Face-Off last February, he didn’t get to play a single game.
- Four days after the tournament concluded, he was placed on waivers to be assigned to the AHL.
- In his first AHL game, he tore his ACL, causing him to miss 10 months of hockey.
Since returning from his injury, Välimäki has recorded three points in three games with the Tucson Roadrunners, Utah’s AHL affiliate. Seeing as he already cleared waivers, he is eligible to play immediately for Carolina’s AHL affiliate, the Chicago Wolves.
In 43 NHL games last season, Välimäki scored two goals and five points. He was selected 16th overall by the Calgary Flames in the 2017 NHL draft.
Why did the Utah Mammoth trade Juuso Välimäki?
It’s no secret that “future considerations” is typically a more polite way of saying there’s no return involved in a trade. Why would the Mammoth do that?
There are two possible trains of thought. The first is that they free up $850,000 of cap space and $1,062,500 in actual money. While these things do matter, the second reason may have been the primary one: opportunity.
The Mammoth have seven legitimate NHL defensemen on their roster, with two young guns, Maveric Lamoureux and Dmitri Simashev, in Tucson pushing to make the big league. And in the event of several injuries, they can still call upon veterans like Scott Perunovich and Kevin Connauton. The chances of Välimäki jumping the line were slim.
On the other hand, the Hurricanes are dealing with several injuries on the back end, including one to Jaccob Slavin, widely considered one of the best defensive defensemen out there. There’s much more space for a player like Välimäki to come in and make a difference in Carolina — and the Hurricanes, who sit in first place in the Metropolitan Division, could use the insurance that a guy like him brings.
Teams will sometimes do their players favors when they realize there isn’t going to be a fit there. That’s what this trade seems like.
Category: General Sports
