WRAL Sports Fan

Canes face off with injury problems

By Mike Maniscalco
Feb 4, 2009

The Carolina Hurricanes Captain Rod Brind’Amour will not finish the team’s West Coast trip. The team’s captain whose season was cut short last year due to a knee injury has not been his usual Selke Award winning self. Brind’Amour had torn meniscus cleaned out of the same left knee this September has been hampered by a nagging “lower body injury” all season long that reflects in his stats. Feel free to guess what that injury might be. Hopefully a few days off will help Brind’Amour down the road, and get him back to the production he has had his entire career.

Add to the mix that Scott Walker has been placed on injured reserve after taking a cheap shot from Penguin forward Matt Cooke, Dennis Seidenberg is out with a groin injury and a team that had been relatively healthy is scrambling for bodies.

Any time a team leader is out of the line-up there are always major causes for concern, especially if the player doesn't finish out a road trip. Where the Canes will miss Brind'Amour on the ice is in the face-off circle, an area where he wins 62% of the draws he takes and no one has taken more draws in the league with a better winning percentage. The line of Chad LaRose, Brind’Amour and Patrick Eaves have been providing a physical spark for the Hurricanes, something that the team needs on a nightly basis.

Off the ice his impact is huge, as the leader in the locker room and the example he sets in the training room are second to none. Brind’Amour will miss the rest of this trip and it is something the Canes can compensate for, especially how rookie Brandon Sutter has played of late. If Brind’Amour returns to the line-up for the team’s game on the 12th against Florida…that would give him nine days off to heal up for the final 26 games of the season. That is a best case scenario for this team.

If this is a more serious situation, Carolina will need more than help from the farm system. The Canes will need help from outside the organization, but at what price? Picking up a rental player with the option to buy becomes more of a realistic possibility, as long as the price is not too steep, and what do the Canes have to offer. A playmaker is something that the Hurricanes need, but those players come at a hefty price and frankly there aren’t impact players out there available for draft picks.

We will have to wait and watch how this situation plays out. One thing is certain a healthy Rod Brind’Amour will have a huge impact in the line-up, waiting for that to happen without bringing in a player to help will have an impact that this franchise can’t have. That is the impact of no playoff dollars.