Some off-season thoughts on the other teams in the Atlantic division for Wednesday...
BOSTON BRUINS
I think there's kind of a small concern that the Boston Bruins didn't do enough this off-season, mostly because they didn't do much of anything. They lost Jarome Iginla under something of a salary cap crunch, and parted ways with a sub-replacement level player in Shawn Thornton. Still, I don't see much reason to believe that this team won't be the Eastern Conference's best -- again -- in 2014. The core is still what it is, and that's a significantly better group over 82-games than what most of the East can offer. I think if there's any concern, it's finding a replacement for Zdeno Chara. Which, obviously, is impossible. But you want to have a first-pairing ready to go when he's moved on. At 37, he's still one of the league's best blue-liners (which is ... insane), but he's shown a little decay over the last couple of years. Age regression bites hard and fast, even for one of the best defenders in the history of the game.
BUFFALO SABRES
Aside from parting ways with Christian Ehrhoff, I've pretty much liked everything that Buffalo has done under the Tim Murray era. And, even the Ehrhoff buyout is defensible -- I'm obviously convinced he's still first-pairing caliber, but the team seemed generally concerned by the retirement penalties on the horizon. It may not have been a bullet they had to take, but getting out of that situation for the future isn't the worst move. Separately, let's talk about what Murray's doing here short and long-term: this is still a rebuilding club, they're likely going to finish near the bottom of the Eastern Conference, and 'McDavid' is already a popular buzzword amongst half of their fan base. And yet, this is a team that Murray still wants to play competitively this year. Look at his moves just this summer. He's committed $61MM in 2014-2015, buoyed largely by signings for Matt Moulson and Brian Gionta, and an extension for Tyler Ennis. Gionta's going to have moved on by the time this thing is really turned around, but you can sense that Buffalo wanted to commit long-term to types like Moulson/Gionta (and maybe even Gorges) so that these veterans are in place when the young talent is ready to knifefight the league for a playoff spot.
DETROIT RED WINGS
This trade idea intrigues me. On one hand, I love everything about Gustav Nyquist's game. On the other hand, I see a closing window with some of Detroit's talent, and the need that the return -- puck-moving defenseman Mike Green -- can provide. It really is an interesting proposal, though I'm skeptical Detroit would make this move. The biggest concern to me is that Green's on an expiring contract, and Nyquist is still (a) on a < $1MM deal; (b) RFA status at the end of the season.
FLORIDA PANTHERS
A player I'm excited to watch this year: Alex Barkov. I think he's the real deal. But, at eighteen years old last year, he took some lumps -- especially early in the season. Aside from your most elite 21-and-under talent (with emphasis on the 20/21 year-olds, really) a lot of these guys go through tough stretches. They're boys against grown men. And it takes a really blue-chip caliber player to not get killed out there, especially early on. I think Barkov's rolling numbers are really interesting -- the first thirty games of last year, the team tried to insulate him and it didn't go well. But, he seemed to adjust a bit. Check out how his EV possession numbers started to spike as the season moved forward, even with less generous zone starts.
MONTREAL CANADIENS
It's interesting watching the differences between P.K. Subban's contractual stuff and Erik Karlsson's. Montreal played hardball with Subban when he came off of his entry-level contract, and squeezed him into a beautiful 2-year/$2.8MM AAV deal a couple of years back. Ottawa was in a similar situation with a similar player, and decided to bite the bullet right out of the gate. Ottawa's been paying Erik Karlsson $6.5MM AAV since 2012-2013, but the benefit of the deal is coming at the back-end -- he's signed to that number through 2018-2019. In Montreal, the team reaped the benefits of their star defenseman early on, and now they're going to have to take a real bullet with him. The only leverage I see with Montreal is that, again, he's RFA. Other than that? I'll just say I'd love to sit in the room when those sides are negotiating. Subban's one of the best players in the world, and Montreal knows it. Will be interesting to see where this one lands. Perhaps Montreal points to Karlsson/Pietrangelo deals and asks Subban to fall somewhere in that range, but I suspect his side knows that the cap situation is quite different and that there should be more dollars available.
TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING
If I'm Tampa Bay, I'm looking around the Eastern Conference and asking who, Boston aside, is a better team today. I don't know if there are many answers. And I do know that, at the right price, Winnipeg's Evander Kane can be had. And I do know that Tampa Bay's prospect pool is comically deep. If you're Stevie Y and you see a first-line winger on the market to play minutes either with or away from Steven Stamkos, and you know the window's never going to be more open than right now, do you entertain the possibility?
TORONTO MAPLE LEAFS
Also add to the list of contract negotiations I'm going to be interested in seeing play out: one Jake Gardiner. He was excellent last year for a Toronto team really in need of a quality puck-mover, and the thirty-one points is going to be a nice counting data point for Gardiner's camp. Toronto's cap situation isn't really bleak or dire right now, but when you add Gardiner to the likes of Reimer/Franson in arbitration, things could get tight pretty quickly. Especially so since you'd think Toronto knows they're going to have to swallow a decently-sized number on Gardiner here. His $875k cap hit, one would think, will be tripled heading into next year.