2021 Expansion Draft Discussion

[Oberyn]

I'm a bit startled by the obsession with Sundqvist on this board. He's a solid player, but he's never going to be a top six producer and his playstyle hints at frequent time on the injured list. You're telling me you'd rather keep Sundqvist over Perron who's been a bit shy of a point per game player since he signed his 4 year contract? This is definitely shades of of Sobotka syndrome which I was guilty of when he was on the team. Sundqvist is a fine two way player, but is his two way presence so influential that he's going to prevent more goals than Perron will produce offensively? Absolutely not. If our last protection spot is between Perron and Sundqvist, I know who I'm taking and there's no deliberation needed.

 

[Mike Liut]

I'm a bit startled by the obsession with Sundqvist on this board. He's a solid player, but he's never going to be a top six producer and his playstyle hints at frequent time on the injured list. You're telling me you'd rather keep Sundqvist over Perron who's been a bit shy of a point per game player since he signed his 4 year contract? This is definitely shades of of Sobotka syndrome which I was guilty of when he was on the team. Sundqvist is a fine two way player, but is his two way presence so influential that he's going to prevent more goals than Perron will produce offensively? Absolutely not. If our last protection spot is between Perron and Sundqvist, I know who I'm taking and there's no deliberation needed.

considering age and contract status, I’m taking Sunny.

 

[simon IC]

Great discussion on both sides here! I would still take Sunny.

 

[Ted Hoffman]

The Sunqvist/Sobotka comparison feels accurate. A guy who is useful and you like to have on the team, but at the end of the day is expendable and can be internally replaced pretty easily. I say as a fan of both players

I would agree with "replaceable." I don't know if I agree with "easily." Easier than say replacing ROR, Schwartz, Pietragnelo, Parayko, ... more difficult than replacing Clifford, DLR, MacEachern, Gunnarsson (especially at this stage of his career), Mikkola, Husso.

We haven't developed that kind of guy in our system. [We haven't developed a lot of key guys in our system if they couldn't step in with more than a year of AHL experience - and that whole situation probably merits its own thread.] We traded for Sobotka and he became that guy here. We traded for Sundqvist and he became that guy here. Looking in the system, if we lost Sundqvist we don't have anyone remotely close to filling that role. If we have a spot open to protect someone because we don't have to protect Schwartz, I'm fine using it on Sundqvist even if we think his style of play makes him wear down in a few years. It's not like we've got someone else in the system we really like who's at risk of getting exposed.

 

[Ted Hoffman]

I will throw this out, though: depending on what exactly is going on with Parayko, I could see him get left off the protected list figuring that Seattle won't roll the dice on him. That would make the selections on defense a lot more interesting.

 

[KirkOut]

I will throw this out, though: depending on what exactly is going on with Parayko, I could see him get left off the protected list figuring that Seattle won't roll the dice on him. That would make the selections on defense a lot more interesting.

That my good sir is one heck of a piping hot take

 

[Stupendous Yappi]

I will throw this out, though: depending on what exactly is going on with Parayko, I could see him get left off the protected list figuring that Seattle won't roll the dice on him. That would make the selections on defense a lot more interesting.

If they could draft Parayko, I think they’d not hesitate. He’d be the MAF for Seattle, the face of the franchise, and they’d offer him above market value on a long term deal. Getting a #1D in his prime years locked up would be a windfall for an expansion team.

 

[Ted Hoffman]

That my good sir is one heck of a piping hot take

We're a long way away from knowing what's really going on, but yes - it's a hell of a piping hot take. But one which, given the way JR danced around the topic, I don't think anyone should dismiss this completely.

If they could draft Parayko, I think they’d not hesitate. He’d be the MAF for Seattle, the face of the franchise, and they’d offer him above market value on a long term deal. Getting a #1D in his prime years locked up would be a windfall for an expansion team.

