In the return of the Friday Grab Bag:
- Good thoughts for bad teams
- The three comedy stars
- The Wendel Line
- An obscure player with a horrifying instagram account
- The infamous (and hilarious) Olympic "Silver" sketch
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In this week's episode of the Puck Soup podcast:
- The Lightning win the Stanley Cup
- Then they make some interesting choices about celebrating it
- Did the voters get the Conn Smythe right?
- We argue about asterisks
- What's next for the Stars?
- About those Jack Eichel trade rumors
- Henrik Lundqvist is bought out
- Early draft and free agency thoughts
- Bobby Ryan, Borat, chicken wings, and lots more...
>> Stream it now:
>> Or, listen on The Athletic or subscribe on iTunes.
>> Get weekly mailbags and special bonus episodes by supporting Puck Soup on Patreon for $5.
It’s Halloween tomorrow. Do you have a scary costume?
If not, don’t worry. I’ve got you covered. If you want to frighten anyone this week, all you’ll need is an NHL jersey, a hockey stick and a stats sheet to point at. Other props are optional, although you might want to invest in accessories like hands of stone, a turnstile or a great big goose egg.
Yes, it’s time for our annual tribute to the league’s scariest starts, where we build an entire roster out of some of the biggest names having the ugliest Octobers we can find. Some of these are bad signs for the rest of the year. Most of them will be forgotten by mid-November. We’ll try to figure out which is which as we go, but in the meantime, you can get into the Halloween spirit by yelling “Boo!” at each guy. It probably won’t be the first time this year that they’ve heard it.
The player: Jonathan Toews, Blackhawks
The start: On the heels of a career year at the age of 30, the Hawks’ captain has managed just two points on the season so far. We already had our first wave of “Is Toews breaking out of his slump?” stories two weeks ago; since then he’s been pointless in six.
Odds it ends well: Toews will get going offensively at some point. But for now, at least, last year’s 81-point season is looking like an aberration for a player who’d been in the 50-something range for the three years before that. That’s not good news for a Hawks team that needs all the help it can get these days.
The player: Sebastian Aho, Hurricanes
The start: Three goals and three assists through a dozen games, with only one of those goals coming against an actual goaltender. To put that in historical context, it’s the worst start in six years for a player who had just signed an offer sheet.
Odds it ends well: Aho’s been heating up lately, or at least getting back to lukewarm. He had that first real goal on Thursday and followed that up with his first multi-point game of the season on Saturday. He can be his own toughest critic, so once he gets a few more solid games under him, he could take off.
The player: Taylor Hall, Devils
The start: On the bright side, Hall is the only player on this roster who is also his team’s leading scorer. On the not-so-bright side, he has just seven points and, well, (gestures at the Devils’ entire season). We could just as easily go with fellow forwards like Jack Hughes or Nikita Gusev, since they’re underperforming Hall. But with apologies to the all-about-the-team narratives, the former MVP has a lot more on the line than his younger teammates. With an extension or unrestricted free agency on the horizon, this isn’t a great time to be sitting with just one goal in the first month.
Odds it ends well: Hall is still generating a ton of shots, and has somehow managed six assists, which doesn’t sound impressive until you realize the Devils are dead last in scoring with just 22 goals on the season. He’s doing his part, even if the numbers don’t look great. The question now is whether he’ll finish the season still doing it for the Devils.
The player: Kaapo Kakko, Rangers
The start: He has just two goals and an assist, is getting caved in on possession and has been on the ice for just one even-strength goal for vs. eleven against. Other than that, things are going great.
Odds it ends well: I think we’ve seen enough to know the kid is a bust. (He’s 18, he’ll be fine.)
The player: Joe Pavelski, Stars
The start: Six points in 14 games for one of the biggest UFA signings of the offseason, half of which came last night. Maybe more concerning, his shots rate has dropped by over a shot-per-game compared to his last few seasons.
