Snapshots: Prospects, Byron, Nylander
It’s that time again, when early rankings of the 2019 draft prospects begin to release and fans everywhere argue over the merit of certain players. Today, Craig Button of TSN published his early Top 40 list for next year’s draft, and to no one’s surprise Jack Hughes sits on top. The 17-year old center has shown he can compete with players several years older than him and should break just about every record imaginable for the US National Team Development Program this season.
Behind Hughes though is a much less consensus ranking with Button putting Dylan Cozens in second place and Kaapo Kakko down at four. Both forwards should be in contention for the second-overall selection by the June draft but could be overtaken by any number of other first round talents. Philip Broberg, another Swedish defenseman occupies Button’s third spot, and brings just about every measurable you’d want on the blue line.
- Paul Byron is expected to be ready for the start of Montreal Canadiens training camp according to Renaud Lavoie of TVA Sports, as he continues to rehab his injured shoulder. That is a good sign for Montreal, given that Byron is now the team’s top trade chip after they sent Max Pacioretty packing early this morning. Getting off to a healthy and productive start could make Byron one of the most sought after players at this year’s trade deadline, if the Canadiens decide they aren’t going to be able to extend him into the future. The 29-year old is coming off shoulder surgery, but has missed just one game over the past two seasons and tallied 42 goals over that span.
- William Nylander is still without a contract despite Toronto Maple Leafs camp opening in just a few days, but newcomer John Tavares isn’t worried. The former New York Islanders captain told reporters including Kristen Shilton of TSN that the players believe Nylander will in fact be in camp. For that to happen the Maple Leafs would need to get a contract finished in the very near future, as players rarely show up without some sort of deal already in place.
Snapshots: Laine, Rangers, Tyszka
Heading into the offseason, many expected that the top picks from 2016 in Toronto’s Auston Matthews and Winnipeg’s Patrik Laine would get early extensions done with their respective teams. It has already been established that it’s doubtful that Matthews will get a deal done and Jets GM Kevin Cheveldayoff indicated to Sportsnet’s Iain MacIntyre that there’s no particular rush to get Laine locked up either:
We’re open to everything. Again, Laine is a huge part of our organization and will be for many, many years to come. If (a contract) happens tomorrow, that’s great. If it happens a year from tomorrow, great.
Laine has quickly established himself as one of the top scoring threats in the league and with that in mind, it stands to reason that they might be able to sign him for less now than it would cost if he has another highly-productive season. However, if Laine believes he can be among the top scorers again, he may prefer to wait. At either rate, it doesn’t seem like the Jets are worried that their young star hasn’t signed just yet.
Elsewhere around the league:
- The Rangers aren’t expected to bring in any veterans on training camp tryouts, reports Larry Brooks of the New York Post. New York is in the midst of a youth movement and is expected to have several key prospects contend for a roster spot so it appears they don’t want to clutter things up by having a tryout or two pushing to play as well. Among the youngsters pushing for spots are 2017 first round centers Lias Andersson and Filip Chytil. Even though there is fairly strong depth down the middle already, GM Jeff Gorton told Brooks that they don’t envision shifting them to the wing which could affect their push to make the team.
- Canadiens defensive prospect Jarret Tyszka has been diagnosed with a concussion following a hit that resulted in him being stretchered off the ice this afternoon in a rookie tournament game against Toronto, notes Sportsnet’s Eric Engels. It’s the second straight game that a Montreal prospect was concussed and stretchered off the ice as Jake Evans suffered the same fate on Friday. Tyszka, a fifth-round pick of the Canadiens back in 2017, is expected to return to Seattle of the WHL for the upcoming season.
Snapshots: Nurse, Karlsson, Crawford, Seattle
Oilers defenseman Darnell Nurse is one of the more prominent remaining restricted free agents and the belief for quite some time has been that he will inevitably sign a short-term bridge contract. However, there is nothing imminent on the contract front for the 23-year-old, agent Anton Thun told Postmedia’s Jim Matheson. A two-year deal with a cap hit around $3MM has been the expected outcome but it wouldn’t be shocking to see the sides change gears and look at a one-year contract if they can’t bridge the gap on the two-year pact in the coming days. Matheson adds that Nurse will not be at training camp next week without a deal in place.
