News Article: “There’s going to be changes,†Henrik Zetterberg

[Zetterberg4Captain]

Ericsson's contract and level of play are almost completely irrelevant to our ability to fix our defense.


If Washington can build a dominant team with that Brooks Orpik contract, no one should be under the delusion that Jonathan Ericsson is the only reason we can't acquire some top-pairing d-men.

are you kidding me

orpik is a mean customer and a solid stay at home dman

ericsson is soft as butter despite being 8 foot 5 and 250lbs and cant clear the front of the net if his life depended on it

ericsson sia waste of cap space given the state of our blueline, if ours started with carlsson, niskanen and alzner then ericsson would be ok to have but since its not and we dont, he is unacceptable

 

[SpookyTsuki]

Oh please

If your not a top 2 dman or have the potential to be one. Your a support player and are responsible why "insert" sucks

Ericsson. Does not fit anywhere on this team ever. Kronwall will add to that list as he gets older

Kronwall - ???
Danny d - green
Ouellet - marchenko. Or replace Ouellet with anyone really that isn't ericsson

 

[SpookyTsuki]

Ericsson's contract and level of play are almost completely irrelevant to our ability to fix our defense.


If Washington can build a dominant team with that Brooks Orpik contract, no one should be under the delusion that Jonathan Ericsson is the only reason we can't acquire some top-pairing d-men.

Brooks orpik is better then Ericsson. And iirc. Washington has prime stars. And a lot of their good players are cheap right now. Kuznetsov and more

 

[Pavels Dog]

ericsson sia waste of cap space given the state of our blueline, if ours started with carlsson, niskanen and alzner then ericsson would be ok to have but since its not and we dont, he is unacceptable

Washington has prime stars. And a lot of their good players are cheap right now. Kuznetsov and more

You guys just answered yourselves why Ericsson is not the problem on our team

Unless you think Ericsson is the reason we don't have Carlson, Niskanen, Alzner and Kuznetsov. Which frankly wouldn't surprise me if you do. Darn it E! Why won't you allow us to draft better players!?

 

[SpookyTsuki]

You guys just answered yourselves why Ericsson is not the problem on our team

Unless you think Ericsson is the reason we don't have Carlson, Niskanen, Alzner and Kuznetsov. Which frankly wouldn't surprise me if you do. Darn it E! Why won't you allow us to draft better players!?

Ericsson costs 4 mil. So yeah. He does since he's useless to this team now and in the future

 

[Zetterberg4Captain]

You guys just answered yourselves why Ericsson is not the problem on our team

Unless you think Ericsson is the reason we don't have Carlson, Niskanen, Alzner and Kuznetsov. Which frankly wouldn't surprise me if you do. Darn it E! Why won't you allow us to draft better players!?

that is not what i meant

ericsson isnt a luxury on our blueline nor can his weaknesses be masked/hidden

nobody said JE and he alone is the problem, what I said is, JE isnt part of the solution

we need to move his body, capspace and roster spot so as to be able to FIX what is the problem and that is a lack of high end talent in the 1-3 roles

if we could fix the problem(again the 1 thru 3 spots) without needing to use JE salary/cap space then I would be fine with keeping him so long as those fixes are long term

 

[Pavels Dog]

nobody said JE and he alone is the problem

The guy I responded to on the last page literally said we can't improve our D unless we move Ericsson.

The biggest problem with fixing our defense is not cap space or roster spots, it's quite simply that the kind of d-men we need are very rarely available at all. Thinking we need to move Ericsson in order to acquire better d-men is backwards. We need to acquire better d-men so we can get rid of Ericsson.

 

[SpookyTsuki]

The guy I responded to on the last page literally said we can't improve our D unless we move Ericsson.

The biggest problem with fixing our defense is not cap space or roster spots, it's quite simply that the kind of d-men we need are very rarely available at all. Thinking we need to move Ericsson in order to acquire better d-men is backwards. We need to acquire better d-men so we can get rid of Ericsson.

And it's very rare to acquire such dmen when you have no cap space

 

[jkutswings]

The guy I responded to on the last page literally said we can't improve our D unless we move Ericsson.

The biggest problem with fixing our defense is not cap space or roster spots, it's quite simply that the kind of d-men we need are very rarely available at all. Thinking we need to move Ericsson in order to acquire better d-men is backwards. We need to acquire better d-men so we can get rid of Ericsson.

Shedding mediocre overpaid players will either lead to more cap space to bring in better players, or lead to higher draft picks, to increase the chances of drafting better players.

 

[Zetterberg4Captain]

The guy I responded to on the last page literally said we can't improve our D unless we move Ericsson.

The biggest problem with fixing our defense is not cap space or roster spots, it's quite simply that the kind of d-men we need are very rarely available at all. Thinking we need to move Ericsson in order to acquire better d-men is backwards. We need to acquire better d-men so we can get rid of Ericsson.

thats kinda of a chicken and egg scenario isnt it?

we need to free up ericssons cap space and roster spot in order to be able to afford and fit the fix into our team, moreover, we need to get younger, faster and grittier on our backend as well

while i agree the bonafide proven #1 elite NHL dmen rarely if ever hit free agency(suter) or are traded but dmen better and(younger) than ericsson are available and I suspect will be this summer too(vatanen or fowler, shatty, myers or trouba, hamonic to name but 5) and thats just the ones we can speculate on(dosent include a potential 2016 dougie hamiliton)

instead of looklng at it as people are scapegoating ericsson, we should only be looking at our blueline LONG TERM and moving everyone else out(except kronner for his leadership and loyalty)

 

[Pavels Dog]

And it's very rare to acquire such dmen when you have no cap space

Shedding mediocre overpaid players will either lead to more cap space to bring in better players, or lead to higher draft picks, to increase the chances of drafting better players.

we need to free up ericssons cap space and roster spot in order to be able to afford and fit the fix into our team, moreover, we need to get younger, faster and grittier on our backend as well

You guys realize that moves to clear up cap/roster space can happen AFTER you hit the point where you need that space right? I'm pretty sure you don't need to be cap compliant or have a 23-man roster until day 1 of the season.

Landing top 4 d-men is the difficult part, not making room for them.

 

[Zetterberg4Captain]

You guys realize that moves to clear up cap/roster space can happen AFTER you hit the point where you need that space right? I'm pretty sure you don't need to be cap compliant or have a 23-man roster until day 1 of the season.

Landing top 4 d-men is the difficult part, not making room for them.

we should be able to trade for a top 4 dman that helps us long term

the way i see it
-dekeyser
-traded for dman(vatanen/fowler/myers/trouba/shatty/hamonic/player x)
-green
-smith
-kronwall
-marchenko/ufa dman(cheap in the 2 million range)
-ouellet/sproul/russo

Je's cap space and roster spot go to that dman we hopefully acquire