rumours of the week

Urkie wrote:I'm not against it but I just don't think it will happen. First of all, we don't have enough assets to acquire him via trade and secondly, we need to rid ourselves of some contracts first if he does become available on July 1st. Sure, it would be nice to add him but it's probably not going to happen.

If we finish around the same spot and draft around 8, 9 or 10 this year then I really hope we can get Granlund. He's a little small but he'll grow to about 6 feet and he's got a ton of skill. He'd be the most talented winger we've drafted since Havlat if we did end up with him that is.

It's likely not gonna happen, but if it meant ditching Kovalev and Kuba, I'd do it in a heartbeat.

shabbs wrote:How many times have we heard "too much, for too long" from the Sens? It's gonna be $9M+ for 10 years, I just don't see us getting in on that.

There's certainly an argument both ways. Too much for too long applies to guys who aren't even in the same discussion as Kovalchuk. Spezza, Heatley, they're nothing compared to him. But...he can't seem to propel his team to the playoffs even though they play in the worst division and they have ample amounts of talent now.

Don't know. I guess I needn't worry, because the odds are stacked against us getting him.

Whoever brought up Sykora has an excellent plug for our injury problem/lack of NHL depth wingers. The more I think about it, the more I'm intrigued - depending on the price of course - I would hardly want to pay anything.

SpezDispenser wrote:It's likely not gonna happen, but if it meant ditching Kovalev and Kuba, I'd do it in a heartbeat.

If we could ditch both of those guys for prospects/picks then that would make my day but how do you go about doing that? In all likelyhood we'd have to take a contract back in both cases and not really save much cap space anyway. I think we're stuck with Kovalev until the summer when teams have more time to open up some cap space.

Kuba on the other hand. I don't see us being able to get rid of him until the end of his contract unless he turns it around between now and then. I'm not saying he won't but he's definitely not worth the money he's being paid right now. He's the guy that I really want to see traded though. I'd give him away for pretty much anything unless we're taking back another Cheechoo.

Urkie wrote:
If we could ditch both of those guys for prospects/picks then that would make my day but how do you go about doing that? In all likelyhood we'd have to take a contract back in both cases and not really save much cap space anyway. I think we're stuck with Kovalev until the summer when teams have more time to open up some cap space.

Kuba on the other hand. I don't see us being able to get rid of him until the end of his contract unless he turns it around between now and then. I'm not saying he won't but he's definitely not worth the money he's being paid right now. He's the guy that I really want to see traded though. I'd give him away for pretty much anything unless we're taking back another Cheechoo.

I think Kuba's gonzo either this summer or next personally - and he's the kind of 3rd or 4th D-man a lot of teams need/want. He'd be great for us if we had a number one and two D-man and he was slotted 3rd. I honestly could see a Kuba for Campbell trade happen in the summer - Chicago gets a nice, solid guy to round out their top 4, we get the PP specialist/puck mover that we covet to go with Karlsson.

Kovalev is an interesting one. In the summer, we might get a taker, or Murray might just say screw it and see how he does on the Sens. But, in these hypothetical situations, I was going after Kovalchuk on July 1, not at the deadline or before.

SpezDispenser wrote:I think Kuba's gonzo either this summer or next personally - and he's the kind of 3rd or 4th D-man a lot of teams need/want. He'd be great for us if we had a number one and two D-man and he was slotted 3rd. I honestly could see a Kuba for Campbell trade happen in the summer - Chicago gets a nice, solid guy to round out their top 4, we get the PP specialist/puck mover that we covet to go with Karlsson.

Kovalev is an interesting one. In the summer, we might get a taker, or Murray might just say screw it and see how he does on the Sens. But, in these hypothetical situations, I was going after Kovalchuk on July 1, not at the deadline or before.

I hope Kuba is gonzo this summer because not only have I hated the way he's played but I've heard he doesn't fit in with the guys in the room. Hopefully you're right and we can deal him this summer.

Urkie wrote:

SpezDispenser wrote:I think Kuba's gonzo either this summer or next personally - and he's the kind of 3rd or 4th D-man a lot of teams need/want. He'd be great for us if we had a number one and two D-man and he was slotted 3rd. I honestly could see a Kuba for Campbell trade happen in the summer - Chicago gets a nice, solid guy to round out their top 4, we get the PP specialist/puck mover that we covet to go with Karlsson.

Kovalev is an interesting one. In the summer, we might get a taker, or Murray might just say screw it and see how he does on the Sens. But, in these hypothetical situations, I was going after Kovalchuk on July 1, not at the deadline or before.

I hope Kuba is gonzo this summer because not only have I hated the way he's played but I've heard he doesn't fit in with the guys in the room. Hopefully you're right and we can deal him this summer.

