2015-16 Report Cards: Dennis Wideman

Dennis Wideman
Defence
Grade: D-

JBizzle – D-

I personally think Calgary Flames D-man Dennis Wideman has been getting a bad rap from everybody. If you look at his stats, he has never really been an offensive machine having only three really good seasons in which he scored over 40 points and only four seasons on the plus side of the +/- category.

With numbers like that I never had really high expectations of him to begin with. He is a guy who contributes by going out and throwing his body around and gets in players heads. Had it not been for an unfortunate incident with an official, I likely would have given Wideman a C grade, but I lost a little bit of respect for him after that moment of terrible judgement.

MattyFranchise – D-

He's not worth 5.25 million. He had a career season last season but this time around he returned to being exactly what Dennis Wideman is: a bottom pairing defender with some time on the power play to boost his numbers. The silver lining is that his suspension and subsequent injury allowed the Flames to look at Nakladal who is a much better option that can fill the same role that Wideman was signed to do.

Corsi? 44.8. Corsi relative to his team? -3.7. He got a healthy zone start push (only 31.6% in the defensive zone), he got a lot of PP time somehow (148:57), and there was almost nothing to show for it. At even strength he was bad, on the power play he didn't produce. How he got the minutes he got is truly a head scratcher. He's a likely buy out candidate and this horrible mess of a season he just had is just more evidence in a buy out's favor.

And don't even get me started on Wideman-gate. For me, I think his season was a D-.

Samwell9 – D

Reflecting upon Dennis Wideman's most recent season does not conjure up the most positive vibes. It was brutal. In the 2014-2015 season, everything went perfectly for Wideman. 15 goals, 41 assists. Terrific offensive numbers for a defender. While Wideman and his partner Kris Russell were consistently providing the Flames with some very poor defensive play, they were often lucky or were bailed out by Hiller and Ramo. Things went south this year. The Wideman-Russell tandem was a disaster, victimized routinely and this year the goalies did not bail them out. To make matters worse for Wideman, his scoring prowess really disappeared. He really struggled to hit the net on a consistent basis, his first goal of the season came on December 20th.

Wideman's season was painful to watch offensively, defensively and then of course the whole Don Henderson saga. The Flames really did not miss him when he was out of the lineup and it looks like there are defenders in the system that can offer better value (Wotherspoon, Nakladal, Kulak). Whether a buy out or a trade at retained salary, it does not seem too likely Wideman is back. Hopefully. I'm giving his season a D.

FlamesMM – D-

Where does Dennis shoot the puck? Wide man!

It's no doubt that Wideman's 2015-16 season was a disaster, and it's more frightening to think that this Wideman is closer to the usual Wideman that the one we saw in 2014-15. It took Kris Russell setting an NHL record in shot blocking plus solid goaltending for that defensive pairing to scrape by two years ago. This year they were exploited consistently, and with Wideman's poor offensive showing to boot, there's really no reason for him to hold a Top 4 spot.

I wrote an article in early May on where the Flames could trade Wideman, and really there's not any particular team that should be lining up for his services. Not to mention his whole linesmen saga and now damaged reputation weighing him down. There's a lot of players within the organization that deserve an opportunity to play ahead of Wideman as the Flames are still a rebuilding team (Nakladal, Kylington, Kulak). A buyout would save the Flames $4M this season in cap space, but cost them $2M the following season. I think it's worth it. D- for Wideman.

MarkParkinson14 – F

I think we all know how I feel about Dennis Wideman, but what's one more chance to tell you. 56 to 19. That's 2014-15's point total and this past season's point total. There's also the 19 game suspension for hitting Don Henderson. There's the fact that the defense played better without him. There's his ridiculous $5.25 million dollar salary. He played on the top line. He played on the power play! AND there's the fact that he couldn't hit the net if it was 12 feet wide. If the Flames can get ANYTHING for him they should. Close the door on this chapter and move on. F+ (the + for making me hate a Flame more than Trevor Kidd).

HockeyGoalieEh – F

Dennis Wideman received a B+ from me in 2014-2015 and I had noted that the only reason that he was getting that grade was because of the production which he put forth. If he wasn't producing points, he wasn't valuable given his absolutely abhorrent possession. Given that point production doesn't necessarily carry over for defensemen, there was a good chance that he would regress heavily.

Low and behold, that production didn't carry over and Wideman regressed heavily. Ignoring the incident with the referee, he was completely useless on the Flames this year. He played over 1000 minutes this year, most of which came at even strength where he performed worse than a bottom six defenseman. His bread and butter continued to be on the power play, but he fell off quite a bit there as well and he was horrible in his limited showing on the penalty kill. He was also a negative in the penalty column. He's probably not moveable given his wretched numbers and massive contract and will likely be a great hindrance on the Flames ability to make any major moves in the off season.

F

by BizzleJ