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2019-20 Canes Miscellaneous News Thread

andyt said:
Haula didn’t practice today. RBA said he won’t be back “any time soon”

Some interesting pictures from before practice. The Bulls play at United Center tonight so the basketball floor was down. Some of the boys showed off their skills before walking across the parking lot to the Blackhawks practice facility. Slavin sank a shot from half court
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I'm hearing that Huala's problem still isn't "structural." Apparently it's more associated with post surgical debris causing swelling. If you'll recall, his injury was fairly traumatic and he had a lot of broken and chipped bone in his knee joint ... more like an auto accident injury than a sports injury. He may need a followup procedure to clean out the joint, but apparently they're going to rest him and re-evaluate because that would put him on the shelf for a month or so.
 
Pierre LeBrun has an update on the expansion draft process from the GM meetings. In general, the rules will be the same as the Vegas draft. The Golden Knights will not have to expose any players but they don’t get a share of the $650 expansion fee either. With that as the case, the league will monitor any player movement with Vegas. For example, the Canes will not be able to trade Brett Pesce to Vegas and then trade back for him. The trade back will be voided. Ron Francis is not allowed at the GM meetings until Seattle’s final expansion fee payment has been made, which is expected about March, 2021, about the same timetable as the final payment made by Vegas.

The GM of the Year Award will be named after Jim Gregory. Nice gesture.
 
As much as I would love to start thinking about how the Canes will approach the 2021 expansion draft, with the current ownership/leadership showing no hesitations on making trades and shaking up the roster pretty significantly every year, it would be a fools errand at this point beyond being able to say that Slavin, Aho, Svech and probably Necas will be protected. By 2021 a third to half of the rest of the roster might look different than it does today.

That said, once we see what the 2020-21 roster looks like the fun will begin.
 
Yeah ... it looks like the Canes are setting up for locking in an established core of players and then churning the rest of the roster while they develop high value picks. I like that approach, but it makes projecting the roster needs even a year or two out exceptionally difficult. Carolina will all but certainly look to protect the young core (Aho, Salvin, Svech, Necas) and players with high value to dollar contracts like Pesce. From there, all bets are off.

In terms of general trends, look for GMs to largely decide to go ahead and bite the bullet on exposing some players this time. Last time around they were all seemingly in the mood to try and trade their way out of potential loses and in the process they got burned pretty badly by Vegas. Seattle will find less room to make protection trades, I think. Ronnie and Co seem to be setting up to mine the NHL's development pools for buried gems as a priority, and that's probably smart. We all know Francis likes to play the long game.
 
Joel Edmundson: 21 Games 2 Goals 4 Assists +4
Justin Faulk: 22 Games 0 Goals 6 Assists -6

Faulk has only 1 power play point still, an assist he got in the first game he played for St. Louis. It was always going to be Alex Pietrangelo getting the top PP minutes for the Blues, but Faulk has done very little in terms of contributing offensively. Faulk has been playing on the 2nd PP unit recently, paired sometimes with Dman Vince Dunn (who has 6 PP points, 2 goals and 4 assists).

Faulk's slow start hasn't mattered much as St. Louis is still rolling.
 
When I've watched St Louis this year, Faulk appears to be fitting in but he's just not showing up on the scoresheet. His shot is still as erratic as ever, and when it's not dropping he just doesn't do much for your offense. He does seem to be a better fit for their defensive systems, though. So there's that.
 
The Faulk trade worked for both sides-- Edmundson fits in and gives us a stay at home d-Man and Faulk seems to work within STL's system. On the other hand, it's Gardner who is struggling to find his fit...
 
SlapShots said:
The Faulk trade worked for both sides-- Edmundson fits in and gives us a stay at home d-Man and Faulk seems to work within STL's system. On the other hand, it's Gardner who is struggling to find his fit...
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Gardiner is a team worst -14. I know +/- is not the best stat to use to judge how well things are going, but despite Dzingel's gaffes tonight, he's still a +3 by comparison. Gardiner's the only player on the team right now with a negative defensive point share as well, and his offensive contributions haven't been enough to counter it.
 
Punzil said:
Gardiner is a team worst -14. I know +/- is not the best stat to use to judge how well things are going, but despite Dzingel's gaffes tonight, he's still a +3 by comparison. Gardiner's the only player on the team right now with a negative defensive point share as well, and his offensive contributions haven't been enough to counter it.
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That -14 is tied for 4th worst in the league, behind Athanasio, Filppula and Jenner.
 
Well that’s because he’s consistently getting put out there against the othe teams top pair. Wait. Nevermind. There is some of that though as teams try to match up their attack avoiding Slavin. But still he’s surely struggling to this point.
 
It’s not the players fault.
unknown to most everyone, before the season starts straws are drawn. The players with the longest straws are the goal scorers and those with the shorter ones are goal allowers. Gardener in this case drew last and alas no more straws so he is the designated goal allower.
 
Looks a like another site visit from the NHL is in the works. There are cones on the field at Carter Finley again.

 
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