For real? Man, I dont see why we wouldnt trade this. We could possibly fill a great hole on defense
Because elite talent is the hardest thing to acquire in the NHL. We certainly weren't going to be getting any through free agency or trades as shown by the Hossa and Heatley debacles. The best way to get elite talent is through lottery picks, and that's just what we should do. The defense can be filled by trading expendable pieces like Gagner or Paajarvi, and if possible, useless players like Hemsky and Smyth. Honestly, not asking for Michael Del Zotto or something from NYR in exchange for Smyth, just so he could satisfy his desire to play in Edmonton (and now he wants a payday?), as well as not trading Hemsky to Nashville for Jonathan Blum+ were big mistakes.
I guess I agree, but Tambo better step up and do something to help on the defensive side, dontcha think?
Of course, but when you can just flat out outscore your opponent on a nightly basis, and they have to think about 2 lines containing the elite talents of Hall, Eberle, the Nuge and Yakupov, that makes it easier to defend, because the won't want to attack as much.
For real? Man, I dont see why we wouldnt trade this. We could possibly fill a great hole on defense
because you don't trade 1st overall for pieces from other teams, try and think long term instead of trying to fill a problem that will sort itself out shortly by our defensive prospects maturing or by signing a free agent D man, and there are a few of them coming up this summer.
The opportunity to get players like Yakupov come around once (maybe) in a decade. (and only if you finish in the toilet)
Do you want to stop the rebuild today, and finish in 9th for a bunch of years and do this all over again or do we become a juggernaut through the draft and win cups?
Imagine the team if Nolan, Sundin and Lindros ( plus Sakic) all played together.
We have that opportunity with our 3 1st overall picks lets not waste it.
Draft Yakupov. If for whatever reason he doesn't fit into our future we can always trade him later.
Go hard after Suter/Schultz/Weber the following season etc. We can patch together a defense good enough to win with our prospects and a pretty good free agent or player brought in via trade. I think we can do the same with goaltending in the future as well.
We should follow the model of living and dying by our 4 super stars and filling out a roster as best we can around them.
I don't get we have been stock piling d man for 2 years klefbom, musil,marincin , gernat and on and on to the point where we may have to keep some in junior and college that could play in the AHL.
People can pick at our defence all they want but it will be fine in a couple of years when our forwards are in ther prime, sign someone like oduya maybe or a solid vet to a 2 year deal, but you don't trade the best player in the draft so you can get another d man that may not be ready for 2-3 years.
draft yakupov, i was looking at some of the prospects on the lottery teams but really is there anything better than yakupov? johansen, el nino,schenn all good players but will they trade them schenn maybe. keep the pick let our d mature and we will be a playoff team within 2 years.
We have to take Yakupov. His goal celebrations will make Rexall go nuts and Gene will be like a kid in a candy shop with all of the possible Nail puns at his disposal.
Draft Yakupov. If for whatever reason he doesn't fit into our future we can always trade him later.
Go hard after Suter/Schultz/Weber the following season etc. We can patch together a defense good enough to win with our prospects and a pretty good free agent or player brought in via trade. I think we can do the same with goaltending in the future as well.
We should follow the model of living and dying by our 4 super stars and filling out a roster as best we can around them.
Exactly. If Weber WANTS to come here of his own accord, we can have Yakupov and our #1D without a Pronger situation. Why not wait one more year to get a d-man?
Nick Schultz improved our D quite a bit it seemed like.
The reason we lost a lot of games down the stretch was because the offence ran ice cold once the refs wouldn't give us any PPs and with Hall out, everyone could collapse on RNH + Eberle's line and sleepwalk to a win.
We don't have to wait a year to improve the D.
Sign a decent top 4 defender. Even a Nick Schultz caliber one.
I forgot what our GA was with Whitney vs. without Whitney but it's apparently a fairly dramatic swing. What we need is someone who can cover Whitney's minutes reliably when he's hurt and compliment them when he's not.
Nick Schultz improved our D quite a bit it seemed like.
The reason we lost a lot of games down the stretch was because the offence ran ice cold once the refs wouldn't give us any PPs and with Hall out, everyone could collapse on RNH + Eberle's line and sleepwalk to a win.
