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Archives for August 2018

Poll: Who Are The Best Centers In The NHL?

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The NHL Network lit up the hockey world recently when they revealed their list of the Top 20 Centers in the league, ranking Connor McDavid as the best in the league ahead of Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. The number four slot was occupied by Auston Matthews, which ruffled some feathers, while the reigning Stanley Cup champions Evgeny Kuznetsov and Nicklas Backstrom were down at 13 and 14 respectively.

The Penguins (Croby, Malkin), Maple Leafs (Matthews, John Tavares), Capitals (Kuznetsov, Backstrom) and Oilers (McDavid, Draisaitl) all had two names on the list, while other potential options like Eric Staal, Vincent Trocheck, Jonathan Toews, Brayden Schenn, Brayden Point, Ryan O’Reilly, Sean Monahan and Dylan Larkin were all absent.

Since the NHL Network’s fan vote was so different—Jay Beagle ranked 20th on the list—we thought we’d do our own tally here at PHR. In the poll below we’ve listed many options and are asking you to vote for your top group by selecting 10 names. Does Matthews stay in the top five? Can defensive wizards like Anze Kopitar and Patrice Bergeron climb up the rankings? Does the PHR community believe in William Karlsson? Cast your vote for the top 10 centers in the league and make sure to leave a comment explaining your choices.

[Mobile users click here to vote]

*Though Claude Giroux has played center for much of his career, his absence from the NHL Network list means he was likely left off the ballot. We’ve similarly left him out of the poll, along with other part-time centers like Joe Pavelski, Blake Wheeler and Logan Couture. If you feel as though any of them should be included in this group, make sure to leave a comment down below.

Minnesota Wild Will Be Patient With Potential Eric Staal Extension

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It’s hard to rank the absolute best contract in the league given the varied contributions that hockey players provide, but near the top of any list would have to be Eric Staal. The former Carolina Hurricanes captain found himself struggling to record much offense during the 2015-16 season and was eventually traded to the New York Rangers. The move did nothing to help Staal’s play and when he became an unrestricted free agent in the summer there wasn’t a big money, long-term deal waiting. A 31-year old center who had registered 781 points in 929 games, won a Stanley Cup and was a two-time 40-goal scorer was forced to take a three-year, $10.5MM deal from the Minnesota Wild in order to refresh his career, and it was the best thing that could have ever happened to him.

Staal took off almost immediately in Minnesota, scoring 13 points in his first 14 games while being given more and more ice time. Head coach Bruce Boudreau realized what he had, and Staal would end up registering 65 points for the Wild in the 2016-17 season. Already the contract was a bargain, but there was even more to come. Staal scored 42 goals this season, trailing only Alex Ovechkin, Patrik Laine and William Karlsson for the league lead. His 76 points were the most he’d had in a single season since 2010-11, and with just a $3.5MM cap hit he likely will go down as the best contract given out during the 2016 offseason—a summer that was marked with terrible deals like the ones given to Milan Lucic, Loui Eriksson and Troy Brouwer.

Now, the Wild have to start considering whether to extend Staal into the future. He’ll turn 34 just a few weeks into the 2018-19 season, and could at any point take a sharp downward turn in production. He’s had struggles before, and age is bound to catch up with him one day. In Michael Russo of The Athletic’s recent mailbag (subscription required), he writes that new Minnesota GM Paul Fenton will wait until the year begins to start any extension talks, wanting to see his production first hand. Russo also suggests that Staal could be a trade deadline piece if the Wild take a step backwards this year.

If they do falter and Staal is available, there are plenty of teams who would be willing to pay up to bring him aboard this time around. As long as he’s not mired in a huge slump, or obviously feeling the effects of age, he could likely bring back a substantial package for the Wild. In 2016 when the Rangers acquired him, it cost them two second-round picks and prospect Aleksi Saarela. That was during Staal’s worst offensive season of his career, and during a stretch where he had scored just one goal and five points in his last 19 games.

Russo also broaches the subject of a possible extension though, suggesting—though qualifying it as a “total shot in the dark”—that it could come in around $5MM per season. That would make sense for a player of his age, though it would obviously depend on how many seasons the Wild are willing to commit for. If Staal is still producing at a high level, perhaps he would be more comparable to the three-year $18.75MM contracts that both Patrick Marleau and Ilya Kovalchuk recently signed. Staal even plays a more premium position at center, and has easily out-produced Marleau for each of the last two seasons.

