The Predators and Penguins swung a deal that likely has both teams trying to shake things up for next year rather than any eyes on the playoffs this year, as both will likely miss. The Penguins are shipping out Michael Bunting and a 4^th round pick for Nashville's Tommy Novak and Luke Schenn.

With Pittsburgh also shipping out Vincent Desharnais earlier in the evening to San Jose for a fifth-round pick, both the Preds and Penguins are equivalently swapping in and out a forward and a defenceman on the day.

The Predators receive:

Bunting is a 29-year-old winger who has had some runway on a top line with star players in Toronto, and has a level of sandpaper that the Predators have been largely lacking this year, as evidenced by his 48 PIMs in 58 games. Over his five full seasons, Bunting has been a 55-point player, both with and without power play usage. He will be a free agent at the end of next year, so this could be a bit of a trial to either sign Bunting for a few more years, or flip him next year as an excellent rental piece.

The Predators also free up a slot for their young defencemen by moving Schenn, who was falling out of favour with the management team anyways after some recent negative comments.

The Penguins receive:

Tommy Novak is a late-blooming middle-six forward who can play both centre and wing, and has put together some top-tier stretches with his /60 numbers. Unfortunately for him, when he was given some runways as the number-two centre to start the year, he flopped. Nashville's roster on the whole did as well, so it's tough just to blame Novak. He still has room to up his production from his current career-high of 45 points, and Pittsburgh might be just the place to do it.

The Penguins also brought in Luke Schenn, who easily slots in as the third right-shot defence on the team behind Erik Karlsson and Kris Letang. This will keep some of Pittsburgh's young defencemen out of the lineup, however none of the relevant and NHL-ready ones are right shots save for Jack St. Ivany. Schenn brings a physical style that the Pens don't have much of on defence, and adding him to take on a bunch of heavy minutes means that it frees up others like Letang to focus more on the offensive side of the puck.

Fantasy impact:

With Novak and Bunting both playing as middle-six LWs at the moment, there isn't a huge shift in how either will be deployed, not with how the rosters around them could be aligned. Bunting was seeing an extra minute or so per game on the power play, so it could be that there is a bit more room for Novak to boost his production than Bunting.

Schenn could see his minutes increase as well, and they will likely all be on the defensive side of the puck, meaning his Hit and Block numbers could see a bit of a spike.

His absence will be felt in Nashville as they are already missing Roman Josi, Adam Wislby, and Jeremy Lauzon, but they do have some young defencemen pushing for roster spots and some extra minutes for righties Justin Barron and Nick Blankenburg. Only in the deepest leagues will they matter this year though.  

Players this helps, in order:

Luke Schenn

Novak

Justin Barron/Nick Blankenburg

Players this hurts, in order:

Bunting

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Fun fact, last summer I also traded Michael Bunting for Tommy Novak in my dynasty league. Life sometimes truly does imitate art fantasy sports.