[McKenzie] Eichel may have requested trade out of BUF

[EP40.]

3 hours ago, oldnews said:

Eichel has a challenging attitude.  This 'my team isn't good enough for me' thing has surfaced before, repeatedly.

 

The whole 'he just wants to win' thing sounds nice on paper. 

 

But it's the kind of thing that doesn't necessarily translate into leadership, and can easily become and remain an underlying rift.

Who knows how it translates in his relationships with his team-mates - but 'star' or not, I don't like the way he soapboxes his expectations.  Call it what you want - it's a 23 year old throwing his team-mates, coaches, GMs under the bus.  Not a fan.

 

At the same time, his (former ) GM Tim Murray practically cried on television when Edmonton won the lottery and Buffalo had to settle for Eichel. 

Looks like Eichel has been taking it out on Buffalo GMs ever since.  

 

Maybe Eichel and Buffalo are a better fit than they seem.

 

Whatever actually lies beneath all the Buffalo drama - I wouldn't be enabling any player to be projecting publicly, pushing his coaches and managment staffs around.

 

Just trade him - whether or not he 'requested' it this time.

 

Get the alternative assets and move on.    Lots of work still to do there - but some good opportunities for Buffalo this summer imo.

 

In case it's not already clear - no interest in him whatsoever.   Some of the proposals inflate this player to insane proportions.

 

What are you trying to insinuate with that exactly? Feel free to elaborate, just couldn’t get the point you tried to make.

[Baratheon]

18 minutes ago, CaptKirk888 said:

He left CDC before COVID. Stated he couldn’t take the constant judgement He received here being a Sabres fan and a canucks fan. I don’t blame him, there was some pretty nasty sh@t thrown his way.

Wow that's too bad.  As a fellow Sabres fan I liked him.  I never experienced that kind of hate personally (though possibly some tried and I just ignored it LOL)

[Guest]

19 minutes ago, CaptKirk888 said:

He left CDC before COVID. Stated he couldn’t take the constant judgement He received here being a Sabres fan and a canucks fan. I don’t blame him, there was some pretty nasty sh@t thrown his way.

That's too bad, I remember some of our homer fans took offense that he was not being a homer in the Canucks-Sabres game.  He was a good poster to have around.  

[CaptKirk888]

1 minute ago, VancouverHabitant said:

That's too bad, I remember some of our homer fans took offense that he was not being a homer in the Canucks-Sabres game.  He was a good poster to have around.  

Agreed, always good to have a ‘somewhat’ unbiased viewpoint. I never will understand the homers non accepted view of a ‘secondary’ canucks fan. He still loved this team, just loved Buffalo more as it as is his ‘home’ team,.

[Ghostsof1915]

Eichel and Buffalo's first rounder for Laffy (i.e. first overall?)

 

Helps Buffalo go cheap. 

[Warhippy]

FAR FAR FAR to much smoke in the Eichel is too hard to work with fire.  A number of players out, wanting out or rumbling about "a high profile player" just scream nope

[Provost]

I think we sometimes lose sight of how great the characters of our stars has been over the years.

 

The Sedins were the hardest workers and incredibly humble.  Petterson doesn’t seem humble, but there doesn’t seem to be any question that he is compotes driven and a good team mate.  Hughes seems like a really solid kid too.

[rekker]

3 hours ago, Junkyard Dog said:

When arm chairing remember Eichel is gonna net more than Petey would right now.

 

So make a return that would be worth Petey and add to that.

Interesting take. Question. Would you trade Petey for Eichel. I wouldn't. Not a chance. Not even close.

[oldnews]

1 hour ago, EP40. said:

 

What are you trying to insinuate with that exactly? Feel free to elaborate, just couldn’t get the point you tried to make.

I'm not sure I can tell you exactly the point - there isn't one point - it's more a general context where - if you want it generalized - as I said in a different post - I prefer young players that handle hard circumstances like that differently - ie that do whatever they can to improve themself and their team-mates, who make working hard their first and foremost concern -and their own performance.

 

If you want me to elaborate on the question of his critical disposition towards multiple management groups - for me, when you indicate that you think your managment group is failing or incompetent, by implication you are questioning the players they bring in, the contracts they give out - in the end, it translates into questioning the quality of your team-mates in the room.

It's really problematic, imo when a principal critical voice of your management group - comes from a 21, 22, 23 yr old player - that is in the dressing room.  Not his job - and even if he feels that way, it's counter-productive at the point it becomes public.  Repeatedly,  when it becomes a recurring dynamic - it gets to the point of looking pretty much dysfunctional - so what are the options?  Fire each subsequent GM until Eichel is happy with one?  Or recognize that not only he, but their young emerging core in general - is still young - and perhaps his expectation/entitlement to play on a winning franchise - is a bit premature, and possibly unrealistic.  I know if I were the owner of an NHL franchise, the 21,22 yr olds would not be instructing the management decisions - (unless of course, that 21 yr old is an exceptional thinker, a fn genius and alien, like EP.)