We don't have to wait a year to improve the D.
Sign a decent top 4 defender. Even a Nick Schultz caliber one.
I forgot what our GA was with Whitney vs. without Whitney but it's apparently a fairly dramatic swing. What we need is someone who can cover Whitney's minutes reliably when he's hurt and compliment them when he's not.
A good defender coming up the pipeline for this team? A healthy Ryan Whitney.
Sign Justin Schultz, get Whitney back in shape, and our D doesn't look god-awful.
A good defender coming up the pipeline for this team? A healthy Ryan Whitney.
Sign Justin Schultz, get Whitney back in shape, and our D doesn't look god-awful.
Honestly, our D isn't even that bad. Our problem is that we don't have any decent secondary scoring. When we get that secondary scoring, we'll get scored on less because the opposition won't have the puck on their sticks as much.
I voted option 1 (keep the pick, take Yakupov), but I could be on board with option 3 if the established NHLer was Doughty/Weber/Pietrangelo.
That's basically it for me. And that's all it should be. No way in hell I trade down just for more picks. Yakupov has been the consensus #1 for two years now and might've gone number one last season had he been eligible. I really don't like the discourse happening here amongst the media and with management these past 2 days.
You pull the trigger and forget about the defensive side.
Eberle-RNH-Nash
Hall-Grigorenko-Hemsky
We turn from a bunch of smurfs to having potential towers on the top six.
Not even ****ing close. Nash has been a bum these past two years and comes with a stupid price tag for what he brings. Plus, nobody is taking Horcoff at those dollars, regardless.
I know we were all pissed off about everything this entire year, but I'm going to puke if Tambo et al start talking seriously about the playoffs and they panic into taking a mediocre deal for Yakupov.
I can see this happening.
They get to pull out the "oh, the rebuild takes 3 or 5 or 27 years, you can't rush it" when we suck, and now that we've sucked for long enough to get 3 #1 picks, they are going to tinker with it.
A good defender coming up the pipeline for this team? A healthy Ryan Whitney.
Sign Justin Schultz, get Whitney back in shape, and our D doesn't look god-awful.
True enough but I just don't see the odds in our favor when signing Justin Schultz, the only reason he would want to come here would be to grow with the young talent. What young defenseman doesn't want to go to a contending team instead of missing the playoffs? I don't know if we have all the persuasion he needs to come here over the 29 other teams, unless I'm wrong? I just doubt it happens
True enough but I just don't see the odds in our favor when signing Justin Schultz, the only reason he would want to come here would be to grow with the young talent. What young defenseman doesn't want to go to a contending team instead of missing the playoffs? I don't know if we have all the persuasion he needs to come here over the 29 other teams, unless I'm wrong? I just doubt it happens
He listed Edmonton as his favorite city (go figure, lol) and his family is in Kelowna, so they could watch a lot of his games if he were to sign here.
That on top of the fact that he would get a lot of minutes here, including primo first unit PP time.
I don't think he should be the only target though. We should go after a UFA d-man too.
Not even ****ing close. Nash has been a bum these past two years and comes with a stupid price tag for what he brings. Plus, nobody is taking Horcoff at those dollars, regardless.
Bum for those dollars. So one stupid price tag for another. That sounds fair. We've essentially upgraded our forward, or at least dumped one extreme bum for one less extreme bum. And we still get Grigorenko/Murray.
The first pick never belonged to us and Columbus needs it more. So we just got a bonus. It's like going to work and you sit on $100 cash for no reason on your chair. Then someone in the company needs to help their kid sell some girl guide cookies, you're not going to say no to that because that $100 cash was not yours from the beginning.
So if I'm Tambo, the only team I'd be willing to trade with is Columbus. Well, unless Nashville offered Weber where we do a trade and sign for 8 years.
If we were able to sign Schultz and _____ (Garrison, Stuart, Carle) it would be a very huge step for us. Huge.
But either way imo we need to upgrade at least 2 spots on our D for Octobers starting lineup.
If we got both... .
Also, to the post above - the team dried up when the second line stopped existing except on bursts of the powerplay. Hence, I'm stoked that Yakupov SHOULD be coming. That's decent scoring, no?