Odds it ends well: The shots rate is a concern for sure. But I think we can give Pavelski a bit of a break here; after 16 years and thirteen NHL seasons with the same organization, a bit of an adjustment period after switching teams for the first time seems reasonable. Now if only he could play the Wild every night …
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In this week's episode of the Puck Soup podcast:
- Greg, Ryan and I make out first-round picks
- I defend the Leafs' chances while still picking the Bruins
- We react to a busy weekend of coaching changes
- I try to sell the guys on the merits of the Gold Plan
- A discussion about Connor McDavid's future gets heated until Bobby Ryan arrives to shut it down
- And lots more...
>> Stream it now:
>> Or, subscribe on iTunes.
>> Get weekly mailbags and special bonus episodes by supporting Puck Soup on Patreon for $5.
In the Friday Grab Bag:
- Seriously, stop talking about sign-and-trades
- An offseason idea we can steal from Marc Bergevin and the Habs
- An obscure player who Canucks fans don't hate, unlike some people we could mention
- The week's three comedy stars get NSFW and involve Alexander Ovechkin's mom
- And a YouTube look back at a Bobby Ryan trade that worked out great.
Who wants a cold one? Tonight marks the return of outdoor hockey, as the Ottawa Senators and Montreal Canadiens meet at Lansdowne Park. It’s also a rare Saturday night without the Toronto Maple Leafs or Vancouver Canucks, while the three remaining Canadian teams get a tour of the Central.
There isn’t much question over where most of the attention will be turned tonight, as the Habs and Sens take it outside at Lansdowne Park in what’s been dubbed the NHL 100 Classic. The game commemorates the meeting between the Canadiens and the original Senators in one of the first two NHL games ever played, way back on Dec. 19, 1917.
But while you can expect to see plenty of history on display, we can forgive these two teams if they’re focused squarely on the present. That’s especially true for the Senators, who desperately need a win to build some momentum after a brutal few weeks that’s seen them lose 12 of 14 to plummet well out of the playoff race. With rumours swirling of major changes on the way – and their GM being forced to deny that he’s about to fire the coach – the Senators are a team that desperately needs to start making up some ground.
They took the first step towards that on Wednesday with a win over the New York Rangers. The two points were important, but the way they were earned them may have mattered even more. Craig Anderson looked strong, Bobby Ryan was a force, Zack Smith finally scored and Matt Duchene may have earned his most important point as a Senator.
Almost as important: With a win under their belt, the Senators can now enjoy hosting the franchise’s first outdoor game, or at least go through the process without feeling like they can’t so much as smile. Still, the timing of tonight’s event isn’t ideal.
Between the losing, Erik Karlsson’s contract comments, a push for a new arena and rumours around ownership, conventional wisdom would say that the last thing this team would seem to need right now is even more distractions. But on the other hand, maybe that’s exactly what they could use. There are worse ways for an NHL team to forget its troubles than by getting out under the lights for a little pond hockey. And if a big crowd inspires Ottawa to collect a win against a division rival it’s chasing in the playoff hunt, even better.
Or they faceplant in front of a national audience. There’s that possibility too.
As for the Canadiens, their up-and-down season continues to defy any attempt at analysis. They lost three straight before beating the Devils on Thursday, falling back out of a playoff spot they’d climbed into possession of last week. The way things have been going this year, that means it’s time for everyone to write them off, at which point they’ll run off another win streak and surge back up the standings.
Outdoor games are always tough to predict – the puck bounces even more than usual, the weather can affect different players in different ways, and the whole endeavour often feels like it’s taking place as a separate piece of its own instead of as part of a larger season. For these two teams right now, that might be a good thing. The league might want tonight to be all about the past, but if the Sens and Habs can’t start banking wins soon, their playoff hopes might be history.
Welcome to the NHL’s “Centennial Birthday Weekend,” in which the league celebrates its 100th birthday. It’s not the anniversary of the first ever games, since that’s in December, or of the league officially forming, since that’s next week. It’s just … uh … a centennial birthday. Stop asking questions. Look, do you want some cake or not?
