Canucks' Daniel Sprong signing: Thoughts on cap space, fit and shooting efficiency

The Vancouver Canucks added some real offensive firepower at a cut-rate price over the weekend, signing one-shot scoring wizard Daniel Sprong to a one-year contract worth $975,000.

Sprong, 27, was originally selected in the second round of the 2015 NHL Draft by the Pittsburgh Penguins, during Canucks president of hockey operations Jim Rutherford and general manager Patrik Allvin’s shared tenure with the Penguins organization. He didn’t really develop into what he’s become — a scoring ace that can fill the net in a bottom-six role — until after the Penguins dealt him to the Anaheim Ducks in a successful trade that brought Marcus Pettersson to Pittsburgh.

It took Sprong a bit longer to establish himself as an NHL player than it normally does for dynamic offensive players. Until his mid-20s, he was still bouncing around between the American League and the NHL.

Since landing with the Washington Capitals for the pandemic-abbreviated 2021 campaign, however, Sprong has become a unique NHL scoring threat.

Sprong is a player who’s almost difficult to describe, in part because the things he does well tend to be the hallmark of elite players. He’s genuinely one of the most exciting pure offensive threats to watch in the league. He’s a unique shooter from distance. He possesses that rare ability to overpower set NHL-level goaltenders from the perimeter with an impossible-to-read wrist shot or a heavy one-time slap shot.

And yet, there are material deficiencies in his game, both from a hockey sense and a defensive-ability standpoint. Those limitations are material and explain why Sprong has become a journeyman, why he’s generally been relegated to a bottom-of-the-lineup role in his NHL tenure, and why, even on the back of consecutive productive seasons, he was signed by the Canucks in mid-July to a one-year value contract.

As the dust settles on the Canucks’ latest addition, and the organization’s decision to pursue some additional depth scoring punch in midsummer, let’s unpack the Sprong signing at greater length.

What does it mean for the club’s cap picture and their depth chart? How will Sprong’s usage fare in Vancouver, especially given what Rick Tocchet typically asks of his wingers defensively? And is it possible for the Canucks to offset some expected shooting percentage regression next season, if they add enough one-shot scorers to the lineup?

Here are three thoughts on Vancouver’s latest addition.

1. The Canucks saved space for a bigger swing in-season

When Canucks hockey operations leadership was debating and considering possible midsummer signing options over the past two weeks, the desire to avoid utilizing Long-Term Injured Reserve (LTIR) was paramount.

Ever since July 1, Canucks management has considered their offseason options on the basis of having the ability to add a finishing piece to the lineup at the cost of up to $3.5 million. That figure reflects the total of the Canucks’ actual remaining cap space (which Sprong now takes up, presumably) plus the $2.5 million the club could exceed the upper limit of the NHL salary cap by if the final year of Tucker Poolman’s contract were to be placed on LTIR.

If something bigger had been available, either on the open market or via trade, the club might have taken a bigger swing this summer. It’s telling, ultimately, that the club opted to do something more conservative.

The contract the club signed Sprong to over the weekend is effectively no-risk. It’s a one-year commitment and the entirety of Sprong’s cap hit can be buried in the American League if the fit isn’t there.

This is a flier on a talented goal-scoring depth winger, and the only real cost of the dice roll is the contract slot Sprong’s contract now occupies against Vancouver’s 50-contract limit.

Importantly, Sprong’s deal is so modest that the club will be able to ice a full 23-man roster with their newest forward on it and still be able to avoid placing Poolman’s contract on LTIR.

This is vital. The club has added a weapon, but they’ve also saved some ammunition. Let’s get into the weeds here and explain why.

While we typically talk about LTIR-induced cap flexibility as if it’s cap space, it really isn’t. Utilizing LTIR doesn’t free up cap space, it frees up LTIR space, which behaves differently than open cap space and comes attached to some serious complexities and limitations. The greatest of those limitations is that teams that operate in LTIR are unable to toll cap space daily.

This goes back to another distinction between how we typically talk about cap space, and how the system actually works for NHL teams managing the cap day-to-day.

We talk and write about Sprong’s 2024-25 cap hit, for example, as being $975,000, but that’s really the face value cap hit his contract represents, which is distinct from his actual cap hit, which in practice, is calculated daily during the season.

For teams that operate outside of LTIR, every dollar that they operate below the upper limit during the course of the NHL season is tolled on a daily basis — adding to that team’s available pot of cap space. If a team is disciplined and creative and fortunate enough about how they manage that space, it can add up over the course of the season and give those teams substantive additional flexibility by the trade deadline.

Even with Sprong’s ticket added to the cap mix, Vancouver is still positioned — as it stands — to be a team that tolls space daily this upcoming season.

