DownUndaCanuck

No chance, I firstly wouldn't want to trade the 1st rounder let alone Demko let alone both and certainly not for cap dumps. Maybe...11OA + Demko to CBJ for the 3rd overall and draft Carlsson, but even then our team is a lot worse in the future, I'd rather taken Reinbacher + Demko + Silovs over Carlsson + Silovs

Hope Bob keeps it up but I could see him decide to crap the bed, Vegas' offence is no better than the ones he's already faced. The Panthers forecheck is pretty fierce but Vegas' D are solid and can move it quickly. Meanwhile, Vegas rolls 4 lines which Florida really hasn't had to deal with much of lately so while their top 4 D is golden, their bottom pairing might get exposed. This series will come down to depth and goaltending. Panthers hopefully take it in 6 thanks to Bob and some 3rd or 4th line winger unsung heros.

Looking at the final say 4 teams in the playoffs, they all have a solid top 4. Their bottom pairings are all average but can kill penalties well and are solid physically, but it's all about that top 4. One guy plays 25+ minutes, one guy is a brutally strong defensive guy and there's a good puck mover in there too. Florida's defence is a great example of a well constructed D. Ekblad is a solid 2 way guy. Montour is a brilliant puck mover. Gudas is a rock solid physical defenceman and Forsling is a pretty slick puck mover. Each pairing can do it all. Looking at the Canucks, we have a top puck mover in Hughes (top 3 in the league). Then we have Hronek who's a solid all-around defenceman. That's it. We don't have a Gudas, or someone physical who can kill penalties and clear the crease. Our 2nd pairing right now is OEL and Myers who are useless - they don't skate well, don't pass that well and certainly aren't playoff-physical. Finally, our bottom pairing aren't physical enough or great PKers either. Because of that, our D is WAY off IMO. How to fix it - get a physical defensive defenceman, even just one, and we go a long way. We're one Gavrikov off from being respectable. Not 100% but we're a lot better. If we can dump OEL and/or Myers to our bottom pairing, we're much deeper.

I'm assuming Rick wants a good forechecker/grinder on each line. That's Mikheyev on the top line, PDG on the 2nd line. Solid two-way center - check - Petey and Miller. Then you add a sniper/scorer - Kuzmenko and Boeser. Tocchet quite likes the NHL video game formula of grinder - two way center/playmaker and sniper, and it has seemed to work in the past for us. I think Hoglander and Podkolzin might steal some minutes here and there from guys, especially if injuries hit, and if we still have Beauvillier and/or Garland lying around next year, I'm sure they'll get a turn in the top-6, but realistically I think it's pretty set. PDG might fall off a bit and Hoglander or Garland could become the 2nd line forechecking presence that Rick wants.

It's a gamble but I wouldn't take it, I think the 11OA will be far better than Glass. Cody might bloom later as a big center but if we have a stab at Leonard, Dvorsky, ASP, Reinbacher or even Moore, I think we take one of those guys over Cody Glass. He had a good year last year but could easily just plateau and never get any better, plus his development has really been disrupted with the trade. I'd maybe do 11OA + 3rd round pick for Glass + 15OA or Fabbro It'd be hard saying no to two former first rounders for the price of one, and Fabbro has done pretty well - RD, playing 20+ minutes, didn't get destroyed defensively on a pretty average team. Glass could slot in at 3C, Fabbro next to Hughes. We'd certainly have to add, probably someone like Rathbone. Glass is due an extension and Fabbro is on a dirt-cheap 2Mish deal which in itself is quite valuable. Assuming we flip a winger (Garland?) for cap space: Mikheyev - Pettersson - Kuzmenko PDG - Miller - Boeser Beauvillier - Glass - Podkolzin Joshua - Aman - Hoglander Hughes - Fabbro OEL - Hronek Hirose - Myers Burroughs