Obviously if this year is a one-off and after an offseason of rest and rehab he'll be back to 100% for '21-22, there's no way we don't protect him. But if WYSIWYG and it's not getting any better - or, it's got a risk of getting worse - because of some condition he has at the moment and it's not going to go away, I can see where we advertise the problem, put him out and Seattle passes not wanting to roll the dice on $6.5 million being unable to play. We could swallow paying him for the rest of his contract for 60-70% of what he used to provide because we don't have any kind of depth in the system that's going to push him out of the top-6. Seattle will have a decent amount of depth, not have first-hand knowledge of what's going on with him, and won't risk having him eat up dead cap space as they're trying to be competitive from the start.

 

[Brockon]

I will throw this out, though: depending on what exactly is going on with Parayko, I could see him get left off the protected list figuring that Seattle won't roll the dice on him. That would make the selections on defense a lot more interesting.

I think Seattle snaps Parayko up in a heartbeat and sends a gift basket.

There's little chance they don't gamble on him returning to form - chalking his current struggles up to either COVID symptoms lingering or a nagging injury that needs surgery the team is attempting to rehab so as not to lose a top 4 dman for the season (and playoffs).

Even if he doesn't rebound from his current struggles to #2 dman form - Parayko is likely to be a solid #3 guy on almost any team around the league and will be shoehorned into a top pairing role for Seattle because no two dmen better than Parayko will be left exposed for the expansion draft.

As @Stupendous Yappi says, to be gifted a cornerstone dman like that is something Seattle cannot pass up. Parayko would be their top guy until they can draft and develop 2 prospects better than CP55 to push him to the 2nd pairing. And the odds of that happening before the last few years of any extension he hypothetically signs in Seattle are negligible.

 

[Brockon]

I think Seattle snaps Parayko up in a heartbeat and sends a gift basket.

There's little chance they don't gamble on him returning to form - chalking his current struggles up to either COVID symptoms lingering or a nagging injury that needs surgery the team is attempting to rehab so as not to lose a top 4 dman for the season (and playoffs).

Even if he doesn't rebound from his current struggles to #2 dman form - Parayko is likely to be a solid #3 guy on almost any team around the league and will be shoehorned into a top pairing role for Seattle because no two dmen better than Parayko will be left exposed for the expansion draft.

As @Stupendous Yappi says, to be gifted a cornerstone dman like that is something Seattle cannot pass up. Parayko would be their top guy until they can draft and develop 2 prospects better than CP55 to push him to the 2nd pairing. And the odds of that happening before the last few years of any extension he hypothetically signs in Seattle are negligible.

I'll add the only players I expect to be available that are potential top pairing caliber dmen in the expansion draft are going to be Ekholm, Suter and Subban.

I expect Nashville protects 4 dmen, meaning Ekholm isn't available. Suter with his contract and age (36) would have to waive his NMC (which I expect will happen, but don't expect him to be taken). And Subban despite looking better, isn't really a top pairing guy on a competitive team...

Then it drops into 2nd pairing dmen. Parayko is better than any of these. Even at 90%, in case he doesn't fully recover after whatever surgery he needs is performed (I'm not sure of the nature of the injury, but I expect this is the issue - he needs surgery and he's attempting to rehab it instead of missing the rest of the 2020-21 season and playoffs).

 

[ezcreepin]

I'll add the only players I expect to be available that are potential top pairing caliber dmen in the expansion draft are going to be Ekholm, Suter and Subban.

I expect Nashville protects 4 dmen, meaning Ekholm isn't available. Suter with his contract and age (36) would have to waive his NMC (which I expect will happen, but don't expect him to be taken). And Subban despite looking better, isn't really a top pairing guy on a competitive team...

Then it drops into 2nd pairing dmen. Parayko is better than any of these. Even at 90%, in case he doesn't fully recover after whatever surgery he needs is performed (I'm not sure of the nature of the injury, but I expect this is the issue - he needs surgery and he's attempting to rehab it instead of missing the rest of the 2020-21 season and playoffs).

