The fantasy impact of the Leafs trading Carl Gunnarsson to the Blues for Roman Polak
Fantasy Impact: The Toronto Maple Leafs trade defenseman Carl Gunnarsson to the St. Louis Blues in exchange for defenseman Roman Polak.
The Leafs get: A rugged blue liner that is a defensive first player. Polak finished second on the Blues last season with 131 blocks and third with 151 hits.
The Blues get: A mediocre defenseman that is maybe a 20-point guy in the right situation. He improved his plus/minus significantly last year playing with Dion Phaneuf, but he's likely heading for a bottom pairing role with the Blues.
Fantasy Players Impacted: Both players don't have a ton of fantasy value, but in my estimation it word hurt Gunnarsson and help Polak somewhat.
Gunnarsson averaged nearly 20 minutes a night last season but he won't see that much in St. Louis with their depth on defense. He's probably going to see somewhere around 16 and it would take something fairly miraculous to get him off the bottom pair.
Polak could see a slight jump in his minutes because of his defensive abilities. Toronto is much weaker than the Blues when it comes to overall defense, so he could see an upswing from his 17:20 last year out of necessity. The Leafs also give up an abundance of shots, so there is opportunities for Polak to compile blocks.
Given both players experience and current contracts, this is going to hurt fringe blue liners for each side. Like Ian Cole and Paul Ranger when it comes to playing time.
Fantasy Players this helps, in order:
Polak
Fantasy Players this hurts, in order:
Gunnarsson
Paul Ranger
Ian Cole
Michael Amato is an Associate Editor for DobberHockey and a News Editor for theScore. You can follow him on Twitter at @amato_mike
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