Sportsnet: Elliotte Friedman and Jeff Marek on the 32 Thoughts: The Podcast – Marek was right about the Flyers episode, on Vancouver Canucks forward Andrei Kuzmenko, who teams are calling about.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Marek: “Elliotte, also in Headlines you talked about Andrei Kuzmenko. Teams are asking. We all know about what happened between him and Rick Tocchet. Previous, 10 minutes and 36 seconds of ice time versus Carolina on Saturday. Teams inquiring about Kuzmenko.
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Friedman: “Yeah, everybody knows that Vancouver is trying to clear cap room right? They did it in the trade with Beauvillier, and I don’t think that’s ended there. Well, now we see a situation where Kuzmenko is down to, you know, he’s still on the number one power play. I would really be worried about his situation in Vancouver if he was taken off that powerplay. That’s when you know that Rick Tocchet or whatever the case has had enough. He’s still there. So to me, that’s a sign that this is a team that has not given up on this player.
But his ice time is way down. He had two recent healthy scratches. You’re making $5.5 (million) this year and next. Although he has a partial no-trade. Nobody wants that from a guy who’s playing 12 minutes a game. You just, it doesn’t make sense in today’s NHL.
So I think there have been some conversations between the Canucks and teams. What are we thinking about here? And it’s probably too soon. Although one thing we’ve learned about Vancouver, if they get something, they do it. Nobody makes more trades in the untradable NHL than the Vancouver Canucks.
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So whenever I hear they’re talking to someone, you know you can expect it anytime. So he, it’s definitely a situation where they are talking to teams and teams are talking to them about Kuzmenko.