[Elias Pettersson]

42 minutes ago, rekker said:

Interesting take. Question. Would you trade Petey for Eichel. I wouldn't. Not a chance. Not even close.

Not in a million years...

[MoneypuckOverlord]

if he's available, no team is giving him a direct even trade, it's really not possible for Buffalo to receive what they think they want for him. 

[Gollumpus]

48 minutes ago, MoneypuckOverlord said:

if he's available, no team is giving him a direct even trade, it's really not possible for Buffalo to receive what they think they want for him. 

Well, I was thinking about which team(s) might be able to deal for Eichel. 

 

Ottawa came to mind as they have multiple 1sts. I assume that they would want to keep the 3rd OA, but might be persuaded to to part with the 5th and 28th. They'd then also have to add to those picks, which as you note starts to get really expensive if you consider maybe White or Chabot could be part of the add. The cap situation between the two teams would also get a bit weird.

 

I then stopped myself from such idle thinking, and I was about to go back to listening to "Band Maid", when I thought, "Well, they could always trade Eichel to the Leafs...." 

 

So, would trading Eichel for Marner work (with possible adds going either way), or for Nylander and significant adds going to Buffalo? The money/cap sorta' kinda' balances out. This now means the Leafs are free to trade Matthews to Arizona for players rather than picks to make the cap balance for the Coyotes (think of guys from among: Keller, Schmaltz, Dvorak, Ekman-Larsson, Chychrun).

 

                                                              regards,  G.

Edited September 29, 2020 by Gollumpus

[Junkyard Dog]

2 hours ago, rekker said:

Interesting take. Question. Would you trade Petey for Eichel. I wouldn't. Not a chance. Not even close.

 

1 hour ago, Elias Pettersson said:

Not in a million years...

Buffalo would never trade him straight up for Petey. Buffalo would want more. He's the better player currently.

 

Petey is still going through the process Eichel went through. Eichel is a top player, Petey isn't, he is still developing.

 

Put Eichel next to Miller/Boeser all year instead and on our powerplay he probably nets close to 100 points.

 

It's no flak on Petey but Eichel is at a Mackinnon level just on a $&!# team. 

[Elias Pettersson]

46 minutes ago, Junkyard Dog said:

 

Buffalo would never trade him straight up for Petey. Buffalo would want more. He's the better player currently.

 

Petey is still going through the process Eichel went through. Eichel is a top player, Petey isn't, he is still developing.

 

Put Eichel next to Miller/Boeser all year instead and on our powerplay he probably nets close to 100 points.

 

It's no flak on Petey but Eichel is at a Mackinnon level just on a $&!# team. 

Vancouver would never trade Petey straight up for Eichel.  In 2 years Petey will also be getting 100 points with Miller/Boeser/Toffoli.  He is also a good 200’ player who will only get better.  In 2 years Petey could be better then Eichel so Vancouver would never do the trade.  Plus Petey already has chemistry with everyone on the team, so no reason to break that chemistry. 

 

Eichel is a great player but Petey in 2 years will also be a great player. And Petey will most likely be on a more team friendly contract for several more years so we can build up this team with the extra cap space.  I would say the same with Hughes. I wouldn’t trade him straight up for Dahlin.  For a lot of the same reasons. 

[Junkyard Dog]

23 minutes ago, Elias Pettersson said:

Vancouver would never trade Petey straight up for Eichel.  In 2 years Petey will also be getting 100 points with Miller/Boeser/Toffoli.  He is also a good 200’ player who will only get better.  In 2 years Petey could be better then Eichel so Vancouver would never do the trade.  Plus Petey already has chemistry with everyone on the team, so no reason to break that chemistry. 

 

Eichel is a great player but Petey in 2 years will also be a great player. And Petey will most likely be on a more team friendly contract for several more years so we can build up this team with the extra cap space.  I would say the same with Hughes. I wouldn’t trade him straight up for Dahlin.  For a lot of the same reasons. 

Perhaps but Eichel has much more value as it currently stands. He is just a better player. If you look at his team and what Eichel has accomplished it is much more impressive than what Petey did during the season.

 

I am also not the one who suggested Petey for Eichel, I was just stating there's no world where Buffalo would trade him straight up for Petey. If both players were made available for trade Eichel would net more. Eichel has Mackinnon value whereas Petey to me has Aho-like value. Aho and Petey are good young players with a lot of potential while Mackinnon and Eichel have established themselves as top players.

