Red Wings Filppula Heads To Arbitration

The Detroit Free Press is covering the story, here's an excerpt from FREEP.COM:

Restricted free agent Valtteri Filppula is heading to arbitration, and that’s a good thing for fans of the Red Wings.

The NHL Players Association announced Saturday that 15 players had elected to have salary arbitration, and Filppula, 24, was the only one for the Wings. Filppula could have signed an offer sheet with another NHL club, but that threat has been eliminated by him filing for arbitration. A Vancouver radio station had reported that the Canucks were preparing to send an offer sheet, but that never happened.

Red Wings general manager Ken Holland said Filppula did what was necessary to protect himself in negotiations, which will continue over the next couple of weeks. No date has been set yet for the arbitration hearing.

“There are mechanisms in the CBA that protect the player and the club,” Holland said. “We now have to determine whether we want a one-year or two-year award. In the meantime, I’ve talked to Bill Zito, Filppula’s agent, a couple times today and yesterday. We’re going to continue to talk and hopefully we can find a solution. We do know he’s going to be under contract by late July or very early August.”