B/R NHL Roundtable: GMs Under Pressure to Make Deals at the 2023 Trade Deadline
It's officially Trade Season.
The New York Islanders' blockbuster Bo Horvat deal signaled the unofficial kickoff to the wildest time in the NHL calendar: the run-up to the NHL trade deadline, which is on March 3 this year.
Every contending team's general manager will be looking for the final piece of the puzzle to lift them to a Stanley Cup parade in June. A Cup victory means eternal praise from fans and colleagues alike, whereas an empty deadline could mean being one step closer to the unemployment line.
With that in mind, the B/R NHL Staff called together another roundtable to determine which GMs are on the hot seat to make a deal that could put the team over the top.
Disagree with the opinions of our team? Share your thoughts in the comments section of the app!
Ron Hextall, Pittsburgh Penguins
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When Ron Hextall was fired by the Philadelphia Flyers ownership talked about wanting a replacement that had "a bias for action."
In other words, they did not like his methodical, patient approach to making moves and building a roster.
Pittsburgh is starting to find out what that process looks like. Hextall is simply not very aggressive in the trading game, but he is going to need to be in the coming weeks because the Penguins need some help.
When they decided to re-sign Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang, Bryan Rust and Rickard Rakell this past offseason for another run, they made it clear that this is not a team looking to rebuild. They still want to contend, and contend now.
The top two lines are outstanding, and Tristan Jarry has been very good in goal when he has been healthy, but the Penguins' biggest issue has been with its unproductive bottom-six forward groupings. They have been outscored and outshot this season by a heavy margin when neither Sidney Crosby nor Malkin is on the ice, which will not get them very far in the playoffs.
Hextall does not have a lot to trade from within the farm system, but he does have a 2023 first-round pick. He seems hesitant to deal that pick, but it has more value to the Penguins as a trade asset in the short-term than a future pick in the long-term. If they make the playoffs, that pick will be between 17 and 32, which is typically only a 50-50 shot of landing an NHL regular and usually only a 15-20 percent shot of landing a top-line player. If it can get them somebody to give Crosby, Malkin and Letang a better shot to make another run this season, they need to do it.
— Adam Gretz
Ken Holland, Edmonton Oilers
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Pierre Lebrun of TSN and The Athletic went on the Got Yer Back podcast in late January and indicated that Edmonton Oilers general manager Ken Holland wants "part of his legacy" to be that he didn't trade his first-round pick every season and "restocked" the organization.
This ethos from Holland is nonsense.
Connor McDavid, now 26, has won three total playoff series in his previous seven seasons with Edmonton. For Leon Draisaitl, it's three playoff series in nine years. Neither has outwardly demanded a trade nor indicated anything like that, but they're not going to put up with mediocrity forever. Don't let last season's appearance in the Western Conference Final fool you; the duo had to drag the rest of the team that far.
Mediocrity is right where the Oilers sit once again. They are third in the Pacific Division and sixth in the Western Conference by points percentage. The offensive production is among the best in the league, as one would expect, but this once again comes from the team's top players. Head coach Jay Woodcroft has virtually zero help in the bottom six, and specifically on the wings.
But if the Oilers see an early playoff exit, it will likely be because of their incapacity to keep the puck out of their own net. They have the 10th-worst goals-against average when down a man, and that's not solely on the goaltenders.
They are average defensively, and while Stuart Skinner has played admirably in net, he's not going to bail the team out in a seven-game series against the Stars, Jets or Avalanche. Veterans Cody Ceci, Brett Kulak, and Ryan Murray have failed to provide any stability on the third defensive pairing.
There is no youth movement Holland could see through that would make Albertans forgive him if he blows the competitive window for arguably the two best offensive players in the league.
This is not the time for austerity. McDavid and Draisaitl need help now.
— Adam Herman
Kyle Davidson, Chicago Blackhawks
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This just in: The Chicago Blackhawks will not win the Stanley Cup this season.
So unlike GMs on this list from Pittsburgh, Edmonton, Toronto and Las Vegas, Kyle Davidson is not seeking deals that'll position his team for a deep playoff run and/or a championship parade.
But that doesn't make his task this winter any less vital to the franchise.
Though the Blackhawks are steeped in title tradition and have rafters full of banners hung by the old-school likes Bobby Hull and Stan Mikita and newer-school superstars Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews, perhaps no team in the league is more in need of a top-to-bottom overhaul.
