- Jul 4, 2014
- 7,871
- 8,214
1. Sign Alex Pietrangelo – This should obviously be the top priority. He’s the straw that stirs the drink, and the consensus seems to be that the team will cease to be a serious contender without him on the blueline, so get him tied up (hopefully something like $68M over 8 years - $8.5M AAV) and be done with it. In the current cap climate, I don’t think he can expect to get over $70M (or $10M a year) from anyone who is remotely a contender even with him on the roster, so let’s sign the only captain to ever lift the Cup wearing the Blue Note to a deal that makes him a Blue for life.
2. Trade (gulp) Colton Parayko – I know I won’t find many who agree with me, but hear me out. I’m not convinced he is going to want to stay beyond the term of his current deal, and his value on the open market will be lower next offseason with only one year left on his deal. He will fetch a haul as he is (rightly) coveted around the league for his size and his reach, but he doesn’t seem to be able to find more offense in his game and I fear that his next contract is going to be a significant overpayment. I don’t want that to be from us. I feel like it would be a mistake to bring back Petro and have the same log jam of him, Parayko and Faulk on the right side, and I would have preferred that this step be “Trade Faulk”, but I just don’t see us getting much for him, certainly not the haul that Parayko will demand, but Faulk’s $6.5M a year should wear pretty well if he’s allowed to do the things he does well. It's a gamble to believe that Faulk's play will stabilize in a set role as the #2RD, but putting him with a stay-at-home partner and giving him some rope to be more of a "rover" could be what he needs to do just that.
3. Trade Vince Dunn – I think we all had high hopes that Dunn was going to turn into the next Duncan Keith, but I think we can all agree that this particular path isn’t happening for him. The truth is that he regressed last season long before the pause, and yet he is still coveted as a prospect around the league. Ultimately, we have two very different prospects in Perunovich and Mikkola banging on the door behind him, and I would rather get something nice for him now and give one of those two players an opportunity than to be in the same position next offseason having dealt with more disappointment from Dunn and trying to send him packing for scraps. While this is mostly about the disappointment of where Dunn is in his development, it can also be about what Perunovich can bring to the lineup on the scale of "He's what we already have in Dunn, just cheaper" to "Wow, Perunovich is the next Hughes/Makar". I think his play will fall somewhere to the middle of that scale, but I'd love to be pleasantly surprised.
4. Trade Jake Allen – We had a good story going for a couple of games there didn’t we? But Jake had to come back to Earth and remind us why he never became the goalie of the future or the present. I think there are a handful of teams that will see him as a reliable 1B or backup option, but I don’t think we can afford to keep this experiment going any longer. Allen is actually 4A under my scenario, with 4B/4C being to sign a top notch UFA goalie like Lehner, Markstrom or Holtby and trade Binnington, too. I just think that is an awful lot to expect from one (shortened) off season when the cap is flat, so let's "ride or die" with Binny for one more year and figure this out next offseason.
5. Find a Scorer (or two) – If Tarasenko is done, or at a minimum done for the next regular season, it would sure be nice to make this plural. Even if he is expected back in time for the start of next season (which I seriously doubt at this point) it is clear that we lack a consistent finisher to compliment him, Perron, Schenn and Schwartz. With more cap space (potentially from the retirement or LTIR of Steen) someone like Hall would be a good get, but even if we’re on more of a budget I would like to see Army step up and grab someone like a Hoffman. We know either of these guys are going to have some warts defensively, but hopefully Army can get Berube to see the big picture that sometimes (especially since goaltending is back to being a question mark) you need to be able to score your way out of trouble. Either guy would also contribute to an overall increase in team speed, something that I think is sorely needed, as well as a more reliable power play given that both REALLY like to shoot the puck. None of this covers the possibility that we can add a dynamic young scorer in a trade of Parayko, as I see that as more likely to be a hockey trade than a futures trade given the flat cap.
Recapping with more detailed steps:
1. Sign Petro to 8 x $68M ($8.5M AAV, full NTC, NMC)
2. + 4. Trade Parayko and Allen to DET for the RFA rights to Anthony Mantha, the UFA rights to Jimmy Howard (vet to challenge Husso) and the EDM 2020 2nd (sign Mantha to 6 x $39M - $6.5M AAV)
3. Trade Vince Dunn and CAR 2020 5th to NJD for ARZ 2020 1st and Nick Merkley (depth support for AHL squad)
4. (see 2.)
