With the All-Star Game on tap tomorrow, we’ve reached the final significant league-wide event before the NHL Trade Deadline on March 3. And, with teams having a few days off over the weekend, I’m sure phones are well charged and ringing as general managers look to bolster their rosters for a playoff push.
So what are people saying about the Blackhawks’ players who might be available? Between now and the deadline we’re going to keep an eye on the interwebs and ear on the ground for buzz that’s noteworthy. Here are some pre-All-Star game updates.
NHL Insider Chris Johnston updated his Trade Deadline Big Board earlier this week in the wake of the Bo Horvat trade (more Horvat impact down below), and it’s loaded with Blackhawks. In addition to the Blackhawks’ two big names — Patrick Kane (ranked 3rd) and Jonathan Toews (6th) — Johnston ranks Max Domi 11th and Sam Lafferty 12th. This is one of the first notable lists that includes Lafferty, and has him that high. Johnston does not include Andreas Athanasiou. He also completely excludes Jake McCabe from his list, which is surprising given the buzz around him recently. Being that he’s based on Canada, perhaps the belief that the only Canadian team to whom McCabe would accept a deal is Toronto impacts his board?
When The Athletic updated their trade deadline big board, they only included three Blackhawks. After Kane and Toews (still 3rd and 6th, respectively), they have Domi at 21 — and that’s it. Somehow they completely omitted McCabe and have Athanasiou listed as “no longer ranked.” It looks and sounds like there isn’t much of a market for Athanasiou, even as a pure rental for what’s left of his $3 million cap it.
Shayna Goldman at The Athletic broke down the trade market for Jonathan Toews. She lists Colorado, Winnipeg, Edmonton, Carolina, Washington and Dallas as the six teams who should be interested in the Blackhawks’ longest-tenured captain.
Mollie Walker of the New York Post joined Forever Blueshirts to talk about Rangers trade buzz. According to Walker (and common sense for those of us who watched them play together in Chicago, Artemi Panarin “would love” to play with Patrick Kane again. I recently wrote about how the Rangers and Blackhawks could make a deal for Kane work.
However, it sounds like at least the media in New York is cooling on the idea of 88 joining the Breadman at Madison Square Garden. As they point out in this look at the market for Kane:
“[The] New York Post‘s Larry Brooks suggested the Blackhawks’ winger might not suit their needs… The Athletic’s Arthur Staple wrote that it seems the entire league knows Kane needs hip surgery.”
I mentioned earlier this week that Frank Seravalli tied the Vegas Golden Knights to Kane as a potential destination for 88. Well, when the Knights announced captain Mark Stone was having another back surgery, that opened a significant chunk of cap space for Vegas to potentially play with. Seravalli talked more about the fit from Florida on Thursday.
How could the Bo Horvat trade impact the value for Kane? Obviously he still has to let the Blackhawks know if he’ll accept a deal (and his preferred destination(s)), but it’s hard to tell what a team might be willing to give up for the future Hall of Famer if they get desperate. Frankly, I’m more interested in what the Horvat deal does to the market for the Blackhawks’ potentially available centers — Toews, Domi, Lafferty and possibly Jason Dickinson.
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