There were a lot of breakout rookie defencemen in 2018-19 and one of them was most definitely Henri Jokiharju. It wasn’t a great fantasy season by any stretch, seeing he played just 38 games in the NHL and spent half the season in the AHL, most of that after the World Juniors. Nonetheless, he [...]
We can knock one important RFA off the board as the San Jose Sharks signed winger Kevin Labanc to a one-year contract with a $1M cap hit. The 23-year old is coming off a 56-point season while playing mostly third-line minutes; just his minutes with Joe Thornton and Marcus Sorensen alone ate up over [...]
The trade of Tyson Barrie has a lot of ramifications all around. It was less than a week ago in these very Ramblings where I discussed the Colorado blue line. The future of Barrie, the brief preview of Cale Makar, and the emergence of Sam Girard were all covered. Now, we have to review [...]
Did everyone catch their breath? With the advent of the talking period, it seems like most deals are ready to go as soon as the clock strikes noon on July 1st. That was pretty much the situation this year as most of the contracts were known a day or two beforehand, and we got [...]
Robin Lehner found a new home in Chicago and with Sergei Bobrovsky off to Florida, the goalie market didn’t take long to thin out. The Islanders relied on their goaltending last year and until the kids they’ve drafted the last couple years are ready, they’ll need to do so again. The help this season, [...]
Often, it’s not the average annual value of a contract that handcuffs a team, but rather the length. Just recent examples of this include guys like Patrick Marleau and Scott Darling. The problem at the outset wasn’t how much money they were getting every year, but how long the deal was. The Leafs ran [...]
Much like Joonas Donskoi, Gustav Nyquist was going to be a cap casualty in San Jose. It seemed almost certain anyway after they acquired him down the stretch but regardless, Nyquist was going to find a new home this summer. Nyquist found his new home as the Columbus Blue Jackets signed him to a [...]
Sometimes, real life hockey mirrors fantasy hockey. Often, in fantasy hockey, the best time to draft a player is the season after a down year. In real life, the same can be said, although rather than drafting or trading, free agency can be the method of acquisition. This is what happened with Joonas Donskoi [...]
The New York Rangers continued to clear out cap space by trading winger Jimmy Vesey to the Buffalo Sabres. Buffalo, you’ll remember, traded for Vesey’s rights a few years ago but were unable to sign him. He eventually would end up with the Rangers. Everything has come full circle, kind of. What Buffalo [...]
The pending Mitch Marner signing, whenever it happens, required the Leafs to move out some money. They did that with Patrick Marleau a little over a week ago and that continued on Canada Day as they rumoured trade came to fruition: defenceman Nikita Zaitsev was traded to Ottawa in exchange for defenceman Cody Ceci. [...]
