Dallas Stars Put Gemel Smith On Waivers Prior To Arbitration Hearing

Things are heating up on the arbitration front for the Dallas Stars. They waived Gemel Smith, their final arbitration case, on Thursday. He cleared on Friday as the two sides prepare for the hearing on August 1.

The Dallas Stars aren’t used to the process of arbitration and all that it can involve. General manager Jim Nill is known for being quick with transactions and agreements, wasting little time in negotiating with his restricted free agents and avoiding arbitration hearings altogether.

That’s a good quality to have until you’re forced into a situation where an arbitration hearing is practically imminent. And that’s what the Stars now have with Gemel Smith.

On July 5, the Dallas Stars still had work to do with their extensive free agent class. They had qualified all but one of their RFAs prior to July 1 and had negotiated new deals with a handful of them, but there were a few more cases to handle.

And of those lingering free agents, three of them ended up filing for arbitration. Devin Shore, Mattias Janmark, and Gemel Smith all filed to schedule a hearing after being unable to come to terms with Dallas management on a new deal before July 5. It was a fairly unfamiliar situation for a Stars franchise that had only dealt with two potential arbitration cases in the Nill era.

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But a player filing for arbitration by no means brings up a red flag regarding their future with the franchise. Instead, it’s a chance for the player to have a third party hear out their case if they cannot reach a desired contract agreement with their team. It’s all part of the restricted free agent process.

Each player was granted a hearing date in the weeks following July 5, but Nill was quick to answer. He signed Shore to a new contract eight days later on July 13 and locked in Janmark this past Wednesday.

But there’s one piece left in the Stars’ 2018 free agency puzzle, and that’s Gemel Smith. And by the looks of it, Dallas will have no choice but to go to the hearing with him on August 1. It will be Nill’s first time to go to an arbitration hearing as GM of the Dallas Stars.

With that comes some unfamiliar planning. This is uncharted territory for the team and its fans, so any move or idea might come as a potential shock. But the Stars have to take the proper precautions in order to build the best possible case when arguing over what his new contract and salary should look like.

That’s likely why they waived the forward on Thursday. Dallas put Gemel Smith on waivers and he cleared on Friday afternoon. And throughout the period, no team claimed him.

It seems like a bit of a risk, but it was a calculated one. The Stars put him on waivers in hopes that he wouldn’t get claimed. And now that he cleared, they have another point to make in the arbitration hearing. The fact that Smith wasn’t picked up by another club can help in their arguing for a lower salary and/or term.

Smith played in 46 games for Dallas last season. He primarily served in the ’13th forward’ role, scoring six goals and tallying 11 points along with a +5 rating while averaging 9:26 on the ice per game. He made his NHL debut during the 2016-17 season, skating in 17 games. So, his NHL experience is rather limited.