Will be interesting to see which way Conroy decides to swing with the Flames. He could go full retool/rebuild and just start selling players left right and center, but the problem is those big contracts will be impossible to move and weigh the team down. It rarely is said but he'd be wiser to try and build around those guys and take a shot at the playoffs the next couple of years and hope to have a Florida-like moment - they've certainly got the defence and maybe goalie who can do so. They're very similar to the Panthers in terms of structure (very solid top-4 defence which is versatile, has toughness and puck moving ability, have a goalie who can be quite streaky and Wolf in the fold soon too, and up front have scorers who can be clutch or invisible). Problem is, it just isn't clicking for the Flames. They need more scoring up front, simple. I don't think Andersson is going anywhere, he's arguably their best defenceman, but there's lots of chatter about Hanifin being moved. He's young, in a contract year, good two-way guy and surprisingly he logged some of the biggest minutes of their team last year, but they're talking about moving him. Just under 5M cap hit is quite tasty too. We should target him big time. Boeser for Hanifin - if there's a deal there I'd jump all over it. We'd probably have to add something though, I'd be happy to give a 3rd or 4th or even Rathbone to make it happen. Slot Hanifin in as our top pairing LD with Hronek and suddenly we have an amazing top-4 which can do a bit of everything. Calgary are still fine - Weegar can play LD and cover the position fine. They also have a tiny bit of cap space to fit Boeser but we can retain a smidge if need be. 2nd pairing RD is still a bit of a mess but if we shelter OEL and Myers but getting Hanifin, I think they'd play better. Put Hanifin and Hronek out there as the top shutdown pairing, Hughes gets to just run around against weaker opposition and OEL-Myers are basically just PK pylons who can step up if injuries hit. Hanifin - Hronek Hughes - Burroughs OEL - Myers Hirose

Certainly an interesting swap but I'd rather not give up on our own prospects like that, there's something to be said for drafting, developing and growing your own players from within in the same system. McMichaels was an interesting center prospect once (I was talking about 1st + MM + something else for Miller last year) but he really has struggled to crack the lineup there. Not even PPG at the AHL level yet. Iorio on the other hand makes things interesting...again, I really like Hoglander but is their value similar? Hard to compare gritty winger to physical defenceman though. I'd do Rathbone for Iorio in a heart-beat though.

Doubt they move Miller, he's surely part of their future core. We've got more chance snagging Schneider and I think we have no chance getting him either. They're a hard team to read - they need wingers for sure, and have a solid young defence but not really any players they can afford to lose. Looking at their roster on D, they have Miller as top LD, Lindgren as 2nd pairing LD, Fox as 1st RD, Trouba as 2nd RD and Schneider sitting as 3rd RD. I would think Schneider really is the most poachable - he's not stealing minutes of Fox (probably ever) or even Trouba any time soon. They can't afford to lose Miller because their depth on LD is nowhere near as solid, and they don't have too many good defensive prospects left (a couple of former 2nd and 3rd round picks). Boeser + 1st for Schneider + 1st Wonder if that gets done? We draft a defenceman with their pick and really swap a positional strength for positional need in a heart-beat. They have the 22nd overall pick, we could walk away with someone like Willander, Lindstein, Strbak, Simashev etc. Really depends who's available at 11OA but if this trade is on the table I'd do it.

Two good and interesting targets, both teams are trying to rebuild rather than retool. Nashville stocked up on draft picks, I don't think they care if they go down with Johansen's contract over the next couple of years to be honest. a RyJo for OEL swap would be so lovely but we'd have to add big time and I doubt they'd want that anchor while they're rebuilding. Crazy to see he was almost 60% at faceoffs last year despite a real down season. Dvorak would be real beauty though, only 27, decent at faceoffs, not much offence but could be a solid 3C for us for the next 5 years or so. I wonder if there's a Garland for Johansen (and they retain 1 or 2M) swap available, I'd do that in a heart-beat if it works cap-wise. Alternatively if Montreal are game, Beauvillier for Dvorak would be nice if we add a B grade prospect or one of our 4th round picks, that'd be a lot simpler.

No chance we trade Demko, Silovs is still a former 6th rounder, he could easily struggle in the NHL and then we end up with no goalie. I doubt it, but he'd need to play 40-60 games comfortably before we think of moving Demko and age-wise it doesn't make sense, they're the perfect age apart to show us a natural transgression of goalies. Demko for a 1st + veteran goalie isn't even worth it.

Interesting to see all the Canucks doing well, I guess this is almost like a step above AHL competition though. Myers does look good at times when he's under less pressure and less speed. Bear made some really good defensive plays tonight too, looks like he's almost out there playing for a job. Garland has been a beast but again, he's just feasting on weak opposition. Silovs is one-day going to have his name chanted at Rogers Arena. Hope Latvia somehow win this thing, but in all fairness if they can beat Sweden, they can beat anyone.