This is the second time this season that we’ve featured a Leafs-Habs game in this spot, and it probably won’t be the last. There’s just something special about a Saturday night matchup between the two long-time rivals. And since the league is using the meeting as an opportunity to douse us with history, all the better.
It’s worth revisiting what we wrote about these two teams the last time they played, if only to serve as a reminder of how many twists and turns can be packed into five weeks. Back on the season’s second weekend, we were wondering if the Maple Leafs could snap Montreal’s 14-game win streak in head-to-head matchups. They did, earning a 4-3 overtime win on an Auston Matthews goal.
We were also wondering if Montreal was ever going to get the offence going. That happened too, although it took a little longer. The Habs’ inability to score went from a curiosity to problem to an outright crisis over the course of the season’s first few weeks, before the floodgates finally opened and all those stats guys were proven right about percentages and regression and sample sizes. The Canadiens aren’t exactly lighting up scoreboards – they still rank just 24th in total goals – and Thursday’s loss to the Coyotes was the first time they’ve scored more than three in a game since Nov. 4. But at least nobody’s panicking about the offence anymore in Montreal. They’ve got other things to worry about.
Instead, we’re all wondering what’s up with Carey Price, who’s “minor” injury has kept him out for two weeks now. He still says it’s no big deal, assuring fans that they “don’t have to be concerned” and that this isn’t a repeat of 2015. That’s reassuring, and with rookie Charlie Lindgren looking fantastic, the Canadiens haven’t missed their superstar all that much yet. But seeing Price try to play through a second pre-game injury raises some fair questions about the relationship between the team and its expensive star. And you can forgive Montreal fans for being a little nervous about the situation, especially when Antti Niemi suddenly shows up via waivers? If Niemi is ever the answer, the question probably isn’t anything good.
As for the Maple Leafs, the last time they were in Montreal they were riding high and scoring a ton. Since then, we’ve seen them boost their record to 6-1-0, be declared Cup favourites, cool off, hit an outright slump, and then reel off five straight wins even though they were missing Matthews for most of that stretch. It’s been quite a journey. And these days, the Maple Leafs are winning thanks to solid goaltending and team defence instead of by just blowing the doors off whoever’s in the opposing net. They even managed a 1-0 overtime win their last time out. That’s not quite as much fun, but it probably makes Mike Babcock a lot less cranky, and that’s worth something.
The conference finals are always a bit of a weird time for hockey fans. On the one hand, three teams are still alive, fighting tooth and nail for the right to lift the Stanley Cup. There’s nothing more important in this sport than the do-or-die games we’re watching right now.
On the other hand, we’ve got 28 teams on the sidelines, and some of those teams have been there since early April. If we’re being honest, at least some fans are already thinking about the off-season. We’ve got a summer’s worth of trades, free-agency signings, and this year even an expansion draft waiting for us. It can be hard to keep focused on the playoffs without looking ahead.
So which is it, playoffs or off-season? Today, let’s do both. Let’s look at how this year’s playoffs may have changed what we should expect to see in the coming off-season. After all, an especially good or bad playoff run can influence or even completely upend the perception of a player (just ask Dave Bolland). Maybe it shouldn’t — a handful of games shouldn’t change how we view a guy who’s been around for years — but that doesn’t really matter. A few weeks in, the spring can rewrite everything that’s going to happen in the summer.
This year will be no different. Now we just need to figure out who’s changed what. We’ll look at a few key aspects of the off-season, starting with what some GM’s have called the biggest day of the year for off-season mistakes: July 1.
There's nothing like a disappointing playoff run to send a player into unrestricted free agency with a dark cloud hanging over them. Fair or not, a player can cost themselves some serious money with a poorly timed post-season slump.
That may have been what we just saw happen to Kevin Shattenkirk. Widely considered to be the top player on this year's market, Shattenkirk doubled as the biggest name to move at the trade deadline. He seemed like an ideal fit for a Capitals team that was already the Stanley Cup favourite. But a disappointing playoffs saw Shattenkirk paired with Brooks Orpik, and the two veterans struggled to keep the puck out of their net.
