Next Year Hagel is staying

If we aern't gooing to rebuild then we need an atcual starting goalie. This team above is bound to pick like 12th overall. Lets eigther make the playoffs or get a top 5 pick. For 3 mil that you have maybe we can take a shot at husso? Or buyout Connely, and swap lankinen for campbell or kuemper. Or of course try to run it back with flower one more year... seems like he doesn't want to leave anyways

I agree with all of that. It definitely think they should resign Flower for a year or two if he doesn't want to move before the deadline. Otherwise, I love the idea of adding Lindholm and Kapanen. Side note, it would be awesome if Johnson comes back from surgery reinvigorated and we get a few good seasons out of him.

I don't think the team is going to rebuild, not with Kane and Toews still on the books, a limited prospect pool, and not enough assets to trade that are older in their career; you don't trade young assets like Debrincat or Hagel if you're rebuilding...that's a recipe for disaster. As such, I think more then likely it will be a retool. That said, this team is significantly younger then this year's team and is a nice retool. The biggest gap we have today is the first line LHD...that absolutely needs to get plugged. None of our prospects are ripe for that role and this has been a big part of why our defense isn't great. Jones, while good, needs a big body shut down guy to allow him to play more freely. Lindholm does that well, but the downside is his age IMO; maybe there is someone else we can get that is younger?

Regarding goalies, it's a fair point however, I'm higher on both Soderblom and Lankinen then most. Soderblom, only turning 23 this summer, has been outstanding in the AHL as his first pro season behind a bad team. Lankinen is still young for a goalie at 26 years old, and while I don't think he will quite develop into a #1, he's going to be a very solid backup. Comesso is also on the way, hopefully turning pro in two seasons. Between the three of them, we have a good future in net.

Noted on Connolly

I'm just struggling to see the path to this team being a contender next year, maybe i'll mess around with my own acgm later. Agreed on LD being a weakness and on Lindholm, my thought would just be that he likely resigns with Anahiem, and aside from him these nothing in the UFA market in terms of top Ld's. And like we have both noted, we don't have many trade assets eigther

If you run an ACGM for Anaheim, you'll see that they won't be able to resign Lindholm for what he should be getting in his next contract. So, unless he takes a BIG discount to stay it just won't work for Anaheim in the bigger picture. That or they'd have to stretch out their younger guys with very cap friendly bridge deals over the next few years. It's all certainly possible, but unlikely.

As far as being a contender next season, I'm sorry to say, but that would probably have to include Toews retiring and some aggressive work on the free agent market. Or, with Toews, it would take some VERY cap friendly 1 year contracts from some difference makers, and promises for better contracts the following summer.