In today’s NHL rumors rundown, could the Montreal Canadiens take the picks from the Carolina Hurricanes offer sheet and flip them for a different asset? Meanwhile, the Buffalo Sabres and Jack Eichel’s camp find any sort of resolution when they met with the league and the NHLPA? The New York Rangers say they won’t be pre-occupied with Tom Wilson, and is there any news or update regarding a possible trade of Vladimir Tarasenko?
Canadiens Shopping the Offer Sheet Picks
Elliotte Friedman suggests in his latest 31 Thoughts podcast that the Canadiens will take the seven days they have to either match or not match the offer sheet from the Hurricanes for Jesperi Kotkaniemi and figure out what options they have if they don’t match. In that time, they’ll shop the first and third round picks that will come as compensation for an unmatched offer.
Friedman wonders if the Canadiens might go to a team like Arizona and say, do these picks get us anywhere when it comes to Christian Dvorak? They may also take the picks and throw them into a trade offer for Jack Eichel. Obviously, it would take more to land Eichel, but they may ask the Sabres what else needs to be included.
Friedman added:
“I’m not sure that Montreal is really big on the Jack Eichel sweepstakes…we now know Eichel has switched agents, there’s a long history between Pat Brisson & Marc Bergevin…I just wonder does this change the dynamic between the Canadiens & the Sabres at all”
Eichel and Sabres Met With NHL
Friedman also reports that the Sabres and Eichel’s reps met with the NHL and NHLPA this past week and before Eichel moved to a different agent to see if any sort of resolution could be worked out. Friedman says he didn’t think either party got anywhere. In fact, he believes it was learned that both sides were going to dig in even deeper and their respective positions hadn’t changed.
Beyond saying the league and the player’s association got involved, he couldn’t add any insight as to whether or not a trade was any closer to happening than in the past.
Rangers Not Overwhelmed by Tom Wilson
“It’s not going to overtake the team,” Gerard Gallant explained. Saying the pieces they added are not a direct response to what Tim Wilson did to their team last season, he added:
“We’ll address that before the first game of the year, I’m sure, but the bottom line is that when we brought these players in over the summer we wanted to make our team tougher to play against. You knew whoever was going to be with the Rangers this year was going to change the complexion of the team a little bit, there was no doubt. Fortunately for me, I got the opportunity to be the coach and we’re going to change it a little bit, the way the team is going to play and respond to issues like that. I don’t think they’re going to happen anymore.”
Latest on Tarasenko Trade Talk
In his latest mailbag for The Athletic, Jeremy Rutherford provided an update on trade rumors involving forward Vladimir Tarasenko. When asked about who may still be interested he noted the Hurricanes; Rangers, and Islanders as the top teams.
He noted the Islanders are likely still in the mix, but there’s a lot of mystery surrounding that team. He said, the Rangers have not moved on from the idea of adding Tarasenko and he notes:
I believe that Carolina, even after this week’s monster signing of Andrei Svechnikov, is still keeping tabs on the Tarasenko situation. The Hurricanes need scoring, and they need help on the power play.
source – ‘What’s the latest on the Blues and Vladimir Tarasenko? Who’s interested? Hurricanes? Rangers? Islanders? Sabres? Mailbag’ – Jeremy Rutherford – The Athletic – 08/29/2021