Regardless, the Wild will have to wait and see where their team is after an offseason that hasn’t brought a lot of change. The team hopes young players like Joel Eriksson Ek and Jordan Greenway can make a big difference, but they’ll have to experience improved health from some of their other key players and another solid season in net from Devan Dubnyk. If there isn’t an improvement on the ice, perhaps we’ll be talking about Staal as a trade candidate in January, instead of someone who is there to help turn things around in Minnesota.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

Morning Notes: Gretzky, Tarasenko, Hall

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Wayne Gretzky has been named global ambassador for Kunlun Red Star of the KHL, lending his name to the development of hockey in China. The team will open a Gretzky-named hockey school for children aimed to give the next wave of Chinese hockey players added coaching and opportunity. As the NHL continues to grow its brand around the world, the “Great One” will be a big part of that movement.

This comes before the 2022 Winter Olympics are held in Beijing, a tournament that may or may not have NHL involvement. The league held its players out of the most recent Olympics, but could return to the format if a financial agreement can be worked out. Attending the Olympics is likely going to be a topic in the next CBA negotiations, which could come soon as both the NHL and NHLPA have opt-out clauses next year that could bring a work stoppage in 2020.

  • Vladimir Tarasenko was back in action yesterday, giving hope to the idea that he’ll be ready for the start of the 2018-19 season. Tarasenko injured his shoulder at the end of last season and needed reconstructive surgery, but has been cleared to skate and can even take some contact. The 26-year old sniper will be re-evaluated in September, at which point the St. Louis Blues will know if they’ll have him for opening night. The Blues have brought in several offensive players this offseason, but will still rely on Tarasenko to drive their attack.
  • Chris Ryan of NJ Advance Media spoke to New Jersey Devils owner Josh Harris about upcoming extension negotiations with Taylor Hall, who explained that it was the team’s highest priority. Hall has two years remaining on his current contract meaning an extension can be signed on July 1, 2019 at which point he could become one of the highest-paid forwards in the league. The 26-year old Hall carries just a $6MM cap hit at the moment, is coming off a Hart Trophy-winning season, and has a good shot at leading the Devils back to the playoffs again in 2018-19. The fact that an owner is willing to comment on the situation should give hope to Devils fans that the team will do everything in their power to keep Hall around for many years.

Salary Cap Deep Dive: Philadelphia Flyers

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Navigating the Salary Cap is probably one of the more important tasks for any general manager to have. Teams that can avert total cap chaos by walking the tightrope of inking players to deals that match their value (or compensate for future value without breaking the bank) remain successful. Those that don’t see struggles and front office changes.

PHR will look at every NHL team and give a thorough look at their cap situation heading into the 2018-19 season. This will focus more on those players who are integral parts of the roster versus those who may find themselves shuttling between the AHL and NHL. All cap figures are courtesy of CapFriendly.

Philadelphia Flyers

Current Cap Hit: $69,217,500 (under the $79.5MM Upper Limit)

Entry-Level Contracts

F Travis Konecny (one year remaining, $894K)
F Nolan Patrick (two years remaining, $925K)
D Ivan Provorov (one year remaining, $894K)
D Travis Sanheim (one year remaining, $863K)

Potential Bonuses

Konecny: $425K
Patrick: $2.65MM
Provorov: $850K
Sanheim: $450K

Total: $4.375MM

Few teams are getting the bang for their buck that the Flyers are.  Provorov has established himself as a legitimate top pairing player already and will be in line for a big money, long-term deal next summer instead of a bridge contract.  Sanheim played himself into a regular role for a big chunk of 2017-18 and the team is hoping he’ll turn that into a full-time nod next season.  Even if he does that, a shorter-term second contract is likely in the cards for him.

Up front, Konecny more than doubled his goal production from his rookie campaign, going from 11 to 24 last season.  If he can repeat that type of output, he should be in line to bypass the bridge deal as well.  Patrick’s rookie campaign was fairly quiet but the team was in a situation where they didn’t have to give him big minutes right away.  While he’ll be asked to take a bigger workload next season, he shouldn’t project to hit his $1.8MM of Schedule ‘A’ bonuses which will give the Flyers a little more wiggle room on the cap for 2018-19.

