Andrej Meszaros recorded 36 points last season for Ottawa. (Rick Stewart/Getty Images)The Tampa Bay Lightning signed Andrej Meszaros to a six-year contract on Saturday, locking up the defenceman they acquired a day earlier in a trade with Ottawa.
Tampa Bay had been prepared to sign the 22-year-old restricted free agent to an offer sheet on Friday before striking a mutually beneficial deal with the Senators, sending defencemen Filip Kuba and Alexandre Picard and a first-round draft pick to Ottawa.
"I'm excited to be joining the Lightning," Meszaros said in a statement issued by the team. "I'm extremely happy to be heading to Tampa Bay and I can't wait to take advantage of this opportunity. We should have a great team and I cannot wait to get started."
Before Friday's trade, the Lightning were reportedly set to ink the Slovakian to a multi-year offer sheet worth around $5 million US per season. When Ottawa general manager Bryan Murray decided he wouldn't match such a deal, he proposed the swap.
The deal appealed to the Lightning because the club would have needed to send first-, second- and third-round picks to Ottawa had the Senators declined to match the offer sheet.
That presented a snag for Tampa Bay, which had traded its third-rounder to Pittsburgh for Ryan Malone on June 28.
Since picks acquired from other teams can't be used as offer sheet compensation, the Lightning would have needed to make a separate deal with the Penguins to reacquire the draft selection in order to sign Meszaros.
Murray said in a conference call Friday that the Senators had been far apart in their own negotiations with Meszaros, who made $984,200 US last season.
"It got to a point where the money was too much for what we wanted to pay," Murray said of Meszaros. "We thought we had made a considerable offer, but when there was the threat of an offer sheet at such an exaggerated [dollar amount], it really led us to believe that making a deal was an easier way, and would give us the return that we needed for this player."
Meszaros, who was drafted 23rd overall by the Senators in 2004, excelled in his rookie year, playing all 82 games and racking up 39 points with a plus-minus differential of plus-34.
The following season he recorded 35 points and his plus-minus plummeted to minus-15. He had 36 points while rebounding to plus-5 last year.
"Andrej will be a very big part of our hockey club moving forward," said Lightning vice president of hockey operations Brian Lawton. "NHL defencemen typically don't hit their prime until 25-26 years of age and we look forward to working with Andrej throughout that time and beyond."
