Canucks forced to place defenseman on waivers after adding notorious agitator to the line up.

A veteran National Hockey League defenseman is headed to the waiver wire.

According to a report from Patrick Johnston of the Vancouver Province 30 year old Canucks defenseman Alex Biega is destined for waivers following the return of an injured Canuck to the line up. On Saturday the Canucks injected 28 year old forward Antoine Roussel into their line up for the very first time since acquiring the notorious National Hockey League agitator and that has left them with somewhat of a log jam on their current roster. 

Roussel's addition to the roster brings the Canucks to a total of 24 players on the 23 man roster and that means that one man has to go, according to Johnston Biega is the man that will be sacrificed to the waiver process. Now obviously by putting Biega on waivers the Canucks risk losing him to a rival team for absolutely nothing at all, although it remains to be seen whether or not any rival teams will actually take a shot at grabbing Biega, a move that would likely then force the team picking him up to waive a player of their own. 

Now under the terms of the collective bargaining agreement the Canucks will only need to place Biega on waivers tomorrow morning which is why you are seeing Roussel currently active in tonight's game but he will be waived. Should only one team claim him they would immediately be able to send him down to the American Hockey League without having to go through the waiver process themselves however should multiple requests be submitted they would need to waive Biega, or another player, in order to send them down to the AHL.

The 30 year old blue liner has seen limited use in recent years appearing in 44 games for the Canucks during the 2018 - 2018 NHL regular season and recording 1 goal and 8 assists for a total of 9 points on the season. He finished that year with ap lus minus rating of +3. In fact Biega has never played in a full season at the NHL level always splitting time between the AHL and the NHL but he has proven himself to be a serviceable and reliable option for the Canucks year after year. 

He will likely only be targeted as a potential depth option but it remains to be seen if that will be enough to get a team to place a claim for him.