Quote:
Originally Posted by Resolute 14
Truth be told, they very well could be.
I think it's unlikely that Lucic matches Neal's offensive output of last year, while his vaunted truculence won't really matter much come playoff time when he's getting 10 minutes ice time tops and stapled to the bench in any high pressure situation. Assuming he even gets into the line up by that point.
And while people are leaning heavily on advanced stats to dismiss Neal's contributions to the Oilers thus far, they don't seem to have realized that Lucic is easily the second-worst forward on the Flames in that department. And between you and me, I expect Sam Bennett to improve. I don't expect Lucic will.
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Yeah, I keep coming back to this as well in my head.
Conceivably if you buy out Stone and Neal in June you're left with an extra ~6 million which allows you to re-sign Tkachuk to the same deal he's at now while signing Ferland to the same deal he's at with Vancouver, as an example.
Which still leaves sucky lucic up in edmonton and leaves the canucks without a decent forward, effectively damaging your two chief rivals.