Glad to see CDC aligns with me. At the start of this season I wanted to trade Brock so badly. He was one of the worst defensive players in the league and we'd given him too many excuses. Then Rick comes in (hopefully to help Garland revamp his game) and go figure Boeser goes on a tear, 20 games at PPG pace, steals the 2nd line wing spot and honestly wins the "eye test" in my books - he was (for the first time in his career IMO) controlling the play and pushing the offence, not just being a drifter and scorer. Beauvillier comes in and scores like crazy but is playing with Petey and Kuzmenko. Then he gets bumped around the lineup when we struggle and he completely disappears. Doesn't generate much by himself, he's still young of course but I don't think his ceiling is very high and he doesn't do much else. Honestly reminds me of a poor man's Boeser. Then there's Garland who's a tough one to watch. Fan favourite, plays the right way, playoff-type guy, great forechecker which is what Rick wants, but man does he suck offensively, just so snake-bitten and he doesn't do much else, doesn't kill penalties particularly well (despite being out there), and his 5M cap hit hurts for a guy who should cost us 3M or so. That's not a massive difference, but it adds up when your team is built on guys playing 1-2M under their caps. When we have Kuzmenko at 5.5M playing like a 6-7M guy, Mikheyev at a similar price playing like a 5-6M guy and PDG playing like a 2-3M guy, we have so many guys lifting their game, but also, far too many wingers. Our 3rd line shouldn't consist of Beauvillier (4M) - Dries (1M) - Garland (5M). 10M for a dreadful 3rd line is a joke. That's where we need to focus this off-season. For me, at a bare minimum, one guy has to go. Either Beauvillier or Garland. Ideally, if I was GM I'd get rid of both of them. Attach picks to them, get a B or C grade prospect back, I don't care, we can do damage with that 9M in cap space. If we can somehow get a 3rd line center with one/both of them, lovely, but I doubt it. I'd like to think they have some minor positive value but if not, send away one of our many 3-4th round picks. With that cap space we can acquire a proper 3C and for me I'd go hunting after one of the big defenceman UFAs. This team would be so much stronger if we had solid NHL top-4 defencemen and a bunch of younger, cheaper wingers, as opposed to expensive wingers and kids playing on our defence mixed in with old elephants. Look at Florida right now - that is how you build a team - defence out. Draft a star in Ekblad, surround him with a shutdown veteran like Gudas, acquire another puck mover in Montour and somehow get a steal puck mover in Forsling. Look at Carolina's defence - a top-4 not a single Canuck forward would be able to beat one-on-one. Look at Vegas' top-4 and how big and mean they all are. We need to improve our top-4. We've got Hughes and Hronek, that's 50% there. One more defenceman and we're almost there, and all it takes is shifting these useless wingers.

Yeah I would have been all over that deal too, realistically we had a lot of options with Bo and Miller. I'm sure Allvin was hunting a young RD for a while and Hronek was his targeted guy, maybe even before piecing the Bo deal together, so he got all the pieces he needed to make it work and got a young center out of it too. There are so many different combinations of those deals he could have done. Hate to bring it back but I wanted us to go after NYR so badly last year with Miller and then re-sign Bo, but if we found a way to deal both we would have had a real haul. Realistically, we were talking Chytil + 1st + Lundqvist (no Schneider sadly everyone) + 1st + Raty + Beauvillier. Lundqvist was flipped for a first so that's basically three firsts, Chytil and Raty and Beauvillier. Hell of a haul. You take those picks, add them to some of our guys/prospects and you can basically create whichever player you want.

