Byron

Team: 2020-21 New York Islanders

Initial Creation Date: Jan. 5, 2021

Published: Jan. 5, 2021

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

A Byron for Hickey swap was suggested earlier by @SevenLeg and I actually really like the idea. Hopefully I don't come off as too much of a hypocrite (just got done railing against the rumored Martin contract), but Byron is actually the type of player that I think could be incredibly effective in the Islanders' bottom six. He wasn't particularly productive this year, but in three seasons before that he scored at at least a 20 goal pace, maintained positive (or close to it) Corsi and expected goal differentials and was worth 7.4 wins above replacement (according to Evolving Hockey's WAR model). I think a third line of him, Pageau and Oliver Wahlstrom (or Kieffer Bellows) would be an excellent two-way, crash-and-bang type group. Byron and Pageau could hopefully use their physicality to create space in the OZ for Wahlstrom, who showed a bit of a mean streak himself in his call up last season too.

Montreal is a little over the cap at the moment and this trade would give them space both this year and in the future, as they could likely bury Hickey for the next two seasons. They could also trade or bury Jordan Weal to get compliant (who is another player I like a lot actually), but trading Byron I feel could get them a slightly better return than Weal, thus him being the subject of the post. I've seen people trade Byron for a lot less than is being suggested here and I think this would be a good use of the Islanders (limited) cap space.

Hopefully you all see where I'm coming from with this and shoutout to SevenLeg for floating the idea.