Author: Brian La Rose

In our final pre-deadline mailbag, topics include the upcoming trade deadline, Washington’s offensive struggles this season, and more.  If your question doesn’t appear here, check back in our last two editions focusing on the Central Division and the Eastern Conference.

Emoney123: Can Briere make a move that balances the playoff drive and rebuilding goals?

Anyone else besides Laughton, Walker, and Seeler likely or could be traded?

Save the draft picks and prospects and look forward to making a splash in the offseason with a signing such as RFA Elias Pettersson?

Such an approach is doable in theory but is often hard to thread the needle on.  To do it, they need to sell high on their rentals to get the future assets and then take on some high-priced players for a low cost (late-round pick or a lower-end unsigned prospect) that hopefully keeps them afloat for the final spot in the Metropolitan Division.  How many teams will be looking to dump pricey expiring deals for just the value of getting the remaining money off the books?  I’m sure there will be some players available but enough to offset the loss of their others who will be more impactful?  I’m less sure about that one.

Beyond Scott Laughton, Sean Walker, and Nick Seeler, I don’t see too many more trade options.  Someone might want Marc Staal for a late-round pick with the experience he has.  If they’re still open to moving Morgan Frost, maybe the right deal comes around there.  I’m not as sold on his potential availability as I was earlier in the season, however.  If they make a move for a goalie, I could see Felix Sandstrom being part of a return going the other way so I suppose he’s in the mix to move as well.

While Pettersson has clearly now signed, I want to address the general idea of the question.  If you wanted the Flyers to make an RFA signing of that level of significance, you’re talking about giving up four unprotected first-round picks for the right to pay someone a contract that will be well above market value.  That’s not justifiable for pretty much any team at that level of a contract and certainly not for a team like the Flyers with where they are in their rebuild, a process that is still closer to the beginning than the end.  This is still a longer-term process that they’re in so it’s not the right time for them to be moving picks and prospects for established pieces.

Schwa: Set of Deadline questions:

1) What teams do you expect to make a splash for bigger names versus teams who will focus on role players?

2) Who is the biggest name you expect to move?

3) Who is the biggest rumored name you suspect will stay put?

As always, thanks for your input!

1) I could see Vegas making a splash.  They’re certainly no stranger to swinging big and with Mark Stone out for the rest of the regular season (and quite possibly longer), they now have the LTIR flexibility to make an impact of some significance.  Florida and Colorado also come to mind as teams aiming high.  The Panthers very quietly have ample regular cap space although they’re lacking top picks to trade.  Colorado, meanwhile, doesn’t have the cap room but if they’re able to move out Ryan Johansen, I could see them making a big move as well.

At the other end of the spectrum, I could see Detroit shopping there.  Here’s a team that has done well this season but is still not near the level that they need to be to have a deep playoff run.  There’s value in giving their youngsters some playoff experience though so I could see them using their cap space to add.  I also have Los Angeles here, not because they only want to do something small but because that’s about all they can do; with Viktor Arvidsson and Adrian Kempe expected back by the end of the season, they don’t have longer-term LTIR flexibility which means they’re pretty much money in, money out.

2) Two names come to mind, neither of which are particularly surprising.  Since Noah Hanifin doesn’t appear to be interested in signing an extension with the Flames, they’re in a spot where they need to move him.  I expect he’ll be the top blueliner off the board.  I’m not of the belief that it’s going to be a big trade deadline with a bunch of notable names moved; it’ll be quieter than this year.  So up front, Jake Guentzel is the biggest one I think gets moved.  It certainly feels like the expectation around him has shifted from a maybe on the trade front to probable with Pittsburgh realizing that even if he stays, they’re aiming for a likely first-round exit.  If they can’t re-sign him (and it stands to reason that if they were close, we’d be hearing about it), then he should be moved.

3) We’ve seen plenty of speculation surrounding Calgary’s Jacob Markstrom to the point where he has been featured prominently on some ‘trade bait’ boards.  I’m not as bullish as they are on the idea of moving him right now.  The Flames more or less have a one-team market for his services, New Jersey.  While I acknowledge the Devils might be desperate for an impactful addition, how much can Calgary elicit from a one-team bidding war?  In the summer, the Devils could still very well be looking for a goalie and perhaps some others too.  If GM Craig Conroy thinks he can get a better deal then compared to now (and I suspect he will think that), then Markstrom likely stays put, at least for a few more months.

