Welcome to the Hotstove! As always, I'm your host, Travis Yost.
Crazy as it sounds, longtime Tampa Bay Lightning forward and captain Martin St. Louis has apparently requested a trade -- likely the result of his initial snubbing from the Canadian Olympic team by general manager Steve Yzerman.
HockeyBuzz's Michael Stuart compiled the notables on the deal. As far as rumors go, it seems pretty accurate that at some point, St. Louis asked out. Beat writers from around the United States have independently confirmed, and it appears this storm is only going to grow in the coming days.
The million dollar question here is what the current situation is. We can comfortably say that Martin St. Louis asked Steve Yzerman for a trade at some point prior to the Olympics, but it's unknown whether making the team as Steven Stamkos' injury replacement quelled any part of St. Louis' anger. If it did, that's sort of an important detail.
But, what if it didn't? Martin St. Louis himself didn't seem to shoot down the rumors any. His comments this morning to local media implicitly confirmed that the initial discussions about his "future" were accurate, but did not address whether the player still held the same sentiment.
Obvious as it may be, the idea of Martin St. Louis becoming a name on the block prior to the upcoming trade deadline is absolutely massive. St. Louis is comfortably a point-per-game player over the last five years at a 1.10 per-game clip, and has shown no signs of slowing down. The 38-year old is signed through the 2014-2015 season.
There are already reports that the New York Rangers attempted to swap winger Ryan Callahan for Martin St. Louis, but that those talks died out fairly quickly. One can probably assume that Tampa Bay was the one who did not have interest in the deal.
In terms of rentals, St. Louis might be as good as it gets. The questions to you guys: (1) Should the Tampa Bay Lightning consider moving their veteran winger?; (2) If so, what team should be interested, and at what cost?
More later.
Thanks for reading!