5. Sign Mike Hoffman 4 x $25M ($6.25M AAV, partial NTC)
In this scenario, going into the 2020 draft we would have the 18th, 26th/27th and 51st OA picks, though I would love to take the 18th and 26th in that scenario and move up to 12th (FLA) to grab someone like Lundell, Jarvis, Guhle or Quinn.
2. Trade (gulp) Colton Parayko – I know I won’t find many who agree with me, but hear me out. I’m not convinced he is going to want to stay beyond the term of his current deal, and his value on the open market will be lower next offseason with only one year left on his deal. He will fetch a haul as he is (rightly) coveted around the league for his size and his reach, but he doesn’t seem to be able to find more offense in his game and I fear that his next contract is going to be a significant overpayment. I don’t want that to be from us. I feel like it would be a mistake to bring back Petro and have the same log jam of him, Parayko and Faulk on the right side, and I would have preferred that this step be “Trade Faulk”, but I just don’t see us getting much for him, certainly not the haul that Parayko will demand, but Faulk’s $6.5M a year should wear pretty well if he’s allowed to do the things he does well. It's a gamble to believe that Faulk's play will stabilize in a set role as the #2RD, but putting him with a stay-at-home partner and giving him some rope to be more of a "rover" could be what he needs to do just that.
3. Trade Vince Dunn – I think we all had high hopes that Dunn was going to turn into the next Duncan Keith, but I think we can all agree that this particular path isn’t happening for him. The truth is that he regressed last season long before the pause, and yet he is still coveted as a prospect around the league. Ultimately, we have two very different prospects in Perunovich and Mikkola banging on the door behind him, and I would rather get something nice for him now and give one of those two players an opportunity than to be in the same position next offseason having dealt with more disappointment from Dunn and trying to send him packing for scraps. While this is mostly about the disappointment of where Dunn is in his development, it can also be about what Perunovich can bring to the lineup on the scale of "He's what we already have in Dunn, just cheaper" to "Wow, Perunovich is the next Hughes/Makar". I think his play will fall somewhere to the middle of that scale, but I'd love to be pleasantly surprised.
4. Trade Jake Allen – We had a good story going for a couple of games there didn’t we? But Jake had to come back to Earth and remind us why he never became the goalie of the future or the present. I think there are a handful of teams that will see him as a reliable 1B or backup option, but I don’t think we can afford to keep this experiment going any longer. Allen is actually 4A under my scenario, with 4B/4C being to sign a top notch UFA goalie like Lehner, Markstrom or Holtby and trade Binnington, too. I just think that is an awful lot to expect from one (shortened) off season when the cap is flat, so let's "ride or die" with Binny for one more year and figure this out next offseason.
5. Find a Scorer (or two) – If Tarasenko is done, or at a minimum done for the next regular season, it would sure be nice to make this plural. Even if he is expected back in time for the start of next season (which I seriously doubt at this point) it is clear that we lack a consistent finisher to compliment him, Perron, Schenn and Schwartz. With more cap space (potentially from the retirement or LTIR of Steen) someone like Hall would be a good get, but even if we’re on more of a budget I would like to see Army step up and grab someone like a Hoffman. We know either of these guys are going to have some warts defensively, but hopefully Army can get Berube to see the big picture that sometimes (especially since goaltending is back to being a question mark) you need to be able to score your way out of trouble. Either guy would also contribute to an overall increase in team speed, something that I think is sorely needed, as well as a more reliable power play given that both REALLY like to shoot the puck. None of this covers the possibility that we can add a dynamic young scorer in a trade of Parayko, as I see that as more likely to be a hockey trade than a futures trade given the flat cap.
Recapping with more detailed steps:
1. Sign Petro to 8 x $68M ($8.5M AAV, full NTC, NMC)
2. + 4. Trade Parayko and Allen to DET for the RFA rights to Anthony Mantha, the UFA rights to Jimmy Howard (vet to challenge Husso) and the EDM 2020 2nd (sign Mantha to 6 x $39M - $6.5M AAV)
3. Trade Vince Dunn and CAR 2020 5th to NJD for ARZ 2020 1st and Nick Merkley (depth support for AHL squad)
4. (see 2.)
5. Sign Mike Hoffman 4 x $25M ($6.25M AAV, partial NTC)
In this scenario, going into the 2020 draft we would have the 18th, 26th/27th and 51st OA picks, though I would love to take the 18th and 26th in that scenario and move up to 12th (FLA) to grab someone like Lundell, Jarvis, Guhle or Quinn.