- Pierre LeBrun of ESPN: Nashville Predators GM David Poile may not be done making moves.
“Right now, we are a team that’s out of the playoffs as of today, so we got to improve,” Predators veteran general manager David Poile said over the phone Tuesday.
“I hope it happens from within our club, but we’re totally open . Because we haven’t played as well as we had hoped to play at this point in the season.”
The Predators are looking for more scoring up front.
The Wild are also looking for scoring help. They lost out on Ryan Johansen, and are believed to have talked to the Lightning about Jonathan Drouin. Wild GM Chuck Fletcher.
“I’ve been making calls and I’ve been receiving calls really on a pretty consistent basis for the last two months,” Fletcher said. “I think most GMs are in the same mode. Everyone is trying to get a sense of who might be available and what type of transaction might be possible. Who knows where it leads. Right now we’re struggling to score, there’s no question about that. The reality is the solution to those problems rests in the dressing room. That’s a group of players that’s been able to score before and will be able to score again.
“Anything I’m looking to do right now is not based on our current offensive slump, it’s about what do we need to add to take the next step,” Fletcher added. “And who potentially can we add to the mix to make us a better team.”
The Stars would like add another top defenseman, but GM Jim Nill won’t give up the farm to make a deal.
The Predators and Oilers did talk about a potential Ryan Nugent-Hopkins for Seth Jones trade before Jones was traded for Ryan Johansen. No sense that the Oilers are shopping Nugent-Hopkins, but it’s not saying they wouldn’t listen to offers. The Oilers are looking to improve their blueline, either it be at the trade deadline or in the offseason.
Preliminary contract talks are underway between the Bruins and Loui Eriksson.