After eight games, Shattenkirk was sitting at a minus-7 rating, a performance that his own coach publicly called "not good enough". He rebounded somewhat after that, including scoring the OT winner in game three against Pittsburgh. But heading towards July 1, teams will be asking themselves if Shattenkirk deserves to be paid like a top-pairing defenceman, and his playoff performance didn't give him much evidence to point to.
The Capitals' other pending UFAs were more of a mixed bag. T.J. Oshie had a productive post-season and probably boosted his value at least a little bit while Karl Azner struggled. Meanwhile, Justin Williams played well but lost his Mr. Game Seven aura against the Penguins.
The deadline's other top name didn't fare much better that Shattenkirk. Minnesota's Martin Hanzal heads into free agency after managing just a single point during the Wild's abbreviated run. He's a two-way player who wasn't brought in to light up the scoreboard, but when your own owner is publicly wishing his team hadn't traded for you, you may have cost yourself a few dollars.
In the NHL playoffs, as the old saying goes, you’re never truly in trouble until you lose one at home.
There’s a corollary to that: If you lose two straight at home, you’re probably screwed.
The Ducks were facing that fate last night, after dropping Game 1 against the Predators on Friday night. It looked like Nashville might head home with a 2–0 series lead; the Predators held a two-goal lead after just 10 minutes, and led 3–2 midway through the second. But the Ducks stormed back, helped along by an uncharacteristically shaky outing from Pekka Rinne.
The two teams will now head to Nashville tied at a game apiece, with the series resuming tomorrow night.
The Penguins will be looking to follow the Ducks' lead tonight, as they host the Senators in what feels close to a must-win game. The high-powered Pens couldn't get much going in Saturday's Game 1, trailing 1–0 for most of the night before Evgeni Malkin tied it up late to briefly wake up a largely comatose Pittsburgh crowd. That gave the Penguins an opportunity to steal a win in overtime, but instead it was Bobby Ryan who capped it off for the Senators.
Game 2 goes tonight, and a Senators win would send them back to Ottawa with a shot at a sweep. The Senators head into this one having won five of seven on the road in this year's post-season.
On to the weekend's power rankings...
5. The Ryan Kesler vs. Ryan Johansen rivalry: The NHL playoffs are always better with a little bad blood mixed in, and the Nashville/Anaheim series is providing plenty early on. Much of it has come courtesy Kesler and Johansen, who've spent most of the first two games matched up against each other.
Things boiled over last night, with Johansen ripping on Kesler after the game. The mini-rant came after he appeared to be on the receiving end of a Kesler elbow, among other battles, and at one point included Johansen telling reporters that "I don't know how you can cheer for a player like that."
You can understand Johansen's frustration, but you have to think those sorts of comments are music to Kesler's ears. For the record, he was relatively complimentary of Johansen immediately after the game. But Kesler has been down this playoff road a few times before, and he knows how to get under someone's skin. He's apparently already there with Johansen, and there are still up to five games left to go.
4. Ben Bishop: The Dallas Stars got a jump on the off-season by locking down the first big-name UFA of the summer, signing Bishop to a six-year deal worth $29.5 million after acquiring his rights from the Kings.
The deal represents a pay cut for Bishop, who'll average about a million dollars less per season than he did on his last contract. But the term will more than make up for that; Bishop is 30 years old and coming off an injury-plagued season, and the market hasn't been especially kind to goalies in recent years. The track record for bigger goalies aging well isn't great, so getting a six-year commitment from a team is a clear win for Bishop.
From the Stars' perspective, Bishop is a clear upgrade at a position that's been a problem for years. He didn't come cheap (and they also had to give up a fourth-round pick to acquire his rights), but at some point GM Jim Nill needed to address his goaltending issues. There's an excellent chance that the contract comes back to bite the Stars by the end, but right now Nill has a potential Cup contender in place, and going another season with the status quo wasn't an option. Let's tentatively call this one even from a Dallas perspective, at least until we see how they wriggle out from Kari Lehtonen and/or Antti Niemi's contracts.
