Arizona Coyotes News: Justin Hodgman Gets Recalled

Justin Hodgman is back! All Hail the Coyotes Offense.

According to NHL.com, the Arizona Coyotes have recalled Justin Hodgman, most likely in order to replace center Martin Hanzal in the lineup.

When I found out, a couple people made cracks about how ‘finally, they noticed that Hodgman is a good player!’

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Well, yeah. Hodgman was the KHL’s best-kept Canadian secret for far too long, in my opinion. He was one of those players who kind of slipped through the cracks at a younger age, and the Coyotes finally took a chance on him this season- thank God, since he’s got the kind of offensive sense that the team has been somewhat lacking.

The plus side to having Hodgman in Portland up until the team ended up with an injury was that he got some quality playing time. In the past few weeks, he’s gotten the chance to play top offensive minutes with the AHL franchise, giving him the proper amount of play to truly develop into a top-six forward that the team can use.

The Tampa Bay Lightning have done something similar with Jonathan Drouin; sure enough, the elite prospect ended up getting called up when Ryan Callahan’s spun-sugar body got hurt early on in the season. Now, the Coyotes will get the chance to truly play Hodgman where he belongs- and if he ends up being the extra skater (although I sincerely doubt this will be the case), at least we know that he’s been getting in his ice time leading up to his re-entry to the Coyotes lineup.

Over the past two weeks, Hodgman has played in three games with the Pirates- and although he hasn’t scored, that’s still three more games than he most likely would have been awarded had he remained on the team’s roster in Glendale. He led the team with four goals and one assist in the preseason.

#TeamHodgman

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