Four NHL teams that need to consider making an early-season trade

The NHL trade market still needs time to fully form, but the rumours are percolating. Some potential sellers might still be waiting to see if they can hang around as a playoff hopeful before leaning further into the future. There are certain contract situations that might need to play out a little before a team understands if it can, or will, re-sign a player, or explore trading them out to be someone else’s rental.

But for some GMs the quarter point of the season, and the crucial American Thanksgiving benchmark next week, is a point at which to make a call to go one way or the other.

Jim Rutherford has made a mark throughout his front office career for being an early actor. Though he’s not a GM anymore, the Vancouver Canucks team he oversees pulled in defenceman Nikita Zadorov on Nov. 30 last season.

The Washington Capitals were the first buyer to strike with a meaningful trade during this regular season, picking up depth centre Lars Eller from the spiralling rival Pittsburgh Penguins last week.

Buying early isn’t for everyone, though. If you have cap room and aren’t in LTIR, then you accumulate space with each passing day. The longer you can do that, the more full-value cap hit you can absorb at the trade deadline. The Edmonton Oilers, for instance, have $1.37 million to work with right now and could use it to acquire a defenceman. But they’re more likely to wait on that addition until closer to the trade deadline, when they could add a player (or two) making around $5 million.

And if you are in LTIR, you have to make sure you’ll have the necessary cap space available if any of your injured players return during the season.

Sometimes those best laid plans go to waste, however, and the desperation of a season slipping away spurs a GM to act. The conditions may not be ripe for everyone to make a deal right now, but some teams are feeling the urgency. So as we close in on the late-November American Thanksgiving mark, we look at a few teams that may have to act soon, for one reason or another.

Buffalo Sabres
Listen to any NHL insider talk about this season’s nascent trade market and the Buffalo Sabres are not far from their lips. This is the poster team for “better get on this before it’s too late.”

The list of players who are and will be available around the league is still taking shape and will change throughout the next few months. But, this early, the streaky Sabres have to be careful one bad run doesn’t bury them again.

“I think, you know, I’ve made lots of calls to understand the market and what’s out there,” Buffalo GM Kevyn Adams told Daily Faceoff’s Frank Seravalli last week. “This is a difficult time of year to make trades, not every team is ready to do something. But I’m open to different things and I’m not going to stop trying to improve this team.”

A winger? Sure, the Sabres could look to do something there, with top-sixers Jack Quinn and Zach Benson combining for four goals so far. Defencemen? Buffalo’s blue line thins out quickly after Rasmus Dahlin, Owen Power and Bowen Byram now that Mattias Samuelsson is out week-to-week. They are 19th in shots against per game.

Byram’s name has been bandied about in rumours, but would surely take quite the upgrade for them to move off him. The Sabres have all their draft picks, over $8 million in cap space and all the motivation to make a push. Falling short of the playoffs again, after all, may mean the team moves on from Adams. He can’t let Ottawa — a team in a similar situation — push too far ahead.

Pittsburgh Penguins
The winds of change are blowing in Pittsburgh and they got a jump on the trade market already, moving Eller to the Capitals.

But how much big movement can we really expect? Five players have full no-move clauses, while an additional seven have modified no-trade clauses. The Penguins have already committed two of their three retained-salary slots, leaving them with just one more to use this season.

“For the first time in the Crosby-Malkin era they’re kind of saying ‘we have to do a deeper rebuild/retool than we ever have,” Elliotte Friedman said on Friday’s The FAN Hockey Show. “I don’t think it’s wrong to say they’ll listen on just about anything, but Crosby is not going anywhere unless he wants to and I don’t think Malkin is either.

“I think (Marcus) Pettersson is getting dealt, (Drew) O’Connor’s getting dealt. It’ll be interesting, (Alex) Nedeljkovic has one more year, (Noel) Acciari’s got one more year, they’ve got a couple players who’ve got a year left on their deals.”

While it’s highly unlikely that Crosby or Malkin ever get traded, defencemen Kris Letang and Erik Karlsson are a different matter. Even still, Karlsson’s $5 million signing bonus due this summer ahead of the second-last season on his contract makes him a more long-term trade candidate, while Letang has major health concerns (two strokes and neck surgery in his past) and is signed through 2028. Both could move one day, if they waive their clauses, but don’t appear imminently attractive.