Elsewhere around the league:
- The Senators have received a trade offer for defenseman Erik Karlsson that features six elements in it, TSN’s Darren Dreger reports (audio link). The offer is believed to consist of a pair of roster players, two prospects, plus a pair of draft picks although it’s contingent on Karlsson agreeing to a long-term contract extension. Dreger notes that the offer came in several weeks ago without a deal happening but that at least provides a better idea of what Ottawa is looking for in order to move their franchise player.
- The health of Blackhawks goaltender Corey Crawford has been in question for a while dating back to last season. While he has made progress, team president John McDonough acknowledged to Mark Lazerus of the Chicago Sun-Times that he hopes the netminder will be ready when training camp opens up next Friday. Crawford is believed to have not taken part in on-ice sessions since mid-February so even if he is physically ready to practice, it will take a while for him to get game ready.
- While the Seattle group secured additional investors and completed negotiations on multiple arena agreements yesterday, NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly cautioned that this doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll be ready to begin playing in 2020-21. Instead, he told reporters, including ESPN’s Emily Kaplan, that the Board of Governors is eyeing 2021-22 as the potential start date, assuming Seattle eventually goes through the approval process. He added that there won’t be a vote from the board at their next meeting with Seattle’s representatives on October 2nd.
Snapshots: Reinhart, Zetterberg, Hadfield
Sam Reinhart still doesn’t have a contract, but that doesn’t mean he can’t practice with the Buffalo Sabres as training camp approaches. While the team awaits for the official practices to start, Jourdon LaBarber of NHL.com reports that Reinhart joined teammates on the ice today for an informal skate. The 22-year old forward seems extremely confident that a contract will be signed in the coming weeks, telling LaBarber that he’s approaching the season like normal because “that’s the way it’s going to turn out to be.”
Excitement is up around the Sabres this season after they drafted Rasmus Dahlin with the first overall pick and made several trades to address their lack of depth. When it comes to success up front, Reinhart may fall just behind Jack Eichel in terms of expectations this season as he tries to improve on his 25-goal 2017-18 campaign. The second-overall pick in 2014, Reinhart still hasn’t really shown he can dominate the league on his own and needs to take another big step forward in his development if the Sabres want to make the playoffs.
- It seems inevitable that Henrik Zetterberg won’t be playing for the Detroit Red Wings this season, but he’s at least heading for another opinion in the coming days. Helene St. James of the Detroit Free Press reports that Zetterberg will see Dr. Frank Cammisa—the doctor who performed his 2014 back surgery—soon to see what he has to say. Zetterberg hasn’t been able to train this offseason at all given his back injury, and will at least miss the beginning of the season. It’s starting to look like the Detroit captain could be headed for a much more permanent designation, but we’ll have to wait and see what comes of the Cammisa visit.
- The New York Rangers will finally raise Vic Hadfield‘s #11 sweater to the rafters on December 2nd, honoring one of their most beloved former players. Hadfield, a famous member of the GAG line alongside Jean Ratelle and Rod Gilbert, scored 50 goals and 106 points in 1971-72 but lost out in the Stanley Cup Finals to the Boston Bruins. A Rangers captain during those days, he’ll join Ratelle and Gilbert above the Madison Square Garden rink as one of the ten players to have their numbers retired by the team.
- The Rangers also announced the hiring of Steve Konowalchuk as an Amateur Scout, adding him to the organization after his year of coaching with the Anaheim Ducks. Konowalchuk was also formerly the head coach of the Seattle Thunderbirds, and led them to a WHL Championship in 2017. The long-time NHL forward played 790 regular season games and scored 396 points. He’ll use his familiarity with the WHL to bring the next wave of talent to the Rangers organization.
