Is the era of Chad LaRose upon us?

[bluedevil58*]

With our most physical power forward out I am thinking we give up a draft pick and a prospect for a power forward. The question is who is that power forward? We need someone who plays a physical game and can also put up some points. Otherwise, it's missing the playoffs by Christmas.

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[tarheelhockey]

This is going to be awfully hard to pull off at this time of year. Nobody's had time to sour yet.

 

[Ole Gil]

Simon Gagne?

 

[bluedevil58*]

Simon Gagne?

I don't think he is physical enough for our needs.

 

[Francis10]

Ryan Jones?

 

[Anton Babchuk]

Jordan Staal is more physical than Ruutu. You are living in an alternate reality where Ruutu's constant injuries haven't slowed his skating to a crawl to a point where he isn't able to hit effectively. And the team wasn't exactly doing poorly when Ruutu was out last year.

 

[Novacane]

I'll add my own question to this thread. Given Ruutu's injury history and current cap hit, do you think JR has it in himself/PK's pocket book to use an amnesty buyout on him next offseason? It's getting pretty absurd at this point.

 

[Oenatzu]

Simon Gagne?

Getting Gagne to replace an injured player is like trying to fight fire with gasoline.

 

[bluedevil58*]

An impact now player was what was needed during the draft. We should have gone with Nich.

 

[golfpro827]

With our most physical power forward out I am thinking we give up a draft pick and a prospect for a power forward. The question is who is that power forward? We need someone who plays a physical game and can also put up some points. Otherwise, it's missing the playoffs by Christmas.

Is it worth sacrificing the future, before the season even starts, to somewhat improve the team?

If you are in the hunt and close, then you make that move.

I'd rather be wrong later when you are close then wrong before you even start.

 

[tarheelhockey]

I'll add my own question to this thread. Given Ruutu's injury history and current cap hit, do you think JR has it in himself/PK's pocket book to use an amnesty buyout on him next offseason? It's getting pretty absurd at this point.

If he's going to use one, this would seem to be the smartest person to use it on. Two more years of this is just hard to swallow. One potential problem is that you can't buy out an injured player, so we have to pretty much bubble-wrap Ruutu if the intention is to buy him out next summer.

 

[TheBigKahuna]

One word: Erik Cole

Ruutu is a waste of a roster spot and $5m in salary right now.




Not at all serious about Cole.

 

[Anton Dubinchuk]

Staubitz.

 

[A Star is Burns]

We will have chances to replace him through waivers or desperation trades that are coming by Sunday due to cap crunches. We just need to be patient. If Ruutu's injury is truly going to be long term enough, he may end up on LTIR too and give us even more flexibility.

 

[TheOllieC]

An impact now player was what was needed during the draft. We should have gone with Nich.

No. Just no.

 

[Zombie Mike Murphy]

One potential problem is that you can't buy out an injured player, so we have to pretty much bubble-wrap Ruutu if the intention is to buy him out next summer.

If he's on LTIR why would we *want* to buy him out? It's be just like the Pitkanen situation... he get's his money regardless, and the cap hit goes away, plus insurance will at least partially be picking up his $$. That's better than a buyout on every front.

 

[Joe McGrath]

If he's on LTIR why would we *want* to buy him out? It's be just like the Pitkanen situation... he get's his money regardless, and the cap hit goes away, plus insurance will at least partially be picking up his $$. That's better than a buyout on every front.

Because he might not be injured to the level where he can't play for the next 3 years? Sounds like he had a setback, no ones even hinted that his career is in danger.

 

[tarheelhockey]

If he's on LTIR why would we *want* to buy him out? It's be just like the Pitkanen situation... he get's his money regardless, and the cap hit goes away, plus insurance will at least partially be picking up his $$. That's better than a buyout on every front.

The thing is, a player doesn't have to be on LTIR to be protected from buyout. Say Ruutu is out for 6 months, that's 6 months where we can't do it. And if those 6 months happen to overlap the buyout window...

 

[QuitStaaling]

With our most physical power forward out I am thinking we give up a draft pick and a prospect for a power forward. The question is who is that power forward? We need someone who plays a physical game and can also put up some points. Otherwise, it's missing the playoffs by Christmas.

add future considerations to that.

Future Considerations = Ruutu

Ruutu has to go. We can't depend on him for anything.

 

[Unsustainable]

Vinny Prospal

 

[bleedgreen]

Funny, a player that would look pretty good sliding into to that third line now?

Jussi jokinen. The options he would have around him now instead of bowman and larose. I'd prefer him on that rw, with skinner or lindholm or gerbe/Dvorak or even ruutu maybe. Shame. He's gone because of the spiral that started when he was asked to play a position that isn't his natural one, in the third line, with chumps. By the time they moved him around his confidence was in tatters. He looks like his old self now, of course he's playing with the best in the world but he is still the one making the same plays he's always made. I wish him well.

 

[What the Faulk]

But would Jokinen's contract have prevented them from signing Hainsey or Gerbe? And who would you rather have?

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

I never heard the exact number, but aren't we paying anywhere from $1M-$1.5M of Jussi's $3M salary this year?

 

[Novacane]

I never heard the exact number, but aren't we paying anywhere from $1M-$1.5M of Jussi's $3M salary this year?

Capgeek claims $.9M

 

[A Star is Burns]

I think Jussi had run his course here. It wasn't just that he was bad for us last year in a bad position. I'm a big Jussi fan, and his last full season here he wasn't getting it done either in my opinion. And I do believe that his $3 mil would have hampered some of our flexibility to add some pieces over the offseason. At the very least we'd probably have had to suffer through Peters as the backup at that point, and have missed out on a couple of the other small signings. It was just time to move on.