I have a ton of respect for the Denver Post's respected, resident hockey head, Adrian Dater.
Adrian's latest blog post asks the question:
Should the Avs give up entirely on at-times brilliant centreman, Paul Stastny?
The Avs fan base must feel the same about Stastny how some Sabres fans feel about Thomas Vanek. Streaky. Long stretches of brilliance interrupted by weeks of silence.
Is it time for Darcy Regier to offer a need-for-need proposal to Colorado? They need a scoring left winger to support their trio of young snipers O'Reilly, Duchene, and Landeskog. The Sabres are searching high and low for a solid, proven #1 centreman.
Dater doesn't think the Avs will be trading the enigmatic winger any time soon. HOWEVER, if the right player, say a left winger, like Bobby Ryan, with a penchant and pedigree for scoring goals by the bushels full, like Bobby Ryan were made available, then the Avs should give it some serious consideration.
Dater writes:
I still don’t think Stastny will be traded yet, though. I could be proven wrong on that, but if the Avs were offering him around for a player like Ryan, I bet Anaheim would have already made that deal by now. To me, Anaheim would be foolish not to take Stastny if offered for Ryan. They need a center quite badly, and they can afford his $6.6 million cap hit. To pass up a player of his caliber for an unhappy Ryan would be just plain stupid.
My sense is that teams call the Avs and inquire about Stastny from time to time, but that the Avs are highly reluctant to move him. As much as he has frustrated fans with his up-and-down play the last couple of years, the fact remains: he’s still only 26, he’s scored 20 or more goals in three straight seasons and five of the six in his career. The only season he didn’t, 2007-08, he missed 37 games with injuries. He has 374 points in 427 career games.
Still, the flipside is: the Avs have two good young centers already in Matt Duchene and Ryan O’Reilly. If Stastny stays, one of them is going to have to be a third-line center. Or, Duchene would have to play left wing perhaps if the Avs don’t bring in someone new still.
Duchene is better as a center. He wants to play center, and that is the spot that would best benefit him and the team. If Stastny were moved, it would cement Duchene-O’Reilly as the top-two centers, and assuming the Avs get a quality left winger in a package involving Stastny, you’d have a potentially dynamic top two lines that could look like this:
Landeskog-O’Reilly-Downie
Ryan?-Duchene-Parenteau
Imagine Vanek riding the LW with Duchene and the recently acquired PA Parentau. That could be an amazing line.
Denverpost.com is running a poll on its Avs page right now:
Poll Question:
Which Avalanche center would you be willing to part with in order to get Bobby Ryan in an Avs sweater?
5%- Matt Duchene
29 votes 41%- Paul Stastny
207 votes
7%- Ryan O'Reilly
37 votes
1%
Any of them
7 votes
35%
None of them
175 votes
8%
Keep the forwards, trade Erik Johnson
42 votes
497 votes
Looks to me that the Avs fan base are willing to move Stastny in order to hold on to O'Reilly, Duchene, and Landeskog. Stastny's their odd man out.
Stastny is no chunk of day-old bratwurst. The kid has game. Sick. He's proven himself in the NHL and on international ice. Perhaps Lake Erie breezes will do him some good.
Duchene is a middle man, not a winger. He does his best work on the dot. Ditto O'Reilly.
Stastny, at a $6.6 million cap hit, is hardly a third line centre. He needs to move. Sooner rather than later.
Its obvious that Derek Roy had no value to the Avs, otherwise they would have pulled the trigger on the alleged Roy for Stastny trade from last winter.
Pehaps, the Avs would say yes to a Stastny trade if Thomas Vanek were the Buffalo player going the Rocky Mountain Way.
I'll preface this by saying that I'm a Vanek believer. He's one of the toughest, self-less guys in today's NHL. He gets his ass kicked in front of the net every night. He wears his welts and bruises like badges of honor. He scores and can make plays. Is he looking for a change of scenery?
Imagine a top line of Ott-Stastny-Pominville. I like it a lot! Jam, sandpaper, silky hands, skill, and scoring. Thats quite a mojo of abilities all blended together in the big hockey blender of life.
The money is almost a push. Vanek, 27, will earn $7,142,857 this season and next. What will Buffalo have to offer Vanek when he's UFA eligible in two seasons?
Stastny, 26, will earn $6.6 million this and next season.
You want to shake up what's left of the core in Buffalo? Make a big bold move like Vanek for Stastny as a pre-emptive strike against Anaheim sending Bobby Ryan to Denver for Stastny.
Do what I have done. Divorce yourself from your personal feelings about vanek. Think of a potential trade the way that a scout of GM does. Personally speaking, I remember sitting with Vanek in an empty Sabres locker room, talking with him after he was bag-skated and benched during the 2006 Eastern Conference Finals vs. Carolina. His coach thought he was tired and out of shape. Vanek never groused. He never complained. He's invested his 10,000 hours in his craft and he's become a tremendous NHL player. I've spent a lot of time around HDTV, and I have the utmost respect for him and his competitive spirit. He's a warrior. He has tiger blood. He hates excuses. He's a winner, and he hates the taste of losing.
