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George McPhee Explains Ryan Reaves Trade |
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Sheng Peng
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This is the full transcript from George McPhee's press conference last night about the Ryan Reaves trade. To recap the three-way deal:
Thanks to the Golden Knights communications staff for the transcript.
Opening Statement…
George McPhee: We completed a transaction today that brought to us Ryan Reaves and a fourth-round pick. Ryan is a big, strong guy that brings some grit and real depth to our hockey club. He’s a unique player. These players, the tough guys in this league, many of them have been rendered obsolete because they can’t play. This guy can play and will be able to help us out. We picked up a fourth-round pick along the way.
Thoughts on the challenge of making the deal happen…
It was a little convoluted when you have three teams involved and it ended up being several transactions, I think four transactions to get it done. We gave up some cap space. We have a lot of cap space and a minor league player to do this. We picked up two assets. I thought it was a good deal for the club.
Thoughts on the dynamic of a three-team trade…
You end up having several discussions during the day with lots of people. I talked to Pittsburgh a couple of days ago and then we talked yesterday. That part came together quickly. The deal actually came together quickly in terms of what everyone wanted to do. Actually, completing it with the league was harder. It took some time.
Thoughts on the difficulties of the trade..
This was more for Ottawa and Pittsburgh to work out. We told them what we were prepared to do and if they could get it worked out, then we’ll participate. But it was a little convoluted and the bottom line is that I don’t know that all of the details would interest you all that much. At the end of the day, we had two assets that we think will help the hockey club.
Thoughts on why they wanted/needed to make a move….
I don’t think that we need to do anything really, but if there are opportunities to make the club a little bit better - one percent, two percent, three percent - you do it if it’s not going to affect chemistry and if you’re not going to take anything out of the lineup. We did a transaction today where we added to our lineup and we didn’t take anything out. It didn’t cost us a draft pick or players off of our roster or our future.
Thoughts on if there are any concerns with Ryan Reaves’ style of play…
No he gets around really well. We wouldn’t have done this transaction if we had any concerns about that. Kelly McCrimmon has known this player for a long time. We thought he was really effective in St. Louis last year and really effective the playoffs last year. He just didn’t get to play as much in Pittsburgh as he did in St. Louis. We’ll see how it goes here.
Thoughts on the team’s activity heading toward the trade deadline..
I think the answer to your question is we talked to a lot of teams about things. It’s what you do at this time of year. We like our team, we like the way they’ve played all year, and at this time of year you’re talking to everybody to find out what’s going on out there and if there’s any opportunities to make yourself better.
Thoughts on how you fit in as the third team in the deal and on the importance of keeping Brassard in the east…
We heard some of that, that he might be coming west and we were able to keep him in the east. Was that a material part of the deal, no. We just saw an opportunity to pick up Ryan Reaves and get a draft pick in what was a simple transaction for us. Cap space that we have a lot of.
Thoughts on the decision to hang on to players taken in the expansion draft as opposed to dealing at the deadline…
Yeah I’m not sure we’re at that point yet. Obviously we had a master plan and if you look at our roster, we have a lot of younger players on our team. We weren’t going to just get a bunch of guys to flip. We tried to get young guys that could be with us for a while and stay with us, and we did that. A lot of the guys that are here are going to be here a long time. So would there have been opportunities to flip people if things have gone a different way, maybe. But this is where we are now and this is our team. And we’re going to do the very best we can to keep winning and try to win the next game in front of us.
Thoughts on making Reaves a contributor during with the injuries the team is facing...
Yeah I think we have five players hurt now. And we’ve been that way for a number of weeks. We’ve had a lot of guys out of the lineup and you can never have enough bodies around. And we just think that he can be really effective for us. We wouldn’t have done it if we didn’t think that way. And we’ll see how things go and who gets in and hope that we get healthy soon and see what we can do.
Thoughts on where Reeves will fit in the team chemistry…
It’s not a major transaction, it’s something more subtle that we did today. We didn’t give up futures, we didn’t take anything out of our lineup. I don’t see it as something that will change chemistry in any way. And this is the kind of player that most teams, most players on teams welcome. To bring in that kind of size and grit, most players like that. So we thought it made sense to do the deal.
Thoughts on how you read the upcoming trade deadline…
I never know what’s going to transpire. I don’t think anyone does. So, all GMs are active making calls, again seeing what might be out there that can help a club now or in the future. I honestly don’t know what’s going to transpire. We’ll keep talking to people and could be a lot, could be nothing, I don’t know. We’ll see what the next 48 hours brings.
Thoughts on what made you the team to get in here and get this player and pick without giving up much…
I don’t know. I haven’t done that sort of analysis. I have a good relationship with Jim Rutherford, maybe trusted that he could do something with us. I did that, and I moved onto other phone calls. I haven’t had a whole lot of time to reflect on why it was us and not somebody else.
Thoughts on if your plan is to keep UFA’s past the deadline…
I don’t anticipate doing a whole lot here in the next few days, but I’ve said that before and things happen. I don’t know how to answer that question other than to say we’ll see what happens over the next 48 hours.
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Gerard Gallant added his thoughts about Reaves after the 6-3 victory over Vancouver:
Thoughts on adding Ryan Reaves to their roster…
Our owner is a guy that wants to win and he made that clear from the first of the year. So we’re going to look at every option and try to make our team better. We got a big, strong guy that can fill a role for us and do a good job. We’re excited.
Thoughts on how much input he had on the trade…
We always talk about every issue. We talk about that with me and the other coaching staff. That’s the way things work with a good organization. He’s going to fit in real well with us. He’s a big, strong guy. He played in St. Louis last year and he played a lot of important minutes on the fourth line with a couple of other guys. He’s going to create a role. I want him to be a good hockey player. We all know what he can do, but we want him to be a good hockey player first and that’s what we expect from him.
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