- Mark Kiszla of the Denver Post: The Avs need to make a move leading up to the March 2nd trade deadline. They need help on their blueline and they could trade one of their top offensive players to get a top-two defenseman. Ryan O’Reilly is obviously the most talked about and his days in an Avs jersey appear to be numbered. Kiszla thinks the Avs should also see if anyone is willing to overpay for a Gabriel Landeskog, Matt Duchene or Nathan MacKinnon. To get a read on what all their assets are worth. A team with defensive holes and an imbalanced roster shouldn’t have untouchables.
- Terry Frei of the Denver Post: (mailbag) On what the Avs may have to give up to get a top defenseman.
They’ll sure as heck try to make a major deal. And they are trying. Sure, Ryan O’Reilly is one of the possibilities to be moved to try to land that D-man, but the truth is — and this is true in baseball and basketball too — if an executive isn’t open to listening to any and all offers for everyone on the roster, he’s a fool. Note, I said “listen.” If I were running a team — we will now pause for the laughter to die down — my position would be that nobody is untouchable and we will consider doing anything if it improves the team. And that could be the automatic answer to every question and rumor, including in hockey, where let’s just say standards for vetting rumors before tossing them out are laughably low.
Frei doesn’t think they would trade Semyon Varlamov for defensive help and run with Calvin Pickard.
- Jonas Seigel of TSN: The Leafs could attempt to trade David Clarkson, but given the size of his contract, limitations as a player and his limited no-trade clause, it seems unlikely that they’ll be able to move him. They could offer to eat half of his contract in a trade. A buyout is not really an option due to the way they structured his contract.
- Sam Carchidi of the Philadelphia Inquirer: If the Flyers get Kimmo Timonen back from his blood clot issue this season, GM Ron Hextall said they would have to make some moves to fit him in. Where they sit in the standing would affect his decision to return if he gets clearance.
“That’s going to come into play, for sure,” said Hextall, adding he would have “something definitive” about Timonen’s situation in a few days.
“Things are moving along,” Hextall said. “. . . There’s a process . . . with a number of things – getting doctors together, and trainers, and Kimmo. There’s a lot of different avenues we have to explore here and dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s. It’s gone a little slower than I maybe would have hoped. He’s still on medication for a few more days, so there’s a little bit of time.”
The Flyers only have about $1.5 million in cap space and would need to clear some space for Timonen’s $2 million cap hit.