Not only has Chicago not won a full-fledged playoff series since capturing its third Cup in six seasons in 2015, but it also entered Tuesday's games sitting last in the eight-team Central Division and tied with Columbus for last overall in the league.
These days, that's what's known as Connor Bedard territory.
If the ping pong balls will fall nicely for the Blackhawks remains to be seen, but whether or not they secure the latest Canadian uber-phenom, they're still going to need a few other bodies capable of shooting, passing and scoring on their own.
That's where Kane and Toews come in. Again.
Both three-time Cup winners are entering the final months of eight-year, $84 million deals they signed in the summer of 2014, and neither is likely to revel in a third straight spring—and fifth in six years—spent watching other teams play for a trophy they're still skilled enough to pursue.
Though flipping one or both future Hall of Famers would cause shudders across an enthusiastic fan base, it'd also return a bounty of NHL-ready players and draft picks that'd allow Davidson to fast-track a rebuild he committed to upon taking over as full-time GM early last year.
On the flip side, keeping them for sentiment's sake and watching them leave for nothing in the summer would be precisely the sort of action—or inaction—that'd seal a failed front-office tenure.
In other words, it's simple:
Everything must go now. Or it'll be Davidson who goes later.
— Lyle Fitzsimmons
Kyle Dubas, Toronto Maple Leafs
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Kyle Dubas took over as general manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs in 2018. Since then, they've reached the playoffs every year, finished atop the Canadian Division in the COVID-shortened 2020-21 season and set a franchise record last season with 115 points.
However, the Leafs didn't even get out of the first round in each of those postseasons.
Dubas felt the heat from Leafs Nation after his club blew a 3-1 series lead to the lowly Montreal Canadiens in 2021, but team president Brendan Shanahan supported him. Shanahan also stuck with his GM following last year's seven-game exit against the Tampa Bay Lightning.
This season, the Leafs are among the top-three teams in the Eastern Conference. Nevertheless, the ghosts of playoff failures past hang over this franchise.
Another first-round exit, regardless of the quality of the opponent, could cost Dubas his job. That's why he has to get it right at this year's trade deadline.
Dubas has been active leading up to previous deadlines. Since 2019, he's added Jake Muzzin, Jack Campbell, Kyle Clifford, Nick Foligno, Riley Nash, Ben Hutton, Ilya Lyubushkin and Mark Giordano among others.
None of them moved the needle for the Leafs, though. Of that group, only Giordano and Muzzin remain, with the latter likely sidelined for the season with a cervical spine injury.
With $1.9 million in projected trade deadline cap space, Dubas has limited room to bolster his roster. Still, he's shown creativity in swinging previous deadline deals, such as using the San Jose Sharks as a third-party broker to acquire Foligno from the Columbus Blue Jackets.
Whatever moves Dubas has planned leading up to this year's deadline, he must hit the jackpot. Another first-round exit could spell the end of his tenure in Toronto.
— Lyle Richardson
Kelly McCrimmon, Vegas Golden Knights
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If you thought the Vegas Golden Knights had a lot of pressure to stay in last season's playoff race, oh boy. Things might get really interesting at the deadline this year.
For a good part of the first half of the season, the Golden Knights were neck-and-neck with the Boston Bruins atop the NHL standings as one of the elite teams. After all, they had a healthy lineup for the first time in a while, with Jack Eichel and captain Mark Stone showing why they're among the best players in the league. Unfortunately, history is repeating itself.
Vegas lost Eichel for a spell with a lower-body injury, and Stone is out for an indefinite amount of time after he underwent his second back surgery in as many years. That's...not good. Since Eichel returned from injury Jan. 5, he had five points in 11 games before the All-Star break. He had 29 points in 27 games before he was hurt, but now he's without Stone for who knows how long.
To make matters more uncomfortable, the Knights have been without defensemen Alex Pietrangelo, Shea Theodore and Zach Whitecloud for stretches this season. At least goalie Logan Thompson has more than made up for Robin Lehner's season-long absence after offseason surgery.
The Golden Knights are stretching their usage of long-term injured reserve to the point they might be the first NHL team to spend $100 million in a season if Stone ends up on LTIR. Considering how uncomfortable things got last season when they missed the playoffs, GM Kelly McCrimmon cannot afford to miss out for the second straight year.
— Joe Yerdon
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