The Nashville Predators “won” last summer’s free agency period, signing Steven Stamkos, Jonathan Marchessault and Brady Skjei to lucrative long-term contracts. The summer victory was short-lived, however, as the Predators struggled to start the season and never regained their footing, ultimately falling to the bottom of the Western Conference standings.
The regular season exposed Nashville, revealing that it was a flawed team that was far from contending for the playoffs. Now, a year later, the Predators have taken a very conservative approach to their summer spending, and alas, they are still a flawed team that might struggle to score this season.
One of the most significant issues for Nashville, if not the biggest, is that its center depth is lacking, particularly in the scoring department. Stamkos is slated to be their top-line pivot, followed by Ryan O’Reilly.
While Stamkos is a first-ballot Hall-of-Famer and O’Reilly could sneak in, they weren’t exactly driving offense last year. Beyond the two of them, the scoring dries up further as the Predators’ options are currently Fedor Svechkov, who had an okay rookie season, as well as Erik Haula and Michael McCarron. No disrespect to Haula or McCarron, who are both decent defensive forwards, but they aren’t going to drive a line and won’t contribute much to Nashville’s offense.
Now, Nashville has a lot of young center depth in the pipeline, including the recently drafted Brady Martin, but those prospects are all a few years away and won’t help this upcoming season. The prospects will need playing time at some point soon, which has led some to speculate that the Predators might consider trading O’Reilly. However, general manager Barry Trotz remains pretty committed to the players he signed last summer and can’t exactly spring for a rebuild, yet.
The Predators’ murky center situation is a microcosm for the whole roster. As it is currently constructed, many of the players in the lineup will be playing outside of their ideal slot. Sure, Filip Forsberg, Roman Josi, Juuse Saros, O’Reilly, and Marchessault are all slotted fine. Still, Michael Bunting, for example, is currently in the top six and is probably best suited as a top-nine forward.
Speaking of Bunting, much of his season will hinge on how he starts. Last season in Pittsburgh, Bunting had an atrocious start to the season, with just a single assist in his first six games, before he was a healthy scratch. Bunting would play another 52 games in Pittsburgh, tallying 14 goals and 14 assists before he was traded to the Predators. Upon joining Nashville, Bunting played in 18 games to close out the season, registering five goals and four assists. The 29-year-old is a bit of a wild card in Nashville since he doesn’t do all that much away from the puck, but when he is on, he is a capable scorer who can post 20 goals and 50 points.
Much of Nashville’s hopes are like the hopes they have for Bunting. They are banking on internal improvement, perhaps better overall chemistry, and better luck. It’s not the worst strategy in the world, and probably a better course than blowing up the roster or trying to trade a pile of futures for short-term help.
The Predators had a pile of players experiencing down years. Stamkos, Marchessault, Bunting, Skjei, Josi and Saros all had off years, and if even half of them were to bounce back, we are looking at a very different Nashville team next season. However, there is no guarantee that they will bounce back; given the age of some of the players named, they may even regress further. However, Nashville is constrained by high-priced contracts and can only hope for some positive regression.
As far as team chemistry, the Predators would hardly be the first team to spend a significant amount of money in the summer only to have negative results. It’s happened in every major sport, including hockey, with perhaps the best example being the New York Rangers of the early 2000s, who repeatedly outspent every team in the league but couldn’t even get a sniff of the playoffs. The more the Rangers added at that time, the more the team’s chemistry became disjointed, which eventually led to a massive selloff towards the end of the 2004 season and ultimately a reset. The Predators have avoided adding much to their lineup this offseason; however, they have tinkered around the edges with the additions of defensemen Nicolas Hague and Nick Perbix.
