With a month left to go in the regular season, some of the award races are more of less settled. Connor Hellebuyck is going to win the Vezina, and will also be a first-team all-star. Barring an injury, Leon Draisaitl will win the Rocket Richard. Sasha Barkov seems set to win another Selke, and Spencer Carberry is pulling away in the Jack Adams race.
But other awards are still up in the air, including the big one: The Hart Trophy, for league MVP, as voted on by the writers. That means we can assume that the Ted Lindsay for best player as voted on by the NHLPA is also up for grabs. And that means there’s at least a decent chance that we get a split, with the players and the writers picking different players for their top honors.
I can’t decide whether or not I hate when that happens.
In this week's episode of the Puck Soup podcast:
- Brad Marchand trolls Mitch Marner and the Maple Leafs
- The Oilers GM candidates include some interesting names
- Final thoughts on John Tavares and Islander fans
- The wildcard races heat up
- The GM meetings don't bring much news
- The passing of Ted Lindsay
- Greg ranks the ten best movie performances by pro wrestlers
- And lots more...
That’s the thing about the deadline. It’s such a hugely important milestone in the season that it almost manages to warp our sense of time around it. The weeks leading up to it seem to drag on forever. The day itself flies by in a blink. And then it’s all over and it almost immediately feels like a lifetime ago. Looks at us, watching Mark Stone play for the Ottawa Senators. We were so young then.
While you might be ready to move on past the deadline, the weekend rankings can’t quite yet. That’s because last week, we were still in pre-deadline mode and trying to figure out how different these rankings might look once the dealing is done. We can’t just leave a question like that open. Let’s dig in and find out how much the deadline day changed the rankings?
Uh, not all that much, actually.
That’s because the deadline saw something unusual this year: The best teams didn’t actually do all that much. Instead, most of the biggest moves were made by teams closer to the mushy middle.
That’s not the way it’s supposed to work. You’re supposed to have your sellers, who are bad and trying to get worse. They do that by selling off assets to the buyers, who are supposed to be the good teams searching for the final piece of a Stanley Cup puzzle.
But this year, we didn’t really see that. In fact, last week’s top five teams – the Islanders, Bruins, Sharks, Flames and Lightning – didn’t do all that much in the days around the deadline. The Bruins got Marcus Johansson and Charlie Coyle and the Sharks got Gustav Nyquist. But with apologies to Oscar Fantenberg and the Flames, that was about it in terms of meaningful moves. The Islanders and Lightning didn’t do anything at all.
In theory, that should open up the door for other teams to storm in and take those spots. But that didn’t really happen either. The Golden Knights were the biggest winners of deadline day itself thanks to the Stone blockbuster, but they’re not catching the Sharks or Flames so their path out of the Pacific remains brutal. And while the biggest trade deadline week moves were made by the Blue Jackets, they’re barely in the playoffs right now, let alone the top five. After this weekend, if anything, it might be time to start worrying about them.
The teams that could make a deadline-based claim at a spot are two that have spent much of the season shifting in and out of the top five. The Jets landed Kevin Hayes and the Predators got Wayne Simmonds and Mikael Granlund. Spoiler alert: One of them does crack the top five this week but we’ll get to that in a minute.
As for the sellers, the big one was the Senators. But they’ve already been owning the No. 1 spot in the bottom five, and after consulting with The Athletics’ analytics experts, it’s been determined that that’s as bad as I can rank them. I thought about trying to slot them in somewhere like “zero” or “negative three” or “let’s never speak of this again,” but apparently those aren’t options. The Senators stay where they already were and the rest of the bottom five doesn’t see all that much deadline-related movement either.
And that’s it for the 2019 deadline. I promise, after today, there will be no more weekly power ranking columns framed around it.
(But tune in next week for the 2020 trade deadline preview.)
Road to the Cup
The five teams that look like they’re headed towards a summer of keg stands and fountain pool parties.
