Tyler Johnson wasn't claimed because noone in this landscape can add cap without subtracting some cap to offset...but thanks for dropping by...
I understand that, and that basically eliminates any "draft pick only" offer.
The only way Drouin would get moved in a 1-for-1 trade is for a player around the same age, with a similar cap hit, who is also underperforming in regards to his contract. Or for an older player with a bigger cap hit but less terms (so 2 years or 1 year left) OR a smaller cap hit but more term, assuming the team receiving Drouin is confident in his potential to break out at his age, and assuming the Bergevin is confident in the player he receives to perform better too. Players like Loui Eriksson, Rasmus Ristolainen, Nick Leddy, Brady Skjei, Kyle Okposo, Milan Lucic, etc. come to mind.
Another ridiculous post. Drouin is much better than Johnson. 7 pts in 10 playoff games compared to Johnson 7 pts in 25 games. Johnson is fading at 30 while Drouin is only 25. Both are overpaid and both are probably immoveable. Drouin will play with a good centre this year so if he doesn't improve his totals he will never be better than a 50 pt middle line forward.
Drouin was alright in that 10 games sample size, for sure. Benefiting from Suzuki's overall play and rolling an unsustainable PDO (just like whenever he has good short stints). Opposite for Johnson, who was indeed relatively awful. But that said, that's a small sample size, and if you use what you see during these small sample sizes to extrapolate, you'll miss the boat quite, quite often. Over the past 3 seasons, no player who has played substantial time with Drouin has performed better with him than without him. None. Playing with Drouin negatively impacts their goal scoring rates, while giving up more goals against.
If Drouin "performs" better because of Suzuki next season, but when away from him, still performs awful, hats off to Suzuki for doing something no other player - even one of the best 5v5 duo in the league in Gallagher-Danault - has managed to do. But that doesn't necessarily mean he has improved. It means he's still the same player, but just tailgoating better players.
I know he has issues but Johnson is not as good. He is small and even if Drouin isn't giving 100% he is still able to produce more. And their career stats are similar. Johnson has never been a great point producer and even though he isn't on the 1st line he has generally had better linemates. Drouin better try to improve his game because Julien is to useless to be of any help.
When Drouin isn't giving his 100%, he is an absolute liability in every aspect of the game. And this happens far more often than not. TJ is at least not as big of a disaster in terms of defensive impact.