[Sylvanfan]

Yeah, after a horrible pre-season in which the team did absolutely nothing I finally decided that the team was actually worse than I thought they were. Now that we're off the hook of owing our first round pick to anyone we felt we could start looking to move some of our veteran players in an attempt to pick up some younger assets that we feel will grow over the course of the season.

We certainly give up a lot in terms of today player as Kozlov and Kapanen are the two best players in the deal right now by a long margin. But Kozlov is 35 and he'll require a raise of sometype next year if I wanted to retain him as a UFA. Kapanen is a good versatile guy who can play F and D, and probably should be a D given how his ratings stack up. Again an older guy and with that a bigger meal ticket. Given where my team was it's probably best to move these guys to places where they stand a shot to contribute towards a more successful team.

Coming back I get Pavelski who is a good younger guy with some scoring potential. A late bloomer type he showed some good scoring when first getting to the NHL last year and the NHL Sharks usually give their own guys a lot more oppurtunity to become players than pretty much any other NHL team. Alzner is a blue chip prospect who might even stand a chance at being in the NHL next year. He's got good size, skates well and is a smart guy who really takes care of his own end. He has a nice offensive skill set, but just needs to become more comfortable adding that role to his game. Smithson is a depth forward, but he should get a chance to get in some ice time with the Preds this year.

Overall our average age has come down quite a bit here in the past couple of days which was something we needed to do. We need our young guys to grow over the course of the year and than look to see what types of options we have come the end of the season.