I think this is the problem we have every time around, we have so many plugs in our lineup already that we have no space for the kids, and then they become waiver eligible and we are forced into trading the young kid as opposed to moving the rubbish out of our lineup. At wing, we have to make room. It frees up cap, it might even snag us a 3C, but most importantly, we have young guys who can do the job of the other guys for a quarter of the cap hit. Beauvillier and Garland aren't quite old or pylons, but they're not worth 9M of cap space. Hoglander and Podkolzin can come in for 2M and pretty much do the same job (if not better as they improve, whereas I think we've seen Beau and Garland's ceiling). On defence, it's a bit trickier. I prefer Wolanin over a lot of the guys we already have and think he deserves more of a chance. Hirose was pretty slick too, acquiring him was a real slap to Rathbone's face. He's not tearing the AHL apart and struggles defensively to be fair, but we're not making it an easy transition for him now either. I have no problem going with Hughes, OEL and Hirose at LD, and sitting Jack in the press-box most nights and going on a rotation on the bottom pairing. Personally I'd hope we could acquire a sturdy defensive top-4 defenceman but that really pushes him back. In any case, we have to make room to let the kids have a chance, we can't just expect them to beat out veteran NHLers right off the bat, get disappointed when they don't and then trade them. That's what's happened with all these guys in the past and they've gone on to have great careers.

Yep take Marner and run, I doubt Toronto would do that though. More comparable guys would be other PPG scorers like Jeff Skinner, Nylander, Tavares, Larkin, Forsberg etc. Honestly I'd rather keep Miller than get one of those guys, he does a lot more than just score (maybe I'd entertain Larkin...). 1-for-1 defenceman, now that'd have me interested. Top line two-way big, strong center would surely get a top pairing defenceman in return. Miller for Hampus Lindholm?

Agreed, also I think if we get him playing big games in the NHL, 20-30 games in the NHL is probably more important than 60-70 in the AHL. Even if he's just playing back to backs. Some goalies are slow burners, look like they take a long time to adjust, but he's out here stopping NHL players in the World Championships with a dead-beat team in front of him. Basically the same thing he's going to get in Vancouver lol

It's a real shame, I liked Dermott when he came in. He was pretty cheap, pretty tough and could skate well. Great bottom pairing guy. Problem is we went out and got Bear who is very similar to Dermott, maybe a bit worse defensively but better offensively. The other problem is now there's Hirose who does the same job, and there's Burroughs too. We basically have four bottom pairing guys. Then there's OEL and Myers who are basically playing like bottom pairing guys. Personally I'd be keeping Burroughs, Hirose and Rathbone right now - they're all cheap, have some high potential and do their job well. These 1-2M guys are good, but we can't have many of them. Honestly, I'd rather keep Dermott than Bear but we don't know how he's going to be after this injury, whereas Bear was pretty solid for us to start, and then got a lot sloppier. In all honesty my first preference would be to let them all go and sign a proper top-4 NHL defenceman in UFA like Graves, Gavrikov, Mayfield or Soucy. Then flesh out our 4th and 5th defencemen slots with OEL and Myers, and the 6th spot goes to Burroughs, Hirose and Rathbone on a rotation.

Unreal game, Latvia were so undisciplined but such solid positioning defensively when they're standing still and wow Silovs is becoming a national hero as a kid. He's going to be the AHL's best goalie next year, probably have a Wolf/Demko like year, carry them deep into the playoffs hopefully and then he'll be ready for 20-30 NHL games the following year. I do agree though - the way he's poised right now he should be our backup next year but no rush. If Martin and Delia really stink up the boat I'm all for bringing Silovs in.

I think Virtanen would have failed on any team with any development, but McCann showed so much promise. Looking back, I thought Cody Hodgson was destined for greatness and obviously his attitude got in the way. Another guy we gave up on quite quickly was Grabner, he was a flash in the pan sort of guy but drops 34G the season we trade him, and had a few 20+ goal seasons around. We give up on these guys way too soon in the hope to trade them for a quick fix. Now we're in the same position with Hoglander, Rathbone and Podkolzin. They're so close to being developed properly, let's hope we don't give up on them and trade them. We've just had far too many guys on the fringe of the NHL traded (because we often don't have space for them or haven't made space for them) and they go off to have great careers elsewhere. Forsling and Chatfield are other great examples of guys we just sent away because we didn't develop them properly or didn't want to make room for them. New management have done a great job of connecting the AHL to the NHL, but the next step is working these guys into the lineup. I think Tocchet is the right guy for this - he's done really well with PDG, but how he works Rathbone into a stacked LD side after acquiring Hirose, or getting Hoglander in amongst an inflated bunch of expensive wingers, will be tricky for sure, and he'll need help from management. This is where in the past we've just traded them for a veteran or pick, but I'm hoping new management give up on the veteran this time (eg. trade Garland or Beauvillier) and let the younger wingers we've drafted and developed ourselves grow into the roll (eg. Hoglander and Podkolzin).

