They Gone: Tyler Myers And Brandon Tanev Depart For Much Greener (As In Money) Pastures

As expected, two Winnipeg Jets UFAs have now signed on with other clubs. Tyler Myers has signed a deal with the Vancouver Canucks while depth forward Brandon Tanev has signed with the Pittsburgh Penguins.

For Myers, the move to Vancouver had been expected for some time and earlier this week it was expected that his deal could see him be one of the highest paid defensemen in the league. It turns out it wasn’t that high, but it was still a pretty high value deal.

The best way we can sum up Tyler Myers for our friends in Vancouver is that he played pretty well for a bottom pairing defenseman, but was given top four d-man type minutes – sometimes due to injury issues that the Jets faced – and at times was a little bit out of his depth.

Brandon Tanev’s deal is much more shocking. The thought was that while the Jets were happy with Tanev’s season and would have liked to have kept him, but he was going to be in demand and price himself out of the Jets dressing room as they couldn’t afford to overpay for his services.

Turns out, the Penguins wanted to not only overpay, but do it for a lot longer than what a sane person would hand him.

A lot of us loved “best Tanev” and the all-out hustle he brought last season, but it might be worth nothing he was helped out a lot being on a line with Adam Lowry and Andrew Copp.

The Jets will miss the constant speed and work ethic Tanev brings and the loss of a veteran like Myers will make things tough to start next season, but for the amount of money both players signed for, those are a pair of contracts the Jets – a team already flirting with all too tight salary cap situation – were well advised to avoid.