What's Murray's next move ?

Now that Heatley no longer exists, what will Murray do next. He has gone on record as saying he wanted to add a physical D. Any predictions ?

Well, he's got some extra bodies, so if he can find a well to package a guy like Kelly and Schubert for a tough d-man I'd been down with that. Ideally, we need a little more free cap space, so it doesn't have to be a stud d-man, just a big body who's reliable and can step in and spot guys out.

Offer-sheet for Kessel?

I hope it's to move Kelly. We have too much money on our bottom-6 and it hurts to see him pencilled in alongside players with the potential to do things offensively.

I thought he might turn around and trade Kelly for a bruising D-man, but I have a feeling he loves the makeup of our forwards lines - so I don't think he'll do anything else.

Plus, there must be a feeling of comradely on the Sens right now. Heatley's gone and no other player got traded in the deal, Murray likes the squad, he likes them. Should instill some confidence.

Where's the room on the blue-line? If he's adding a defensive defenceman (which IMO we don't need, Phillips, Volchenkov and to a lesser extent Kuba fulfill that role), one of Picard or Lee has to be on the move (assuming Karlsson's off-limits).

Some good points there by both of you.

Pretty damn quick on the avatar asq2.

Lee has a 2 way deal, dont see why he would have to be on the move at all. If they think Lee is the better option they may very well try and move Picard, i agree with that.

asq2 wrote:Where's the room on the blue-line? If he's adding a defensive defenceman (which IMO we don't need, Phillips, Volchenkov and to a lesser extent Kuba fulfill that role), one of Picard or Lee has to be on the move (assuming Karlsson's off-limits).

I wouldn't call Kuba necessarily tough in the least. He's effective, but, tough? Nah. So Phillips and A-Train are the closest we have to real toughness on the backend. Not too sure about that.

hemlock wrote:Some good points there by both of you.

Pretty damn quick on the avatar asq2.

I was pretty upset at the up-start, so I'm trying to convince myself that MM is on the path to becoming an elite winger in the NHL.

EDIT: And he looks pretty bad-Donkey in this picture.

More speculation?? I thought we were done that and can now sit back and enjoy our new look

SpezDispenser wrote:

asq2 wrote:Where's the room on the blue-line? If he's adding a defensive defenceman (which IMO we don't need, Phillips, Volchenkov and to a lesser extent Kuba fulfill that role), one of Picard or Lee has to be on the move (assuming Karlsson's off-limits).

I wouldn't call Kuba necessarily tough in the least. He's effective, but, tough? Nah. So Phillips and A-Train are the closest we have to real toughness on the backend. Not too sure about that.

Fair enough, I was focussing more on the defensive side of things.

Physical offensive defencemen are hard to acquire (Phaneuf, Pronger, Weber, Chara...um...Bogosian...)

Since they seem out of the question, I'm assuming that we're talking defensive defencemen (otherwise, we should just put Schubert out there, who can't do either). Do we need another one of those?

I think the lineup is pretty much set, aside from perhaps waiving one of Schubert or Donovan, this teams line up is pretty much set.

Cheechoo - Spezza - Kovalev
Michalek - Kelly - Alfi
Foligno - Fisher - Shannon
Neil - Winchester - Ruutu

Kuba/Karlsson
Phillips/A Train
Campoli/Lee
Picard

Leclaire
Elliott

Not a bad lineup, not a lot has to be done either. It might be a good idea to keep Schubert over a guy like Picard for the simple fact Schubert can ill in anywhere... anyways, that's how I think things will look. Murray has done a pretty good job considering everything on his plate.

Cheechoo apparently played LW on the 3rd line in SJ. Don't know if that means he can play it, or if the Sharks just didn't really care anymore.

Cheechoo - Spezza - Kovalev
Michalek - Fisher - Alfredsson
Foligno - Kelly - Shannon
Ruutu - Winchester - Neil

Kuba - Karlsson
Phillips - Volchenkov
Campoli (not a fan of him on the 3rd pairing) - Lee/Picard

Lecalire
Elliott

SpezDispenser wrote:I thought he might turn around and trade Kelly for a bruising D-man, but I have a feeling he loves the makeup of our forwards lines - so I don't think he'll do anything else.

Plus, there must be a feeling of comradely on the Sens right now. Heatley's gone and no other player got traded in the deal, Murray likes the squad, he likes them. Should instill some confidence.

Bingo. One of the things about this deal (not necessarily what I like about it) is that we did not lose any roster player other than the one who did not want to be here. Heatley's demands did not result in anyone else being shipped out. That has *got* to make them tighter. Imagine if we lost Kelly as part of this deal. Kelly by all accounts is very strong in the dressing room. If he was dealt the players left could be dealing with a little "survivor guilt". Instead, right now they are dancing ans singing "Ding-dong the witch is dead".

wprager wrote:Bingo. One of the things about this deal (not necessarily what I like about it) is that we did not lose any roster player other than the one who did not want to be here. Heatley's demands did not result in anyone else being shipped out. That has *got* to make them tighter. Imagine if we lost Kelly as part of this deal. Kelly by all accounts is very strong in the dressing room. If he was dealt the players left could be dealing with a little "survivor guilt". Instead, right now they are dancing ans singing "Ding-dong the witch is dead".

:^^^^: Always with the zinger at the end.