NYR is a tough one because we need blue chip C prospects, established 2C with potential and established top 4D with potential. NYR have some great pieces but not really the types that would fit what we need.
To absolutely decimate our C depth you would need a massive overpay and players like Schneider and Kravtsov certainly don’t do that. It would be Laf/Kakko + with the plus being a pretty big piece that I don’t think NYR would do either
You'll probably run into that with most teams. If a team has a stud NHL-ready C prospect, then they don't need Larkin. If they are swapping that prospect for Larkin because of an anticipated Cup run, there's the whole issue of Larkin not really having any playoff experience. I'm still not entirely sure why Larkin would be available considering his age.
I don't really see much of Detroit except for when they play the Rangers, but I did have one question. Larkin's career stat line reads like a roller coaster, where you seemingly don't know what you're going to get from one season to the next. His rookie season was great. Sophomore season saw a 13 point drop and an
ugly +/-. Seasons 3 and 4 he bounced back and looked to be settling in as a legit 1c (esp season 4). But then seasons 5 and 6 were ugly with 20 and 30 point drops. Now this season, he's a ppg+. His shooting % is all over the place from year to year as well with his lowest (6.7%) and highest (16.1%) coming in the last two seasons.
What's his deal? Is he more of a passenger type who needs talent to put up production? Has he played through injuries in certain years? Is he just wildly inconsistent? Like I said, I rarely see the player, so I'm not judging or making any assertions on his value or anything. I've just never seen such regular fluctuation in a player's stat line.
