Farnham keeps grinding in hope of landing back in NHL

SPRINGFIELD, MASS. » On a Devils team that was largely miserable to watch during the 2015-16 season, it wasn’t difficult to see how Bobby Farnham emerged as a cult hero among the faithful fans who still showed up at the Prudential Center that year.

In his first extended opportunity in the NHL, the 5-foot10, 180 pound winger did everything he could to stick after he was claimed on waivers early in the year; he finished every check, wasn’t afraid to drop the gloves and managed to contribute a handful of goals (8) as well.

Those are the calling cards of a seven-year pro career that’s had plenty of ups and downs. This year? That’s been a roller coaster ride in its own right.

The 28-year-old was coming off what was statistically the best season of his career — he scored 11 goals and added 17 assists in 71 games for the AHL’s St. John’s Ice Caps while also earning a threegame stay with the parent Montreal Canadiens as well — but somehow couldn’t land a standard contract anywhere for the 2017-18 season.

He ended up in camp with the Rangers on a “Professional Tryout” deal, better known as a PTO, but was let go at the end of the preseason.

“Sometimes, you’re surprised by the process and the way it is, but you look at other guys who are doing the same thing,” Farnham told The Trentonian. “There were a ton of PTO’s out there, and a ton of guys who were without contracts. The approach that I took was to take a PTO, and whatever you get, you’re going to be playing somewhere and then you have to perform. And even if you perform, sometimes the chips aren’t going to fall in your favor, but it’s nice to be here playing.”

Here for Farnham is with the Springfield Thunderbirds, the American Hockey League affiliate of the Florida Panthers. Curiously, the Rangers chose to not send him to their own AHL team in Hartford, so he’d found himself looking for a job before signing an AHL PTO on Oct. 24.

“That was a little surprising, I won’t lie about that,” said Farnham of how things played out with the Rangers. “I was a little surprised myself. But that’s the business of it, and that’s what I keep hearing. As cliché as that sounds, it’s the truth.”

The period between getting let go by the Rangers and signing in Springfield was one of the most challenging in Farnham’s career; he skated on his own for several weeks waiting for an opportunity to come up, perhaps hampered by an AHL rule that states 13 of the 18 skaters must qualify as a “developmental player” by having played in under 260 professional games with only one exception for a player who’s reached 320 or fewer.

Entering this season, Farnham had suited up in 346 contests between the NHL, AHL and ECHL levels.

“It sucked, I’m not going to lie. It was brutal,” he said. “I wasn’t expecting that at this point in my career, but it was just one of those things where you knew you were going to get another chance at some point, but it kind of lingered. I thought it might be three or four days, but then the veteran (roster limit) thing started to come into play, so then it started being three or four weeks.

“The way I looked at it is it just adds to the story of your pro hockey career, and getting to see what you can do with another opportunity. There’s always going to be setbacks, and that won’t be my first or my last.”

The Brown University alum is once again having to grind his way through the uncertainty of a PTO, but anyone who’s watched him play over the past seven seasons knows that won’t have any impact on his game.

“I think I’m a guy who’s always played with a fire under my ass, so I don’t think I need a contract or a PTO to get me going,” he said. “I’ve never been that way. To me, you get to play hockey and prove yourself.”