In a follow-up story about New York Islanders and John Tavares upcoming free agency, The Athletic’s Arthur Staple (subscription required) writes that the Islanders’ Lou Lamoriello left the draft to fly to Los Angeles to be nearby while Tavares meets with the teams that he and his representatives have invited to speak with him. Lamoriello will meet with Tavares last in hopes of keeping the superstar in the fold.
As reported earlier, it is believed that he will meet with the Toronto Maple Leafs, San Jose Sharks, and Dallas Stars and possibly the Tampa Bay Lightning, Vegas Golden Knights and the Montreal Canadiens, although that isn’t too clear so far. However, Staples writes that an earlier rumor today that the Islanders made an eight-year, $88MM deal may not be accurate. He believes in the end, whether offered by the Islanders or another team, that Tavares will be making $12MM per year, which Lamoriello has said that ownership has said that money is no object.
- Sportsnet’s Chris Johnston reported that the Carolina Hurricanes intend to keep defenseman Dougie Hamilton, who the team acquired in the five-player trade earlier today. The scribe said the team had no intention of flipping the blueliner for more assets. Hamilton should provide the team with a No. 1 defenseman to go with their core of young blueliners. The six-year veteran is only just 25 years old and put up 17 goals and 44 points last season.
- Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic (subscription required) writes that the Carolina Hurricanes were supposedly close on sending winger Victor Rask to the Montreal Canadiens, but the asking price of two second-round picks in this draft (including the No. 35 pick) was too much for the Canadiens. The 25-year-old winger still has four years at $4MM AAV and seems to have regressed somewhat since a 21 goal season back in 2015-16.
- The New York Rangers had three first-round picks in this latest draft with much speculation wondering if general manager Jeff Gorton would use those picks as assets to either acquire a pro-ready player or even to move up in the draft. Instead, the Rangers used all three picks (albeit, they traded up late in the first-round). NHL.com’s Dan Rosen reports that Gorton said he was never close to making a deal this weekend. Gorton said he was ready to change his draft strategy if he got a trade offer he liked, but never got one. “I would say there was probably less conversations than I anticipated,” Gorton said.
So your saying there’s a chance the leafs sign JT to form the best 1-2 centre combo comparable to the Malkin Crosby duo
Yep! And then all they need to do is trade Nylander for a top 5 D-man (Carolina comes to mind) and bring some of that young Marlies talent up and the Leafs will be a top 4 contender for the cup next year!
I feel like that if they do do that, their window will be extremely small. They just simply won’t have the money to get good D men and keep Matthews/Marner/Nylander long term.
Maybe you didn’t read the trade nylander part. and defiantly get a 3/4 guy for Nylander or package around him, not worth trading him for a number 5 dman
I just mean if they get JT. The funds will dry up fairly quickly after that.
Kuzy and backstrom better
Most under rated maybe as well.
The Kopitar/Jeff Carter duo is also under rated. Maybe not at the level of Crosby/Malkin but they’re up there as top center duos.
The Leaf fans are the NHL version of Yankees fans: every star player is going to sign in New York or Toronto or both.
Funny how fast Doughty went out of their long term picture
Maybe it’s cause the leafs are one of the oldest and richest franchises in North American sports along with the Yankees.
There’s a salary cap so it doesn’t matter. But he’s implying the fan base is super annoying and act like they’re gonna get every player. He is right.
No objections here. Most leafs fans are pretty awful that way.
Guess you haven’t been paying much attention to the Yankees
Just because Brian Cashman has been smart enough not to spend doesn’t mean the fans aren’t expecting every star player under the moon. I’m from New York and all I hear from fans is that “The Yankees are going to sign ‘Player X’ and turn their team into a dynasty”.
From what I’ve read, Montreal is not getting a meeting with Tavares. I heard Boston might get a meeting, although I doubt they have the money to sign him. Tavares is supposedly sitting on an 8-year, $88 million contract from the Islanders. No other team can offer him 8 years. So, that means the other teams will have to up the money. That eliminates some teams. San Jose has the cap space to sign Tavares now, but they have to sign Couture, Pavelski & Donskoi to extensions after the upcoming season. The same goes for the Leafs. They have Mathews, Marner, Leivo & Gardiner all coming up for extensions following the 2018-19 season. The Leafs need to upgrade their defense big time & Nylander isn’t going to bring them the high end defensemen they think he will. In truth, the Leafs need 2, top 4 d-men. It will be hard to add that cap-wise if they have close to $30 million invested in Tavares, Mathews & Marner
Boston could move Backes/Krejci/ McQuaid and literally any other roster player making more than 1 million and they’d probably have enough. Backes would be 6, Krejci would be 7, McQuaid + would be at least 4.
Easier said than done. Who is going to want to take on the full cap hits for those guys and still give up something? Backes is a bottom six center/winger, Krejci looks like a fringe second line center after this past season, and McQuaid is a 3rd pair dman. Especially at their cap hits? Nearly all three are unmoveable unless Boston ate some of their contracts/sent a pick or prospect in addition.
Which they would definitely do. If they agreed to terms with Tavares, they’d make it happen.
The Canes want 2 seconds for Rask? No way they get that! They shouldn’t even get a bag of pucks for that guy!
Well, he’s coming off a down year, but they happen. Based on his prior two years and his reasonable contract, I don’t think 2 2nds is much of a stretch.
I’d venture to say he remains with the Islanders. Lamoriello has the track record and the money is there. It’s home – where he’s familiar.