I'm not advocating trading him just for the sake of a trade. i'm suggesting that you need to trade value to get value in return. If the Sabres don't offer Vanek, then Bobby Ryan could end up in Denver, and Stastny in Anaheim. Then, Darcy is back at square one.
Question is: Would you approve of this type of trade?
Vanek was clearly peeved at locker clean out day. Well he should have been. His team played like gangbusters down the stretch, for the second season in a row, however, their best was not good enough to get them into the eighth seed. He was injured for the second half of the season and could never get himself healthy enough to score goals by the hockey bag full, when his team needed him the most.
thanks, sabres.com
***
The Dallas Stars have officially broken the ice.
Stars GM, Joe Niewendyk, has signed his first round draft choice from last month's entry draft. Radek Faksa, the 18 year old from the Kitchener Rangers, was the 13th pick overall, one slot behind Buffalo's Mikhail Grigorenko.
Faksa becomes the first, 2012 first round choice to sign his ELC.
Will Mikhail Grigorenko's signing be next?
Sabres developmental camp begins Monday at First Niagara Center. Grigorenko has been staying in Buffalo since the draft. He's been working out with Pat Kaleta, Cody McCormick and some of the vets. He will attend rookie camp, along with Girgensons, Armia, Hodgson, McNabb, Pysyk and all of the other noteworthy Sabres prospects.
Last week, Sabres GM Darcy Regier spoke about his desire and that of Grigorenko's agent, to get the native of Khabarovsk, Russia signed to his entry level deal.
Wouldn't surprise me if Regier inks Grigorenko before rookie camp opens.
Regier and Ruff are looking for a number one centreman, and Grigorenko just may have the goods and the game to be the main man in Buffalo this season. Its a lot to ask of an 18 year old, however, the buzz around Buffalo is that @Miggy25 is serious about showing the Sabres brass that he is a world class player with NHL level scoring, toughness, and vision.
Here's a recap of the first round of the 2012 Entry Draft.
#1 Edmonton Oilers Nail Yakupov (RW)
#2 Columbus Blue Jackets Ryan Murray (D)
#3 Montréal Canadiens Alex Galchenyuk (C)
#4 New York Islanders Griffin Reinhart (D)
#5 Toronto Maple Leafs Morgan Rielly (D)
#6 Anaheim Ducks Hampus Lindholm (D)
#7 Minnesota Wild Mathew Dumba (D)
#8 Pittsburgh Penguins Derrick Pouliot (D)
#9 Winnipeg Jets Jacob Trouba (D)
#10 Tampa Bay Lightning Slater Koekkoek (D)
#11 Washington Capitals Filip Forsberg (LW/RW) #12 Buffalo Sabres Mikhail Grigorenko (C)
#13 Dallas Stars Radek Faksa (C/LW) #14 Buffalo Sabres Zemgus Girgensons (C)
#15 Ottawa Senators Cody Ceci (D)
#16 Washington Capitals Tom Wilson (RW)
#17 San Jose Sharks Tomas Hertl (C)
#18 Chicago Blackhawks Teuvo Teräväinen (C/W)
#19 Tampa Bay Lightning Andrei Vasilevski (G)
#20 Philadelphia Flyers Scott Laughton (C)
#21 Calgary Flames Mark Jankowski (C)
#22 Pittsburgh Penguins Olli Määttä (D)
#23 Florida Panthers Mike Matheson (D)
#24 Boston Bruins Malcolm Subban (G)
#25 St. Louis Blues Jordan Schmaltz (D)
#26 Vancouver Canucks Brendan Gaunce (C/LW)
#27 Phoenix Coyotes Henrik Samuelsson (RW)
#28 New York Rangers Brady Skjei (D)
#29 New Jersey Devils Stefan Matteau (LW)
#30 Los Angeles Kings Tanner Pearson (LW/RW)
***
Help is on the way to the Amerks.
Williamsville native , David Leggio, has been re-upped to tend the bars.
Leggio's Career Awards:
- ECHL Goaltender of the Month 08/09
- ECHL Goaltender Of The Week 08/09
- EJHL First All-Star Team 02/03, 03/04
- NCAA (ECAC) Champion 06/07
- NCAA (ECAC) Clarkson Team MVP 06/07
- NCAA (ECAC) First All-Star Team 06/07
- NCAA (ECAC) Goaltender of the Year 06/07
- NCAA (ECAC) Knight Club Award 07/08
- SM-liiga Champion 09/10
The Sabres have also re-signed former Amerk/Sabre power forward, Mark Mancari.
The Sabres confirmed today that they have indeed signed centre, Kevin Porter.
****
Roberto Luongo in a Blackhawks sweater? Sounds like it may happen.
Luongo un-wound and yucked it up on Jeff O'Neill's radio show on 99.3 Th eFox in Couver today.
You want the truth about whats going on in Vancouver? Just listen to Luongo.
Join the Discussion:
»