The Athletic’s Max Bultman filed an incredibly thorough 15-point notebook article regarding the Red Wings’ draft haul, the team’s trade for goaltender John Gibson, and many other topics, including this from GM Steve Yzerman regarding the free agent marketplace (or the lack thereof):
Yzerman was candid about the shortage of potential impact players on the free-agent market this year but said the team will look at the blue line, and will look to add a winger as well — neither of which is surprising. Asked if there was a viable trade market for defensemen, he opened his answer by saying: “I’m not sure if viable is the right word. I’m going to look into it.”
Part of the issue, it sounds like, is the state of what teams are looking for.
“When I’m talking to teams right now, everybody wants — the teams I’m talking to — they want players,” Yzerman said. “Much like we want players. What do we have to offer? Like, I don’t want to trade our core players. You trade, whatever, a young centerman for a young centerman — I’m looking to add to our team, and use our future assets for that, and right now, teams are all looking to add players to their team, kind of do the same thing (that) we’re trying to do.”
He did acknowledge “there’s a couple of somewhat interesting options” but added he thinks all the teams will now turn their attention to free agency, then see what shakes out and who can accomplish what they want, who might be left still looking, and who might need to move bodies out.
Yzerman’s appraisal of the market is revealing, though. It doesn’t sound like this is an issue of Detroit cautiously hoarding prospects. Rather, it sounds like the opposite: a market that also wants to improve and isn’t as interested in futures.
“When I talk to teams, you know the players they want,” Yzerman said. “And I’m like, ‘That doesn’t make me better.’ I want to keep these players. I want to add to it. Am I willing to trade a core player? Maybe, but it doesn’t make, necessarily, sense to take any position and trade that, to create a hole at that position to fill in another one.”
From the sounds of it, the scenarios to watch are either a needle-moving free agent or a trade with a team that is successful in free agency and needs to move a player off the roster for cap reasons, becoming more amenable to taking back futures.
Continued (paywall); I always worry that the “futures” other teams want are Moritz Seider and Lucas Raymond, but that’s just me.
