if i'm drury/lavi, i'm telling berard/sykora this summer is a massive opportunity for them. they have the potential to be an answer for what this roster desperately needs.
one thing the rangers get dinged with is lacking team speed. that isn't the case, the forward group has plenty of speed overall. what they do lack is guys who change the pace of the game. everyone looks faster with a mcdavid, hintz, point, hughes, barzal, etc...and similarly down the lineup guys like evan rodrigues, duclair, duhaime, lizotte, hoglander...they can change the complexion of your entire roster. their pace impacts the pace of the game and makes everyone else appear faster. when you lack those guys, it logically has the opposite effect.
if i'm drury, maybe the biggest priority this summer is how they inject some pace into the lineup. obviously, you aren't going to add an elite talent who brings that element outside of some wildly unexpected development, but you don't need to. there's plenty of skill and forechecking depth in the lineup, but you need 1-2 spark plugs who create the conditions for them to thrive.
if i'm drury, obviously you kick the tires on tkachuk and see what that might take, but you can't view that as any sort of end-all be-all. if you find a deal that works, i'd love to add him.
but...but...the answer is probably not moving trouba and definitely not moving kakko. anyone who knows anything about asset management knows this is not the time to sell here. these are probably the two most motivated players heading into this offseason, their return value isn't likely to get any lower. in trouba's case, you run into an argument that can be made depending on what else transpires and where that puts us in relation to the salary cap...but as of now you assume he's coming back and coming back off a summer he spent highly motivated to change the narrative about his game. i don't think anyone can question how much he cares or how much he means to his teammates...you'd be crazy not to think he doesn't have a much better year next season. kakko, on the other hand, will come cheap, is at a minimum a very solid bottom 6 piece who still absolutely has offensive upside potential and will have a ton of motivation to prove it...esp after watching laf take off this year ahead of him. the absolute worst decision you could make right now is taking pennies on the dollar to free up under 3 million of cap space for a guy who has a very reasonable probability to significantly outperform that, at a minimum will deliver it, and knowing you'll be spending at least that on any replacement that will come with a lot more uncertainty in terms of what you'll get to the downside. it would be complete dereliction of duty to sell on kakko at this point - at least in any deal centered around him. i would understand including him in a hypothetical bigger deal but that would entirely depend on who it was for and what else was included.
one thing the rangers get dinged with is lacking team speed. that isn't the case, the forward group has plenty of speed overall. what they do lack is guys who change the pace of the game. everyone looks faster with a mcdavid, hintz, point, hughes, barzal, etc...and similarly down the lineup guys like evan rodrigues, duclair, duhaime, lizotte, hoglander...they can change the complexion of your entire roster. their pace impacts the pace of the game and makes everyone else appear faster. when you lack those guys, it logically has the opposite effect.
if i'm drury, maybe the biggest priority this summer is how they inject some pace into the lineup. obviously, you aren't going to add an elite talent who brings that element outside of some wildly unexpected development, but you don't need to. there's plenty of skill and forechecking depth in the lineup, but you need 1-2 spark plugs who create the conditions for them to thrive.
if i'm drury, obviously you kick the tires on tkachuk and see what that might take, but you can't view that as any sort of end-all be-all. if you find a deal that works, i'd love to add him.
but...but...the answer is probably not moving trouba and definitely not moving kakko. anyone who knows anything about asset management knows this is not the time to sell here. these are probably the two most motivated players heading into this offseason, their return value isn't likely to get any lower. in trouba's case, you run into an argument that can be made depending on what else transpires and where that puts us in relation to the salary cap...but as of now you assume he's coming back and coming back off a summer he spent highly motivated to change the narrative about his game. i don't think anyone can question how much he cares or how much he means to his teammates...you'd be crazy not to think he doesn't have a much better year next season. kakko, on the other hand, will come cheap, is at a minimum a very solid bottom 6 piece who still absolutely has offensive upside potential and will have a ton of motivation to prove it...esp after watching laf take off this year ahead of him. the absolute worst decision you could make right now is taking pennies on the dollar to free up under 3 million of cap space for a guy who has a very reasonable probability to significantly outperform that, at a minimum will deliver it, and knowing you'll be spending at least that on any replacement that will come with a lot more uncertainty in terms of what you'll get to the downside. it would be complete dereliction of duty to sell on kakko at this point - at least in any deal centered around him. i would understand including him in a hypothetical bigger deal but that would entirely depend on who it was for and what else was included.