Welcome to Round 2 of the NHL playoffs. It arrived a bit early, since the hockey gods cruelly deprived us of so much as a single Game 7 in the opening round, but we're happy to have it anyway.
The action gets underway tonight with the Western Conference, and tomorrow night with the Eastern Conference. And the previewing gets underway right now.
For years, the Western Conference has been the NHL's better half. That wasn't the case this year, and with the conference's two best teams in terms of regular season points already done, the path to the final is wide open.
In this corner: The Ducks (46-23-13, 105 points, +23 goals differential not counting shootouts), who should be well-rested after sweeping aside the Flames in four games.
And in this corner: The Oilers (47-26-9, 103 points, +36), making their first postseason appearance since 2006. They went all the way to the final that year, in case you were wondering.
Head-to-head: The Oilers won three of five.
Dominant narrative: The up-and-coming Oilers face a veteran team whose window may be closing. If that sounds familiar, it was pretty much the same story line we had in the San Jose series. The Ducks' situation isn't quite as urgent as the Sharks', but it's not far off, thanks to an aging core that's locked into some long-term deals. It's not quite "now or never" in Anaheim, but in theory they should have a sense of urgency that the young Oilers may not be able to match.
Injury report: The Oilers are relatively healthy. The Ducks have been missing two key defensemen in Cam Fowler and Sami Vatanen, but it sounds like both men might be back for Game 1, which would be huge.
The big question: Does momentum matter in the playoffs? If so, the Oilers could be in trouble, because the Ducks have been just about unstoppable lately. They've won eight straight going back to the regular season, and haven't lost in regulation since March 10.
One player to watch: Ryan Kesler. The Ducks went out and traded for Kesler three years ago (and gave him a big extension that lots of us questioned) for exactly this sort of scenario. He'll be tasked with shutting down Connor McDavid, or at least with preventing him from single-handedly winning the series. It's no easy task, but Kesler earned a Selke nomination for his defensive work this year, and he's been around long enough to know how to target the other team's star. McDavid had four points in the first round, which would be fine for most players but was a disappointment for him. If Kesler can limit him early, frustration could set in.
Key number: 79. That's how many games Edmonton's Cam Talbot has started so far this season, including a league-leading 73 during the regular season. That's well above his previous career high of 53, and this is his first playoff run as a starter. Does he wear down eventually? He was very good against the Sharks with the exception of a Game 4 meltdown in which he gave up five goals on the way to a 7-0 loss.
Prediction: Oilers in six.
Bonus prediction that is oddly specific: At some point, Kesler does something to McDavid that leads to Milan Lucic making a show of wanting to fight him.
In the Friday Grab Bag:
- The playoffs have been pretty good so far
- Does the way the stick-slashing rule is called make sense?
- An obscure player who was a better playoff performer than Wayne Gretzky
- The week's three comedy stars
- And we try to cheer up Capitals fans in the best way we know how: With yet another terrible late-80s lip synch video
I'm still confused.
A few weeks ago, I wrote about the NHL's five most confusing teams, at least from my perspective. These were the teams that I just couldn't figure out. Were they good? Bad? Somewhere in the middle? I'd spent the season trying to work it out, and come up empty.
As it turned out, I wasn't alone. More than a few readers confessed to being confused by those teams too, not to mention several others. It was like having a support group. A support group of confused hockey fans, all watching the games unfold with their heads tilted like a puppy seeing a toilet flush for the first time.
Well, today I'm going to call another meeting of the confused hockey fan network. But this time, we're not looking at teams. No, today we're going to dive into some specific players that have me perplexed. In most of these cases, I thought I had a handle on things. But now I'm not so sure.
Maybe you can help me out. Or maybe you're just as confused as I am. Either way, I think it will be good for my soul to admit that I just can't figure these guys out.
