Red Wings Lock Up Lindstrom For Two Years

The contract agreement between the Detroit Red Wings and defenseman Gustav Lindstrom came late in the day and without fanfare. Much like Lindstrom’s game.

The Red Wings locked up another of their restricted free agents late Monday when Lindstrom agreed to a two-year deal worth $850,000 per season.

There were some Red Wings fans who felt that Dennis Cholowski should’ve been the third defenseman protected from the NHL expansion draft instead of Lindstrom. Cholowski, Detroit’s 2016 first-round draft choice, was lost to the Seattle Kraken in the expansion draft.

The reason why the Wings preferred Lindstrom, 22, over Cholowski is that the flaw in Cholowski’s game is the strength of Lindstrom’s game. He competes for pucks, whereas Cholowski too often willingly surrenders space on the ice to opponents. The 6-foot-2, 190-pound Lindstrom is strong on the puck. He moves it smartly. He’ll never be an offensive dynamo but he also won’t be defensive detriment.

“I would say he just tends to make the right play,” Red Wings coach Jeff Blashill said. “The right play might be the simple play and the right play might be a cross-seam play. He just makes the right play that’s available and manages risk-reward very well

“He knows when he’s got an opportunity to make a tape-to-tape pass and knows when he’s got to live another day. That’s something in hockey that’s extremely important. He’s good defensively, he’s got a good brain on him and he can pass the puck.”