One Year Remaining, Non-Entry-Level

G Brian Elliott ($2.75MM, UFA)
F Christian Folin ($800K, UFA)
F Scott Laughton ($963K, RFA)
F Jori Lehtera ($4.7MM, UFA)
F Taylor Leier ($720K, RFA)
G Michal Neuvirth ($2.5MM, UFA)
F Michael Raffl ($2.35MM, UFA)
F Wayne Simmonds ($3.975MM, UFA)
F Jordan Weal ($1.75MM, UFA)

Simmonds is the most prominent player here by a considerable margin.  He has provided the Flyers with significant value on his deal over the past several years and is renowned as one of the better pure power forwards around the league.  There’s no doubt that the Flyers will want to keep him around but the question is should they?   He’ll be 31 when the puck drops in 2019-20 when his new deal will kick in and physical wingers tend to have more dramatic declines as they age.  On the flip side, he brings an element to the table that Philadelphia’s forward group is largely lacking otherwise.  It wouldn’t be shocking to see GM Ron Hextall try to work out a shorter-term extension if that’s something that Simmonds is open to.

Philadelphia’s goaltending was a concern heading into last summer which is why they brought in Elliott to try to help things.  Last season, the goaltending was still a concern and both netminders had issues staying healthy.  The good news is that with both being on expiring deals, there’s no long-term risk here and if a team has someone go down midseason, the Flyers could conceivably look to move one and give one of their youngsters some more NHL action.  Looking beyond 2018-19, there’s a good chance that they will look to bring in a more prominent starter on a short-term deal to bridge the gap until top prospect Carter Hart is ready to step in.

As for the rest of the group, the other UFA forwards appear to be candidates to leave next summer.  Lehtera was a buyout candidate this summer but since the team has plenty of cap space, it makes sense for them to keep him so there’s no carryover to 2019-20.  Raffl has seen his output dip in recent years while Weal didn’t thrive in his first full-time NHL opportunity.  He’ll battle with Laughton for playing time and the winner between the two should be part of the plans beyond next year.  Leier projects to be a depth winger while Folin gives the team some extra depth on the right side of the back end.

Two Years Remaining

D Radko Gudas ($3.35MM, UFA)
D Robert Hagg ($1.15MM, RFA)
D Andrew MacDonald ($5MM, UFA)
F Dale Weise ($2.35MM, UFA)

This group features some of the Flyers’ bloated contracts.  Weise has underwhelmed significantly since joined the team two summers ago and has struggled to hold down a fourth line spot in the lineup.  MacDonald is a decent defender but is well overpaid for the role that he is best suited to play.  Gudas certainly provides a physical element but isn’t going to bring much offensively to the table.  The same can be said for Hagg but he’s on a good bridge deal for someone who is pegged to be a third pairing player next season.

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Snapshots: Pacioretty, Norell, Genoni

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The lower-than-anticipated return that the Hurricanes received for winger Jeff Skinner isn’t going to help the Canadiens in their efforts to move winger Max Pacioretty, suggests Jared Clinton of The Hockey News.  The two have been statistically similar over the past three years so while Pacioretty has the stronger long-term track record, it’s going to be challenging for them to justify commanding a significantly better return even though unlike Skinner, he doesn’t have any no-trade protection.

With that in mind, it’s fair to wonder if they would be better served holding onto their captain to start the season despite their reported desire to move him as soon as possible.  While that would create a media frenzy, it would give Pacioretty a chance to rebuild his value as he enters a contract year while giving the Canadiens time to see if something happens elsewhere that gives them the opportunity to potentially leverage a better return.

