One of the Flames’ problems throughout the 2017-18 season was a lack of adequate depth, particularly on the right side. Enter Tobias Rieder, who is approaching unrestricted free agency after the Kings elected not to qualify for him.

Listed at all three forward positions across various websites and resources, Rieder is a German left shot 25-year-old who was originally drafted by the Oilers in the fourth round of the 2011 NHL Entry Draft, just 10 picks after one Johnny Gaudreau. The Oilers swapped him out for Kale Kessy (selected three picks earlier than Rieder). Kessy has gone on to establish himself as a minor leaguer, while Rieder has played 312 NHL games to date, scoring 55 goals and 117 points over that time.

Perhaps most notably, in his rookie season he scored two shorthanded goals on the same penalty kill… against the team that drafted him.

Rieder’s career high in points is 37 from 2015-16, and he scored 25 over 78 games for both the Coyotes and the Kings this past season. He averaged 14:39 in ice time for both teams in 2017-18 – more for the Coyotes, one of the worst teams in the NHL, than for the Kings, a team that made the playoffs.

If the Flames bring Rieder into the fold, his role would be pretty clear: he isn’t going to help the top six, but he is someone who should be able to bring a fair bit of value to the lower two lines. He has consistently scored at least 12 goals a season throughout his career to date, has never failed to hit the 20-point mark, and – going back to those shorthanded goals – can help make an impact on the penalty kill.

The Kings didn’t turn to Rieder often for their penalty kill, but the Coyotes did. Before he was traded, he played 89:36 shorthanded minutes for them over the 2017-18 season, which ended up being the 10th most on the team. In that time, he had a fenwick against per 60 – shots on goal and missed shots – of 66.96; of penalty kill regulars, only Oliver Ekman-Larsson produced better numbers, at 65.68. (The next highest above Rieder was Christian Dvorak at 69.52; everyone else was well into the 70s or much higher.)

Let’s go back a year to the 2016-17 season, when Rieder played 191:04 shorthanded minutes for the Coyotes: the second most on the team. Then, his FA/60 was 75.37. Among regular penalty killers, only Jakub Chychrun had a better rating at 72.32, and he only played 78:49 down a man.

In short: Rieder was one of the Coyotes’ top penalty killers, and that’s a success he may be able to replicate in Calgary, as well. It would especially help as the Flames have a good set of top penalty killers in Mikael Backlund and Michael Frolik, but it somewhat falls off after them – particularly with Matt Stajan, their fourth most used forward on the kill, not coming back.

At even strength, though, Rieder may leave a little more to be desired. In his first two seasons, he was a positive corsi rel player; that dropped to a +0.02 in 2016-17, and this past season he was in the negatives for both the Coyotes (-2.84) and Kings (-1.11).

Rieder likely wouldn’t be all that expensive to sign, though. He’s coming off of a two-year $2.25 million cap hit, which was signed after his career high 37-point season. In the following years he’s scored 34 and 25 points. Matt Cane’s free agent salary prediction projects Rieder to come in at a little over $1.9 million, which would be an affordable ask for a bottom six penalty killer with a pretty steady scoring record – particularly if he can reach the top of his game once again.

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