This must really suck being a Flames fan right now, not only is Tkachuk owning this playoffs but look at Bennett out there, from Calgary's what...3rd line about 3 years ago to playing out of his socks in the playoffs. Bennett and Reinhart are sort of flying under the radar a bit but they were great little buy-low projects by Florida a few years ago who play quite good two-way gritty hockey. Bennett is a bit dirty at times, doesn't score as much as he probably should, but man has he been a factor these playoffs. Under a PPG but he's been throwing some bombs of hits all over the ice and is built for the playoffs like Tkachuk. A lot of very smart savvy passes as well which have gone unrecognised.

After this playoffs, I think Tkachuk takes the edge. Matthews disappeared in the post-season, Tkachuk raised his game and is winning games by himself now. Right now if you're building a team, you take Tkachuk. Dare I say, if you had to pick between McDavid and Tkachuk...who do you take... I don't care if a guy drops 200 points in the regular season, if they disappear in the playoffs the way Matthews did, he's useless. Matthews still had 11pts in 11 games but look at what Tkachuk is doing - not many players in the world can raise their game the way he has. 3 GWGs in the Eastern Conference final series of 4 games. Even McDavid isn't playing that clutch.

I guess the danger of putting too much stock into the WJC. Same might be said for the Americans in the most recent tournie, Smith and Leonard and Moore tore it up and are all pretty highly ranked...

Certainly could get a bit more nuts with it... Garland + Myers + 11OA for Goodrow + Schneider + 23OA They have 11M in cap space but we'd probably have to retain, I'd be willing to eat 2M of Myers for a year to get this done. We'd have around 5M in cap space after this deal, I think around 3M has to go to raises so we could splash the remaining 2M on a guy like Kampf Draft a guy like Strbak, Willander or Simashev with the late first Mikheyev - Pettersson - Kuzmenko PDG - Miller - Boeser Beauvillier - Kampf - Goodrow Joshua - Aman - Hoglander Podkolzin Hughes - Schneider OEL - Hronek Hirose - Burroughs Rathbone

Seems like there's lots of talk about NYR trying to move Goodrow. He's a 30 year old, pretty gritty but kind of average 3.6M player on contract for another 4 years, is a consistent 10+, 30+ point scorer but average at faceoffs. Apparently it sounds like NYR would have to add a 2nd or 3rd to move him and they're looking to do so, he only really plays 4th line minutes in New York. Obviously, New York want some more scoring, especially with their rentals up in the air (Kane and Tarasenko). I think they're pretty solid down the middle with Trocheck and Zibanejad and Chytil getting better and better too, but on wing they're pretty thin in the middle-6. Guess who has a bunch of wingers and needs a bottom-6 center? Vancouver. Instead of NYR adding a pick to move Goodrow, I wonder if they take one of our wingers back? It gets a bit messy with the valuation of players, picks and caps, but I think Goodrow for Garland straight up would be quite interesting and quite close, maybe NYR have to add a late pick? People are talking about Garland costing us a 3rd or 4th to move, he obviously scores a bit more and is a lot younger than Goodrow, but Goodrow is a gritty center we could use. Obviously not the perfect 3C, but if it means we get 1.5M cheaper and get a late pick (say 5-7th round), it'd be worth considering? Another option is to swing for the fences - give them a top-6 winger like Boeser for Goodrow but then they have to add something of real value. Dare I say a first is enough? (for example, Boeser alone is probably worth a 2nd, but with the bad contract of Goodrow which is also worth a 2nd = a late first). I'd avoid this, I like Boeser too much, but there are options out there for sure. The last one is Beauvillier - I think we could easily do Goodrow + 2nd for Beauvillier. Problem is they don't have a 2nd rounder until next year.

Exactly my point, these trades would be great if we were going for a bit more of a prolonged retool and wanted to hit our prime in say 2-3 years, but Allvin wants to make the playoffs next year so any one of these trades are a step back next year. Obviously in say 3 years time, Chytil + a first (say for example Simashev or Willander) will be better than a 33-34 year old Miller, but clearly he wants to win when Petey is under 25, not in his late 20s. For that reason I don't see Miller getting moved, there's not many 1-for-1 deals around the league which would work either.