2011 Stanley Cup champion with the Boston Bruins and former Edmonton Oilers’ captain, Andrew Ference has been shut down for the remainder of the season with a hip injury. The 36-year-old veteran defenseman was stripped of the “C” this season because of a diminished role on a rebuilding Oilers squad.
Ference will have season ending hip surgery announced by the team on Thursday. Andrew hasn’t played since November 27th and has been limited to just six games this year. In those six games he averaged just over 13:00 a game and no points. Andrew has just one year left on his current contract at a value of $3.25 million.
Andrew’s future with the Oilers has been up in the air for the better part of this season starting in the summer. Moving a defenseman of his age is tough in this league especially with the cap having such a big impact in any roster moves. His diminished role doesn’t exactly sell the veteran and he’s not likely to play a bigger role on any other team in the league.
It makes you wonder what kind of cap relief this will gift the Oilers, especially if he is on the long term injured reserve into next season as well. If the Oilers were to buy out the remaining year on Andrew’s contract they would be responsible for two thirds of his cap hit, somewhere in the neighborhood of $2.145 million. Between injuries and healthy scratches, the former captain’s season was over before the 2015-16 season got its legs.
With a measly 40.3 percent Goals for Rate and 44.2 Corsi for Percentage, Andrew has been anything but spectacular in his time with Edmonton after coming over in free agency from Boston. In the summer of 2013 the Oilers and Ference reached a four year deal to have him step into a major role on their blue line while they developed their young talent. He was merely a stop gap until their group of prospects came to fruition. He has played 907 games over 18 seasons in his career and totaled 225 points with the Oilers, Bruins, Calgary Flames, and the team that drafted him, Pittsburgh Penguins.