Snapshots: Sbisa, Dubinsky, Nummelin
With Nate Schmidt now out for the first 20 games of the regular season and Shea Theodore still a restricted free agent, David Schoen of the Las Vegas Review-Journal speculates (Twitter link) that the Golden Knights could turn to veteran defenseman Luca Sbisa on a PTO deal for training camp. Vegas is certainly familiar with Sbisa as he played in 42 games (regular season and playoffs) with them last season. The 28-year-old is one of the top defenders left on the open market and would give the team some extra competition at training camp at the very least and potentially some insurance if Theodore remains unsigned into the season. Whether it’s Sbisa or someone else, it wouldn’t be surprising to see Vegas add another defender heading into training camp.
Elsewhere around the hockey world:
- While Blue Jackets center Brandon Dubinsky struggled considerably last season, the team didn’t give any thought to buying out the remaining three years of his contract, notes George Richards of the Columbus Dispatch. The 32-year-old spent time as a healthy scratch last year and recorded a career-low 16 points, hardly the type of value they were expecting for someone carrying a $5.85MM cap hit. Dubinsky has slimmed down over the summer and hopes that his improved speed will help him make more of an impact. If not, the buyout talk will pick up once again over the summer.
- Former NHL blueliner Petteri Nummelin announced his retirement today at the age of 45. The ex-Blue Jacket and Wild rearguard has had quite the journey since leaving the NHL, playing in Switzerland, Finland, Norway, and Japan. He’ll be staying in the game, however, taking on an assistant coaching role in TPS Turku’s system in Finland, his hometown team, per a report from Turun Sonomat in Finland (link in Finnish).
Snapshots: Stastny, Hextall, Klefbom
The Vegas Golden Knights may have lost a pair of high-end forwards in James Neal and David Perron, but the team did bring in an important free agent this offseason when they signed center Paul Stastny to a three-year deal. The 32-year-old center showed off his impressive skills after he was traded to the Winnipeg Jets from St. Louis at the trade deadline. Stastny was given the role of anchoring a line with their star youngsters’ Patrik Laine and Nikolaj Ehlers and that line was a key part of the team’s deep playoff run, before being eliminated by Vegas.
Now ironically in Vegas and expected to center the team’s second line, Stastny said he spends a lot of his offseason training much differently considering that he’s entering that portion of a players’ career where a decline begins. Stastny told The Athletic’s Ryan Clark (subscription required) that he spends a lot of time focusing on off-ice things, especially his diet.
“Trying to keep up with your diet, trying to stay lean, trying to stay quick because as you get older, you might lose that step,” Stastny said. “The game’s changed from my first year where it was a lot heavier, stronger, touch and grabbing to know where it’s just not as much physical. A lot more skating and you gotta keep with that endurance as much as you can.”
Stastny, who posted 16 goals and 53 points between St. Louis and Winnipeg, expects to join the team’s second line between Alex Tuch and either Erik Haula or Tomas Tatar.
- David Isaac of the Courier Post interviewed Philadelphia Flyers head coach Ron Hextall, who said in the Q&A that the team looked into upgrading their bottom-six this year in hopes of improving their penalty kill, which struggled last year, but felt they were unable to do that. The special teams’ unit played better over the final 25 games, according to Hextall, but he would still like to add a penalty killing forward, if possible. “I’m open to it, but it would probably be more of a lateral move on the market rather than a free agent,” Hextall said. “It would be a forward. We’d like to add a penalty-killing forward but to this point there’s been nothing there that’s made enough sense for us to move.”
- The Edmonton Journal’s Kurt Leavins wonders if this is the year that defenseman Oscar Klefbom puts it all together, especially now that reports are coming in that say he’s 100 percent already with just a couple of weeks before training camp. The 25-year-old had a breakout season in 2016-17 when he tallied 12 goals and 38 points, but struggled through an injury-plagued 2017-18. Now healthy, the scribe believes this is the year he takes that next step.
Snapshots: Panarin, Forbort, Monahan, Montour
Although the Rangers and Blackhawks have linked as potential landing spots for Blue Jackets winger Artemi Panarin, Sean Shapiro of The Athletic reports (Twitter link) that the Stars are also on Panarin’s shortlist of preferred destinations. Shapiro adds that the team believes that they could have the cap room long-term to have both Panarin and fellow pending UFA Tyler Seguin on long-term contracts but that there would likely need to be roster casualties to do so. Columbus has been fielding trade interest in the Russian winger but they have been receiving futures-based packages, something they don’t seem interested in doing at this time.
