By signing Patrick Kane the Yzerplan has moved into the next stage

On why the concept matters, even more than the actual player itself.

This was always going to be the next step in the Yzerplan.

Not necessarily Patrick Kane himself, but what he represents in Steve Yzerman’s now five-year rebuild for the Detroit Red Wings.

Whether you like his moves or not, Yzerman has worked with long-term visions.

He’s focused on pieces that could help in the short term, but really were acquired for their lasting impacts on the culture of a team. David Perron, for example.

And now, by signing Kane, Yzerman is dealing in luxury purchases.

The Red Wings don’t need Kane, they are a good team without him. He struggled last season with the Chicago Blackhawks and New York Rangers and is coming off a major hip surgery. He doesn’t play defense and when you think of the mold of Derek Lalonde’s team — hard-working, turning defense into offense — Kane doesn’t fit.

But teams that contend, teams that are serious about the postseason, deal in luxury purchases. The Red Wings, as I wrote on Sunday, are a good team and should be considered a playoff contender.

Yzerman, with this signing, is co-signing that statement.

It’s fan service to his big off-season acquisition Alex DeBrincat, who sparkled with a younger version of Kane in Chicago, and has been constantly texting and recruiting his former linemate to come to the Red Wings.

It’s a message to his coach that the GM is paying attention.

Last week in the media Lalonde spoke about his team not having some of the special offensive players, the ones that make up for mistakes in a close game, the way the Tampa Bay Lightning can lull through until a Nikita Kucherov or Steven Stamkos rescued them with a big goal in the third period.

Kane may not be that player anymore, but he has that reputation, and will be in the Hockey Hall of Fame. For GMs and broadcasts, he checks that “special player,” box.

And, perhaps most importantly, it’s a message to Dylan Larkin.

Larkin, now 27, had felt the emotional highs and lows of the rebuild in Detroit. He’s the first full-time captain in Red Wings history to endure this type of playoff drought. When he signed his long-term extension last season, it was coupled with his best friend on the team, Tyler Bertuzzi getting traded away.

On the day he was supposed to be celebrating staying in Detroit, Larkin wept at the podium.

Signing Kane is glamorous and luxurious, headline grabbing. It might not work, in fact there are many reasons it might not work.

But Larkin deserved something from his GM. He swept away his tears last spring and still pushed Detroit as close as possible to a playoff berth, he re-focused the team in training camp, and when the Red Wings were in the possible lowest spot this season — having lost back-to-back games in Sweden — Larkin stood up and righted the ship.

On Sunday, he led Detroit past the Wild, and potentially got Dean Evason fired, with a combination of will and skill. And on Tuesday, his boss decided to make sure Larkin was rewarded for that effort.

So the Yzerplan has moved into the next stage. It might work, it might not. But the most important part of all of this is that the man pulling the strings and levers has finally decided he can make moves like this, red flags and warnings be damned, because his team is already good enough at the core.