Jim Matheson reports in today's Edmonton Journal that the frontrunners for Ryan Smyth are "Colorado, Detroit, Toronto and the New York Rangers" in an article entitled "Don't Count on Ryan flyin' back here".With Smyth's money still in the Oilers' bank account (it was $27M/5yr), and the Oilers having stated they'd like to add a shooter for Ales Hemsky, on top of this club's penchant for trading instead of signing unrestricted free agents, can we compile a list of "possibles"? I'm not going to include names like Gagne or Hossa because that's pretty much a pipe dream. Can you imagine a new GM like Holmgren dealing Gagne for any combination of Oilers players? After watching how quickly Kevin Lowe's team fell apart when he dealt away his best players? I doubt it.
Glenn Murray, Boston: He'll be 35 in November and has two more years at $4.15M. The Bruins are apparently interested in moving him. Murray's a big guy but isn't really a power forward and he played in fewer than 60 games this season due to various injuries. Still, he scored 28 goals, 12 on the powerplay.
Alexei Kovalev, Montreal: He'll be 35 in February and has two more years at $4.5M. He's a ridiculous talent, but doesn't display it as much as he used to. He seems to be in a bad situation so might blossom in a new town. 18-29-47 last season, with 22 powerplay points, he's not the shooter Edmonton is looking for to compliment Hemsky.
Sergei Samsonov, Montreal: He'll be 29 in October and has one more year at $3.525M. He had a terrible year, but this guy is talented. He's a speed merchant which would help him on the Hemsky line (Sykora's footspeed isn't close) and certainly on the powerplay.
Miro Satan, NYI: He turns 33 in October, and has one more year at $4.5M. Ideal match for Hemsky in a lot of ways (although they both play RW). Satan is a Czech and he can score goals, plus he's very consistent. In the last 5 NHL seasons, he's scored 37,26,29,35 and 27 goals.
Brad Richards, Tampa Bay: He turns 28 next May and has 4 years left at $7.8M. In many ways Richards is a guy who solves all of Edmonton's problems in one fell swoop. If they were truly one player away and didn't have to send a Shawn Horcoff the other way then Richards might be ideal. He's a quality offensive player who loves to shoot the puck and he can handle the heavy work. He's coming off a subpar season but these guys aren't available when they're at their best. I'd like him in Edmonton but the dollars and the players going to other way scream 'robbing Peter to pay Paul.'
I'll have the West later today.
On the contrary, I think Hossa is a very good candidate for us to acquire by trade. Atlanta has 6 players under contract and two of them account for about $13 million in budget this year now that Hossa's contract has ramped up his salary to a whopping $7 million. Combined with the fact that Atlanta has no prospects to speak of, no draft picks, and no young players looking to step up and I'd say Kevin Lowe is looking into what it could cost to get him.
ReplyDeletejon: Which is great. If there weren't 28 other GMs then Lowe might be able to swing a deal. However, the asking price for Hossa is going to be a little more dear than Lupul, Pouliot and a pick.
ReplyDeleteKevin Lowe lacks established NHL players to deal in return for quality talent. Raffi Torres, Shawn Horcoff, Jason Smith, those are the players teams are going to ask for, along with Pisani, Moreau, Staios.
The Oilers probably have fewer than 10 guys who have enough value to get something real in return, and those are the exact guys he can't trade.
What would Lupul, Pouliot and a pick get you? Not Hossa. Better offers for a player of that calibre will come from somewhere, and chances are that team has many more established NHL players to deal.
LT: What do you think about Yashin as a possibility? Might not be ideal but I would say he is in the ballpark of the other names mentioned and probably reasonably affordable.
ReplyDeletePersonally I don't think Hossa is a great probability but I don't consider it a "pipe dream" either. There aren't that many teams that can take on his salary while clearly the oilers can. Frankly if I was the Atlanta GM I would sooner deal Kovalchuk. Yes he is insanely talented and in the old NHL pre salary cap that would be fine. However; in a salary capped league your best player needs to be able to lead you to the holy land and imo he will always be too selfish to lead them there. Ovechkin has has the jam and Kovalchuk most likely never will.
Yashin might be a good pickup for Edmonton, actually. They aren't going to contend in 07-08, and if Yashin can come in and catch fire they might have a player moving forward.
ReplyDeleteThat contract damn near killed his career.
LT - kind of OT but will post it here anyway. Interesting the rumours of potential for Selanne and possilbly Neidermeyer (sp?) to retire. Would set up a number or interesting scenarios for the Ducks.
ReplyDeleteNo doubt Burke is a very good GM (although his talent identification is overrated imo) and he would have much more cap space to use. However; most likely not going to find the quality of players he would be losing and certainly not at the $$$. Also might find himself in an Oilers situation where thanks to the teams success he is very close to draft day and July 1 with some real important questions left unanswered.
Not to mention the ducks would then be another big edition to the FA demand side pusing $$$ up even more.
Fun to speculate....
Yeah as someone else mentioned, the key thing to keep in mind is salary. There are few teams who are able or willing to take on 7 million dollars for a winger. I think the Oilers are one of the few teams who would be willing to and who also have the assets to negotiate.
ReplyDeleteI think it was mentioned in a recent Matheson article that the Oilers have no interest in Yashin as a free agent pickup.
No to all names you mentioned.
