MLive’s Ansar Khan reminds Red Wings fans who “they’re dealing with” (pun intended) this morning:
“I want us to be a team that can compete for the Stanley Cup,” general manager Ken Holland said earlier in the week. “We’re competitive. We’re not quite where we need to be. To be where we want to be, I got to acquire draft picks. We need to hit on those draft picks, and the more draft picks that I can acquire, or young players through trades, is a better chance that we’re going to wake up three, four, five years from now and start to see the young players coming on to the team and having an impact on the team.”
Defenseman Mike Green is the most likely player to be dealt because he’s an unrestricted free agent after the season. Detroit has had extensive talks with Tampa Bay, but the Lightning’s first priority is Erik Karlsson, the star Ottawa appears poised to deal. Green has missed six games with a sore neck but is close to returning.
The Red Wings are trying to move one of Tomas Tatar or Gustav Nyquist. Nashville has shown interest, but there are stumbling blocks with both. Tatar has three years remaining at a cap hit of $5.3 million, which might be too rich for some teams. Nyquist has a full no-trade clause.
Toronto is interested in Luke Glendening as a fourth-line shutdown center but doesn’t appear willing to meet the Red Wings’ asking price of a second-round pick or good prospect.
The Red Wings made it known weeks ago that defenseman Xavier Ouellet is available. He hasn’t cracked the lineup on a regular basis.
So Kenny is…
-overvaluing his players (Glendening, thinking there is demand for Ouellet)
-discovering that nobody wants to touch his ugly contracts (Tatar, too many others to mention)
-and showing no creativity to escape from these ugly contracts (ie Phaneuf was just traded, Beleseky was just traded, Yzerman found ways to dump Filppula, Streit, Vegas was willing to eat cap space on Brassard to collect an extra pick…but not Kenny).
Get ready for the biggest news of the summer being a contract extension for Kenny, you know, because he’s the best in the biz…
I expect Green to move.
Trading Green is the bare minimum of what a monkey would do. Kenny talks a big game…we’re open for business, I’m kicking lots of tires, blah, blah. But look at what other GMs have accomplished!
Ottawa nearly made the Cup Finals last year. But they realized it’s time to retool. So they dump Phaneuf’s contract. Then Brassard gets sold for a 1st, 3rd, top prospect, and Ian Cole. Days later Cole gets flipped for a 3rd. And we know they aren’t close to being done yet.
NYR was closer to a playoff spot than we were. But they realized it was time to retool. They waived the white flag and actually penned an honest letter to their fanbase. Holden gets shipped for a 3rd plus a prsopect. Grabners nets a 2nd and a prospect. Nash gets sold for a boatload of assets. And they sit McDonough to protect him from injury…while Kenny is busy doing math about being 5 points out of the playoffs.
That’s what proactive GMs do. Kenny is just kicking the can down the road. The draft, yeah the draft is where moves are made. Oh wait, make that preseason, oh no, Thanksgiving, oh wait, after the Christmas trade freeze, oh wait, maybe the next deadline. Can’t believe the owners allow this fool to ruin our franchise. Look at the empty seats Illitch…they aren’t buying popcorn.
I have a really, really bad feeling after DET getting these last couple of wins.
Like, Kenny might not just not sell, he might toy with BUYING. Because he does think DET is far closer than they actually are. I know he talks about needing to get picks and “hit” on them, but at the same time he talks about DET being “competitive” and…. they just really aren’t. Not in any definition.
Until I see some trades, I’m going to feel kinda’ sick…
Hey Kenny. Did you notice Chicago just turned…
Panik, Kempny, and Hartman into…
Duclair, 1st, 3rd, 4th, prospect
Re-tooling is super hard work huh?
He can’t hear you here. I understand that it’s healthy for people to release anger and stress, but we’ve got 2 hours to go. We (me included) can yell at him after 3 PM.
Be happy he will give Green away, trade I guess, LOL
He can’t sign the kids if he doesn’t fix the CAP HE screwed up.
In my mind he is still in the “Have to make the Playoffs” The picks he picked up are not going to make this team much better than it is now.
I have no idea what Illitch is thinking but neither does he.
Today will be another KH step backwards
Nashville was apparently interested in Tatar or Nyquist. I guess Kenny was asking too much or wouldn’t eat any cap hit…so instead Nashville turned to Chicago and gave up a 1st for Ryan Hartman. Sigh. How about you keep your 1st and give us a 2nd for Tatar? We’ll even eat some salary.
Oh wait, trades are hard. I’m going to focus on selling my UFAs and deal with the complicated stuff later…
Fatty,
1st, 2nd & a 3rd.
Trades are hard.