Sportsnet: Elliotte Friedman and Jeff Marek on 32 Thoughts: The Podcast – Big Daddy Kane on San Jose Sharks pending RFA Timo Meier.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Marek: “Timo Meier it looks and feels as if this thing is headed toward New Jersey, which means he won’t cause that’s the nature of how things go. But it does really seem to line up here for the New Jersey Devils.
If you look at what a team like the Maple Leafs were unprepared to pay for Timo Meier. I look to the New Jersey Devils and I say, ‘you know what, the New Jersey Devils can pay that price.’ Plus they have a need. Plus it seems like a real fit. Plus it’s a playoff team. Like everything seems to line up with Timo Meier and the New Jersey Devils.
What are we missing if anything?”
Friedman: “I don’t think you’re missing anything Jeff. We just don’t have a deal. See with Toronto being out, I don’t think they were the number one contender or even the number two contender but they were in the race and they were a bit more of a long shot, but they were there.
I agree with you. Everybody seems to think here that New Jersey is not only the most likely place that he ends up if you’re handicapping it but what someone said to me was, they’re probably the place that needs him the most. I said to a couple people, what do you mean by that, and what they said is that, ‘look, the Islanders have gone out and they’ve added (Bo) Horvat for eight years. The Rangers went out and got their guy Tarasenko and they could win the Stanley Cup this year.’
One of the things you think about is, is just like the local arms race. When you’re New Jersey, you’re always battling for attention. You’re always battling to get noticed. This is the year you guys have a great team and Meier is available who’s a difference maker of a player who could be yours for many years.
And they just said for like on the ice reasons he’s a hell of player and New Jersey’s a bit of a small team. People also talk about that being the perfect place for Meier to go because he’s exactly what they need in terms of a bigger, stronger forward who can score. Really talented guy.
So people look at it as the fit from an on-ice perspective and the off-ice perspective of, ‘hey, we’re the Devils, we think the best team in New York. We have been for most of the year and now we’re going to show while the Islanders and Rangers are adding, well we think we’re better than them so we’re going to add too. It’s a really fascinating conversation.
The one thing that someone said to me is, they feel that (San Jose Sharks GM) Mike Grier is prepared to slow play this a bit. And when you’re a new general manager people want to understand, K, what is this guy’s MO? Like every general manager has an MO.
Doug Wilson they call the dentist cause he would just drill you and that was his nickname. Brad Treliving has a reputation as a guy who like to be on everything. He likes to know everything that is going on around the league. There are the GMs who are very tight with the information. Bill Armstrong in Arizona is developing a reputation as a bit of a salesman. He’s very good at talking to you and selling you on why what he is going to propose is good for you. So everybody’s got their rep.
So people are trying to figure out the way Grier handles this. What is his rep going to be? What one person said to me is, he’s slow playing this. Okay, if you play cards and you’re a slow player, what that means is you wait and you wait and you wait and they you make your big bet.
And the only reason you slow play, there’s two reasons you slow play. Number one is because you don’t have anything and you’re bluffing, or number two, you have a really good hand and you’re trying to draw in the people to find out who’s really in this game with you. You want to see who else might have a good hand or who else is really going to be there with you at the end.
Well, it’s obviously ‘B.’ He’s got the best player available. They think he’s going to wait this out, wait this out, wait this out, wait this out, and then see at the end who may bend to him a little bit.
Now that I’ve said this, he’ll probably trade him two seconds after the pod drops. But at least that’s the early read on the market.
Marek: “Email from San Jose coming in.”
Friedman: “I think that’s really interesting because you want to see how confident a new general manager appears to be with a key piece of the deadline. People seem to think he’s really confident.
Now, one of things I’ve heard about the Sharks is, they don’t feel that their prospect pool is as good as they’d like it to be.”
Marek: “I believe that a 100 percent. 100 percent Elliotte.”‘
Friedman: “And I’m not talking one or two individual prospects, I’m talking about the entire pool. I don’t want people going to William Eklund and say, ‘hey, the Sharks think you’re not very good.’ That’s not what I’m talking about here. I’m talking about I think just the overall group of it.
Marek: “The depth of pool is not where they would like it. That’s safe to say. I’ve heard that from multiple people.”
Friedman: “So, one team said to me, they think what Grier wants is a ton of draft picks so he can move around the first round this year. St, Louis is going to be able to do that cause they’re going to have three of them depending on what they decide to do. But they think the Sharks want that too. They want multiple first-rounders so they can move around the pool and they want a lot of picks.
So we’ll see what turns out to be the truth. this is all speculation right now. We’ll see what happens when he makes the deal. But they think that Griere’s content to wait until he gets what he wants. And who’s left standing here is, Jersey obviously, and Jersey wants an extension as part of this. Carolina is still there and the thing about Carolina is, if you look at the way Carolina does business, and you look at their cap situation, I would think that they are comfortable with acquiring him, even giving him the qualifying offer next year and just playing this out for a year and a half.
Now that may not be what they decide to do, but if you look at the way they do things, they slap a value on you and then they work around that value. I can see Carolina doing that cause they have the ability and flexibility to do that. So that’s number two.
And I do wonder about Vegas. It makes a lot of sense for them. I wonder if they’re sort of like a Vegas tax. Now I know Nevada is a no tax state but I look at San Jose dealing with Vegas and I wondered, does San Jose say if he’s going to go to Vegas, it has to be a bit more. We’re going to find out.
But the other team I do wonder about is Winnipeg. Now, the thing about the Jets is, I think this is the year they should be going for it. I think they’ve got a good team in a wide open Western Conference. The one thing about the Jets is, they didn’t like their last four rentals with Kevin Hayes, the (Paul) Stastny one turned out really well
Here’s the thing about the Jets is, (Blake) Wheeler, he’s got one more year. (Pierre-Luc) Dubois, we all know that his situation leans towards Montreal. So Mark Schiefele also has one more year and then he’s a UFA. And what Winnipeg could do if they wanted, is they could trade for Meier, cause they could do it, and they could basically decide, we’re building our entire team around him, or our front line around him. And in theory, it’s a really good plan and if I was Winnipeg, I’d consider that.
There’s one flaw in the ointment with my plan, and that is, does Meier want to stay in Winnipeg long-term? And I just don’t think Winnipeg can make this deal for what it’s going to cost them without that assurance.
If it was me, would I say take a shot at Meier for year and a half and see where this going? Yeah, in a regular situation I would, but I don’t think Winnipeg can do that, and I know the way they think, and I understand the way they think. I don’t think they would do that without assurances, and I always assume there’s teams out there I haven’t thought of Jeff, always.”