Out: Niederreiter, Trocheck, DeAngelo, Lorentz

In: Pacioretty, Burns, Kase, Jack Drury has a real shot to make the team as the 4C also

Obviously Waddell isn't done making moves since Gardiner is poised to come off of LTIR and the Canes are currently over the cap after signing Necas, but looking at the above framework of the team's off-season, I'm sure the team will still be very good, but are they BETTER is the real question. I guess if Gardiner is traded, that begs the question of who is the ideal 3LD next season. I imagine Coghlan will be the 7th defender so long as Pesce, Burns, and Bear are all healthy as oppose to being asked to play on his off wing, so that leaves us with...Maxime Lajoie? I dunno

My thoughts on this are similar to last season. I think they have the potential to be better, but it could go either way. A few things need to go right. My biggest concern is that with Pacioretty expected to be out most of the season, neither Trocheck nor Niederreiter have really been replaced. Niederreiter had an interesting role last season – an offensive player on the checking line – and it worked extremely well. I see Kase slotting in there this season. He’s not going to score like Niederreiter did, so maybe this becomes more of a typical third line, but I liked him in Anaheim and I think he did pretty well in Toronto last season, so this may not be too much of a downgrade.

I’ve been saying for a while that I thought Kotkaniemi was brought in to take over the 2C role from Trocheck. The biggest question for team going into this season is whether he can do it. If he can make that step, the forwards should be in good shape. If not, other options could be Staal (with KK going to the third line), Drury or Necas, though with Pacioretty out I think they need Necas on the wing.

Speaking of Necas, they need him to rebound, Jarvis not to regress, and Svechnikov to continue to mature, which includes taking fewer stupid penalties. I think Drury will get a chance to join Martinook on the fourth line, assuming KK graduates to the second, and they have a few good options with NHL experience for the other wing and the 13th forward.

On defense, Burns should be an upgrade over DeAngelo. I don’t know much about Coghlan, but perhaps he can make up for the loss of Cole, along with a healthier Bear if one of them can move to the left side, and anything they get out of Gardiner would be a bonus. With Pacioretty on LTIR, they can afford to keep him rather than giving up assets to dump his cap hit.

I hope Freddie and Raanta can stay healthy, because I think Kochetkov would benefit more from a full season as a #1 in the AHL than a backup in the NHL. He seems to like a heavy workload, and they should be grooming him for the #1 job in Carolina.

Exactly, Niederreiter and Trocheck haven't really been replaced. Kase is definitely a downgrade on Nino, question is by how much. He also has trouble staying healthy

Obviously there is a lot of skepticism with KK stepping into the 2C role, even if Staal had to step up into that role I'd be pretty weary still

I think Drury will come in as the 4C and play alongside Martinook

Yeah, don't have to consider moving Gardiner until Pacioretty is ready to come back. Whether it's before training camp or in season. Canes are most likely gonna need to clear some cap space

Canes made a big role of the dice when they signed both Andersen and Raanta to be their goaltending tandem, both of whom have noteworthy injury history's. Kind of bit them last post-season

Andersen never had injury issues until his last year with Toronto, so I wasn’t too worried about that, but now I’m wondering if the heavy workload he had when he was younger has taken its toll on his body. Raanta was more of a concern, but he’d played well for the most part when he was healthy, so I thought he’d be a good backup. The roll of the dice seemed to be paying off well until they had to go into the playoffs without Andersen. Still, I don’t feel like it was goaltending that cost them the series with New York or made the one with Boston closer than it should have been, but I guess a healthy Andersen could have made a difference. Both are signed for one more year, then I expect at least one of them will be gone, probably both.

Speaking of Toronto, they made a similar move this off-season with their goaltending, maybe even more of a dice roll because their goalies also had performance issues with their former teams. We'll see if they have similar results.

No, I don't think Goaltending is what cost them the Rangers series either, but it certainly didn't help losing Andersen at that time

I agree.

Now you can add Paul Stastny to your “in” list. He makes me feel a lot better about some of the uncertainties I mentioned around the forward lines. If one of those things doesn’t work out – Kotkaniemi taking over for Trocheck, Kase taking over for Niederreiter, Drury in the NHL, etc. – Stastny is versatile enough that he could step into any of those roles. And if everything else does work out, they’re only paying him a 4th-line salary, so even if he ends up in that open 4th-line wing spot, it’s still a good investment, though actually I think it’s more likely Kase ends up there while Stastny takes Niederreiter’s spot on the third line with Fast and Staal. Stastny put up similar numbers to Niederreiter last season, though with more ice time, so he’s probably still a bit of a downgrade on offense, but maybe an upgrade defensively.

Lol, I'm not sure there are any upgrades over Niederreiter when it comes to defensive forwards, but yes, Stastny is certainly a nice little investment. He had a relatively productive year last year, but I have to imagine the low cap hit has to do with the age factor for the most part, the overall lack of cap space league wide may have a little something to do with it as well. I imagine the opening night roster looking something like Kotkaniemi at 2C, Stastny at 3LW, and Kase at 4RW. I'm gonna guess Drury scores the 4C job out of training camp, and plays alongside both Kase and Martinook. The rest of the usual suspects will of course play where we expect them to. With Gardiner on the Roster, the team has around 3.5M in cap space...until Pacioretty is ready to be activated off LTIR

I will also say I'm pretty fond of a checking line consisting of Stastny, Staal, and Fast