Roster/Rumors/Speculation/Trade Talk - 2024-25: Re-Tool, Re-Group, Re-Mix, Re-Build

[xECK29x]

He's struggled this season.

And I would absolutely take that bet that he rebounds, he is still on pace for 76 points and rarely gets injured. He impacts every area of the game.

 

[duster19]

My take…Dobber not playing well but wants a big contract. Lou doesn’t want to pay that. Starts to look into trades. Dobson hoping new agent can find ground with Lou before it’s too late.

He's struggled this season.

Rebound type players are where we are at I think. Not like Dobsons is playing well…buying players who are coming off their best years generally cost alot and can regress.

 

[Throttle]

Lou can then send Cizikas to Toronto for his brother.

 

[WangMustGo]

And I would absolutely take that bet that he rebounds, he is still on pace for 76 points and rarely gets injured. He impacts every area of the game.

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Absolutely insane that he isn’t on team USA.

 

[Chardo]

I think it means he's a goner. Wasserman is a huge agency, and his new agent represents McDavid and Matthews. He's looking to get PAID paid, which in this case probably means a 4 year deal to walk him to UFA so he can get paid again after the cap jump... not dissimilar to the Matthews deal. The absolute last thing we need Lou doing is giving him some crazy 9Mx4 deal, and honestly I bet he doesn't have any interest in doing that.

New team, new agent. Wipes the slate clean.

Or maybe Lou will work with the agent to pry McDavid or Matthews away...

 

[impaaaaaact]

Absolutely insane that he isn’t on team USA.

We probably add something not insignificant to get Robertson. Heiskanen/Dobson would be an insane pairing… a first line of Robertson-Horvat-Barzal would be pretty sick too.

 

[Lek]

Lou can then send Cizikas to Toronto for his brother.

Cizikas has a brother?.....

 

[periferal]

Man...

I cannot believe how much buzz/reporting/leakage there has been around the Isles this season. Something is definitely afoot - Because no way Lou lets this happen in years past. I'm hoping the reason is that Malkin/Ledecky/Collins have wrestled some control away from Lou (and prepared him for his exit in the very near future). If it's because Lou is slipping due to his age then we're in even bigger trouble then when Lou was fully coherent.

In this specific case, switching agents isn't something that Lou can control (both that Dobson did it or the media for reporting it), but the fact that the media has really picked up on it where it has legs is the interesting part here.

There's no doubt this is noteworthy. I feel bad for his old agent (Maloney) as Dobson was his biggest client so he was on the verge of the biggest payday of his career when Dobson signs his new deal. Now he doesn't get a penny of that. Brutal as the commission for Dobson's new deal will probably be conservatively around $2,000,000 for his agent.

Meanwhile Moldaver works with some top top clients (like McDavid and Matthews) so no doubt he's more of a shark who is familiar with the top deals done in the NHL will go out and try to get every last dollar for his clients.

It could be that Lou/the Isles have been holding strong at a certain number (let's say 7M) and Dobson wants 10M/year (and has people in his ear saying he's worth that). He may not get it in the end, but he was obviously under the impression that his former agent couldn't get the deal done. Now he's swinging for the fences, but what we can deduce here is that the Isles and Dobson have been negotiating for a while and Dobson has grown at least a little frustrated and wants a new deal or a trade (or both), in the near future.

The next few weeks/months in Islanderland are not going to be dull.

 

[The Real JT]

Some of you may know this but Brock Nelson’s wife is a former Ms. Hockey Minnesota. Tavares’s fiancé and future wife was a local Ontario girl.

Yes Brock has young kids and he’s laid down some roots on the Island but friends, family and your hometown are hard to resist especially when your wife and her family have the same upbringing.

Food for thought.

 

[seafoam]

Some of you may know this but Brock Nelson’s wife is a former Ms. Hockey Minnesota. Tavares’s fiancé and future wife was a local Ontario girl.

Yes Brock has young kids and he’s laid down some roots on the Island but friends, family and your hometown are hard to resist especially when your wife and her family have the same upbringing.

Food for thought.

Brock will stay if they offer him the dollars. Full stop.

 

[LeapOnOver]

Well of course everything I write is just my opinion. And of course literally nothing that hasn't happened yet can't be stated as 100% absolute fact.

But that doesn't mean that based on past patterns you can't make obvious and concrete assumptions on what will happen going forward.

I mean you can't say to me right now that any plane scheduled to fly later today will land safely. On some level everyone knows this and yet...Millions of people fly each day. Why...? Because there's enough PAST EVIDENCE to say that air travel is an incredibly safe way to fly.

Similarly we have enough evidence based on Lou's past GM work to confidently say that we know how the next few years of Islander hockey will play out - If he's allowed to continue on as GM. Look at just the last 3 years:

• 22-23: 53 points in 57 games
• 23-24: 53 points in 57 games
• 24-25: 53 points in 57 games

Without stating it as fact you really think it's beyond outlandish to think that if Lou is still GM that the Isles won't be in the same ballpark a year from now? Well I think it's crazy to ignore patterns we've seen already and think things will be different when there's literally no evidence to support that.

If you want change in on ice results then some form of ownership, management, coaching, and/or players must change. Well ownership isn't changing, but Lou has changed coaches and has made multiple trades and signings and yet...Still a fringe playoff team at best.

While again of course nothing in life is certain, if you don't think we can make a very confident guess as to how things will play out as long as Lou is GM, then I'd say that you're ignoring all the evidence right in front of you.

But hey...That's just like...My opinion man.

You're not to old to learn that statistics and patterns are not immutable. The fact that things are ever-changing makes words like "obvious " incorrect usage.

 

[Zeeker]

Some of you may know this but Brock Nelson’s wife is a former Ms. Hockey Minnesota. Tavares’s fiancé and future wife was a local Ontario girl.

Yes Brock has young kids and he’s laid down some roots on the Island but friends, family and your hometown are hard to resist especially when your wife and her family have the same upbringing.

Food for thought.

Yeah, my one worry with trading him is that he might only re-sign with one or two teams, and we won’t get the best deal. “Good guy” Lou will take less to send Brock where he wants to go.

 

[iggy]

Brock will stay if they offer him the dollars. Full stop.

That's exactly what we said about Tavares.

 

[seafoam]

That's exactly what we said about Tavares.

Tavares is and was whipped, he was destined for the GTA because of his wife.