On the Carolina Hurricanes …
- Pierre LeBrun of ESPN: The Hurricanes playoff push was a little unexpected, and it’s unclear how the push will influence GM Ron Francis heading towards the trade deadline. Francis will be meeting with Eric Staal’s agent soon.
“We touched base last month and agreed to touch base towards the end of this month to see where things were,” Francis said. “So, we haven’t had that conversation yet. There’s still six weeks until we get to the deadline. Hopefully we’re still in the hunt.”
Hurricanes scenarios:
- Re-sign Staal with a paycut from his $8.25 million cap hit. LeBrun thinks it would have to be a really reasonable salary for the Hurricanes to do this.
- Decide they need the assets they could get from trading Staal, and ask him to waive his no-movement clause.
- Hurricanes hold on to him for the playoff push, even if they are unable to re-sign him.
- Staal says he won’t waive his no-movement and plays out the season.
Another Hurricane to watch is Jeff Skinner. He has three years left on his contract at a salary of $6 million per season. If a team thinks he’s past his concussions issues, the Hurricanes would listen to offers. Staal’s agent Rick Curran, also represents Skinner, Jordan Staal and Cam Ward.
On the Minnesota Wild …
- Michael Russo of the Star Tribune: In the past 15 games, the Wild are averaging 1.93 goals per game, 1.67 goals per game if you don’t include empty netters. GM Chuck Fletcher said he’s looking at options, via trade for from the AHL.
“But,” the Wild general manager said, “the most likely scenario is going to be just to find a way to play better with the group we have and we play our way out of our little scoring slump and get back to the way we were scoring earlier in the year.
“If something makes sense, we’ll do it. But usually the solution’s in the room and not found on the outside.”