The Oilers Aren’t Willing to Make The Keith Trade At All Costs

Coming from an Edmonton Oilers point of view, BLH provides you with excerpts from the latest NHL news, rumors, and speculation from all of the internet’s best sites including Spector’s Hockey, The Fourth Period, NHL Trade Talk, The Hockey Writers, Sportsnet, The Athletic, TSN and more!

From NHL Trade Talk

Details on Oilers Rumored Strategy to Trade for Duncan Keith

The Edmonton Oilers are reportedly interested in trading for Duncan Keith, but they aren’t willing to add him at all costs. What’s the plan?

Chicago is likely willing to retain a bit of salary, but they aren’t willing to take a terrible contract and retain money.
The Oilers aren’t willing to make the trade and sacrifice cap flexibility, just to add a player of Keith’s pedigree.
A middle ground is what the two sides are working on.

“The Oilers aren’t willing to make the trade at all costs. They’d like Chicago to retain salary or to take a bad contract off their hands, the source said…. Having the money nearly equal out in a deal for Keith is all but a necessity for the Oilers, the source said.” – Daniel Nugent-Bowman, The Athletic

Barrie, by the way, has not been ruled out as an option for Edmonton next season.
Holland is not interested in committing money to a player that makes it difficult to get Nurse signed this summer.
If the Oilers make the trade first, they’ll have to hold off on signing Larsson until the draft is complete. Because Keith has no-movement clause heading into the trade, the Oilers are required to honor it during the draft.
If the Oilers don’t sign Larsson before the draft, and don’t add Duncan Keith via trade, Caleb Jones is the player the team will protect.

BLH’s Thoughts: Lots of moving parts… I can’t see Edmonton making that trade ahead of the expansion draft unless they have a subsequent move planned for Bear and/or Jones. Surely their focus is on getting Adam Larsson signed to his new deal and then focusing on a 2nd pairing LHD.

From NHLRumors.com

The Red Wings have lot of salary cap space to use to their advantage if they want

Kevin Allen of Detroit Hockey Now: The Detroit Red Wings currently have 12 players under contract for next season and $48.1 million salary cap space. Once they re-sign their RFAs, and including Moritz Seider and Joe Veleno, they should have about $21 million in cap space with 21 roster players.

The Red Wings could look to buy out Frans Nielsen or Richard Panik.

BLH’s Thoughts: Here’s a team that could help out the Oilers if they require a third club to help facilitate a trade for Duncan Keith. The amount of history between the execs on Edmonton and Detroit could possibly come in handy and Holland might look for a favor from Steve Yzerman after doing him one with the Andreas Athanasiou trade…

Will the Penguins try to trade Jason Zucker?

Dan Kingerski of Pittsburgh Hockey Now: The Kraken would be guaranteed to select Zucker from the Penguins if he was left unprotected. Could the Penguins get similar draft picks if they traded Zucker? They could then use one of the draft picks to send to the Kraken to protect a player/suggest to take someone like Marcus Pettersson.

If the Penguins were able to trade Zucker and get the Kraken to select Pettersson, that would take over $9.5 million off their cap.

BLH’s Thoughts: Would there be an appetite from the Oilers to trade Zack Kassian and a good prospect or draft pick for Zucker? That’d all but end their bid to upgrade the top-six, right? Mind you, the American winger would have to waive his M-NMC, which could be a task given his nationality and the fact that he’s playing on one of the NHL’s best clubs and alongside one of the league’s best players all-time…

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