What I thought I knew: After an up-and-down start to this NHL career, Elliott had settled in to a predictable pattern with the Blues. He'd play well. He'd post strong numbers, sometimes even league-leading ones. And then, just when push came to shove, the Blues would lose faith in him and hand the starter's job to someone else. Maybe it was the backup. Maybe it was a pricey trade acquisition. Maybe it was even a semi-retired legend, in a move we'd all agree to just pretend never happened. But time and time again, the Blues had no faith in Elliott.
And I was convinced that they were wrong. This was the classic case of a team over-thinking things, or maybe letting dressing room politics or a faith in intangibles override basic logic. The numbers didn't lie: Elliott was one of the best goalies in the league. And when the Flames nabbed him at a discount in the offseason, I was sure that they'd found their starter.
Where I'm at now: Sitting around wondering what happened. Which is also where Elliott finds himself most games these days.
Chad Johnson has been a great story, and you can't blame the Flames for riding the hot hand. Elliott got off to a bad start, and when you're a young team that hasn't earned a ton of self-confidence quite yet, you can't let yourself fall too far out of the race. The Flames are being smart here.
But… Elliott is still good, right? Every goalie has the occasional slump, so we can't panic over 13 games. Then again, Elliott's never really done much outside of Ken Hitchcock's goalie factory, and the Blues still didn't believe in him. Did they know something that the rest of us, including the Flames, somehow missed?
We’ve crossed the halfway point in this year’s playoffs, which means we’re down to four teams left battling it out for the Stanley Cup. Making it this far is an enormous accomplishment, and we should take some time to celebrate the excellence of the players who are making it happen.
We should, but we won’t, because it’s way more fun to point fingers at the guys who didn’t get it done. So today, let’s assemble a dream team of playoff busts from the first two rounds.
One obvious disclaimer here: “disappointment” is relative. A first-liner who suffers through an awful series may still be more productive than a fourth-liner who meets expectations, but the star still gets the dreaded bust label. Fair? Maybe not, but that’s why these guys get paid the big bucks.
These lists are always tricky, since you’re dealing with a small handful of games and the boxcar stats can be misleading; I fully expect to wake up tomorrow to find the words “small sample size” spray-painted on my garage door. But I’m willing to take that chance, mainly because I just want to write a post about disappointing hockey players that doesn’t include any Leafs.
We’ll pick a full roster of centers, wingers, defensemen, and goalies. Spoiler alert: This is going to end up being a pretty impressive group that would win an awful lot of games under normal circumstances (if you could squeeze them under the salary cap). But if you had many of them in your playoff pool, you’re already out.
Evgeni Malkin, Penguins — Let’s start with an easy one. The Penguins bowed out to the Rangers in five, but all were one-goal games. An extra goal or two could have turned the series around, which is why it was so frustrating to watch a superstar talent like Malkin struggle through a point-less series. That slump extended beyond the playoffs — he had no goals and just three points in his final 10 regular-season games — and it’s contributed to calls for the Penguins to trade him. (So far, it sounds like the team will stay the course.)
Paul Stastny, Blues — Stastny was the league’s biggest UFA signing last summer, at least in terms of average annual salary, and while his 46-point season was well under his career best, his solid two-way play still made him a key component of the Blues’ hopes. But his playoff numbers — just one goal and no assists in six games — were even worse. He didn’t play badly (his lined outscored and outchanced their opponents), and he certainly wasn’t alone, as pretty much every Blues forward not named Tarasenko could make an appearance on this list. But after yet another disappointingly short playoff run in St. Louis, it’s hard to argue that the Blues got what they paid for.
Tomas Plekanec, Canadiens — That Plekanec is, in theory, the Canadiens’ no. 1 center probably says more about the way the roster has been built than it does about the player. But that’s where he’s slotted in, and one goal and four points in 12 games doesn’t really cut it.
