Hoss

That deal, to me, is similar to a Turcotte, Kuperi, Adrian Kempe and 2022 first deal.

I’d do that but I’d demand a postcard from Peterka every year because he has somehow become a favorite of mine so quickly.

That’s a no. We aren’t getting near that value and I don’t believe a healthy Eichel would either.

I don’t think so. No other team has even come close to the idea of two high-end prospects PLUS a first PLUS two other good young pieces.

I think Cozens is the caliber of prospect near the likes of Zegras and a few others who have been forbidden fruit seemingly from the beginning so I don’t believe we need to add. Also, in the real world, our 2022 first has so much value we’re probably not adding much more than Cozens and that first.

Yes, definitely.

Deal. Here’s one Nils Lundqvist in return (I don’t know how any of this works but Rangers fans told me he’s too good to be traded for Eichel so he must be on the same level).

Yea let’s definitely stop posting the fakes please. It doesn’t serve anybody and just rustles some jimmies. My first action when I see a fake is to block the account. My block list is like 100 deep because of this.

We could do a little experiment and simply ask what people are willing to give up for an Eichel caliber player

I’d be interested in the percentage of times a team has said a player wants to test the market and “see what’s out there” and they returned to their original team. I’d bet that percentage is very low. I wouldn’t expect Jake back.

Monahan is barely an asset right now. You’re not getting Rossi for Monahan. Not even close.

So I'm going to waste some time and brain up some trade packages for the teams mentioned at the forefront of this Eichel stuff tonight - based on the "2022 first-round pick ... at least one top prospect and two young, NHL-proven players." Price reported by David Pagnotta. I don't believe they get those four. I believe they get three and then some salaries to match. I'm not going to dive into the salaries to match and focus on the young pieces. In many of these deals we'll likely need to add a young NHL body like Olofsson or someone similiar. Calgary Flames (mentioned in Friedman & Pagnotta's reports) 2022 First From Calgary (no protection) Top prospects: C Connor Zary or C/LW Jakob Pelletier NHL-proven players: C Dillon Dube, LW Matthew Tkachuk, LHD Noah Hanifin, LHD Jusso Valimaki Final deal: 2022 First, Connor Zary, Matthew Tkachuk Logic: This feels like too steep of a price to expect Calgary to pay but it's hard to get a mix that makes sense without these three piece. Tkachuk means no veteran salary dumps needed. Monahan doesn't make sense because he's likely aging out of what they want (I'm only doing players under 25). They won't move Hanifin. If you swap in Dube for Tkachuk then you're going to need to add one of Valimaki or Pelletier and some salary. Anaheim Ducks (mentioned in both reports) 2022 First From Anaheim (no protection) Top prospects: C Trevor Zegras, C Mason McTavish, D Jamie Drysdale Young, NHL-proven players: LW Max Comtois, RW Troy Terry, C Sam Steel, C Isac Lundestrom, LW Max Jones Final deal: 2022 First, Max Comtois, Mason McTavish Logic: Anaheim would also need to mix and match salaries and I highly doubt they trade a player they just loved enough to take third overall, but I don't see Zegras or Drysdale being involved. If they were this deal would be done already. I don't think Anaheim is willing to pay the price it would take. (Yes, I'm aware I was loose with "NHL-proven" here). Los Angeles Kings (mentioned in Pagnotta's but not Friedman's report) 2022 First From Los Angeles (no protection) Top prospects: C Quinton Byfield, C Alex Turcotte, RW Arthur Kaliyev, C Rasmus Kupari, RHD Brandt Clarke, RHD Brock Faber Young, NHL-proven players: RW Carl Grundstrom, C Adrian Kempe, C Gabe Vilardi, LHD Tobias Bjornfot Final deal: 2022 First, Brock Faber, Adrian Kempe, Alex Turcotte Logic: This deal feels closest to reality because it doesn't even touch LA's top two in Byfield and Turcotte and builds on a young C, a more "veteran" C and a RHD which the team needs more of. This deal feels the most fulfilling from a team-building perspective. Minnesota Wild (mentioned in Friedman's report, Pagnotta says he thinks they're not willing) 2022 First From Minnesota (no protection) Top prospects: C Marco Rossi, LW Matthew Boldy, RHD Calen Addison Young, NHL-proven players: C Joel Eriksson Ek, LW Jordan Greenway Final deal: 2022 First, Marco Rossi, Calen Addison Logic: I don't expect the Sabres to get both Rossi AND Boldy in this deal even though that's probably the fanbase's biggest hope in any of these deals. Addison gives them an NHL-ready RHD prospect and with Minnesota tearing down their roster a bit that 2022 first rounder could be worth a lot. The salaries with the Wild are the most interesting ones because they don't have bad contracts left. That means whoever is added (Fiala/Dumba) would either have an impact in our lineup or be flipped for additional assets. Las Vegas Golden Knights (mentioned in Pagnotta's reporter, not Friedman's) 2022 First From Las Vegas (no protection) Top Prospects: C Peyton Krebs Young, NHL-proven players: LHD Nicolas Hague, C Nolan Patrick Final deal: 2022 First, Peyton Krebs, Alex Tuch Logic: Okay, Tuch didn't make my qualification of under 25 but I'll allow him to slide in as the young, NHL-proven player here. This deal doesn't feel great overall simply because that first round pick isn't worth much. Financially and asset wise Vegas doesn't make much sense ... I also don't think they can just keep getting rid of all their prospects and first round picks in every draft. Ultimately, I think chances are this deal gets done and their one or two pieces that are considered "centerpieces" that I don't list here and that we haven't really clamored for. Those pieces will be sold as great pieces, either out of desperation or because the Sabres front office actually believes in those pieces. I think we get a resolution soon.

