[kipperiggy]

re posted from the garbage day thread, might be better here.

Now I am no cap expert, and don't have the hockey experience of many on this forum, but it's Saturday and I don't want to work overtime lol.

If Monahan can return to form after both hips being done, why can't he slot into the #2 or #3 C? I know everyone is counting him out, but I'm not ready to just yet. Not only that, but Backlund has shown us time and again he can step up to #2 at times but age will start to catch up I know.

What if we can re-sign Johnny, Chucky, and Bread and roll with something like:

Gaudreau - Lindholm - Toffoli -
Keeps chemistry from the top line and hopefully gets Toffoli back to the level we saw him play in Montreal, since he needs someone to dish him the puck. I have no problem with Lindy being our #1 and not sure why the other thread is suggesting Stutzle etc.

Dube - Monahan - Tkachuk
Maybe a bit slow but Dube can bring some speed, Chucky can show us if he can carry a line.

Bread - Backlund - Coleman - Don't know why we ever break up the 3B line (or why we have not called them that yet). Also don't know how Bread gets more than Lindholm, hopefully can get him signed around $4.0-4.5m and not the $5.0m+ people are projecting.

Then try and trade Lucic to someone trying to reach the cap floor (or he could retire or be bought out if he doesn't want to move, his actual cash owing is actually only around $1.0m this year if I'm recalling correctly which would be attractive to a team potentially or less on the table if he wants to retire). Re-sign Lewis especially and Jarnkrok if the price is right otherwise get a young gun or two up here to win a spot. They are getting their own playoff experience right now! Lewis' experience was key in the run but remember all our guys have got more now.

For Defense Gudbranson at least hopefully wants more stability but Zadorov might be gone, unless he wants stability too, since he's also bounced around a bit too. I think another year of experience for our guys is a good thing as 3 of them are still relatively young (Hanifin, Andersson, and Kylington especially if he can bulk up). Stone also strikes me as a guy looking for stability so could be enticed to re-sign especially if Zad goes and opens up a top 6 spot. Alternatively if both Gudbrandson and Zad are gone it gives Mackey or Valimaki a chance to win a spot like Oliver did. And let's hope and pray that Tanev's recovery is more like 4 than 6 months.

As someone who has up and left my place of employment to move for a secondment and then returned home, there is something to be said for the known (being Calgary for JG).

With Connor making $12.5m and Leon making $8.5m up north, if Johnny and Chucky want to stay, it might be easier than we think, given their stars outperformed ours. If they stay, this team is certainly closer to Cup than many teams that have the cap space to add them. So why wouldn't you want to stick with the known?

Anyway, just some ideas.