Currently PuckPedia projects the Canucks to be about $16,000 shy of the upper limit based on face value calculations with this full 23-man roster.

Now, if the Canucks are pressed up against the salary cap to this extent, the amount the club tolls over the course of the season ahead of the trade deadline wouldn’t be very significant.

If the club is willing to risk losing depth players on waivers this season, however, or if a waiver-exempt player like Arshdeep Bains or Jonathan Lekkerimäki is able to push to make the team out of training camp ahead of a Phil Di Giuseppe or a Nils Åman type, then Vancouver’s hockey operations team could really cook their books.

When the team is at home, for example, the Canucks could send a player (or perhaps even two) down to Abbotsford before the conclusion of each business day during the campaign. Doing so would save the club the value of that reassigned player’s daily cap hit. Do this consistently at home, and the club could juice the amount of cap space the club is able to toll.

If the Canucks could even average being something like $450,000-$500,000 shy of the upper limit in face value cap space on a daily basis this upcoming season, that could toll to become a figure north of $2 million or so by the NHL trade deadline (this is very back of the envelope cap math).

When you add that flexibility to what the club could then create in LTIR space with Poolman’s contract ahead of the trade deadline, when tolling space is no longer advantageous, it becomes clear that the Canucks could realistically work this to have some real buying power cap-wise in late February and early March when it matters most.

Signing Sprong adds much-needed firepower to Vancouver’s offensive arsenal. Signing him to a deal modest, however, leaves the door open for the Canucks to create more cap space in-season, in anticipation of being buyers at the 2025 trade deadline.

Daniel Sprong and Phil Di Giuseppe battle for the puck. (Gregory Shamus / Getty Images)

When Andrei Kuzmenko slid down the Canucks lineup this past season and became an occasional healthy scratch and a fourth-line regular, it was a daily story in the rabid Vancouver hockey market.

Partly that’s because Kuzmenko was a fan favourite in this city. Mostly, however, it was such a big story because Kuzmenko accounted for $5.5 million per season against the salary cap and had a banner with his face on it mounted outside Rogers Arena.

It’s one thing for an NHL head coach to play a high-profile star in a bottom-of-the-lineup role, it’s another thing entirely to play a late-July signing making less than a million on a deal with no term in a bottom-of-the-lineup role.

Whether or not Sprong will fit in with how the Canucks want to play is a fascinating question, one that could remain in flux throughout the course of this upcoming season.

This is a team that demands a lot from its wingers, after all. A team that leans on relentless backchecking pressure in the neutral zone to achieve high-end defensive results, with a lot of that responsibility falling on the club’s wingers.

Canucks wingers are expected to manage the puck conservatively, especially at the offensive blue line. Sprong is an aggressive offensive player that is always looking to create.

Canucks wingers slash hard through the neutral zone when the club is in possession, but the Canucks aren’t a team that jailbreaks with abandon on the breakout. Sprong is a player that dines out attacking against the grain.

Canucks wingers are expected to skate hard on the backcheck, while cheating strong side, which is the basis of the club’s neutral-zone wedge, designed to funnel puck carriers toward Vancouver’s big-bodied defenders squeezing along the wall. Sprong doesn’t have the speed profile shared by most of Vancouver’s other wingers, and his defensive commitment has been inconsistent at times in his NHL career.

So could those attributes, and how they conflict with some of Vancouver’s “staples,” limit Sprong’s effectiveness in a Canucks sweater? Absolutely.

Does it really matter given how modest Sprong’s deal is? Yes, but in a far more muted sense than what the Canucks went through last fall and winter with Kuzmenko.

The Kuzmenko comparison, however, is a useful one to bear in mind I think. Not just in terms of Sprong’s offensive ability and ability to convert chances at a super efficient clip, but also in terms of fit.

You’ll recall in the early part of the 2023-24 campaign, for example, that Kuzmenko often started games on Elias Pettersson’s wing. And on those rare occasions in those giddy months of October and November that the Canucks found themselves trailing, Kuzmenko would remain there.

More often, however, as Vancouver held a lead through the first seven weeks of last season, Kuzmenko would be replaced in the top six as the game went along with a more defensive reliability winger, usually Anthony Beauvillier, popping up the lineup to take Kuzmenko’s place on the second line and contribute to closing out the two points.

I wonder if this could be a roadmap for the Canucks with Sprong this season, in terms of his usage. Perhaps the club will consider using Sprong up the lineup and having him open the game on Pettersson’s right flank with Jake DeBrusk. If the club is holding a lead, a more defensive reliable, faster winger like Kiefer Sherwood could take Sprong’s place to help close out the game.