Another NHL regular season is in the books. The standings are set, 14 teams have been sent packing, and the matchups have been finalized. And that means it's playoff preview time.
We'll cover the Eastern Conference tomorrow. Today, let's start off with a look at the Western Conference matchups.
The view from Minnesota: The team spent almost $200 million in free agency so Wild fans could watch a championship caliber team, and now they can for four games until the Blackhawks move on to round two.
The view from Chicago: Know that playoff success can come down to taking advantage of just a few short seconds on one single shift, which is good since that's probably all the time that Ryan Suter will be spending on the bench each game.
Player to watch: Duncan Keith, assuming he's soaping himself up in the shower and you are an impudent lady reporter, Don Cherry assumes.
We’re still two weeks away from the NHL’s April 3 trade deadline, but there’s a good chance action could pick up over the next few days. Recent history has shown a trend toward a quieter deadline day, with most of the bigger deals going down in advance. And because of this season’s modified post-lockout schedule, this week’s annual GM meetings are taking place before the deadline instead of after.
So now seems like a good time to get an early jump on the speculation with a look at 10 of the players who are showing up in trade chatter. Not all of them will be traded (let’s face it, there’s a decent chance none of the top players will), and we all may have moved on to 10 different guys by next week, but right now, these are some of the bigger names driving the rumor mill.
The 2011-12 season preview continues today with the Western Conference. (You can find yesterday's Eastern Conference preview here.)
Last week's talk of a potential Ducks/Leafs deal involing Bobby Ryan, Matthieu Schneider and the Leafs #1 pick ended up being a non-story. Of course, that didn't stop the usual suspects from weighing in on what a terrible idea it was.
The pundits were wrong. Shocking, I know.
The big name in the rumor was Ryan, a well-regarded prospect who was the #2 overall selection three years ago. While he's yet to have much impact at the NHL level, he's generally still viewed as a top prospect and potential franchise player.
Should the Leafs be willing to trade a package of picks and prospects for that type of player? Absolutely.
The NHL is a league where you build around superstars. The Leafs don't have any right now (with apologies to Kaberle), and may not until Luke Schenn arrives to save us all. If you can deal for one, you do it and you don't look back. Forget the old joke about trading three quarters for a dollar -- in the NHL, it often makes sense to trade five quarters for a dollar. Quarters are easy to find. Dollars aren't.
Fletcher knows that you can pay all the lip service you want rebuidling slowly and carefully. At some point, you need a superstar to build around. Fletcher knows this so well that he pulled the trigger on two trades to bring exactly that sort of player to the Leafs in his first stint with the team. Those guys only wound up being two of the three best Leafs of this generation.
(Side note: Can anyone imagine what the current Damien Cox would have written about the Gilmour trade? Probably something along the lines of "The Leafs, unwilling to patiently rebuild because draft schmaft dumb fans 1967, today acquired four washed-up old guys and Kent Manderville".)
If Cliff has a chance to land a young (key qualifier) franchise player this time around, he should do it.
Under today's CBA, young superstars occasionally become available on the trade market due to impending free agency or salary cap troubles. When those situations come up, the Leafs should be the first team on the phone looking to work a deal.
Beyond that, the Ducks deal hinged on the inclusion of Scnheider and his inconvenient contract. And that's the second piece of the strategy the Leafs should be pursuing.
The Leafs have plenty of cap room, and more money than they know how to spend. As the US economy gets ready to kick the NHL in the balls this year, the Leafs should be ready and willing to pick up another team's cap castoffs -- for a price. Chemmy already suggested targeting Nikolai Khabibulin, which would be a great fit if Joseph were to wind up on the sidelines.
Not only could that be a sneaky way to pick up some draft picks or marginal prospects, but guys who are washed-up cap crunchers in October have a funny way of becoming attractive trade bait in February.
And since this year is all about the trade deadline, anything that puts an extra arrow in Trader Cliff's quill is worth a shot.
So keep working the phones and staying creative, Cliff. Even if those trade talks with Brian Burke must have been a little awkward.
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