Finally, as far as luck goes, Nashville didn’t have much of it last season, as evidenced by their PDO (shooting plus save percentages), which was dead last in the NHL at .970 (per MoneyPuck). Now, PDO alone doesn’t tell the whole story, but the top teams in the NHL typically have a PDO above 100, and the Predators were nowhere close to that. Much of that falls on the goaltender, Saros, who had the worst season of his career and will be looking to bounce back. If he can get back closer to his career average numbers, and the Predators’ offensive guys can get back to their career average shooting percentage, the Predators could make some moves in the Western Conference to try and climb back into the playoff conversation next season.
Photo by Kim Klement Neitzel-USA TODAY Sports
Trotz should return to coaching, Get rid of Brunette, And hire a competent GM, Those moves would help greatly.
You left out the Preds #1 impediment: Andrew Brunette. Add to that all the other issues you mention here and this team will be a 7th place finisher in the Central.
Seems kind of risky hoping that the moves you made last year, That totally didn’t work, Will magically work this year isn’t it? What’s that definition of insanity again……………?
Sounds like Trotz and Bowman have been discussing strategy!
I haven’t seen anything or anyone worse than Bowman. But I’m only 69. There’s still time I guess. LOL
Yeah, for sure, wish in one hand and s^^^ in the other, see which one fills up first.
The Preds should’ve push for a complete rebuild a couple of years ago. This team is full of aging vets who are the wrong end of their careers. Trotz is not a good GM. I feel for the fans in Nashville.
If Brind’Amour is not a hall of famer, no way O’Reilly is. There is a 350 point spread between them. That’s significant. Similar awards. Cup, Selke (RBA has 2 and RO has 1), O’Reilly has a Bing and a Conn Smythe.
I imagine it is difficult to run an NHL franchise. Still I am pretty sure that Gbear and I could do a better job than Trotz + the current executive committee. Figners crossed for Gavin McKenna!
This whole article is pure speculative detritus. You need a quote from a team official saying they’re banking on internal improvment to write this story. You can’t just write out your feelings and call it “information.”
You can in this era.
Well, it certainly looks like Trotz is either banking on internal improvements or banking on drafting in the top 5 again.
Exactly.
Without an official statement, you cannot just understand the obvious.
Actions may speak louder, but words are official.
Trotz did say so (paraphrased) sometime around the draft. You are right that this piece should have linked to some other article that quoted Trotz though.
The site name is “Pro Hockey Rumors” – that would seem to inherently invoke both speculation and speculative analysis. The Preds have done jack since the merciful end of the season, that would seem to very clearly imply that they are happy to “internally improve” in contrast to teams like, say, Vegas that rolled up the sleeves and got to work..
So they’re banking on being awful again? Nice. Enjoy another tough season, Preds fans.
The lower the expectations the better the Preds have played in their history. Fully expecting them to rise back up to the mushy middle and challenge for the 7/8th playoff seed. Unfortunately this likely pulls them out of the Gavin McKenna sweepstakes unless they pull an Islanders type Lottery win.
Shocked Gbear is openly rooting against Brunette.
No, I’m just acknowledging the reality of the situation. The sooner he’s gone, the better for the players.
Brunette, 51, owns a 128-92-19 coaching record with the Florida Panthers (2021-22) and Predators. He was a finalist for the 2024 Jack Adams Award.
May we all do as “awful” as you think he is doing at our current jobs.
And what happened to him in Florida? Why did Bill Zito fire him?
Doesn’t seem like he did so well there.
wasnt fired
Distinction without a difference.
Took over the Panthers early in the Season after the Quenneville mess and won the President’s Trophy as well as a Round in the Playoffs. Hard to argue their choice to hire Maurice but still a successful Season. No question Brunette is a good Coach. My only concern is that if the Preds go for a total rebuild and aren’t competitive he hasn’t shown the ability to develop young talent.
Below is why Bruno was replaced as HC. 3 goals scored in a 4 game series with a talented roster. Same pattern as we’re seeing with the Preds: initial success, but once teams figure out how to gameplan against him, he has no answers.
link to hockey-reference.com
I think you just don’t like Brunette and it’s a free Country.
I deal with the facts.
Preds fan here… Woof!