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Growth and new opportunities
Feels like we’ve been asking for this for several years now. Basicaly ever since the Stanley Cup window slammed shut following 2018-19 and a first round exit to the Dallas Stars.
The organization kept pushing to stay relevant by adding new veterans rather than commiting to getting younger and acquiring draft picks. They kept making the playoffs, but continued to lose in the first round. Now we’re here at the bottom of the NHL and they have no choice but to finally start turning towards their youth.
Fans are really about to get their wish to see a very young starting lineup as these trade chips start to be shipped out of here. A lot of call-ups will be needed from the Milwaukee Admirals, and by March we should have a really young starting lineup and a 2026-27 outlook that will feature a younger team as well.
The current youth that is getting consistent playing time with the Predators are Matthew Wood, Fedor Svechkov, Adam Wilsby and Ozzy Wiesblatt. I even still consider Luke Evangelista in that group of young players that needs to show strong growth in these remaining 59 regular season games.
It will go a long way to minimize some of the pain of this season if we see a positive trend from the young talent that figures to be around for the aftermath of the sell-off. No one expects this team to quickly bounce back to being a playoff team anytime soon, but we need a vision and to feel confident that we have the right prospects already here to lead the way and build the foundation.
Despite the trade rumors, I still fully expect Filip Forsberg to be around for a while through all of this. Also, since the Predators don’t want to retain salary most likely, I think Stamkos will probably be too difficult to trade. Roman Josi will stick around, as will Nicolas Hague and Brady Skjei most likely.
Some veterans will stick around, but the team is about to get a lot younger. It will actually be kind of fun and entertaining to see them get more playing time after these trades rain down. It will probably mean a lot more losing at first and a great chance at winning the lottery, but I’d rather see it with the young core playing over aging and disgruntled veterans who won’t be around anyway when this thing finally does get turned around in the distant future.
Zachary L’Heureux and Joakim Kemell should get another shot to get NHL playing time as roster space becomes available. David Edstrom is one of the few center prospects we have yet to see on the NHL level, so maybe he gets a shot eventually.
Among the defensive prospects, Andrew Gibson, Ryan Ufko and maybe even Tanner Molendyk could get NHL opportunities later this season.
These are positive outcomes out of a bad situation that should happen later this season. Just have to get past all of the trades first.