Yelle Signs in Carolina

The Carolina Hurricanes added more quality defensive depth down the middle on Wednesday with the announcement that they had signed UFA forward, Stephane Yelle to a new 1-year deal.

Yelle, 35, played with the Bruins last season, scoring 7 goals and adding 11 assists in 77 games. He isn't a very good fantasy player, by any means, unless you're keeping defensive stats or face-off percentages in your highly complicated pool. Yelle sees a lot of time in key defensive situations, which does keep his +/- a tad low, but he is reliable, which is what you're after when you're looking for a third or fourth line centre.

The contract is reportedly worth $550,000 for the season, which keeps the cap number reasonable in Carolina. The team does have 20 players signed on now (with Yelle), at a cap rate of $52.3 million. That leaves them plenty of space to be players at the trade deadline, if the team plays as well as they did at the back end of the regular season and the playoffs.

The Hurricanes, along with their new addition, have one of the older, more savvy line-ups in the league, which could benefit a player like Cam Ward, in getting more wins this season. With Rod Brind'Amour, Ray Whitney, Matt Cullen, Scott Walker, Sergei Samsonov and Aaron Ward already in tow, the dirty-30 club will be packed and ready to rock in 2010.