Pettersson has been struggling mightily this season and been on the ice for more 5-on-5 goals against than any other player in the league, but recent history suggests he’d be a great get for a contender’s top four. Just last season, Pettersson led the Penguins with an on-ice goals percentage of 56.49 (87 for, 67 against) and was 24th among all NHL defencemen in 5-on-5 scoring. A pending UFA, the Penguins might want to wait until around the deadline to move him and capitalize on the market as more saved-up cap space is available. He could return them the best package in 2024-25.

O’Connor, Anthony Beauvillier, and Matt Grzelcyk are all pending UFAs who could — and should — be moved at any time. It gets interesting with Michael Bunting (contract expires in 2026), Acciari (2026), Nedeljkovic (2026) and even Rickard Rakell (2028), who could all be interesting pieces in their own way and still under contract. Even Bryan Rust, a long-time, 32-year-old Penguin with a full no-movement clause, has to be on the table, if he’ll allow it. A 28-goal scorer and near point-per-game player last season, Rust has two Stanley Cups, experience, a track record of producing and years of control at a $5.125 million AAV that could have teams calling.

There are all sorts of trade candidates here, some more long term than others, but the earlier the Penguins can move some of these players, and perhaps better position themselves for the 2025 lottery, the better. Some sort of end is nigh.

Boston Bruins
We thought after last Thursday’s 7-2 loss in Dallas that the Boston Bruins might part ways with head coach Jim Montgomery. We thought his seat got hotter after Saturday’s 3-2 OT loss to St. Louis. But surely Monday’s 5-1 loss at home to Columbus, with the crowd raining boos down on the team, was the last game for Montgomery on the bench.

Next up is a home game against the Utah Hockey Club, who have dropped a couple in a row themselves.

There’s little doubt Montgomery is one of the better coaches around and it’s fair to wonder if a change behind the bench is what’s really needed, or if the makeup of the team needs a tweak. The heat is being turned up in Boston either way, and with off-season pickups Elias Lindholm and Nikita Zadorov off to slow starts, depth being tested, and Jeremy Swayman in a rut early, GM Don Sweeney’s focus may be on how to improve the roster Montgomery has to work with.

Nashville Predators
Can this season still be saved? With so much schedule still ahead you can’t completely write off Barry Trotz’s team, but each day they fail to make up ground or leap over someone ahead of them, the steeper the climb gets.

When Nashville was on the border of being a seller last season, they sat four points out of a playoff spot (and ninth in the West) on Feb. 16. A brutal 9-2 loss at home to Dallas was a low, and presumably a turning point in a negative way. Then they immediately won eight games in a row, got a point in 18 straight games, and wound up being the sixth-best team in the conference.

Trading away prospect goalie Yaroslav Askarov while re-signing veteran netminder Juuse Saros to an eight-year extension was one sign they were pushing to compete, as was spending north of $100 million on UFA contracts to Steven Stamkos, Jonathan Marchessault and Brady Skjei. Those have largely fallen flat so far, as has the team, sitting 6-10-3, 15th in the Western Conference and five points back of a playoff spot.

O’Reilly has sounded off on his frustration over a recent loss. Trotz has threatened his team with a rebuild, though that seems more a rallying cry with the potential for AHL call-ups as opposed to trading out of their chosen path. Nashville has already made its commitment to winning in the near future.

Is the coach on the hot seat? Andrew Brunette is in his second season with the team, but the prevailing local opinion is that he is not. If the coach doesn’t go and selling off for the future isn’t an option, the only thing left for the Predators to do is try and find immediate fixes. Their needs are for a centre, or more defencemen.

Nashville is one of a few teams with cap space — $6.69 million of it. They also have three first-round picks: their own, Tampa Bay’s and Vegas’. Plus two second-rounders.

If Trotz is able to hold off adding money to the roster until March, he’d be able to take on roughly $24.69 million in full-value cap hits at the trade deadline and be able to do virtually anything. But he might not have the luxury to wait that long if this slow start doesn’t start course correcting now.

More from Sportsnet

Scout’s Analysis: Looking at Blue Jackets trade candidate David Jiricek

Logan Thompson building strong case for Team Canada ‘dream’ at 4 Nations