Could definetly see them trading one of them as their top two picks the last two years have been defencemen. Should keep Boqvist as he can be their 1RD for a long time. The problem for Hawks is they have way to much tied in defencemen not living up to their contract. Cant believe they gave Seabrook a contract thet long. I can see them wanting to reward him for the cups, but should have given him a shorter reward contract and then he could get his value.
Keith contract is still worth it as it gave Hawks 3 cups and hes still probably worth around his salary cap. He gets close to 0,5 ppg playing 23 minutes a night and not getting a lot of pp time. Seabrook is also a quite good defenceman, but hes not close to 7 million and the contract is so long its gonna be worse. Then you also have Murphy who have not been a huge success. All tied up for a quite long time. Leaving little room for the young guys to get in to the lineup.
Still a lot of positives for the Hawks and the rubuild might not be as long as some tought. DeBrincat is amazing. Strome have been ppg after the trade and both of these guys are young and can improve. If Kane keeps his level for some years and Strome and DeBrincat develops more they have a scary offense when adding Toews, Anisimov, Saad and I also really like Kahun. Then if Boqvist and the rest of the young D is ready to step up to the NHL soon the defense where the problem is now will be strong.
Stan would be a moran to trade his blue chip defenseman .
This team is barely a 500 level team.
They lack a solid defensive group, their top 6 is missing at least 2 players. They need a solid bottom 6 who can contribute both offensively , but shut down other teams top units.
Keith's contract is what it is , it was signed 7 years ago.
Seabrook contract their is no reasonable person who would have made that offer for the terms and added a NMC to a guy who was in his 30s .
Murphy lacks size and the willingness to block shots
Dalhstom is a solid bottom depth guy
Forsling useless
Koekkoek lacks size
Gustafson great offensively but his defensive mishaps are glaring.
Stans only choice is to somehow force the issue with Seabrook and Keith to get moved.