I knew a Nemo trade was a real possibility but I’m still trying not to cry about it lol. Those picks better get flipped for someone insane.
@apineappleheart I hope you don't mind I am going to use this ask to get all my feelings out.
with the caveat that we have no idea who they're going to flip these picks for and so the trade is essentially incomplete, I have some thoughts.
Luke Hughes, I am so fucking sorry, that they've stuck you with a bunch of useless old men who are going to slow you down.
what are you going to do after Douie is gone? who is going to take over? Seamus Casey? he cannot defend and he cannot defend in the playoffs, for sure. he panics in the defensive zone and I don't see him being able to seriously quarterback a power play unit. he has not shown any type of consistency or growth/development.
speaking of Dougie, so are we putting all our eggs in the Dougie basket? or are we planning to move him, too, given his 9M cap hit? because if you're truly leaving Luke alone with a bunch of defensemen who cannot handle a puck, then we are actually fucked. if we are keeping Dougie, are you expecting him to produce at the rate he did in the second half of the season? is that sustainable especially when he's manning PP2 and not PP1? and when he's only getting slower and older?
and okay, so we're hoping to replicate the shutdown pair of Siegs-Kovy. let's do it! sure hope we're not depending on half a season of dominance to dictate our choices for the future! I am rooting for these two, though. Siegs is due for a bounce back year and hopefully Kovy is fully healed, but banking your second overall hand picked for Luke Hughes defenseman on the fact that Siegs and Kovy will be able to do what they did for four months long term is not a great bet.
Brett Pesce. the one thing you have to hand to the Carolina Hurricanes is that they know when a player is done. they know when to move on from a player. they made a choice not to keep Pesce and there was a reason for that. his injury history and his play style, which is primarily shot blocking because he's too slow to defend with his stick or one on one against an opposing player, doesn't bode well for the longevity of his contract either. will he be able to play a full season? I guess we'll see! will he continue to bring Luke Hughes down if he's paired with Luke? you bet your bottom dollar! hashtag free luke.
Brenden Dillon. I am still not over his little podcast moment. the gall of this man to throw his teammates under the bus for fifteen minutes of fame and virality. a man, who simply does not have the hockey skillset to keep up with an actual contender of a team. only good at penalty kills because the only thing necessary there is to get the puck out of the zone. I will always give him props for standing up for his guys, but it kind of doesn't end up mattering if during the off season he's just shit talking those same guys. from a purely hockey viewpoint, though, he needs to be gone, gone, gone.
it sickens me Fitzgerald's idiocy with other contracts, Keefe's stubbornness with defensive pairs, and an awful development strategy is what got us here with Nemo. his first season in the NHL he wasn't even supposed to be here. and yet he stepped up big when Dougie went down. and he ended that season being one the few highlights of a shite season. his second season was plagued with injury and cannot really be used to evaluate anything. and his third season, his first, mostly, full season, he was sentenced to a defensive pair with Brenden Dillon, whose version of "mentoring" is taking private conversations and sharing them with all of hockey media, or he was tossed around from D partner to D partner with no consistency in deployment or minutes. if he was played "normally" it was primarily with the fourth line who were always getting scored against. when he was finally played for the reasons he was drafted he delivered. watch any footage of him out there with Jack Hughes. its pure magic. I truly believed that a new regime meant he'd get a real shot.
but now we're here. with an aging, slow, blue line. with Luke and maybe one other defenseman who can conceivably be here long term. this shortens our "window" significantly if other changes are not made.
we couldn't score last season and you've taken away one of our offensive play drivers and offensive contributors and kept four "grenade launchers". three of which are old fucking men.
and whoever this fucking "big fish" is going to be, they better be fucking worth it. and I have a growing fear they won't be, but I'll hold judgment until the "second half" of this trade is complete.
