Jan 18: McKeown has now been sent back to the AHL.
Jan 14: After opening up a roster spot yesterday when they returned Yaroslav Askarov to the minors, the Predators have filled that vacancy, announcing that they’ve recalled defenseman Roland McKeown from AHL Milwaukee.
It’s the fourth recall of the season for McKeown and the third in the last two weeks as he has been shuffled back and forth a bit more than usual lately, including to create the roster spot when Askarov had to be brought up a few days ago. The 26-year-old has gotten into five games with Nashville this season, logging 13:32 per night on the back end in his first NHL action since the 2017-18 season. In his career, he has three assists in 15 appearances at the top level.
McKeown has spent the bulk of the year in the minors, getting into 25 games with the Admirals where he has eight points. He’s in the first season of a two-year, two-way deal and is likely to return to his previous role of being Nashville’s spare defender as they were only carrying the minimum of six prior to this roster move.
How bad of a GM do you have to be to have as mediocre a roster as the Preds have and yet be less than 2 million under the cap? And then to have to alleviate the cap crunch by losing a kid like Tolvanen on waivers because you have no cap room for injury call ups?
We should all have the job security Poile has. :/
Imagine someday if a move of actual positive consequence happens with the Preds? I may have a heart attack.