oh that's a relief
a $3.1M defenseman with about the same rate of production of the $3M Walman. Plus Roy is one year older. Imagine thinking that's a significant upgrade over Walman, so significant that his acquisition makes Walman so expendable that we can pay another team to take him off our hands.
Matt Roy is one of the best defensive d-man in the league. Roy's numbers might be similar to Walman offensively, but his calling card happens in his own zone. What I loathe is this sets up Mo with Chiarot, now last years version probably isn't as bad as the first time they tried this, but that is risky by Yzerman and Lalonde. Roy is ideal to be Edvinsson's first partner though, he would be a huge addition there.
Roy would be the stabilizing defensive force he was attempting to do with Chiarot. I expect nobody will love it and everyone will cry about the Michigan connection. Roy's emergence has been big in LA and I think he would help ease some of the burden and get more offense out of Mo. I guess we will find out, but he is one of the few players I expect would have a pretty large impact on our team because he can really help slot roles. Also lost in the Walman move is this does make Aljo's chance to make the roster and contribute on the third pair a lot better.
I would like to move on from Ghost so Seider can have PP1 and Edvinsson can get some reps, I could see those two as future 2nd pair guys once ASP is ready to take that first role over.
But really that was it to me in terms of the trade is what are the likely roles, still confused about the second but the NHL supposedly closed future consideration loopholes without a league exemption, so this was blessed with some tangible stipulation.
Walman while exciting had a very tough second half. It is also hard to project a special teams role here long term. Chiarot and Edvinsson are going to provide size and PK roles on the left side next year, Wallinder also has significant upside in this role in the pipeline. Offensively while Walman has some gifts in this department, he isn't a PP player when we tried it. So you're likely to see him fall down to a bottom pairing role with minimal special teams impact. better to make the space and clear the roster for Aljo in a similar role who can hopefully rotate between Petry and Holl, I expect Maatta (we can hope Holl but...) will depart for something, maybe middle rounds in terms of a pick. There are ways you can evaluate and see some of the rational. That or use the buyout on Holl on top of this to create more space.
Yzerman doesn't seem intent on taking the step back. We asked that to start the summer, but there seems to be a clear intent towards clearing space and getting ready to do something. Trying to get us better everyday is his job, they saw something they really didn't like out of Walman to be sure. I wish him luck in San Jose, I really do like him, but I reserve judgement on this in a pretty big way until we see the fuller picture.