We all had a chance to learn a new rule yesterday: You can win a shootout without actually putting the puck into the net, thanks to the ultra-rare shootout HORN OF DOOM:
That win also moved the Capitals back into first place in the Metro, as the Islanders lost both weekend games and continue to struggle when they’re not pantsing John Tavares and the Maple Leafs. That leaves us without a Metro team in our top five again, at least temporarily, while making room for a Central team to nudge back in. But which one? Let’s end the suspense …
5. Winnipeg Jets (39-22-4, +28 true goals differential*) – Should this be the Predators? Maybe. But the Jets are still holding down a narrow lead in the Central and maybe more than narrow if you factor in their games in hand. They beat the Predators head-to-head on Friday. And they may have landed the bigger deadline day prize in Hayes, although that’s a close call and probably hinges on whether you think Simmonds has much left. It’s not much more than a coin flip, really. But we don’t do ties here, so the Jets get the spot this week.
4. Boston Bruins (39-17-9, +34) – Their win over Tampa snapped the Lightning’s 10-game win streak and was the sort of statement game that suggests that the Atlantic may not be quite the sure thing it looks like. The Bruins are riding a streak of 16 straight with at least a point, although they still haven’t opened up all that much of a lead over the Maple Leafs for home ice in their almost inevitable first-round matchup. Maybe that comes this week; Boston gets a tough matchup tomorrow with the Hurricanes, but then finishes off the week with home games against the Panthers and Senators.
Easy. Wayne Gretzky being traded from the Oilers to the Kings in 1988. There’s really no debate. That one’s number one by a mile.
Cool, good post. See you in a few days.
(Editor’s note: Uh, Sean … we were kind of hoping for more than 40 words out of this one.)
Huh. OK. In that case, let’s up the degree of difficulty by changing the question around.
What’s the second most important trade in NHL history?
Now things get tougher, in large part because the Gretzky trade was such a game-changer that it overshadows everything else. That trade changed the league’s financial landscape, reset how hockey was viewed in the U.S. and is directly responsible for the existence of about a half-dozen of today’s teams. Forget the NHL, you could make a solid argument that it’s the most important trade in the history of sports.
So sure, the drop down to second place is going to be a big one. But that’s what makes the debate fun, because once you get past Gretzky, the field suddenly gets crowded.
Note that we’re not talking about the “biggest” trade, in terms of the number of players or even the sheer star power involved. What we’re looking for here is importance. That’s an admittedly fuzzy concept, but think of it this way: If you go back and undo the deal, how much of NHL history changes?
So with all due respect to Alexandre Daigle, let’s take some time to remember number two – or at least the contenders for that crown. Here are 10 possibilities that I think can make the strongest case.
The Next One arrives: Eric Lindros to the Flyers
The trade: On June 30, 1992, the Nordiques sent Eric Lindros to the Flyers for Peter Forsberg, Steve Duchesne, Mike Ricci, Ron Hextall, Kerry Huffman, Chris Simon, two first-round picks and $15,000,000.
The case for: Read that list of names again. Then remember that Lindros hadn’t played a single NHL game at this point. It was an almost unfathomably huge haul for one teenaged prospect – and it may not even have been the best deal the Nordiques could get, given that they preferred the Rangers’ offer.
At the time, Lindros was considered the best prospect to come into the league since Mario Lemieux, and maybe even the best ever. He never quite lived up to that hype in Philadelphia, but he did win a Hart Trophy and led the Flyers to the Stanley Cup final. Meanwhile, Forsberg became arguably the best player in the deal and helped the Nordiques win two Cups in Colorado.
The case against: Both Lindros and Forsberg had their careers shortened by injury, so the trade’s impact wasn’t quite what it could have been. Still, that feels like nitpicking.
Moose on the Loose: Mark Messier to the Rangers
The trade: On Oct. 4, 1991, the Oilers traded Mark Messier to the Rangers for Bernie Nicholls, Steven Rice, Louie DeBrusk and future considerations.
