The Nashville Predators are a good team, they have been for years. In 2017 they even made it to the Stanley Cup Final and then finished with 117 points the following season. But for years now they’ve been criticized for not having enough star power, not having enough scoring. This season, those critiques rang true as the team needed a Norris Trophy-level performance from Roman Josi to even get them to the qualification round. Josi was the only player on the roster who recorded more than 50 points, leading the way with his 65 in 69 games. Filip Forsberg was next with 48, the only player on the roster to crack the 20-goal mark.
So when the team couldn’t get past the Arizona Coyotes in a best-of-five series to earn a real playoff spot, it didn’t come as a real shock. The Predators were a good team, but not a dominant one. Even after a midseason coaching change, Nashville only went 16-11-1 for John Hynes, not a lot better than they’d been under Peter Laviolette.
It comes as no surprise then, as GM David Poile watched this transpire, that he knows there needs to be a different group on the ice next season. In his end of year media availability today, Poile told reporters including Adam Vingan of The Athletic that “it is very clear to me that we need to make some changes.” Mike Morreale of NHL.com tweets an even longer, perhaps more telling quote:
Some players aren’t going to be brought back…We’re not satisfied, and we’re going to make some changes. We have to manage better, John and his staff have to coach better, and players have to play better.
The veteran GM has been with the Predators from the very beginning when they broke into the league as an expansion franchise in 1998-99. That team, with Barry Trotz behind the bench and Cliff Ronning leading the offense, was bad. This group isn’t anywhere near that, but after more than two decades of existence and only a handful of playoff series wins, something obviously needs to change.
Notably, the Predators don’t have a ton of cap room to make those changes. This was the last season of Josi’s incredibly inexpensive previous contract, which saw him carry a $4MM cap hit while routinely being among the league’s best offensive defensemen. Next year, that number more than doubles to $9.06MM per season and locks Josi in as one of the highest-paid defenders in the league.
Long-term contracts for Ryan Johansen, Matt Duchene, Kyle Turris, Viktor Arvidsson, Colton Sissons and Ryan Ellis also tie up a huge amount of money for the next half-decade plus. Trading contracts of that length is increasingly difficult in today’s NHL, somewhat tying Poile’s hands on how drastic a makeover he can accomplish. There’s also the issue of goaltending, where Pekka Rinne is now an expensive backup and Juuse Saros will soon need a new contract.
Poile has always been known as GM willing to make big trades. He’s pulled off some of the biggest one-for-one deals in recent history, moving Seth Jones for Johansen, Shea Weber for P.K. Subban, and Martin Erat for Forsberg (apologies to Michael Latta, but that deal will long be remembered for the primary pieces). Perhaps he can pull off a deal of that magnitude again because if the Predators come back with the same group next season they’ll be good—but that’s obviously not enough.
I had no idea Rinne will be 38 next season! Can’t imagine there’s many teams looking to take on his $5mil at that age. Don’t think they want to move Ellis, Duchene, or Arvy, and Turris is a real tough sell. There in a pretty bad spot, they really could’ve used the 1st pick.
Arvidsson is exactly what the Pens need.
Rust and Murray for Arvidsson and Rinne?
No way the Preds do that. First, I think they’re content with Saros as their number one. Second, they value Arvidsson highly. His numbers were down because he played hurt after he took a cheap shot from Bortuzzo. He was also their best player against Arizona. I don’t see them moving Arvi unless they get completely blown away. I do think that Poile is regretting the Duchene signing & would ditch Turris for a couple of broken sticks if he could. I just don’t see him trading Arvidsson
If they are content with Saros, what games were they watching?
I bet they regret signing Duchene. He’s a dog.
I keep thinking Turris would be a great 3C for the Pens…and then I see how long his deal runs. Makes Jack Johnson’s deal look like a steal.
Rust did score 27 goals without PP time last year. Murray shut out the Preds back to back to win the Cup in 2017. And both teams need a shake up. I think something like this could happen, especially with two old school GM’s that go way back and are itching for change.
I don’t see the Preds trading Arvidsson at all. He’s the heartbeat of that team & he’s on a reasonable contract. Also, Murray isn’t the goalie he was when he beat the Preds. He wasn’t very good this season & he’s a restricted free agents. There are UFA goalies who were better & there could be other goalies available in the trade market. As for Turris, the Pens aren’t taking his salary unless the Preds take Bjustad’s contract & that doesn’t make much sense for the Preds. They have enough underachieving forwards & they can buy Turris out for a smaller cap hit than Bjustad’s contract.
As a Columbus fan, I was glad we didn’t re-sign Duchene. I wasn’t impressed with him at all. For $10 million, Nashville got 13 goals, 29 assist, 42 points and a minus 4 form Duchene. For $4 million, the Blue Jackets got 15 goals, 27 assist, 42 points and a plus 4 from Gus Nyquist. For all the fuss made over the free agents who departed Columbus last year, only Artemi Panarin earned his keep. The teams that signed Duchene, Bobrovsky and Dzingel have severe cases of buyers remorse already
Agreed CBJ hasn’t lost a step without those “stars”, though I definitely think they missed Breadman in their 5OT game. Grinding and playing stout defense only works so long when you need a timely goal in OT.
Jarmo deserves a ton of credit. ESPECIALLY for drafting Dubois. He’s the player who has impressed me the most so far in the playoffs. He’s what everyone pretends Toews to be*.
*Though to be fair, Toews is playing his best hockey right now, but generally, he’s been a bit overrated most years.
I give Poile credit for making bold moves to try and improve the team, but he clearly doesn’t have the right mix of players right now. The Preds used to be a pain in the arse team to have to play against, but they’re a pretty soft group right now. And outside of Arvy, they haven’t done well in drafting top offensive talent. Hopefully Tomasino can change that trend.
I thought Duchene was going to solve those offensive woes? What happened to that?
They have lots of things that need to be changed, not only moving from players, coaches, and maybe poile himself. I think if the preds were to move on from poile as gm, he would still be in the org just not gm.
The changes need to start with David Poile.