TrueBlueGED

And give him #79.

It's always possible Risto stays...but really, short of hitting you in the face with a frying pan, Botterill can't make it any more obvious that Risto is as good as gone.

I think Q playing him a lot is more encouraging than any other data point. Coaches can say whatever and I don't care about Q praising him in public. But ice time? That isn't faked. Q hates rookies, and trusted this guy. I'll take it.

Pilut might not be ready to start the year either. He's on a similar timeline as Bogo IIRC. Either way, I expect Scandella to be around. Something like this to open the season: Dahlin-Miller McCabe-Montour Scandella-Nelson/Jokiharju

My guess is Botterill isn't expecting Bogo to be ready to go and/or expects him to miss more time regardless, sees Nelson as more of a 6/7 tweener, and may not believe Borgen is ready. In Botterill's head I think he expects to start the year with Montour, Miller, and the winner of Nelson/Jokiharju on the right.

I'd imagine Risto is gone and Bogo will be after this season. Miller and Montour in the top-4 on the right, with Nelson/Jokiharju/Borgen battling for 3rd pair after this year. In the near term, there's enough depth to cover for Bogo not being ready to start the season and Risto being traded.

It doesn't have to happen in the grand scheme of things. But c'mon now. Risto is sooooooo gone.

I don't think this is right at all. Nobody is taking Bogosian off our hands, and Nelson profiles as the type of D that Botterill values, even if only in a depth role. I don't think acquiring a young Dman with little NHL experience necessitates a Risto trade right this very second...but the tea leaves are pretty clearly blowing in that direction.

At the very least, if Chicago fans are mad then I'm happy.

Indeed. Risto is beyond gone.

For the sake of our collective sanity, I hope Nylander doesn't completely turn it around like Dylan Strome did after arriving in Chicago. I might be a bad person for feeling that way.

Right. Beating a dead horse at this point, but adding a true 2C makes that whole lineup look so much better. Everything slots into place better and we upgrade several positions for the price of one.

I don't see how anyone could expect that lineup to make the playoffs. Some things fall the right way and it could make it, but definitely shouldn't be the expectation. Basically I don't think that forward group is good enough to be a playoff team without stellar goaltending, and there's no reason to think that's going to happen.

I wish I was still in Buffalo to go. Anyway, my brother-in-law played Sunday at midnight I think. He had a great time and raised nearly $800.

Can you change the title to reflect it happened when Risto was a rookie? Not that I'm a huge Risto fan, it between the speeding thread and this I had a panic that he was in some sort of downward spiral.

Well, he's better at making the proper amount of money for what he brings to the ice.

Well, doing so probably wouldn't result in a worse on-ice product than he's been responsible for the last two seasons.

Yea, I simultaneously feel that Botterill has to have at least one other trade cooking by looking at the roster, while also thinking he thought Berglund and Mittelstadt were okay at 2C last year so he might be okay with Johansson this year.

Johansson himself said he hasn't played much center outside of his first few years in Washington. I don't often take athletes at face value, but I'm comfortable assuming he knows what position he's been playing.

An article in the Athletic suggests the asking price for Gusev is a 2nd round pick and another late round pick or low end prospect. Assuming he'd sign here, I continue to think it's a reasonable gamble if we don't have anything else going on.

I continue to hope that Johansson isn't the plan at 2C.

This is the crux of it to me. I don't have problems with Botterill trying to improve the depth of the team, but there are very real questions about whether his moves actually do that.

Shouldn't the bar be where the team was when Botterill was hired, not where it was after he inadvertently captained it into the toilet year 1? I'm assuming that's why you have the emoji, but still, there are people who really think progress has been made.

How many teams actually have this? Even those who do, it wasn't a thing until relatively recently. Half the time the GM also holds the president title. And seriously, if the owner is hell bent on being involved, the idea that another layer will prevent it is kind of amusing to me. And if the argument is that a strong president would prevent meddling, then why can't that also be applied to a strong GM? I continue to believe that president of hockey ops is an unnecessary position. Truth. To some, involvement is by default meddling. To me, meddling has to mean overriding or directing a GM's decisions on the regular.

But that doesn't mean he's involved in the directorial capacity PA and Smell seem to believe.