Elsewhere around the hockey world:

  • Djurgarden of the SHL is interested in bringing back Blackhawks prospect Robin Norell, reports Johan Svensson of Expressen (link in Swedish). The 23-year-old has one year left on his entry-level deal and Chicago would need to sign off on loaning him back home.  Norell is certainly familiar with Djurgarden having been a part of their system for parts of seven seasons before coming to North America.  He has been a regular on the back end with their AHL affiliate in Rockford the last two years but has yet to make it to the NHL level and isn’t expected to contend for a spot in training camp.
  • Swiss goaltender Leonardo Genoni has long been viewed as one of the top goaltenders outside the NHL. While he still has one year left on his current contract with SC Bern of the Swiss NLA, he has now committed to EV Zug of the same league for 2019-20 and beyond.  Per a team release (link in German), the 31-year-old has agreed to a five-year deal that will keep him in Switzerland through 2024 and with it, any chance of him crossing the pond one day to try the NHL has now been put to rest.

Free Agent Profile: Mike Cammalleri

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While he isn’t close to the point-per-game mark like he was with the Kings a decade ago, winger Mike Cammalleri has still been a decent secondary scorer in recent years.  Despite that, he remains unsigned more than a month into the free agent period.

The 36-year-old signed with Los Angeles last summer after being bought out of the final two years of his deal with New Jersey.  While he was fairly productive in limited playing time (seven points in 15 games), the Kings quickly moved him to Edmonton in exchange for Jussi Jokinen in a swap of veteran wingers.  (Jokinen went on to be waived, claimed by Columbus, and then dealt to Vancouver at the trade deadline.)

Edmonton, meanwhile, got the better end of the swap.  Although he didn’t light the lamp too often, Cammalleri was able to hold down a third line role and chip in on the playmaking side, notching 18 assists in 51 games.  Between the two teams, he totalled 29 points in 66 contests which wound up being decent value for a $1MM base salary.

On the downside, this was the fourth straight season that his output dipped going back to 2013-14 when he collected 45 points.  That may scare off some potential suitors as Cammalleri is slowing down and doesn’t bring a whole lot defensively to the table.  Despite that, there could still be a market for the second highest point getter remaining in free agency.

Potential Suitors

There are two situations where a team could have interest in Cammalleri.  The first is a team that’s right up against the salary cap that’s looking to add some depth or competition for a spot at the end of the roster.  The other is a younger team that wants some insurance in case their younger talent isn’t quite ready or to serve as a short-term bridge to allow a prospect some more development time in the minors.

In the first group, Minnesota makes some sense.  They’ve added some grit to their fourth line over the summer but those players aren’t good fits to move up the lineup when injury strikes.  Cammalleri would be a better fit to do so.  If Washington wants to add a bit more offense to their depth forwards, he would be a fit there as well.  In the second group, the Senators and Rangers could stand to add a veteran buffer to hedge against some of their prospects not being quite ready for the NHL spotlight.

Projected Contract

With there being a limited group of potential suitors, Cammalleri doesn’t have much in the way of leverage.  At this point, he’s going to have to settle for a PTO deal or something close to the league minimum $650K in salary.  In the right situation though, the veteran could still provide a little bit of value for that contract.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Plenty Of Talent Remains Unsigned Among Restricted Free Agents

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Now that all of the arbitration hearings have concluded and any player filings resolved, 21 restricted free agents remain unsigned around the league. These players must have a contract by December 1st in order to play at all this season, otherwise they will have to sit out the whole season. On the list are several players who play a huge role on their respective teams, and are likely in negotiations on long-term contracts.

Dylan Larkin, perhaps the most talented offensive player on the Detroit Red Wings, expects to sign before training camp begins in a little over a month. There have been reports that he’s looking at a five or six year contract, which would take him right to unrestricted free agency. The talented forward scored 62 points last season and is a huge part of the future for the Red Wings, but the team is currently in salary cap trouble and likely needs to make a move of some sort before the start of the year to fit Larkin in.

William Nylander has also been clear in his desire for a long-term deal, but isn’t stressing about the negotiations. The Toronto Maple Leafs will face questions over the next few seasons of how to fit all of their talented forwards under the cap, and the first real step towards that salary structure is getting something done with Nylander. The 22-year old forward finished with 61 points for the second year in a row, but could take another step forward if the Maple Leafs second powerplay unit rebounds in 2018-19.