Elsewhere around the league:
- Kings defenseman Derek Forbort sustained a back injury over the summer, GM Rob Blake told reporters, including Zach Dooley of LA Kings Insider. The issue is unrelated to the knee injury he had last season but the team will need to evaluate him when he reports to training camp to determine if he’ll miss any time.
- Flames center Sean Monahan has fully recovered from the lengthy list of surgeries he underwent back in April, notes Aaron Vickers of NHL.com. The 23-year-old was shut down late last season and had wrist, groin and two hernia surgeries shortly thereafter. Fortunately for Calgary, he has been taking part in informal team skates in advance of training camp and they will need Monahan as his best as they hope that a bolstered top line will help them get back to the postseason.
- While the Ducks and defenseman Brandon Montour ultimately settled on a two-year bridge contract, they did discuss a long-term pact, Montour acknowledged to John Matisz of theScore. However, they weren’t able to find something that worked for both sides which isn’t particularly surprising as the 24-year-old only has one full NHL season under his belt so a short-term pact was the likeliest outcome. That will likely be the case as well for their last RFA in winger Nick Ritchie.
Snapshots: Bergeron, Vilardi, Rielly
Patrice Bergeron was back on the ice today for the Boston Bruins as they prepare for training camp, but he won’t be going to China with the team for their upcoming preseason games. The Bruins are scheduled to open the preseason on September 15th in China against the Calgary Flames, but instead of travelling with the team Bergeron will be continuing his rehab after offseason surgery.
Bergeron is aiming to be ready for the start of the regular season, but as Joe McDonald of The Athletic writes he may have a different winger beside him to open the year. Danton Heinen has apparently been preparing to play either wing this offseason, and could get a look on the top unit beside Bergeron and Brad Marchand if the Bruins decide to move David Pastrnak onto a different line. Heinen may have been overlooked in an incredible rookie class last year, but still recorded 47 points in his first full-season which led all forwards outside of the top line.
- Los Angeles Kings fans may have to wait even longer to see top prospect Gabe Vilardi on the ice as his back injury could keep him out of rookie camp next week. That’s according to Curtis Zupke of the Los Angeles Times, who reports that the 19-year old forward experienced a “flare-up” of the injury this summer. Vilardi missed a good chunk of his junior season last year with this chronic injury, and the Kings want to be as careful as possible. The 11th-overall selection in 2017, Vilardi has the talent to become a dominant offensive player in the NHL if he can stay healthy enough to continue his development. He is a “day-to-day” situation at this point, just two weeks until training camp begins.
- Kristen Shilton of TSN sat down with Toronto Maple Leafs defenseman Morgan Rielly recently, and asked the alternate captain about the recent news that Auston Matthews would accept the captaincy if offered it by the coaching staff. Rielly spoke incredibly highly of Matthews’ maturity and drive, and admitted that he’d already a leader on the team. The Maple Leafs have been without a captain since trading away Dion Phaneuf in the middle of the 2015-16 season, and lost two alternates in Tyler Bozak and Leo Komarov to free agency this summer.
Snapshots: Top 100, KHL, Lindholm
Sportsnet released its full ranking of the Top 100 NHL Players of 2018-19 today, and to almost no one’s surprise Connor McDavid is at the very top. The Edmonton Oilers star center edged out Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Victor Hedman and Nathan MacKinnon in the top five, after winning his second consecutive Art Ross Trophy as the league’s top scorer. The Boston Bruins, Winnipeg Jets and Nashville Predators lead the way with six players each, while the Detroit Red Wings were the only team to not have a single appearance on the list.
Amazingly, the New Jersey Devils had just a single player—Taylor Hall—appear on the list despite reaching the playoffs last season. Hall was awarded the Hart Trophy as league MVP after registering 93 points, and clearly the Sportsnet staff believes he deserved it for carrying the team without any other top 100 player on the roster.
