On the Detroit Red Wings …
John Niyo of the Detroit News: Overvaluing some players and giving them long term contracts has given the Red Wings some salary cap limitations.
The Wings may need to ‘bribe’ the Vegas Golden Knights with a draft pick to take one of their larger contracts (Darren Helm? Justin Abdelkader?).
The Wings need to stand pat at free agency.
The Wings need to find a top-pairing defenseman and there shouldn’t be many untouchables on their roster. Making a blockbuster trade isn’t easy though.
“Would I like to shuffle the deck? Would I like to make some changes?” Holland said Sunday. “Yeah, I would.”
Ansar Khan of MLive: The Red Wings and GM Ken Holland have a challenging offseason ahead of them. They don’t have a lot of salary cap room and the free agent market is thin.
Some of their big contracts won’t be easy to move without giving up a young player and/or a first-round pick.
They’ll need to do a lot of improving from within.
Indications are that Jeff Blashill will be back behind the bench.
There is no reason to think Kevin Shattenkirk would be wanting to sign with a team that was 25th overall.
They could look at bringing defenseman Brendan Smith back.
Any impact defenseman would need to be acquired through trade.
The Red Wings have looked at Cam Fowler and Jacob Trouba in the past, but it’s unlikely they could land either one of them without giving up a Dylan Larkin, Anthony Mantha or Andreas Athanasiou.
Chris Nichols of FanRag Sports: Elliotte Friedman was on the NHL Network on Tuesday talking about the Detroit Red Wings.
“I met with Ken Holland about a week ago, just before they finished their season,” relayed Friedman. “And I asked him. There were some rumors that maybe he’d be going somewhere else at the end of the season, that he would say, ‘Okay, I’ve had my time and it’s someone else’s time to run the Red Wings.
“He said to me, ‘I’m 61 years old. I’ve gone one more year under contract and I want to be here. I don’t want to go anywhere else. I was here for the good times. I want to bring them back.’