Quoting: Ste_Catherine_Street
Dude the entire premise of your team here is to shed cap. You're getting rid of Staal, Kreider, Trouba and Strome. It's obvious what you're doing and guess what, approx 25 teams are trying to do the same thing. It's a buyers market now for these players. You'll be surprised. Contracts have a lot to do with trades, especially now. Trouba underperformed for his money, now he's a serious liability, Staal is no longer playing at the same level anymore, (agree to disagree on Kreider obviously) but you clearly have a LW playing 3rd line making over $6M AAV and that's a serious problem with a flat cap. And bigger problem is Strome who had a great year, but just 1 great year. And now he'll ask for a shtonne of money and term that you cannot give.
Admit your goal here was to shed cap, now think that 25 teams are trying to do the same.
I never said it wasn't a part of it lol, I said it's not the main reason.
Keeping Kreider... blocks Lafrenière and Kravtsov
Keeping Trouba... blocks Lundkvist
That's not the way to do it for a team like us.
Also we have a history of moving players before their NMC/NTC kicks in (Brassard in 2016 and Stepan in 2017) so I really wouldn't be shocked one bit if one of/both of Kreids/Trouba got moved.
The premise that Strome only has one great year behind his belt is ludacris, he was one of our only bright spots (ZIbanejad and AG being the others) in the 18-19 season.
Also I've seen LA fans themselves saying that as a plan C/D, Staal could work. And there is retention, and there's a prospect added lol