Dayvisferreras: Any chance the Caps change head coaches for next season? I can’t tell if it’s the roster underachieving on offense or Carbery’s coaching system.

I suppose it’s possible that GM Brian MacLellan feels a coaching change is needed but I wouldn’t be expecting it to happen.  This is a coach who was well-known for getting lots of his groups offensively and while yes, the Capitals are struggling considerably on that front, I don’t think a whole lot can be pinned on him.

For me, this is more of a roster composition issue.  They have plenty of high-priced talent but a lot of them are in the downswing of their careers.  Going into the season, their top three centers were someone coming off major hip surgery, a veteran who had made it known he wanted to be traded, and one who was non-tendered in 2022.  With due respect to those players who are all NHL talents, centers are play-drivers and going into this season with some big question marks in those spots is risky.  That’s the fault of the GM, not the coach.  Meanwhile, on the wing, it’s a pretty old group as well.  Eventually, some fall-off was reasonably expected.

On the back end, how much firepower do they have?  John Carlson isn’t a top-end point producer as he was before but he’s still above-average.  Rasmus Sandin has some upside offensively but is still developing.  That’s about it in terms of offensive ability; most of their other options are more defensive types.  It’s hard to get much going in transition when you don’t necessarily have the defense that can kickstart that or some consistent options down the middle to drive that attack.

With their aging roster, they need an influx of speed and creativity.  If they can get that, I think you’ll see a better offensive performance from the Capitals moving forward with Carbery still at the helm.

Sunshine swede: Any chance that Florida choose to trade Reinhart at the deadline if they get a good package in return and feel they can’t afford to extend him? Or Montour/Forsling?

From a long-term asset perspective, the idea of getting value for any of Sam Reinhart, Brandon Montour, or Gustav Forsling over losing them for nothing but the vacated cap space makes sense on paper.  However, it would be shocking to see any of them moved over the next few days.

First, at this point, I don’t think the Panthers are at the point where they know they can’t bring back any of the players under any circumstances.  Can they keep all three?  That seems iffy but which one can’t they keep?  That’s far from being determined.  If they put pen to paper on long-term extensions with two of the three, then the idea of moving the other becomes a little more plausible as you’d be reasonably certain that you wouldn’t be able to keep the third one.

But even having said that, Florida’s a legitimate Stanley Cup contender.  Can they justify taking a key player away from their group and weakening their chances in the name of asset management?  That’s a tough sell to make.  If they were a bubble team, even in the spot their state counterpart in Tampa Bay is, such a move is defensible.  But when you’re battling for the top spot in the league and have eyes on playing into June, GM Bill Zito will be solely focused on adding to his core group, not hedging his bets about free agency in July.

RipperMagoo: To keep the game moving, what do you think of icing and offside resulting in loss of possession by the offending team? The defending team then gets the puck behind their net and the offending team has to clear the offensive zone.

This feels like a creative solution to a problem that I’m not sure many would necessarily agree exists.  I don’t see too many complaints about pace of play or game lengths going wildly beyond the planned television block.  I also think there are a lot of coaches who wouldn’t be fond of this rule as on icings, they’d lose the advantages of line matching against a tired group and choosing what side to take the draw on.  We already see a good chunk of something like this on delayed offside calls and an increase in that isn’t necessarily the end of the world but if the defending team has to take the puck behind the net first, it might actually slow things down as they’ll want to regroup, maybe get a line change in, etc.

If you’re looking to shave a few minutes off the average game length, why not just bring back the old hurry-up faceoff rule?  Instituted in 2002, teams had eight seconds to make a change after a whistle and then five seconds to line up for the draw before the puck was dropped.  When actually followed, the amount of dead time between whistles went down while we even had the odd calamitous draw where one team wasn’t even at the dot when the puck was dropped.  Of course, it wasn’t enforced too strictly and quietly went away.  But even then, I could see broadcasters taking issue with that as it would reduce the opportunities for replays and between-whistle advertisements.

Maybe it’s just me but I find games are fairly fast-paced as it is with fairly frequent multi-minute stretches without a whistle.  A period from start to finish generally doesn’t take much more than 40 minutes to complete and often comes in quite lower than that.  Points for creativity but I can’t see this gaining a lot of traction.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.