Just stopping by to say I love this movie (A Knight's Tale - no clue where the dog comes from but I love it)

I don't believe Bryson showed a lot of promise in the NHL last season so I have low expectations for him and wouldn't expect him to be in the NHL or at least on this team when they get to competing. I will add he has already gotten to a point in his career I didn’t expect him to do there’s definitely potential he keeps doing that.

You could also play Eakin on Jupiter and run Daniel Briere's corpse onto the ice instead.

Oooh oooh do me next! I agree on Power over Cozens, Quinn at three and R2 being WAY too high. Also: are we severely underrating the possibility that Oskari Laaksonen is in the NHL full-time this season? He played 28 games in the AHL last year as a righty and produced at a pretty good clip. We don't have a lot of options on the right side (especially if Miller is out). He's a guy that we keep hearing could be one of our biggest steals and it might be time to find out.

And it won’t be because he shouldn’t have, as noted by the games missed for reasons out of his control. Gretzky did have two lockouts but no COVID and his lockouts cost him 52 fewer games than the two Ovi has gone through.

This is something I’ll have to consider a little more going into next year’s evaluations which is something I’ll probably do sooner rather than later. Hope to be a bit more involved in the process next year. What was your impression of Connor Hurley his draft year?

My crack at rankings: 1. Owen Power 2. Dylan Cozens 3. Jack Quinn 4. JJ Peterka 5. Isak Rosen 6. Mattias Samuelsson 7. UPL 8. Arttu Ruotsalainen 9. Aleksandr Kisakov 10. Erik Portillo 11. Ryan Johnson 12. Prokhor Poltapov 13. Oskari Laaksonen 14. Jacob Bryson 15. Devon Levi I’ll be honest after about eight it became just a bunch of hunches based on limited knowledge but I’m going to work some this offseason on getting to know the new guys more. I do believe Power has a slight edge over Cozens as a prospect. Even though Kisakov was drafted BELOW Poltapov I really like what Kisakov brings to the table.

I thought he looked big there, too.

Fun fact: Isak Rosen has already played in two games since being drafted. He scored in a 4-2 loss for Sweden against Finland yesterday. He led the team with five shots in a 4-2 loss to USA today. Here is his goal yesterday: Here’s a look at a really nice play to give himself a scoring chance in today’s loss:

He’ll be on the Instigators tomorrow. This is one thing I noticed about Owen Power: he is VERY media friendly. He went on every show imaginable before the draft. He even went on a cheap local podcast run by people with very little social media presence and just zoom chatted with some hockey nerds. It’s awesome to see him engage like that.

It’s very likely he spends at least one more year in the SHL. If he is able to produce in an expanded role I’d expect we see him competing for a spot in camp in 2022-23.

I think the Samson deal was a good young piece away from being good. The argument for it appears to be that RFAs don’t hold a ton of value compared to the player they are. If we had Buchnevich and made THAT deal I’d have thrown something.

And even in basketball it’s incredibly rare, taking all-time greats to accomplish it. It takes a village, they say.