Anaheim Ducks Free Agent Options: How Much is Cody Hodgson Worth?

The 25 year-old center isn’t washed up yet; it just appears that way!

This past weekend, the Anaheim Ducks cleared some money off of the books in order to pursue free agents this summer.

By trading James Wisniewski and especially Kyle Palmieri, the Ducks have given themselves some wiggle room that will make it a little bit easier to bring in free agents this summer, or swing another trade or two.

The problem with this summer’s free agent crop?  Uh, it’s lame.  Mike Ribeiro is probably the cream of this year’s crop, followed by Matt Beleskey, who is over-pricing himself right out of Anaheim.  Honestly, Beleskey epitomizes what is wrong with a free agent class such as this: it’s essentially a bunch of role players who are going to ask for more money than they are worth, but since some desperate GM will wind up accepting their terms, over-pricing themselves won’t hurt these guys.

We all know that Anaheim Ducks GM Bob Murray is not going to be suckered into over-paying for a role player such as Antoine Vermette or Cody Franson . . . but is he willing to take a bit of a gamble on a young, sure-to-be-inexpensive forward such as Cody Hodgson, whom the Buffalo Sabres just placed on waivers today?

When you look up the definition of the word, “bust,” in the sports dictionary, there must be a photo of CoHo next to it. Trust me, I know: I spent two years covering the Buffalo Sabres.  When Hodgson was surrounded by Thomas Vanek and Jason Pominville during the lockout-shortened 2013-2013 season, he appeared to be a top-six forward, putting up a stat line of 15-19-34 in just 48 games.  I never once thought that he was good enough to be starting at center, but come on – he was on pace to score close to 60 points that season if he had played 82 games.

Even his 2013-2014 campaign was not embarrassing: playing on a Sabres squad that went 21-51-20 to finish with the worst record in the NHL (a season in which the Sabres were outscored 248-157, mind you), Hodgson was good for 20-24-44 – not bad, when you consider that he was one of only three players on Buffalo’s roster that opposing defenses needed to worry about.

Hodgson never was much of a two-way player, as his -26 rating in 13-14 will attest, but again, this is Buffalo we’re talking about.  CoHo was the leading scorer on that godawful team, leaving us to ask, “How good could he be if he was surrounded by actual talent?”

Of course, the wheels totally fell off of Hodgson’s career in 2014-2015.  In 78 games, he scored six goals.  He dished out seven assists.  His +/- was -1000.  Sorry: it was actually -28; it just felt like more.  He scored one goal in a 47-game stretch: one!  And he endured goal droughts of 19 and 27 games.

For a guy who was signed to a ridiculous six-year, $25.5 million contract, that is obviously unacceptable . . . but no one outside of Buffalo’s front office ever believed that CoHo was worth that much money, and again, he played on the Buffalo freaking Sabres.  He wasn’t exactly getting much help last year.

So is CoHo worth the risk?

There is no doubt that Cody Hodgson can produce 40+ points per season, when surrounded by the right personnel.  He’s a defensive liability, but he sure would not be the first player in the NHL to be known more for his scoring than for his ability to D-up.  I would hope that his crash-and-burn last season has humbled him and will light a fire under his ass, should an NHL team be willing to take a risk on him – and since he is still only 25 years-old, you have to believe that SOMEONE will make him an offer.

Even as cheap as he might come, though, I don’t see the Anaheim Ducks taking any interest in CoHo’s talents.  Sure, he is able to wow you once and a while with individual efforts such as this one:

But since Hodgson would never be able to crack Anaheim’s top six, he would be relegated to third or four-line duties.  Have I mentioned that he doesn’t really understand how to play defense?   Or use his body?  The guy averages 41 hits per season – exactly a half of a hit per game!

He may come cheap, and he still has untapped potential, but the Anaheim Ducks are not the sort of team who needs to take needless gambles.  As much as I hope CoHo finds a team that will allow him to play to his potential, there are too many question marks surrounding him for me to consider him worth the Ducks’ time.

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