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Kruger and Jooris on Waivers

Or it's like the Marty Gelinas waiver stunt.

That could be the case for Kruger ("look, man, no one even wants you"), but doubt it. We'll see. Someone might indeed want him (JR?).

Joorvis unlikely to see any action here soon, so presumably either down to Charlotte or elsewhere if there are takers (doubt that).

Hopefully this is a move to free up roster spots for call-ups. All fourth-line stuff, so presumably part of the search for fourth-line offense with Ryan remaining as 4C.
 
Kruger might be guy we can deadline trade if we eat some salary. Not saying we will but I think there will be interest. Jooris no harm no foul.
 
Until Jooris and Kruger are assigned elsewhere I'm not getting too excited about this.

This. Less and less vets get claimed on the waiver wire these days. New York is dangling defenseman Brandan Smith but his contract will mean that he's not going anywhere ... except maybe the A.

Kruger is the one that's been a huge disappointment. He's supposed to be our "other" PK center but has been pretty terrible on the kill all year and at times seems to be willfully ignoring his assignment and over-pursuing. I suspect that the Canes also thought they could get some third line minutes out of Kruger, coming off of his strong showing at the Worlds ... just a suspicion, nothing firm. If that is indeed the case, it only deepens the frustration with his low energy level. Jooris is pure meh. He was never going to be anything other than a fourth line grunt and I think his only real issue has been that he can't seem to stay healthy. I was expecting more energy out of him as well and he's delivered at times ... but again, just not an impact player.

Of course, if anybody actually believes that the only thing that's wrong with Carolina's mix at forward is the fourth line, well ...
 
Jeffbear is going to sell me the London bridge and promise I can get to London, England by car w/o the assistance of watercraft.
 
I was just reminded how much Krueger makes. Wow. What a waste of money.

Cap Friendly shows that most of his salary for this year was a signing bonus. Did we pay that, or did the Hawks? How can you have a signing bonus that's not paid until a year after you sign?
 
Jeffbear is going to sell me the London bridge and promise I can get to London, England by car w/o the assistance of watercraft.

Catch the latest episode of The Grand Tour ... it's possible, just not wise, safe or likely.
 
Hawks paid the bonus.

And God bless them for that.

If there's a hidden benefit to Carolina's awful player acquisition return from last summer, maybe it will be that we finally start to move away from Chicago's castoffs.
 
Hoping this means that Lindholm at center (which I have been wanting to see for a while) might be a thing. That was what we drafted him to be and was his natural position. We just sort of shunted him off to the wings when he was younger and we were stronger down the center until he got bigger...and perhaps we were a bit weaker.

Well, both those things have occurred and there's a lot to be said for making this move. He's RFA this summer, so let's just see what we have here.

Instead of odd-manning him out of the top 6 and giving him dual special teams assignments to get his minutes up, here's what I would like to see for the forwards (includes two AHL call-ups):


Teravainen / Staal / Aho

Skinner / Lindholm / Williams

McGinn / Rask / Stempniak

Foegele / Ryan / Zykov

Kruger (if still around)
PDG


That leaves the Finns intact with our de facto 1C.

Gives Skinner top-6 line mates and ice time along with a couple of bodies that will hopefully take exception to any shenanigans being directed Skinner's way along with providing enough scoring threats to where Skinner cannot be double- and triple-teamed by the defense. Lindholm's points have been at a 2-to-1 ratio favoring assists his entire career (except for this season, where he has more goals than assists). So scoring playmaker seems to be his destiny.

Pushes Rask down to 3C with third-line talent wingers. That alone is progress.

Good AHL line that need not defer to any NHL'ers and can function as the 4th scoring line we need. Foegele plays PK for the Checkers and I believe leads the AHL in shorthanded goals, so replaces Nordstrom on that unit.


It could happen.
 
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Ideally what I would like the Canes to do here with all of this is:

1) Once Kruger and Jooris clear, send them down to the minors. If Kruger wants to go sulk back in Sweden then let him.

2) Call up any combination of Foegele, Zykov, Saarela, Roy, Gauthier, Kuokkanen.

3) Put these kids out there in place of any of Ryan, Stempniak, Rask or Nordstrom. Roll 4 lines.

If the kids are completely overmatched out there and don't belong, ship them back to Charlotte and call up someone else.

The Canes are already only scoring 1 darn goal a game. It can't get any worse out there so what the heck do we have to lose? Oh yeah...and Ronnie....there is no rule that says that our kids can only handle 6 minutes a game and need to be protected. What kind of defeatist attitude is that to take on what our prospects are capable of handling at the NHL level? How about expecting to play these kids 10 minutes a game. Have Foegele and Roy up and killing penalties, you know, like they excel at in the AHL. Have Zykov on the PP, you know, where he excels for the Checkers? Maybe a little less Derek Ryan and Lee Stempniak and Victor Rask doing nothing productive out there.

This team was so darn willing to put Hanifin, Pesce and Slavin and Aho out there playing regular minutes very quickly....now Ronnie is acting like every other prospect we have needs to be treated with kid gloves.
 
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One could make a compelling case that Zykov, Foegele and Saarela have all more than earned at least an NHL look-see with their play in the A. I'm with you guys ... why not all three at the same time? The scoring is gonna get worse? Please.
 
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