Could Vancouver approach building a second-ling winger in the aggregate once again this season, but in a far more tolerable and budget-conscious fashion, with Sprong in the Kuzmenko role?

3. The shooting efficiency thing

Sprong is a ton of fun. His presence is going to make Canucks games more exciting.

We’ve already noted it, but the shot really is remarkable. It’s a shot with a distinct voice, unlike any other in the league. Sprong will score some goals that leave the jaws of Canucks fans on the floor.

It’s also a shot that Sprong gets off at an incredible rate. Over the past four seasons, Sprong ranks among the top 15 NHL forwards in five-on-five shot rate (minimum 2500 minutes played). Almost everyone else in that stratosphere is a star-level performer.

The shot rate thing is especially notable given how much difficulty Vancouver had generating looks at even-strength down the stretch and into the playoffs. It was arguably the club’s single biggest weakness at the end of last season, and it’s a weakness that the Sprong addition helps assuage, at least to some extent.

There are reasonable grounds to wonder about how Sprong fits with how Vancouver wants to play, but this is the other side of that coin. Sprong’s demonstrated ability to generate looks and shots on goal, and this team’s desperate need for precisely that, is worth prominently noting.

Now there are some drawbacks to Sprong’s shot selection. This is a preternaturally confident goal scorer, and there are going to be rush chances that he takes himself where fans are left yelling “pass!” at their TV screen. That’s part of the Sprong experience.

For the most part, Sprong is a player who knows how to manufacture scoring opportunities and converts on those opportunities at the rate of a star performer in depth minutes.

This is perhaps the most intriguing part of the Sprong signing, from my perspective. Dating back to when Sprong became a full-time NHL player during the 2020-21 campaign, his teams have consistently been among the most efficient in the league at converting on their scoring chances.

Between his stints with the Washington Capitals, Seattle Kraken and Detroit Red Wings, Sprong has maintained a dizzying 10.7 percent on-ice shooting clip. That sandwiches him between Steven Stamkos and Kirill Kaprizov for the 11th-highest mark among the 337 NHL forwards that have logged at least 2500 minutes over the past four years.

Two things interest me about Sprong’s hyper-efficient offensive game. The first has to do with the player who ranks fifth among the 337 qualifying NHL forwards in our sample, which is Pettersson. Now I’m not sure if Sprong and Pettersson are likely to play with one another next season, but I’m desperate to see it.

Perhaps Sprong isn’t an efficiency driver to the extent that the data suggests, and it’s highly possible that his conversion efficiency would regress significantly if pressed into a larger role higher up the lineup.

If he’s really driving conversion efficiency, however, and he’s paired up with one of the league’s best at doing so, what’s the outcome? It’s a hockey experiment I’d be very curious to watch play out in real time across, say, 300 shared five-on-five minutes at some point next season.

Additionally, I’m curious to see how the addition of Sprong interacts with the overwhelming likelihood that Vancouver isn’t going to shoot the lights out to the extent they did this past season next year.

Expecting some significant shooting percentage regression from the Canucks as a team next season is entirely reasonable. This is a club that converted on their shots on goal to a historic extent across the first 50 games of last season, and finished the year first in the NHL by shooting percentage at five-on-five by a massive margin — the Detroit Red Wings, who were second, finished a full half percentage point behind the Canucks.

In previous seasons I’d have analyzed the Canucks as a team with an extremely high probability likelihood of falling back to Earth in terms of their shooting efficiency next season, and while that’s still probably true, the NHL has evolved. It’s a higher-scoring game today than it was a decade ago, in large part because the average save percentage has massively declined. Shooters and teams are figuring out intelligent ways to attack goaltenders — through layered traffic, during transitions and with a preposterous array of drag shots and other tricks to disguise their release — and the sport is less possession-based as a result. And better for it.

With save percentage dropping this quickly — from .915 10 years ago, to .910 before the pandemic, to .903 this past season — I’m somewhat less confident in predicting that a team loaded with one-shot scoring talent like the Canucks is bound to succumb to the gravity of regression. I still think it’s likely, but I don’t know that it’s a slam dunk the way I would’ve five years ago.

And I’ll be especially cautious about predicting it for a Canucks team that’s poised to ice an elite playmaker (Conor Garland), a big-bodied goal scorer with good hands that lives in the blue paint (Dakota Joshua), and finishers like Höglander and Sprong among their bottom-six forwards.

If an NHL team throws enough one-shot goal-scoring talent at the wall can they outdo Icarus? We’re about to find out.

(Top photo of Daniel Sprong and Teddy Blueger: Dave Reginek / NHLI via Getty Images)