Confirmed with Link: Vrana @50%

[Spektre]

DA regaining my trust since the DP57 situation.

He's played this TDL very well. The only one that hurt was ROR (another guy who competes everyday, even when his body is broken, and he wants to be in STL). However, DA got a lot out of TOR for essentially a rental. I don't think ROR is coming back, which still saddens me.

Can we still trade for Perron??

 

[Ginger Papa]

Hey folks,

Just found out about this Trade. Hopefully Jacob has been able to deal with his personal issues and able to resume his career.

Your retool/rebuild seems to be coming along nicely.

Cheers

 

[i aint Dunn yet]

nice

 

[TheDizee]

Great move at 50% retained.

 

[Brian39]

We suddenly have a plethora of young talent up front. Thomas, Kyrou, Buch, Vrana, Kapanen, Neighbours, Bolduc, Snuggerud, Dean…

That’s basically an entire top 9 we now have moving forward.

Now the forwards aren’t a concern and all Armstrong really has to do in the offseason is focus on the defense.

I'd like to see another young center in that group, but other than that I agree. I like Dean, but I will be surprised if he turns himself into a legit top 6 C. Schenn can fill that role for us over the next couple years, but ideally we come out of this draft with a guy who can grow into that role as Schenn ages out of it.

That's a good mix of 27-and-under forwards and legit prospects. I doubt Vrana and Kap are both here beyond next year, but having two chances at adding a medium-term piece is great. I like the cap flexibility of this group. We've got time to watch prospects grow, see how Vrana/Kap look in our roster, wring some cheap ELC years out of guys and then re-assess in the summers of 2024 and 2025.

I'm always a 'best player available' guy at the draft, but I like our chances of building a good medium-term forward group with the pieces we already have and focusing our picks on other areas.

 

[Blueston]

I'd like to see another young center in that group, but other than that I agree. I like Dean, but I will be surprised if he turns himself into a legit top 6 C. Schenn can fill that role for us over the next couple years, but ideally we come out of this draft with a guy who can grow into that role as Schenn ages out of it.

That's a good mix of 27-and-under forwards and legit prospects. I doubt Vrana and Kap are both here beyond next year, but having two chances at adding a medium-term piece is great. I like the cap flexibility of this group. We've got time to watch prospects grow, see how Vrana/Kap look in our roster, wring some cheap ELC years out of guys and then re-assess in the summers of 2024 and 2025.

I'm always a 'best player available' guy at the draft, but I like our chances of building a good medium-term forward group with the pieces we already have and focusing our picks on other areas.

That is where Bedard slots, silly.

 

[BlueKnight]

God damn, I’ll admit Armstrong has proven me wrong. Low risk high reward, I hope his personal issues are behind him. I wanted Vrana back in 2017 in the Shattenkirk trade. Now he is a Blue. Great work Armstrong!!!

 

[mk80]

Great trade! We gave up nothing of value for a good proven player!

I definitely think Armstrong’s relationship and likely proof in our organizational support system from our time having Montgomery swung the deal in our favor. I don’t think Yzerman was going to put Vrana in a place where he had doubts he couldn’t find success both on and off the ice.

 

[TheDizee]

does he have a drug problem issue?

 

[Brian39]

That is where Bedard slots, silly.

A prospect like that turns around most franchises, but it is amazing how much it would turn around this franchise. I'd immediately feel great about our center group through 2031. I'd feel great about a 2023/24 winger group of Buch, Kyrou, Saad, Kap, Vrana, to support the Thomas/Bedard/Schenn top 9 center group. I'd be satisfied with Neighbours/Blais/Torpo/Alexandrov competing for the 9th forward spot and impact 4th line spots. And a trio of non-NHL forward prospects of Snuggy, Bolduc, and Dean would make me confident that we could fill in those top 9 wing spots in the future as guys like Kap, Vrana, Buch, Saad, and Schenn price or play themselves themselves off the roster.

Suddenly I would view every other pick we own in this draft as fully expendable toward the goal of retooling the defense. As would all remaining cap space. We'd have roughly $4M to fill 3 roster spots before moving any existing D once you account for Bedard and Hofer's addition to the roster. Not a ton of space, but enough to fit in a legitimately good D man if we also move out any of the 5 well-paid guys.

Bedard is an absolute dream, but I would very much settle for a secondary lottery win that gets us Fantilli or Carlsson. Adding an NHL-ready center with short-term top 6 upside on an ELC would solidify a pretty damn good forward group and lets us heave assets at the blue line.

 

[Blueston]

A prospect like that turns around most franchises, but it is amazing how much it would turn around this franchise. I'd immediately feel great about our center group through 2031. I'd feel great about a 2023/24 winger group of Buch, Kyrou, Saad, Kap, Vrana, to support the Thomas/Bedard/Schenn top 9 center group. I'd be satisfied with Neighbours/Blais/Torpo/Alexandrov competing for the 9th forward spot and impact 4th line spots. And a trio of non-NHL forward prospects of Snuggy, Bolduc, and Dean would make me confident that we could fill in those top 9 wing spots in the future as guys like Kap, Vrana, Buch, Saad, and Schenn price or play themselves themselves off the roster.

