Deadline Moves Starting Early

Thursday and Friday were busy days for general managers in the NHL. Phones were ringing off the hook into the wee hours of the morning with teams trying to find the right pieces for their teams moving forward. All this action started a little earlier than I thought, considering the deadline is over a week away, but it shows how tight the races are in both the east and west. Many of these teams we have seen already involved in deals feel that they need to get better now to make their playoff push, and then there’s Ottawa. The Senators seem to be having a fire sale. Let’s take a look at what’s already gone down.

• Way back on Tuesday the Senators sent center Chris Kelly to the Bruins for a second round pick. Kelly is a gritty player, but for my money, he’s not worth a second round player. This seems to be a pretty lateral move and just fills a roster spot.

• Thursday the Senators sent the pesky forward Jarkko Ruutu to Anaheim for a sixth round pick next season. I’m not real sure what the purpose was on this one except maybe to collect draft picks.

• Friday, the big day, sent Ian White from Carolina to San Jose for their second round pick in the 2011 draft ,in an attempt to solidify the Sharks blueline. I am not a fan of Ian White whatsoever, but the Sharks blueline is really shakey this season, and this can only make it better.

• The Bruins and Leafs finally put an end to the Kaberle drama by completing what ended up being a three team deal. The Bruins cleared some cap space by sending Mark Stuart and Blake Wheeler to Atlanta for the ogre Boris Valabik and Rich Peverly. As soon as this trade was finalized, Boston was on the phone with Brian Burke. The Bruins acquired Tomas Kaberle for one of their top prospects Joe Colborne, a first round pick in 2011, and a conditional draft pick for 2012.

• The Lightning strengthened their blueline by acquiring Eric Brewer from the St. Louis Blues in exchange for Brock Beukeboom and a third round draft pick. I don’t like this move for a couple reasons. First of all, I feel the Bolts gave up too much for Brewer. He’s not going to have that much of an effect on their defense, and he’s going to be a free agent at seasons end. Secondly, and who am I to question Steve Yzerman, but I feel that this move was made just because the other top teams in the east made moves. With Philly bringing in Versteeg and the Bruins getting Kaberle, the Bolts felt that they needed something. I feel that they should have been more patient and waiting it out a few more days.

• For the third time this week, the Senators were involved in a trade, moving goaltender Brian Elliott to Colorado for goaltender Craig Anderson. This is a pretty useless move, however, I do believe that Ottawa got the better of the two goalies in the deal.

The blockbuster so far came late into Friday night and into Saturday morning when the Avalanche sent rookie sensation Kevin Shattenkirk and forward Chris Stewart to the Blues for Jay McClement and former first overall draft pick Erik Johnson. I am not sure what the thought process was for either of these teams when they made the trades. Erik Johnson is a exellent player and he’s still young, so I would have not moved him. Colorado on the other hand, got rid of two very good young players in Stewart and Shattenkirk, and I question their motives for this move. The Avalanche have fallen far down the western standings, but it’s because their roster is devastated by injuries. I think they may have given up too soon on Stewart, and I don’t think they fully believed in Shattenkirk’s talents. That being said, Colorado could afford to get rid of these two because they are already loaded with young offensive talents, so scoring won’t be a problem. They made this move to significantly strengthen their defense. The Blues obviously needed to increase their scoring depth, and with this move they feel as though they’ve added it at both offense and defense.

As you can see, there has been no shortage of action at this trade deadline, and I believe there’s going to be more. There are still some teams who are expected to make some moves, and some teams that are expected to be selling off some of their assets in order to rebuild in the future. It should be a very exciting week to come.