Among defensemen, Noah Hanifin, Shea Theodore and Josh Morrissey stand out as some of the most important names. Hanifin’s contract is finally on the front burner after a busy arbitration schedule for the Calgary Flames, and things are progressing in a “positive” direction. When the Flames bought out Troy Brouwer’s contract last week they gave themselves some flexibility for signing Hanifin to a long-term deal, but could always go the bridge route to make sure he fits into their organization properly. Theodore developed into a key piece for the Vegas Golden Knights this season after starting in the minor leagues due to a roster crunch, and should be rewarded accordingly on his new deal. The Golden Knights haven’t been shy about locking up some of their key players recently, and Theodore should likely be no different.

Morrissey is interesting, given the uncertainty around the Jets blue line in general. Jacob Trouba is once again on a short-term deal and could bolt for unrestricted free agency in 2020, while Tyler Myers is scheduled to become a UFA next summer. If the team has plans on retaining either of them they’ll have to be careful with how much money they commit to Morrissey, despite his obvious talent and fit for the club.

The full list of restricted free agents is below:

Ondrej Kase (ANA)
Nick Ritchie (ANA)
Marek Langhamer (ARZ)
Sam Reinhart (BUF)
Noah Hanifin (CGY)
Hunter Shinkaruk (CGY)
Dylan Larkin (DET)
Matt Puempel (DET)
Darnell Nurse (EDM)
Michael McCarron (MTL)
Kerby Rychel (MTL)
Kevin Rooney (NJD)
Steven Santini (NJD)
Miles Wood (NJD)
Jordan Schmaltz (STL)
William Nylander (TOR)
Shea Theodore (VGK)
Eric Comrie (WPG)
Nicolas Kerdiles (WPG)
J.C. Lipon (WPG)
Josh Morrissey (WPG)

New Jersey Devils Slowly Developing A Contender

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The NHL offseason usually revolves around the salary cap. Teams struggle to fit in as much talent as possible under a fixed ceiling, and are hindered in trade negotiations because of their limited cap space. The Edmonton Oilers for instance have done little this summer despite a desperate need to return to the playoffs, strangled by their expensive long-term contracts. Few teams in the league find themselves as unencumbered as the New Jersey Devils do currently, with less than $60MM in cap commitments for this season and only two players under contract for more than three years.

Even with the most cap space in the league the Devils haven’t done much to improve their team this summer, instead deciding to take an extremely slow approach to developing a contender. Amazingly, it could pay off sooner than later. New Jersey returned to the playoffs last season on the back of a Hart Trophy-winning year from Taylor Hall and solid debuts from several of their young players. Will Butcher jumped from winning the Hobey Baker award as the best college player in the country to quarterbacking an NHL powerplay, and finished his rookie season with 44 points. That put him 20th in the league among defensemen, ahead of star players like Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Aaron Ekblad and Zach Werenski. While there are other flaws in Butcher’s game, the Devils used him perfectly in a role that was best suited to take advantage of his talents.

Jesper Bratt started the year off on fire with 12 points in his first 13 games, and finished the year with a solid rookie total of 35 points. After turning 20 just a week ago, Bratt will be relied on as a key piece for years in New Jersey, despite his sixth-round draft pedigree. At the other end of the spectrum was Nico Hischier, who put up 52 points after being selected first overall and took over the team’s first-line center duty by the end of the year. The teenaged Hischier looks like he could be a Selke candidate in the future, along with having big offensive potential.

While Hall has just two years remaining on his modest six-year, $36MM contract the team seems in no rush to surround him with expensive free agent talent in order to take advantage of his bargain price. Instead, seeing as they’re already a playoff-caliber team, they will wait for their internal talent to blossom before eventually sitting down with Hall for a long-term extension. Hischier, Bratt, Pavel Zacha and others will mature on the roster while prospects like John Quenneville, Michael McLeod, Ty Smith and Jesper Boqvist will fight to secure jobs on it. Unlike Edmonton, who is fighting to improve the roster without any flexibility, New Jersey finds themselves in a position to wait for the right moment.

At the trade deadline last season, the Devils rewarded the solid play of their young team by adding Michael Grabner and Patrick Maroon for a playoff run. The team gave up relatively little in future assets—a pair of draft picks and two unsigned prospects—to try and make a bit more noise in the postseason. Though they wouldn’t find much success against the Tampa Bay Lightning, they would gain some good experience for the future. Even Hall, who will turn 27 this November, had never reached the postseason before last year. You can bet they will be interested in doing something similar should they find themselves in a playoff hunt again this year, given their ample cap space.