If he really needs surgery and it's nothing to do with covid, I'd say f it and tell him to get surgery and be ready next year. If we tank, then maybe we can get a nice defenseman in the draft and come back strong next year. With all these injuries piling up, Vova being out for a sizeable chunk of the season, Parayko maybe needing surgery; I just don't think the chances of a repeat are good this year and it seems like the injury bug is doing its best to keep us from being a top team in the league. Idk if the Blues can afford to be bad this year, but if there were no outside forces or string being pulled, that's what I would try to do.

 

[BlueDream]

We're a long way away from knowing what's really going on, but yes - it's a hell of a piping hot take. But one which, given the way JR danced around the topic, I don't think anyone should dismiss this completely.


Obviously if this year is a one-off and after an offseason of rest and rehab he'll be back to 100% for '21-22, there's no way we don't protect him. But if WYSIWYG and it's not getting any better - or, it's got a risk of getting worse - because of some condition he has at the moment and it's not going to go away, I can see where we advertise the problem, put him out and Seattle passes not wanting to roll the dice on $6.5 million being unable to play. We could swallow paying him for the rest of his contract for 60-70% of what he used to provide because we don't have any kind of depth in the system that's going to push him out of the top-6. Seattle will have a decent amount of depth, not have first-hand knowledge of what's going on with him, and won't risk having him eat up dead cap space as they're trying to be competitive from the start.

Oof. I didn’t expect to see this kind of take from you.

Nah, I’m dismissing this. It makes no sense at all.

If Parayko gets left unprotected he’s 100% being taken by Seattle. Not even a question which is why there’s no chance of it happening.

Parayko will be 28 this Summer with only one year left on his deal. Even IF he had injury issues, Seattle would still take him because there’s literally zero risk. It would be for one year for only 5.5M so if he really bombed and was banged up, they’re not making a long-term commitment to him. But if he bounces back, which is likely, they just got a stud in his prime. They’d take that any day of the week because they’d have nothing to lose.

 

[Stupendous Yappi]

I thought when the post mentioned "Seattle risking it" it was referencing whether they could re-sign him or not, nothing to do with the injury. Until you hear there is a career threatening injury, if I'm Seattle I'd assume he will recover maybe with need for an offseason surgery. That doesn't concern me in the slightest in their position.

 

[BlueDream]

I thought when the post mentioned "Seattle risking it" it was referencing whether they could re-sign him or not, nothing to do with the injury. Until you hear there is a career threatening injury, if I'm Seattle I'd assume he will recover maybe with need for an offseason surgery. That doesn't concern me in the slightest in their position.

Whether you think you can re-sign him or not still doesn’t matter. You don’t pass on a player of Parayko’s caliber. Vegas didn’t re-sign Perron but they went to the Cup so it was worth it. He would be taken no matter what.

Either way, the fact that this is even being discussed is ridiculous. Parayko misses 2 games and now there’s speculation about his career ending. Gotta love the internet.

 

[Vincenzo Arelliti]

You’d better off trading Parayko than allowing him to get exposed. Ridiculous take, despite my usual high regard for the poster

 

[Stupendous Yappi]

I’m not going to pick on someone for exploring the idea of exposing Parayko. But I think it’s pretty clearly a non-starter. I think we saw some GMs outsmart themselves like this in the last expansion draft, where bad deals were made where more was lost than the guy they feared losing in the first place. I’ll be a little surprised if GMs make the same type of mistakes again, but only a little.

 

[Brockon]

I’m not going to pick on someone for exploring the idea of exposing Parayko. But I think it’s pretty clearly a non-starter. I think we saw some GMs outsmart themselves like this in the last expansion draft, where bad deals were made where more was lost than the guy they feared losing in the first place. I’ll be a little surprised if GMs make the same type of mistakes again, but only a little.

I expect we're going to see Columbus make some sort of deal to protect Elvis/Korpi and lose a skater instead.