The case for: For better or worse, this trade defined the next decade and more for both teams. Against all odds, the Oilers had survived the Gretzky trade and won another Cup in 1990. But Messier’s exit signaled the true end of the dynasty and the Oilers’ new role as one of the NHL’s have-nots. (A point that was driven home when Nicholls initially refused to report.)
As for the Rangers, they watched Messier win the Hart while guiding them to the Presidents’ Trophy in his first season. But the big moment came in 1994, when they finally put an end to the “1940” chants by winning the franchise’s first Stanley Cup in over half a century. It was Messier who led them there, most memorably with his guaranteed win against the Devils. And it was Messier who was the one to receive the Cup handoff in front of a roaring MSG crowd.
Messier would go on to captain the Rangers until 2004, not counting the three years he took off from 1997 to 2000 to go do missionary work, and is often ranked as the greatest Ranger of all-time. And maybe even more importantly, Messier and the Rangers made the NHL seem cool and trendy for just about the first time ever.
The case against: New commissioner Gary Bettman decided that the Rangers’ win made for the perfect time for a lockout, and any momentum the NHL was riding was squandered. Rangers fans were too delirious to care, but this trade’s impact beyond New York and Edmonton didn’t end up being as big as it could have been.
OK, nobody really thinks that will happen. But you’ve probably heard some jokes about the possibility, since it plays into an old stereotype about Leaf fans — that they arrogantly assume that every star player is destined to wear the blue and white before their career is up, and anyone who doesn’t wind up in Toronto must have just missed.
Like most stereotypes, this one is hurtful and untrue. So just for the record: No, Maple Leafs fans don’t actually believe that every single star player to ever grace the league was this close to playing in Toronto.
Just almost all of them.
Seriously, it’s kind of a thing. And in fairness to Leafs fans, it’s not like we’re all just engaging in wishful thinking. There’s a long history of star players being linked to the Maple Leafs. Whether it’s a trade, a free-agent signing, or something more nefarious, the list of hockey legends linked to the Leafs is a long one. And most of those stories don’t come from delusional fans, but rather from media, executives or even the players themselves.
How long a list? Well, long enough to fill out a full roster. Which is what we’re going to do today. Consider it a warmup as we head towards the trade deadline and the Maple Leafs hype train revs up. And also a reminder that every Leaf fan you know might not be as crazy as they sound.
First line
Centre: Wayne Gretzky
Our first pick is an easy call. Gretzky was rumoured to be headed towards Toronto pretty much since he first arrived on the hockey scene, although much of that was admittedly just the fever dream of desperate 1980s Leafs fans. But the Great One really did almost become a Maple Leafs during the 1996 off-season. He was an unrestricted free agent and wanted to finish his career in Toronto. Leafs GM Cliff Fletcher was on board, but the Leafs’ board of directors shot the idea down for financial reasons.
Winger: Rocket Richard
The idea of Richard in a Maple Leafs’ sweater seems unthinkable — the sort of sacrilege worthy of 100 million moths. But while Richard would become the Canadiens’ most iconic superstar, there was a time early in his career when he was viewed as an injury-prone disappointment, and the team was reported to be shopping him to Toronto, among other teams. The Leafs missed their chance at the time, but GM Conn Smythe would later set his sights on The Rocket, offering a ransom to pry the winger away in both 1949 and 1951. The Canadiens resisted the temptation, and Richard finished his career in Montreal.
Winger: Ted Lindsay
The Maple Leafs were the first team to get wind of the future Hall of Famer’s prowess, and they dispatched a scout to put Lindsay on the team’s negotiation list. But an injury led to a mix-up, and the Leafs ended up adding the wrong player. That opened the door for the Red Wings, and the rest was history.
Puck Soup is a podcast featuring me and Ryan Lambert. We release one free episode each week during the season, plus mailbags and other bonus episodes for Patreon subscribers.
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