Mike Hoffman has carried around a little baggage with him since his days in Ottawa came to an abrupt and dramatic end. We won’t go into that messy story, but it’s easy enough to find with a quick Google search.
Regardless of what’s happened off the ice, he’s continued to be a producer on the ice. His lowest point total in the past 5 years has been 56, and that includes the move to Florida and a shortened season (in which he scored 59). Those number should be good enough to hold your own on the payroll of a lot of teams.
That was the initial cause of confusion for NHL fans after the St. Louis Blues announced that they’d signed him to a professional tryout.
A PTO is usually utilized to see if a player is someone the team would like to sign. It allows them to participate in team activities without actually being signed. So what’s a player like Hoffman doing signing a PTO? Has he not proved his worth enough to actually just get a contract?
As TSN Hockey Insiders Darren Dreger and Pierre LeBrun explain, there’s a likely a little more to the story than that.
Long Term Injury Reserve would free up cap space to make signings, so it seems as though the Blues have essentially saved a spot in the team’s camp and roster until they are able to maximize their cap situation.
Still, it was initially a funny source of confusion for the Twitter sphere.
(H/T Darren Dreger, Pierre LeBrun)