If Suter doesn't wave his NMC I expect Minnesota will make a deal of some sort.

Arizona and Florida are both still rumoured to want to shed cap for their own internal cap structures - I think we'll see lesser deals there.

If we see less than 5 deals I'd be shocked - granted, I expect one of them will likely involve a 3rd, B tier prospect or something less significant to shift interest from one player to another one of similar upside. Something like us coughing up a 4th to steer Seattle to select Barbashev over Sunny.

 

[Frenzy31]

I expect we're going to see Columbus make some sort of deal to protect Elvis/Korpi and lose a skater instead.

If Suter doesn't wave his NMC I expect Minnesota will make a deal of some sort.

Arizona and Florida are both still rumoured to want to shed cap for their own internal cap structures - I think we'll see lesser deals there.

If we see less than 5 deals I'd be shocked - granted, I expect one of them will likely involve a 3rd, B tier prospect or something less significant to shift interest from one player to another one of similar upside. Something like us coughing up a 4th to steer Seattle to select Barbashev over Sunny.

Would you trade Sunny for Barby and a 4th? I wouldn’t and neither would Seattle. We are likely going to lose him or Dunn.

yeah it sucks, but it could be a lot worse

 

[Ted Hoffman]

I think Seattle snaps Parayko up in a heartbeat and sends a gift basket.

There's little chance they don't gamble on him returning to form - chalking his current struggles up to either COVID symptoms lingering it's already been noted this isn't a COVID hangover thing r a nagging injury that needs surgery the team is attempting to rehab so as not to lose a top 4 dman for the season (and playoffs) which contradicts JR's reporting.

Even if he doesn't rebound from his current struggles to #2 dman form - Parayko is likely to be a solid #3 guy on almost any team around the league and will be shoehorned into a top pairing role for Seattle because no two dmen better than Parayko will be left exposed for the expansion draft.

As @Stupendous Yappi says, to be gifted a cornerstone dman like that is something Seattle cannot pass up. Parayko would be their top guy until they can draft and develop 2 prospects better than CP55 to push him to the 2nd pairing. And the odds of that happening before the last few years of any extension he hypothetically signs in Seattle are negligible.

Oof. I didn’t expect to see this kind of take from you.

Nah, I’m dismissing this. It makes no sense at all.

If Parayko gets left unprotected he’s 100% being taken by Seattle. Not even a question which is why there’s no chance of it happening.

Parayko will be 28 this Summer with only one year left on his deal. Even IF he had injury issues, Seattle would still take him because there’s literally zero risk. It would be for one year for only 5.5M so if he really bombed and was banged up, they’re not making a long-term commitment to him. But if he bounces back, which is likely, they just got a stud in his prime. They’d take that any day of the week because they’d have nothing to lose.

To both of you and anyone else who thinks I'm off: say it comes out that Parayko has a degenerative hip condition. It's not something surgery fixes, it's not something rest really fixes. You still want to stand by those positions? You think his level of play this season is indicative of a 1D? You think it'll be indicative of a 1D for Seattle? You think it'll be indicative of a 1D for the next several years as that hip wears out more and more?

Again: I'm not saying expose him right now. Of course he's on the protected list if we do this today, in the absence of any other information that becomes available. I'm saying if he has a chronic injury which will never get better and will only get worse over time, do you really protect him given other options you might want to keep instead? I know, this requires reading what I said - but it's really key to understanding my comment to make an accurate response, instead of thinking I've said Parayko is going to be totally healthy, but f*** it - let's expose him, I'm sure Seattle is a bunch of dumbasses and they'll never take him and jumping off accordingly.

 

[Ted Hoffman]

Whether you think you can re-sign him or not still doesn’t matter. You don’t pass on a player of Parayko’s caliber. Vegas didn’t re-sign Perron but they went to the Cup so it was worth it. He would be taken no matter what.

Either way, the fact that this is even being discussed is ridiculous. Parayko misses 2 games and now there’s speculation about his career ending. Gotta love the internet.