The right deal was last season at the deadline. I would hazard a guess and say his value will never be that high again. He could be an extra guy though as someone mentioned, a team looking for someone to round out a top four. Someone to give a team an extra edge in the playoffs.

SpezDispenser wrote:Whoever brought up Sykora has an excellent plug for our injury problem/lack of NHL depth wingers. The more I think about it, the more I'm intrigued - depending on the price of course - I would hardly want to pay anything.

Twas me... and I was serious.

I agree with SpezD, you break the bank with an offer to Kovalchuk. This isn't a normal free agent, this is a franchise changer.

Not too mention he's twice the player Heatley is.

With that being said, we'll bow out like fools.

shabbs wrote:

SpezDispenser wrote:Whoever brought up Sykora has an excellent plug for our injury problem/lack of NHL depth wingers. The more I think about it, the more I'm intrigued - depending on the price of course - I would hardly want to pay anything.

Twas me... and I was serious.

He's a scratch already in Minnesota. Why would we even want this guy for free?

SDH89 wrote:I agree with SpezD, you break the bank with an offer to Kovalchuk. This isn't a normal free agent, this is a franchise changer.

Not too mention he's twice the player Heatley is.

With that being said, we'll bow out like fools.

If he reaches July 1...all bets are off. It'll be nutty.

hemlock wrote:He's a scratch already in Minnesota. Why would we even want this guy for free?

I can't speak for anyone else, but for me the winning equation here is that he's scored 20+ goals the last ten NHL seasons he's played. He's played 900+ games and is almost a PPG player. It's not like he's 38, he's 32 (or thereabouts), he needs a center (Spezza or Fisher) to feed him some passes and he knows how to finish them. There's nothing anyone can tell me that can persuade me otherwise - once a guy has scored that many goals, that many times, he knows where it's at. And again, this is not Cheechoo, he didn't score 56 goals one year, then 37 and down the crapper, he's been perfectly consistent around 20 goals a year.

It would be so worth our time to inquire.

SpezDispenser wrote:

SDH89 wrote:I agree with SpezD, you break the bank with an offer to Kovalchuk. This isn't a normal free agent, this is a franchise changer.

Not too mention he's twice the player Heatley is.

With that being said, we'll bow out like fools.

If he reaches July 1...all bets are off. It'll be nutty.

i dout murray goes the distance cash wise for him uness melnyk puts the order in.

what's the league maximum now $/lenght? did they enforce anything on 7 year contracts yet?

sykora, again is a short term solution which i'm fine with for now. as long as it doesn't cost us much... cheechoo

minny likes a gamble, latendresse worked out for them(much to my surprise).
i just hope we don't make a play for an old dog standing on one leg with a couple of years left on his contract...

hemlock wrote:

shabbs wrote:

SpezDispenser wrote:Whoever brought up Sykora has an excellent plug for our injury problem/lack of NHL depth wingers. The more I think about it, the more I'm intrigued - depending on the price of course - I would hardly want to pay anything.

Twas me... and I was serious.

He's a scratch already in Minnesota. Why would we even want this guy for free?

I think there's something else going on there, but he has been treated strangely of late. I'd see this as a short term solution only though.

SpezDispenser wrote:

Flo The Action wrote:unfortunetly a re-signed kova would cost more then spezza. i meant in a package....

Diddle that then, we'll take our chances getting someone like him on the open market. Although, I know where you're coming from, Kovalchuk might be top 5 league-wide in terms of raw talent. Crosby, Malkin, Ovechkin...4th even.

In terms of goal scoring and drive, I think he is better than Crosby.

SpezDispenser wrote:

Flo The Action wrote:
the other day i was mentoning that the only time i talked of trading spezza was part of a package for a re-sign kovalchuk. so i agree with you on that one, but i doubt those type of players come up often and it todays NHL they get traded at the deadline with a new contract in hand.

Pfft. Spezza for Kovalchuk? Where the heck do I sign? No takebacks either, once it's done you can kiss my arse.

That's funny. When was the last time a team owned a 1st and 2nd overall pick of a draft?

Flo The Action wrote:

SpezDispenser wrote:

SDH89 wrote:I agree with SpezD, you break the bank with an offer to Kovalchuk. This isn't a normal free agent, this is a franchise changer.

Not too mention he's twice the player Heatley is.

With that being said, we'll bow out like fools.

If he reaches July 1...all bets are off. It'll be nutty.

i dout murray goes the distance cash wise for him uness melnyk puts the order in.

what's the league maximum now $/lenght? did they enforce anything on 7 year contracts yet?

They haven't done anything, you can make it a 15 year if you want. They keep saying they'll investigate, but they can't really.