There is a "Cyber Monday" deal on a veteran Stanley Cup winning defenseman.
Interested?
Ian Cole, the left shot stay at home defensemen has been a healthy scratch for the Pittsburgh Penguins for past three games. Jason Mackey of the Post-Gazette reports that Pens GM Jim Rutherford is actively trying to shop Cole for a scoring forward.
Cole, 28, has played a large role on Pittsburgh's back-to-back winning Stanley Cup teams. Cole, the 18th overall pick of the St. Louis Blues in 2007, has a goal and two assists in 20 games played this season. Cole scored 5 goals and 21 assists in 2016-17. He added 9 assists in 26 Stanley Cup Playoff games last spring.
My friend in hockey and red wine, Elliotte Friedman, confirms the Mackey report and adds that Cole is free to speak with interested NHL teams.
As an addendum to the story from @JMackeyPG on Ian Cole, word is his rep -- Kevin Magnuson -- has permission to talk to other teams. Cole was terrific in last year's playoffs.
— Elliotte Friedman (@FriedgeHNIC) November 28, 2017
On a related note, the assistant general manager of the Penguins was in Buffalo on Black Friday to peep the Sabres-Oilers game. Sabres GM Jason Botterill was has intimate knowledge of all players on the current Pens roster and in their AHL incubator in Wilkes Barre-Scranton. Botterill, the former AGM of teh Pens for a decade before transitioning to Buffalo, has been eager to upgrade his Sabres D corps.
Cole will become an unrestricted free agent on July 1, 2018 and is carries a $2.1M AAV this season.
Cole is averaging 16:50 TOI this season. He has blocked 35 shots and has 26 hits. Last season, Cole had 164 hits and 194 blocked shots. In the 2017 Stanley Cup Playoffs, Cole added 44 more hits and 62 more blocked shots.
The team that lands Cole will be getting a plug and play, stay at home ass kicker who is nasty to play against.
Cole missed three games earlier this season when a Roman Josi clapper knocked out three of Cole’s chiclets and required surgery to his jaw.
Thanks, Penguins TV
In October, Rutherford made a trade with Detroit for center Riley Sheahan. The thought process behind the Sheahan trade was to find the replacement for the departed third line center Matt Cullen. Sheahan has struggled to embrace the L3 center role. He has one goal and five assists in 16 games played. Against his better judgement, Mike Sullivan has been playing Jake Guentzel at L3 center. Sidney Crosby has come to rely on Guentzel as winger. Sullivan and Rutherford don't want to tick off Crosby. Therefore, they need to find a center to stabilize their third line.
Should Botterill make a move for Cole, he has bottom six center Johan Larsson to offer as trade currency. Should Rutherford want to trade for Samson Reinhart or Zemgus Girgensons, the stakes will be much higher.
**
Phil Houlsey has seen enough of his down trodden power play units.
After Jack Eichel’s power play turnover that led an NHL-leading seventh shorthanded goals against in. Following Saturday night’s 3-0 loss to Carey Price and the Montreal Canadiens, Housley promised changes.
Understandably, Housley has thrown his PP units into Dan Bylsma’s line blender.
The NHL’s #1 PP unit from 2016-17 consisted of Rasmus Ristolainen, Jack Eichel, Ryan O'Reilly, Kyle Okposo and Sam Reinhart. The Bob Woods coached PP succeeded at a 24.6% rate.
Buffalo’s power play is 0 for its last 15 attempts and has scored only 10 PPG in 75 PP attempts this season. The struggling Sabres have scored just 27 power play points in their first 24 games of the season.
Jack Eichel has not scored a power play goals in 24 games this season. The super center scored 10 PPG and 24 PP points in 2016-17. Where has his man advantage prowess gone? O’Reilly has 4 PPG (8 PPG, 24 PPP last season) and Reinhart (9 PPG, 27 PPP last season) 2 PPG this season, while Kane, Pominville, Okposo (7 PPG, 23 PPP last season) and Pouliot have only one power play goal apiece.
The Sabres defensemen have not scored a goal this season. In 24 games, Chris Hajt’s D corps are ohfer the PP, PK and 5v5.
When Housley took over the Sabres in June, Woods was not hired by the new Sabres head coach. Woods landed in the Twin Cities with his good friend Bruce Boudreau and the Wild.
At Monday’s practice, Eichel, Reinhart, Evander Kane, Nathan Beaulieu and Victor Antipin comprises the number one PP unit. For most of the season, Kane, Beaulieu and Antipin have played on the second PP unit with Ben Pouliot and Jason Pominville.
Don't hate Kane that he hasn't been scoring on the power play. He scored only 3 PPG and 8 PPP last seaon while skate 30-45 seconds TOI per power play attempt on the second unit. His promotion to the first PP unit will allow Kane to skate 75-90 seconds with the top unit. More TOI will lead to more opportunity to score and create with the man advantage. Kane has scored 12 goals and 11 assists in 24 games this season. Eight of Kanes goals have come at even strength while three have been shorthanded and only one has been on the power play. Kane presently has 5 PP points.
Who better than Kane to provide more needed hydro-electric power to a flat-lining man advantage unit?
Housley’s new number two PP unit now features Ristolainen, O'Reilly, Kyle Okposo, Pominville and Matt Moulson, who has been a healthy scratch for the past six games. Moulson has been buried in the fourth line this season and he hasn’t played PP. last season, Moulson potted 11 PPG for Bylsma and the Sabres.
Housley’s going back to the future to see is Moulson still has PPG’s in that twig of his.
Moulson, 34, has zero goals and zero assists in 12 games played this season. When he plays, Moulson averages 10:24 TOI this season. In his NHL career, Moulson has been a power play specialist with the Islanders and Sabres. Moulson has scored 54 PPG and has accumulated 114 PP points. Housley and his power play coach Davis Payne are hoping and praying that by scrambling the PP units and adding in Moulson May be the tonic that cures that ills the woeful Sabres PP.
**
Center Jake Josefson is headed back to the IR after a promising return from the LTIR recently.
Josefson will be lost for the next 4-6 weeks with an aggravation of an ankle injury that sidelined him for 15 games.
Josefson scores his first goal as a Sabre when returned to the lineup in last Wednesday’s loss to Minnesota. In his three games playing with Jordan Nolan and Kyle Okposo, Josefson had a goal and an assist. Nolan scores two goals and an assist while Okposo chipped in a goal and two assists playing without Josefson.
One man’s loss will be another man’s gain.
The Sabres have only 12 healthy forwards now that Nosefaon is gone for a while and Seth Griffith has cleared waivers and is with the Rochester Amerks. Griffith scored just two goals and one assist in 18 games played for the Sabres.
Phil Housley said Monday he will ponder a forward calm up from the Amerks.
Evan Rodrigues and C.J. Smith are the two likely candidates that Housley will select from.
**
Housley's D corps will be getting a needed boost from a veteran war horse on Tiesdfay night when teh Sabres host the Tampa Bay Lighting.
Zach Bogosian suffered a lower body injury on September 29. Bogosian pulled up lame in the third period of Buffalo's final preseason game against the NY Islanders. Bogosian has missed the first 24 games of the season.
At the time of his injury, Bogosian was having rock solid exhibition game performances during his impressive training camp. Bogosian was skating exceptionally well and was often seen as the fourth man in the rush. His physicality, shot blocking and skating will be a long overdue upgrade to the middling Sabres defense.
Bogosian skated with Josh Gorges on Monday.
Scandella-Ristolainen McCabe-Antipin Beaulieu-Falk Gorges-Bogosian
Bogosian will be a game time decision on Tuesday.