The other consideration is the expected free agent class of 2019, which should include several (if not many) star-level players. GM Ray Shero already admitted that he pursued James van Riemsdyk this summer before the price got too high, but perhaps that threshold would raise when dealing with someone like Tyler Seguin or Artemi Panarin. Both are still scheduled to become unrestricted free agents next summer, along with names like Erik Karlsson, Mark Stone, Matt Duchene, Jordan Eberle, Jeff Skinner, Blake Wheeler, Joe Pavelski, Max Pacioretty, and dozens more. While many of those players will be re-signed before New Jersey ever gets a chance at them, they might find themselves in a situation where they can outbid basically any other team in the league for whoever is left.

Edmonton Fans Still Waiting For Big Changes

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The Edmonton Oilers were one of the biggest disappointments of the 2017-18 season. Despite being led by one of the best players in the world in Connor McDavid, the team dropped 25 points in the standings and finished well out of the playoffs. Only three players on the team broke the 15-goal or 40-point thresholds, and goaltender Cam Talbot posted his worst season as a professional. Changes were obviously needed, and big things were expected from GM Peter Chiarelli, who had never been known for his hesitation in the past. Chiarelli has always been willing to trade players who he believed were problems, and acquire assets that could help his team.

In April, just after the Oilers season had come to a close, Jim Matheson of the Edmonton Journal wrote a piece outlining ten changes that could happen in order to get the team back to the playoffs in 2018-19. Among them was a common thread, that basically everyone on the roster outside of McDavid, Leon Draisaitl and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins should be considered available. Real additions also needed to be made up front, to help add some secondary scoring to the rest of the lineup. A puck-moving defenseman should be added, and something needs to be done about the left-handed imbalance of the blue line.

This summer though, almost none of those things have happened.

A change in the coaching staff was expected, and the team did bring in several new faces to help head coach Todd McLellan this season. Glen Gulutzan, Trent Yawney and Manny Viveiros were all hired as assistants, replacing several outgoing names. That should give the team a different look in terms of system, but those asked to perform will be the same. The defense corps remains relatively unchanged, other than the fact that Darnell Nurse is still without a contract and Kevin Gravel was brought in on a two-way contract. No additional puck-movers have been added, meaning as it stands the burden will once again fall on players like Nurse and Oscar Klefbom to really drive the team.

On the topic of secondary scoring, there has been little change. Tobias Rieder and Kyle Brodziak were the Oilers’ big free agent additions, giving the team two more middling offensive talents to plug into the lineup. While Rieder has shown potential at times, he still only recorded 12 goals and 25 points last season. Brodziak is actually coming off one of the better offensive campaigns of his career with 10 goals and 33 points, but shouldn’t be expected at age-34 to be an answer to the team’s problems.

Perhaps the biggest change came in net, where the team opted to avoid signing one of the more proven names in free agency and instead brought in Mikko Koskinen from the KHL. The 30-year old goaltender had an incredible season for SKA St. Petersburg in 2017-18, but hasn’t played in North America on a full-time basis since 2011. If Koskinen can push Talbot back to the level he had previously shown the Oilers will be much more competitive, but there’s no guarantee they’ll have any consistency in the position this year.

No instead of the big changes that were expected, the Oilers have generally sat on their hands this summer and hoped a change could come from within. Even their 10th-overall pick in the draft which they were open about potentially trading, was eventually used to pick Evan Bouchard. There’s clearly a boatload of talent in the London Knights blueliner, but if Bouchard isn’t able to jump right to the NHL this season he can’t help a team that needs to compete immediately. If it’s not Bouchard, then perhaps Jesse Puljujarvi is the key to the offseason in Edmonton. The fourth-overall pick from 2016 is now 20 years old, and needs to become an impact player this season. In 65 NHL games last year he registered 12 goals and 20 points, but those numbers need to improve drastically if the Oilers are to expect a winning season.

