TSN’s Hockey Insiders discuss the trade chatter around Vancouver, where things go from here for the Predators, Carter Hart on track for an NHL return next week, Cole Caufield and others making a tough decision for USA GM Bill Guerin and how much an average NHL team is worth now.
Gino Reda: Better than a quarter of the way into the new season, the buyers and sellers are hitting the phones, dealing with their new realities. So, our Insiders, Chris Johnston, Pierre LeBrun and Darren Dreger are getting super busy. Dregs, let’s start in Vancouver – Canucks, open for business?
Darren Dreger: Yes, but we do need to apply some context in all of this. We know that Canucks management sent a note to all general managers across the league on Monday just stating that they’re willing to listen on their pending unrestricted free agents – not all of their veteran players.
So we’re talking about a very specific group here. If you look up front, you’ve got Kiefer Sherwood, who’s having a great year, you’ve got Evander Kane and Teddy Blueger, when he’s healthy.
But Patrik Allvin is also looking for a specific return. We know that he covets a centreman, but if there’s a younger player that’s made available, why wouldn’t the Canucks move an unrestricted free agent – pending, now – as opposed to the chaos around trade deadline?
But if they don’t do that, and they have to wait, they’re okay with that too. They need to get healthy, they want to continue to battle because they know what’s coming, and that’s the uncertainty around their captain, Quinn Hughes.
If this season doesn’t improve, then as you get closer to the deadline, perhaps all bets are off and you have to revisit Hughes’ future in Vancouver- either at the deadline or in the offseason.
Reda: Major chaos right now in Nashville. They’re dead last and Barry Trotz is fed up – he made that clear with a profanity-laced interview with the Tennesseean. But he said Andrew Burnette isn’t going anywhere and Trotz doesn’t want to go back behind the bench, so where do they go from here, Pierre?
Pierre LeBrun: All eyes on his roster, and really that roster had begun a transition after last year’s disappointing season. They’re a younger team this year, and that’s going to continue now as we get closer to the end of the season.
Look for younger player to be integrated into that roster over time, which means, of course, listening on veteran players. We’ve talked before about the possibility of Steven Stamkos, Jonathan Marchessault, those guys with full no-trade clauses, that teams will check in and the Predators are open to that.
The name that has the most interest is Ryan O’Reilly, which isn’t surprising – there are teams that called on him last year as well. The Predators decided to keep him at the time. He’s got a year and a half left on his contract at $4.5 million, [which is] very appealing to teams looking for a centre who’s a Stanley Cup champion.
The Montreal Canadiens are among the teams, I’m told, that have interest.
What is the price tag for O’Reilly? I’m told, if and when the Predators are ready to go down that route, it’ll likely be a first-round pick and an A-level prospect to get in to the conversation on O’Reilly.
Reda: In the summer, Carter Hart was acquitted in the Hockey Canada sexual assault trial, last month he signed a two-year deal with the Vegas Golden Knights – what’s next for him now, CJ?
Chris Johnston: He’s on track to resume his NHL career as of next week, which is when the official suspension lifts, December 1, from the NHL. The expectation is that he will be recalled by the Golden Knights. Hart has spent the last couple weeks in the AHL with the team in Henderson getting regular practice time.
He’s played two games on a conditioning stint, going 1-1 in those games, due to make another start Friday and then the Golden Knights – which remain without Adin Hill in the crease – are expected to recall Hart and start leaning on him, even though he hasn’t played in the league in almost two years now.
Reda: We were all together at the NHL meetings when we found out that Seattle was paying what we thought at that point was a mind-blowing $650 million for an expansion fee – but that could soon look like a great deal, CJ.
Johnston: Yeah, we all thought Darren Dreger was a little crazy too a year ago when he reported the NHL could get $2 billion when it comes time for the next round of expansion but that doesn’t look quite so crazy now.
There’s been some evaluations, released by CNBC, in which they have found that in the last year, the overall valuations for teams have risen 15 per cent to $2.2 billion on average, which means that the average team is worth a little bit more than that potential expansion cost.
A couple of things here – media rights have driven that growth, primarily, but you also now have three of the five most wealthy teams based in Canada, which includes the Edmonton Oilers, who passed the Boston Bruins in the last year to move into the fifth spot on those back-to-back appearances in the Stanley Cup final.
Reda: We’re just over a month away from teams having to announce their Olympic rosters, and Team USA has some tough decisions to make, Pierre.
LeBrun: They do, which is a testament to the depth that they have. Team USA general manager Bill Guerin was spotted on Sunday afternoon watching Tage Thompson of the Buffalo Sabres – the previous day he was in Montreal, watching Cole Caufield and Lane Hutson.
I asked Guerin about it today and he said he loves Caufield’s compete, he’s happy he got to see him play live, and not just about Caufield but a growing number of players making it hard on Guerin.
He said that’s what you want, you want these decisions to be hard and you think about Logan Cooley, who scored four goals on Monday night, Jason Robertson’s on fire, Alex DeBrincat, Clayton Keller, the list goes on.
The one thing I retained from my interview with Guerin today was how hard and heavy the game was at Four Nations and he said “If you can’t check, it’s probably not the tournament for you.” Read between the lines on that, if you will.