Apparently, Alex Tanguay passed his physical, because today the Tampa Bay Lightning officially signed him to a one-year contract.
“We are extremely pleased to announce Alex’s signing today,” [Brian] Lawton said. “He is a player we had targeted some time and I could not be happier about welcoming him to the Lightning organization. We fully recognized the need for another top six forward and in signing Alex we feel we could not have possibly done any better.”
And apparently, no one could be happier about that than Vincent Lecavalier.
“He’s a hard-working guy, a good guy and you never have enough of those guys,” Lecavalier said Saturday. “I played with him in the world juniors (in 1998). I’m happy he’s part of it.”
Lawton was willing to give a little bit of info what they were looking for.
“We were always looking at our options, but at the end of the day, Alex was always our first choice,” Lawton said. “Of course, our coaches are banging on your door all the time and they wanted a top-six forward. Alex fit that.”
So what have the Lightning gotten themselves into?
Here are Alex Tanguay’s NHL career stats (from HockeyDB.com):
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | Pts | PIM |
| 1999-2000 | Colorado | 76 | 17 | 34 | 51 | 22 |
| 2000-2001 | Colorado | 82 | 27 | 50 | 77 | 37 |
| 2001-2002 | Colorado | 70 | 13 | 35 | 48 | 36 |
| 2002-2003 | Colorado | 82 | 26 | 41 | 67 | 36 |
| 2003-2004 | Colorado | 69 | 25 | 54 | 79 | 42 |
| 2004-2005 | Lockout | |||||
| 2005-2006 | Colorado | 71 | 29 | 49 | 78 | 46 |
| 2006-2007 | Calgary | 81 | 22 | 59 | 81 | 44 |
| 2007-2008 | Calgary | 78 | 18 | 40 | 58 | 48 |
| 2008-2009 | Montreal | 50 | 16 | 25 | 41 | 34 |
Last season, Tanguay was limited to just 50 games due to a shoulder injury. Which the Lightning have had their fair share of the last couple of seasons. Since Paul Ranger has had both of his shoulders operated on in the last year and a half or so, and he’s only got two shoulders, hopefully that’s all been taken care of, right?
Tanguay’s a good goal scorer, but he’s more likely to pass than to shoot. I watched him play often early in his career with Colorado. So even if he has the wide-open net, he’ll often make a pass instead. Still, he’s responsible defensively and is pretty disciplined so he won’t take many stupid penalties. He can be very physical, but is really more of a finesse player, I think.
One last parting quote, from the man himself:
“I’m looking forward to the opportunity to help this team get to the playoffs and, hopefully, do further damage after that,” Tanguay said. “But we’ll worry about the playoffs first. Obviously the organization has made huge steps in improving the team this offseason and I know (coach) Rick (Tocchet) during his days as (assistant) coach in Colorado. I know what to expect out of him and am looking forward to the opportunity to getting back to the playoffs.
“Knock on wood, I’ve never missed the playoffs in my career, and hopefully this won’t be the first time.”
We hope so, too, Alex. Welcome aboard. We hope you like it here.
And as an extra special little treat, because you’ve all been so good, here’s the video of the press conference.
