EL SEGUNDO, Calif. – Christian Ehrhoff still has that smooth, efficient skating stride.
With ease, the 33-year-old German defenseman glides to top speed with just a few steps.
“That’s not something that went away from his game,” Los Angeles Kings coach Darryl Sutter said. “That’s the strength of his game.”
This is the skill that earned Ehrhoff a 10-year $40 million contract from the Buffalo Sabres in the offseason of 2011 – a deal the Sabres bought out two summers ago. And it’s the reason why the Los Angeles Kings believe Ehrhoff can give them some depth for the upcoming season for one year at $1.5 million.
“You’re getting older, physics are maybe slowing you down a little bit,” Ehrhoff said. “But I think I still have lots in the tank left. I think that’s something that can benefit my game and the Kings game moving forward.”
He has size, skating ability and can score when healthy. His last year in Vancouver was 2010-11 and Ehrhoff had 14 goals and 50 points in 79 games played. This led to him cashing in on his unrestricted free agent contract in Buffalo.
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There, it just didn’t work out. His best season point-wise was 2013-14 where he had 33 points.
“I didn’t put too much pressure on myself. In the end I deserved that contract from what I had done previously and it was just probably a bad time for me to come to Buffalo with the way things turned out there,” Ehrhoff said. “First it was looking good and I would go to a team that’s a few moves away from being competitive for the Stanley Cup, and it turned out it wasn’t that way, then they broke it all down.”
Buffalo bought him out the summer of 2014, and Ehrhoff then signed with Pittsburgh. With the Penguins, he had the lowest point-per-game total of his career at 0.29.
He suffered a concussion and only played 49 games.
After the season, Ehrhoff went to Turks and Caicos with his family for a week to try to relax and get away from hockey. While he was in this beach paradise, his concussion symptoms began to subside.
No longer did he fear a bad day would follow a good day. Being with his family helped this.
“You don’t know what day is going to be a better day and what day not and being out in the playoffs, it’s more of a mental thing that wears on you,” Ehrhoff said. “When you can take your mind off it, that helps too.”
This past summer, Ehrhoff had the appearance of damaged goods. The concussion and the drop in production made him an unattractive option for a lot of teams.
But the Kings needed a player like Ehrhoff – a veteran who was both cheap and skilled.
Los Angeles’s defense was in flux with Slava Voynov serving a jail sentence for domestic violence. There were also questions about whether the Russian born Voynov would be deported – he eventually decided to leave the country on his own volition.
Voynov’s decision to depart should give Ehrhoff a chance to re-prove himself. Is he still a top-four defenseman? It’s unclear at this stage in his career.
The end of his tenure in Buffalo and his one year in Pittsburgh bring more questions than answers.
His most recent success came with the Canucks, a team that played a similar grinding puck possession style as the Kings. Ehrhoff also put up solid numbers in five years with the Sharks, another big grinding team. Though he played for these teams when he was in his 20s, not his 30s.
“Vancouver’s style then with Alain (Vigneault) as their coach is closer to our style than any team he has played on since so a lot of that plays into it too,” Sutter said. A player has to fit the type of team you have.”
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Josh Cooper is an editor for Puck Daddy on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at puckdaddyblog@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @joshuacooper
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