{"id":469612,"date":"2025-07-01T14:38:29","date_gmt":"2025-07-01T18:38:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=469612"},"modified":"2025-07-01T14:38:29","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T18:38:29","slug":"detroit-red-wings-have-identified-signed-key-depth-defender","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/07\/01\/detroit-red-wings-have-identified-signed-key-depth-defender\/","title":{"rendered":"The Detroit Red Wings Have Identified and Signed a Key Depth Defender"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Detroit Red Wings have decided to give a fresh start to a 2025 NHL Trade Deadline acquisition, by the Buffalo Sabres. Today, depth-defenceman <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/b\/bernaja01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-06-01_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jacob Bernard-Docker<\/a> signs a contract to move to <em>Motown<\/em>. This is a low risk signing, and Bernard-Docker still carries potential to make it a nice reward.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Detroit has signed D Jacob Bernard-Docker to a one-year contract worth $875,000.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; David Pagnotta (@TheFourthPeriod) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/TheFourthPeriod\/status\/1940112904096985277?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">July 1, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h3>Jacob Bernard-Docker Signs With Wings<\/h3>\n<p>Bernard-Docker was unable to catch on in <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/05\/16\/ottawa-senators-restricted-free-agents-2025-26-offseason\/\" target=\"_self\">Ottawa<\/a>. The trade to the Sabres in at the trade deadline that saw <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/n\/norrijo01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-06-01_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Joshua Norris<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/c\/cozendy01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-06-01_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dylan Cozens<\/a>, as well as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/g\/gilbede01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-06-01_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dennis Gilbert<\/a> change allegiances as well, was as seen as a fresh start for the still relatively inexperienced defender. Now, he gets a second restart in Detroit.<\/p>\n<p>Over the course of five seasons for Bernard-Docker, he&#8217;s still only up to 144 games played. In contrast, when he joined Buffalo, he did see more opportunity. His ice time in 2024-25 was up nearly a minute-and-a-half in Buffalo as compared to Ottawa. Also, he had the same amount points (four) with the Sabres as he did with Ottawa in ten fewer games. Still, he only played 40 total games in 2024-25. This new contract, in a new town, is hopefully a sign he will get added opportunity going forward.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"ZY0zlG10Yy\"><p><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/03\/07\/buffalo-sabres-make-dylan-cozens-trade\/\" target=\"_self\">Buffalo Sabres and Ottawa Senators Swap Centres and More<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; visibility: hidden;\" title=\"&#8220;Buffalo Sabres and Ottawa Senators Swap Centres and More&#8221; &#8212; Last Word On Hockey\" src=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/03\/07\/buffalo-sabres-make-dylan-cozens-trade\/embed\/#?secret=sGAH8GxMVE#?secret=ZY0zlG10Yy\" data-secret=\"ZY0zlG10Yy\" width=\"600\" height=\"338\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3>What Does He Bring to the Lineup<\/h3>\n<p>As Jacob Bernard-Docker signs a new contract, one thing is that he should get is confidence. He relies on strong breakout passes and being mobile, so confidence is imperative to his game. Getting regular rotation will do wonders for his game. That was an opportunity he never really got in Ottawa. However, with this new start he has been given, look for him to take advantage. His skillset allows up to play throughout the defence pairings, and as well as the specialty teams.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo Credit: Amber Searls-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Detroit Red Wings have decided to give a fresh start to a 2025 NHL Trade Deadline acquisition, by the Buffalo Sabres. Today, depth-defenceman Jacob Bernard-Docker signs a contract to move to Motown. This is a low risk signing, and Bernard-Docker still carries potential to make it a nice reward. Detroit has signed D Jacob [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4222,"featured_media":471808,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4547,4,34,4548],"tags":[5911,3309,662],"class_list":["post-469612","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hockey","category-redwings","category-news","category-nhl","tag-detroit-red-wings-news","tag-jacob-bernard-docker","tag-nhl-free-agency"],"modified_by":"Levi Pike, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4222"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=469612"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469612\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":471809,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469612\/revisions\/471809"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/471808"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=469612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=469612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=469612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}