- The KHL have moved to a different point system for this season according to Russian reporter Aivis Kalnins, just days before games are about to begin. The league will abandon their previous scoring system that awarded three points for a regulation win, two points for an overtime or shootout win, and one point for an overtime or shootout loss in favor of the same two-point model the NHL currently uses. This system, critiqued by fans at times in North America, creates a level of virtual parity among all teams by keeping the standings squashed together for a longer period of time. In the KHL last season the first place team, SKA St. Petersburg, finished with 138 points in 56 games while last place, HC Yugra, collected just 48. In the new system, those extremes would have been 98 to 41.
- Par Lindholm is ready to fight for a spot in the NHL this fall, but that wasn’t true just a year ago. As Kristen Shilton of TSN reports, Lindholm had an offer to come over from the SHL in the spring of 2017, but decided it was better for his career to stay in Sweden for another season. It looks like he was right, as the now 26-year old center registered a career-high 47 points in 49 games during the 2017-18 season and proved that he was one of the most dependable offensive leaders in the entire league. Those 47 points put him fourth in the SHL and only nine points behind young phenom Elias Pettersson. He’ll now try to battle for the fourth-line center role with the Maple Leafs, behind a trio of stars that should get the vast majority of minutes.
Snapshots: Gulls, Hiller, Sbisa
The San Diego Gulls, AHL affiliate of the Anaheim Ducks, are bringing in some fresh faces behind the bench. The team announced that they have hired Sylvain Lefebvre and David Urquhart as assistant coaches for the coming season. The pair will join the staff of former Edmonton Oilers head coach Dallas Eakins in San Diego. Lefebvre, a well-known name in hockey, has been the head coach of the Montreal Canadiens’ AHL affiliates – in Hamilton, St. John’s, and Laval – for the past six years, but was not retained by the organization this off-season. He also served as an assistant coach at the NHL and AHL level for the Colorado Avalanche. Lefebvre enjoyed a long NHL career, suiting up for 945 games over 14 seasons with four organizations, including a Stanley Cup-winning campaign with the Colorado Avalanche in 1996. Urquhart is a more outside-the-box hire, but could help with the development of the Ducks’ young prospects. An assistant coach at McGill University in Montreal for the past six years, Urquhart was also a standout player for McGill in the mid-2000’s. He also got a taste of the AHL, playing in 130 games before joining the coaching ranks. The Gulls missed the playoffs last season for the first time since joining the AHL and are hoping that some new voices behind the bench could make the difference in getting back to postseason and continuing to provide Anaheim with pro-ready talent.
- A former Duck is not looking to return to the NHL. Jonas Hiller, now 36, has not played an NHL game since the 2015-16 season, when he struggled greatly as the backup for the Calgary Flames. However, prior to that unfortunate campaign, Hiller spent seven years as one of the best and most consistent goalies in the league for Anaheim and even found success in his first season in Calgary. Since he left the league, he has also done well for himself, playing for EHC Biel-Bienne of the NLA in his native Switzerland. Last year in particular, Hiller was one of the best goalies in the league. Given that recent success and his impending free agency, some speculated that he might eye an opportunity to return to the NHL next summer. However, that thought was put to rest today when Biel-Bienne announced a one-year extension for their star keeper. Barring an otherworldly performance over the next two seasons, it seems unlikely that Hiller would want or be able to return to the NHL at age 38 when his current contract expires.
- Another former Duck, and former teammate of Hiller’s, defenseman Luca Sbisa is still weighing his options for the coming season. No sooner did a report come out yesterday claiming Sbisa could receive a PTO from the Vegas Golden Knights that agent Andre Rufener now tells the Swiss Hockey News that Sbisa has already received a PTO offer from an “unnamed team”. Rufener also states that there is considerable interest in his client and that several teams are weighing a contract offer. It seems that Sbisa is inclined to hold out for that solid offer rather than accept a PTO at this point in time. With so much noise surrounding the 28-year-old blue liner, it seems likely that he will find a new NHL home before the puck drops on the new season.