ReplyDeleteExcept the last one. ESPECIALLY if you can get Richards without giving up Shawn Horcoff. Follow that by grabbing Mr. Hartnell....
Hartnell Richards Hemsky
Torres Stoll Pouliot
Moreau Horcoff Pisani
That "3rd" line is more of a "2nd" line in terms of matchups (hell, they might draw HTH against other team's top lines sometimes), but you get the idea.
Two things the Oilers need to focus on: a kick-ass top-nine at forward and a solid top-four on the blueline. That's what's going to get this team back in the playoffs.
Because if it doesn't, yes, Kevin Lowe's job is in serious jeopardy....
I think it's a giant leap to say we can't possibly contend this season.
ReplyDeleteHossa is 1 year from UFA status, $7 million dollar contract, $6 million cap hit, on a team with few draft picks or contracts, on a team with no centers and with financial challenges.
ReplyDeleteI think that means that Hossa is certainly available. Hossa has produced in his career without a top tier center, and is a reliable even strength player.
I agree with Shawn - we can, it just takes a lot of things going right.
ReplyDeleteI think guys like Torres and Horcoff are solid bets to bounce back next season and both will likely outplay their contract.
The big issues when I look at this team is the missing top end talent (Richards...), and the Lupul contract. Unfair? Possibly, but simply said the guy was so utterly terrible last year that it killed us in a lot of ways. Either the guy just explodes for no apparent reason and scores 40 while playing some decent defense and figuring out the PP - or we ship him off. I'd rather ship him off because I don't see him ever being that great of hockey player, but I know some people still think he can turn this around, so maybe he will =D. But either way I think if we want to compete next year a lot of it lies on Lupul. At his cap hit and with his talent, he's going to get the ice time.... if he can't do anything with it, and is anywhere near as bad as he was last year, we're down to two lines instead of three.
And we're not winning hockey games like that.
I think Hossa is an excellent target, but my question is: can Atlanta take on players with more than one year on their contract? Is their ownership issue cleared up? Because I know last year they were not allowed to sign anyone to longer than one season. I think we match up decently with Atlanta, and the prospect of having a Hossa-Hemsky-Pisani troika on the right side makes me drool. What would it take to get it done?
Lupul + Greene + Schremp + NYI's 1st? Is that even near it for Hossa? And would he sign here for 4 years and $28,000,000?
PDO,
ReplyDeleteYou must be having a good day as that is the most positive I have heard you in months. ;-)
I am also warming to the Hossa idea. I know he is a natural RW but can he play LW since that is where oilers are weakest? He kills penalties, can score goals all on his own and is good ES
Not sure of the Atlanta 1 year rule of which you speak but I could see a package along the lines of Lupul+Smith + Schremp being attractive with some mixing and matching of sweetners as needed.
Top 6 of hossa, hemsky, horcoff, stoll, pisani and torres would be very dangerous and a bottom six of moreau, nilsson, pouliout, thoreson, reasoner and stortini/brodziak/JFJ would give lots of opitions for a scoring line, checking line or a couple balanced lines as need be.
You lose Smith but frankly if the rumours of Tarnstrom coming back are true you have to move a D man or two somewhere along the line. The oilers also need to lose some C's and clearly the younger ones are best to move as the oilers can't get any younger and compete
LT you are pretty high on bringing back Samsonov, this is the 2nd or 3rd time you posted that.
ReplyDeleteFor me if he came back I would put him on the 2nd line as outside that play against Detroit him and Hemsky seemed to have zero chemistry together.
I think I may have mentioned this before but when I was on the Bruins board one time I mentioned that I felt Sammy and Ales had no chemistry. They mentioned that is why an early on experiment between Joe Thornton and Samsonov was scrubbed and rarely returned to as they had no chemistry. Then one poster said they had trouble finding anyone that clicked with him.
Fast forward to Samsonov's struggles in Montreal. I read a thread on the their board and all the posters are basically throwing up their arms in amazement that Samsonov and Kovalev have zero chemistry together and they were certain that they would.
So beyond his dipsy doodles does Sammy even work well with his linemates? The other thing was did anyone else feel in his time in Edmonton that they were surprised how ineffective he seemed on the PP?
That and at the end of the season MacT mentioned they needed a right handed forward for the PP. Mac then said "kind of like Samsonov even though he was not a good fit for our team".
Anyway if it is true that Yashin is not the head case he is made out to be that might be an interesting option.
According to the posters on the Bruins board around the trade deadline they described Glenn Murray in a way that made him sound more or less like a more offensively consistent, slightly more intense Lupul.
Satan is an interesting possibility, have you heard anything LT about him being available?
I love Richards but his contract and possibly his asking price scare me. Can you imagine though if we somehow pried him loose while keeping Stoll and Horc.
We would be sick down the middle with Richards, Horcoff, Stoll... It is nice to dream. But MacT could really go to war with match ups with that threesome.
I'd bring back Sammy if he was bought out and thus he's coming back on the cheap. Then again, from the Oilers perspective, trading for him and his full contract would be a good wink and nod to the fans, ie it would get them closer to the cap, and that's a promise they're throwing around, but it wouldn't be a contract that would haunt them for long.
ReplyDeleteIf the Oilers fail on the trade and FA market, then maybe bringing in Sammy, even at full freight, wouldn't be such a bad idea. Hey, it's not my money and I don't care if the EIG spends money on Sammy just for the "cap fuck of it."