Suddenly I would view every other pick we own in this draft as fully expendable toward the goal of retooling the defense. As would all remaining cap space. We'd have roughly $4M to fill 3 roster spots before moving any existing D once you account for Bedard and Hofer's addition to the roster. Not a ton of space, but enough to fit in a legitimately good D man if we also move out any of the 5 well-paid guys.

Bedard is an absolute dream, but I would very much settle for a secondary lottery win that gets us Fantilli or Carlsson. Adding an NHL-ready center with short-term top 6 upside on an ELC would solidify a pretty damn good forward group and lets us heave assets at the blue line.

I’m getting a woody.

 

[MissouriMook]

I’m getting a woody.

Yes. Yes, you are.

 

[Bluesish]

Trades likes this are why I think it would be so hard to replace DA.

 

[Ted Hoffman]

I know any team in the league could have had him for nothing in the last couple of weeks, but that would have required taking on the full salary and cap hit. We gave up virtually nothing to get him at 50 cents on the dollar for a 21 game audition.

That tells you exactly what kind of value he had: practically none, even at 50% retention.

And to everyone thinking Yzerman did us some favor here for all we did for him in past trades: If he thought Vrana could provide any value to the team, he'd still be in Detroit.

He's not, and he didn't get called up until the Red Wings were pretty much out of other options. That should speak volumes about the value Yzerman thought he could provide.

If he works out, we have him for another year. If not, we can trade him, waive him, or buy him out.

1. We're not buying him out. Armstrong has never bought anyone out, he won't do it here either.
2. If we get to the point we think we need to waive him, no one else is taking him. Period. Even if we're retaining 50% of our 50%.

Very low risk but potentially decent reward move. He's been a 25-25-50 guy in this league since we won the Cup, maybe he can get back there in a different environment. I think we see his offense come back, I am more worried about how he fits defensively.

I'm more worried about whether he's got things together between the ears. Yeah, sure - he could be a 25-25-50 guy again. He could also be Zach Sanford or Matt D'Agostini - not the 15, 20, 25-goal versions where they looked confident and earned a spot in the lineup, the versions that came after those seasons. I would not be shocked if he scored occasionally but made people miss Tarasenko's oft-maligned defensive play.

Ultimately, it's a practically no-cost move. I think banking on him to suddenly return to past form is expecting a hell of a lot, though, and we better hope that Snuggerud, Bolduc, Dean or MV63 are ready if (when) Vrana fails.

 

[stlbluz]

Trades likes this are why I think it would be so hard to replace DA.

Shhh - there's a whole thread for short sighted folks that would beg to differ.

 

[izzy]

I love taking the risks during the retool. The cap space was made available and bring in free short term assets with low risk high reward.

Avoids the messy long term UFA contracts, give the Kapanens and Vranas a year to see how they can fare in stl

 

[stl76]

Was pissed when a buddy first told me about this trade. Then I read about the retention. Probably a good gamble, here’s hoping Vrana gets his house in order and can turn around his career.

 

[TheDizee]

Shhh - there's a whole thread for short sighted folks that would beg to differ.

Reason we are in this mess is because of DA handing out so many bad contracts and letting heart and soul guys like Chuckie go. Just because he makes some good moves here and there does not excuse or change that.

 

[stlbluz]

Sure he's jacked up our current D situation but his overall work has been pretty darn good. Name another GM that compares or that you'd rather have.

BTW - Chuckie sucks.

 

[Stupendous Yappi]

God damn, I’ll admit Armstrong has proven me wrong. Low risk high reward, I hope his personal issues are behind him. I wanted Vrana back in 2017 in the Shattenkirk trade. Now he is a Blue. Great work Armstrong!!!

Good thing he wasn’t fired when he traded O’Reilly (or was it Tarasenko…or both)?

 

[ChicagoBlues]

I'm kinda meh about Vrana, but I am so going gay for Chuckie.

 

[LGB]

Woah. This is an awesome move if Vrana can resolve his off-ice issues.

 

[stlbluz]

Good thing he wasn’t fired when he traded O’Reilly (or was it Tarasenko…or both)?

Yeah - He should have just let them walk for nothing at the end of the season. We needed them for our deep playoff run.

 

[LGB]

In the last two seasons Vrana played at least half the games (19/20 and 20/21) Vrana had the second highest 5v5 goal scoring rate in the NHL trailing only Auston Matthews.

 

[Majorityof1]

I am torn on the trade. Vrana obviously has skills, but personal issues and injuries have derailed his career. We paid nothing in trade/draft/propsect pool capital.

But it is another struggling one dimensional winger eating into our cap that I'd rather use to fix the defense and get some Cs. I want at least 2 Cs added to this roster. Right now we have Thomas, Schenn and Alexandrov who is a 4th liner max. We need at least a 3C and I'd love a 2C that could shift Schenn to wing so we'd have more flexibility with lineups. But we don't have cap.

I won't be surprised totally if Vrana or Kapanen find a role beyond next year. I wouldn't bet on it. They are middle 6 guys who need to play top 6. Kapanen is doing ok but not great because he is getting top 6 linemates. When its time to compete and our prospects graduate, I'd rather give them that role. If we are going to be good, we need players better than Kapanen playing with Thomas, Kyrou, Buchnevich.

These moves basically tell me that Armstrong knows we will be bad next year. Vrana and Kapanen can find a role on bad teams. Its why they were waived by playoff (or near playoff) teams. There is no place for them on a deep cap compliant team.