 

I believe Petey will have a similar developmental path as Eichel/Mackinnon where it takes him 4 years to reach his potential. Funny enough you agree since you stated in 2 years time you think he might have a breakout year. Aho and Petey's playoff performances do show a glimpse of what they will be capable of when they do reach their max potential. I do believe that Petey could end up better than Eichel.

 

Dahlin has the most potential out of anyone in the NHL currently. He did things at a young age Lidstrom never did much like Petey with Forsberg. Dude is like the Petey of Dmen. Unfortunately he is on Buffalo, the one team who could spoil him. In terms of value he has similar to Hughes right now but he has more potential. He is 6 months younger than Hughes too. I wouldn't trade Dahlin for Hughes at any point. In fact I probably wouldn't trade Dahlin for almost anybody, the list of people I would want would back would be very limited.

[Nuxfanabroad]

For the past several wks, journos...

 

May have been trying to drum up interest in a never-ending season

Might have been dredging the bottom of gossipy streams, for baseless watery-Muck

Could have been trying to justify their dwindling salaries

Might possibly have been swinging a blunt machete, in a mighty dense Jungle

 

^Hey there's some nifty headlines! ^

 

...begging the question, has sport journalism jumped the shark? It's so seldom I see anything mildly interesting in the mainstream. Any tip-off that's prescient & worthwhile. There are many more examples of interesting questions/insights/etc..., that I'll see here, there, or maybe some Youtube blogger.

 

The mainstream now seems to be about stroking egos of perceived 'important' people; or not p*ss*ng them off, so you've got contacts going forwards. Or they're virtue signalling for some obscure cause, which has connections to perhaps 0.0001% of the overall pro hockey, fan market.

 

Just one disinterested(once passionate) consumer here, but seems to me there's just too many pigs at the trough. Sure don't envy anyone entering the world of sports journalism today.

[RWMc1]

I think that some players on bad teams want their GMs to try to ice a competitive team that can compete. It's what any competitive player would want. That's one risk of tanking too long. Your better players might leave as soon as they reach UFA status.

 

I doubt they trade Eichel, so what type of players do they need to be better. That would be a more realistic way to approach this.

[filthycanuck]

14 hours ago, BPA said:

Eichel would be nice but would cost alot.

 

Would have to think if VAN made a play for him, then it would be at least Boeser + 1st 2021 (unprotected) + Gaudette.

 

 

Thats a reasonable ask but the problem is Eichel's cap hit which is 10million I believe. That is a LOT of money to tie up in addition to upcoming Hughes and Petey contracts. Not many contenders or playoff bound teams are going to have that sort of space unless they absolutely gut the rest of their roster. You can wave goodbye to Marky, Tanev, Toffoli or Stetcher with that cap hit. Make no mistake about it Eichel is an PHENOMENAL player, and theres a decent arguement to be made that he might be even better than Petterson, and then you have them both in the same team! With the landscape of the NHL now with the pandemic, its an unrealistic scenario

[Timråfan]

6 hours ago, Junkyard Dog said:

 

Put Eichel next to Miller/Boeser all year instead and on our powerplay he probably nets close to 100 points.

 

Well, if Miller could use Petey as a passing partner more when he attacks Petey could have reached that level the last season. I have stopped counting all the times Miller just rushe into ozone and and only has Petey as a decoy. Petey on the other hand always involves his linemates in the game.

Remember that Petey got close to ppg in his first season without Miller so I believe it's Miller that benefits being beside Petey.

 

How is Eichel working defensively? 

He got a lot of minus but that doesn't always tell the whole story.

I don't know because I haven't seen much of him

[DefCon1]

14 hours ago, GhostsOf1994 said:

Buffalo is such a great place!

 

/s

 

The ask for Eichel would be huge!

Petey Or Hughes, 1st, likely Podkolzin and or more draft picks or prospects.

 

 

He's not a generational talent but definitely a franchise #1 center.

 

 

 

Ottawa or Montreal should pick up the phone asap

Ok I think you are getting carried away. Eichel has high value but if he wants to be traded, it will lower his trade value. You are throwing in a calder winner who is on ELC in Petersson or a calder nominee Hughes who has broken NHL records along with a 1st round pick, Podkolzin who is a 10th overall pick plus more?? There is no way Benning would give that up unless it was for McDavid or Mckinnon. Eichel is good, even great elite player but he isnt that good. That package is reserved for a generational player not just a #1 franchise center. Petersson is already developing to become that franchise center if he is not already.