Long Time Red Wing, Griffin Heads to Germany

by September 13, 2024

written by September 13, 2024

Since 2019, Taro Hirose has been a fixture of the Red Wings organization at the NHL and AHL levels. Now, he’s getting a fresh start elsewhere.

Hirose signed with DEL team EHC Munchen, the German team announced Friday. His departure from the Red Wings organization ends a six-year stint with the franchise, which was the third-longest tenure of any player with Detroit.

Hirose signed with Detroit as a UDFA in 2019, following a 50-point season with Michigan State in the NCAA. He showed promise with seven points in 10 games, playing on a line with Henrik Zetterberg during this stint. In the following four seasons, he earned numerous call-ups to Detroit, including a career-best 26 games in 2019-20 that saw him add another seven points to his totals. In 60 career NHL games, he tallied 20 points.

Over time, as prospects around him improved, Hirose started getting fewer and less frequent call-ups to the big club. He didn’t earn a single NHL game last season, instead sticking around Grand Rapids, where he has scored 201 points in 248 career games.

Now, Hirose will get a fresh start in Germany on an EHC Munchen team that could use his scoring touch. He joins a roster with a few mid-level NHL contributors from the mid-2010s, such as seven-year NHLer Tobias Rieder and former AAAA forward Ben Smith.

It’s a bit surprising that Hirose chose to play overseas instead of trying for another AHL opportunity, where he has played well in the past few seasons. He still has one more year of eligibility as a “development player” according to the AHL’s rules, which state that 12 skaters in the lineup must have played fewer than 260 pro games and one must have played fewer than 320. Based on his totals at the start of the season, Hirose’s 248 falls well short of that. But given Hirose’s age at 28 and his inability to stick at the NHL level since 2020, it appears as though NHL teams aren’t willing to take on the investment of signing him.

Hirose’s six years with Detroit was the third-longest tenure with the team as a player, following Michael Rasmussen, who is entering his seventh year with the franchise, and Dylan Larkin, who is entering his 11th dating back to his AHL playoff debut in 2015.