There is a chance that the team still makes a big splash to bring in some scoring help, but there financial situation is obviously limiting them. With just $4.98MM in cap space and Nurse still to sign, the team likely couldn’t go after someone like Jeff Skinner. In order to land the talented winger from Carolina, the Hurricanes would have had to accept another contract back in order to even out the salaries. That puts the Oilers in a distinct disadvantage in trade talks, and one that won’t be fixed anytime soon. None of the hefty Oilers contracts come off the books next season outside of Talbot and Koskinen, but there isn’t a brilliant young goaltender ready to step into that void on an inexpensive contract. Without moving a defenseman or Milan Lucic’s contract, the Oilers will remain in salary trouble as they try to add pieces in the future.

For an offseason that was expected to bring fireworks in Edmonton, and help surround McDavid with a team that could give him a legitimate chance for the Stanley Cup, things have been awfully quiet. Oilers fans will have to hope that change is coming from places they didn’t expect, and someone can step up to alter their fortunes. Otherwise it could be a long season, and another wasted opportunity with one of the game’s premiere talents.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

Poll: Did The Carolina Hurricanes Improve This Offseason?

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The Metropolitan Division is a meat grinder. In the five seasons since the NHL realigned into the current divisional structure, the Metro has produced 14 teams with 100 or more points, sent a team to the Stanley Cup Finals four times and won it on three occasions. The Pittsburgh Penguins, Washington Capitals, New York Rangers, New York Islanders, Philadelphia Flyers, Columbus Blue Jackets and New Jersey Devils have all been to the playoffs at least twice. Notoriously absent from that group is the eighth team in the division, the Carolina Hurricanes.

Not only have the Hurricanes failed to make the postseason in each of the five seasons they’ve been part of the Metro, but they haven’t even cracked 88 points during that period, instead topping out at 87 in 2016-17. Even before the realignment the Hurricanes hadn’t been finding any success, failing to reach the postseason since 2008-09. It’s been a long run of futility for the franchise, and this year looks like they’ll have another powerhouse division to take on with the Devils, Flyers and Blue Jackets all potentially taking steps forward while the Capitals and Penguins try to continue their dominance.

The other teams in the Hurricanes division aren’t going to get out of their way, meaning the only way to the top for Carolina is by improvement. With new ownership, management and coaching staff in place now is the time to try something different. That’s been shown in plenty of different examples this offseason, including most recently with the trade of scoring winger Jeff Skinner. Skinner was sent to Buffalo (and the Atlantic Division) for a package of picks and prospect Cliff Pu, in order to give the team a different look up front. That trade followed the draft blockbuster that sent Elias Lindholm and Noah Hanifin out west in exchange for Dougie Hamilton and Micheal Ferland (and the rights to Adam Fox), which certainly shook up the roster construction for new head coach Rod Brind’Amour.

In free agency, Carolina shocked many by signing another defenseman in Calvin de Haan, and brought in Petr Mrazek to compete with Scott Darling for starts in goal. The team also drafted Andrei Svechnikov with the second-overall pick, and could get full-time contributions from prospects like Martin Necas and Janne Kuokkanen.

The question though now remains: did Carolina actually improve this offseason?

Up front the team still doesn’t have the first-line center they’ve been searching for since trading Eric Staal, despite his younger brother Jordan Staal and 25-year old Victor Rask being fine players. With time Necas may become that, but certainly shouldn’t be expected to shoulder that role this season. Even with the added skill of Svechnikov up front, it’s hard to imagine he and Ferland replacing the contributions of Skinner, Lindholm and outgoing free agent Derek Ryan right away. The improvement on defense is real, as Hamilton is close to being an elite offensive defenseman in the NHL and is basically the ceiling of what the team had hoped Hanifin had become. But it’s tough to think that de Haan really pushes the needle given that his addition comes at the expense of Trevor van Riemsdyk and Hayden Fleury’s playing time.

In goal, adding Mrazek doesn’t at all address the situation that they found themselves in last year after Darling struggled. In fact, there’s not much of a reason to believe that Mrzak will perform any better than Cam Ward did. Mrazek has shown potential in the past, but struggled immensely in Philadelphia and has shown real inconsistency in his game.

In aggregate, it doesn’t seem all that clear if the Hurricanes actually improved much this summer. To overcome some of the other teams in the Metro they’ll have to take a big step forward, and if some of their young players struggle there may be tough times coming. Do you think they’ll be able to jump up in the standings and make the playoffs? Or is another disappointing season coming in Carolina? Cast your vote and make sure to explain your thoughts in the comment section below.

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