1. I'm not saying Parayko's career is in jeopardy, I'm positing a hypothetical based on JR's comments.
2. The idea, based on that hypothetical, is no less outlandish than the hot takes offered at other times on this team - especially its outlook for the season - after Game 2. It's based on information presented to everyone, which clearly indicates this isn't some short-term thing and it's not a "we can rehab it, we can fix it with surgery" thing which, if accurate, rules out a lot of things we commonly think of and starts to raise more questions about what kind of injury would fall into the category where surgery/rehab wouldn't fix it.

You’d better off trading Parayko than allowing him to get exposed. Ridiculous take, despite my usual high regard for the poster

Again, please read what I wrote and go beyond hey, I have an idea, let's expose Parayko for shits and giggles.

 

[Blueston]

I expect we're going to see Columbus make some sort of deal to protect Elvis/Korpi and lose a skater instead.

If Suter doesn't wave his NMC I expect Minnesota will make a deal of some sort.

Arizona and Florida are both still rumoured to want to shed cap for their own internal cap structures - I think we'll see lesser deals there.

If we see less than 5 deals I'd be shocked - granted, I expect one of them will likely involve a 3rd, B tier prospect or something less significant to shift interest from one player to another one of similar upside. Something like us coughing up a 4th to steer Seattle to select Barbashev over Sunny.

Elvis is exempt.

 

[Brockon]

To both of you and anyone else who thinks I'm off: say it comes out that Parayko has a degenerative hip condition. It's not something surgery fixes, it's not something rest really fixes. You still want to stand by those positions? You think his level of play this season is indicative of a 1D? You think it'll be indicative of a 1D for Seattle? You think it'll be indicative of a 1D for the next several years as that hip wears out more and more?

Again: I'm not saying expose him right now. Of course he's on the protected list if we do this today, in the absence of any other information that becomes available. I'm saying if he has a chronic injury which will never get better and will only get worse over time, do you really protect him given other options you might want to keep instead? I know, this requires reading what I said - but it's really key to understanding my comment to make an accurate response, instead of thinking I've said Parayko is going to be totally healthy, but f*** it - let's expose him, I'm sure Seattle is a bunch of dumbasses and they'll never take him and jumping off accordingly.

I'm not up to date on sports reports, I'm in the middle of some intensive training - so that it's not lingering covid issues or whatever JR is reporting is news to me.

Can you elaborate on what has been reported about Parayko, so I can discuss this with at least a degree of insight?

 

[Ted Hoffman]

I'm not up to date on sports reports, I'm in the middle of some intensive training - so that it's not lingering covid issues or whatever JR is reporting is news to me.

Can you elaborate on what has been reported about Parayko, so I can discuss this with at least a degree of insight?

GDT: - Blues vs. Coy --ope!-- San Jose Sharks| 7pm, FSMW|

That specific post. Might be some discussion after that you can get people's views on, but it all jumps from there.

 

[joe galiba]

1. I'm not saying Parayko's career is in jeopardy, I'm positing a hypothetical based on JR's comments.
2. The idea, based on that hypothetical, is no less outlandish than the hot takes offered at other times on this team - especially its outlook for the season - after Game 2. It's based on information presented to everyone, which clearly indicates this isn't some short-term thing and it's not a "we can rehab it, we can fix it with surgery" thing which, if accurate, rules out a lot of things we commonly think of and starts to raise more questions about what kind of injury would fall into the category where surgery/rehab wouldn't fix it.


Again, please read what I wrote and go beyond hey, I have an idea, let's expose Parayko for shits and giggles.

a back injury sure makes this not as much of a hot take
(still think we protect him, but it not with the certainty i felt before)
if it had been a rib/chest injury or a sports hernia that is almost 100% correctable
recovery from back problems is way more uncertain
see: Steen, Alexander as a very recent example

 

[LetsGoBooze]

Parayko will be protected 100% of the time, unless his back injury is career threatening.