[stemit14]

We are starting to see some separation as far teams with impressive records that, if they keep up their level of play, they should be buyers at the TDL this year. Focusing on their records and games played (rather than just points), I would say the teams that could be buyers at this point are:

Winnipeg
Florida
Minnesota
New Jersey
Los Angeles
Carolina
Washington
Vegas
New York
Vancouver

I’m sure this list will change. Toronto, Colorado and Dallas are likely to be buyers as well but they have pretty mediocre records at this point.

Of those teams, I’m wondering which ones would have a strong interest in any of the flames potential trade pieces (Mantha, Kuzmenko, Barrie and possibly Andersson). Personally, I could see these as good fits:

Kuzmenko to Washington - the caps have a long history of Russian players and he could compliment Ovechkin on the powerplay. Their powerplay is struggling so far this year so the need might be there. They could hope Kuzmenko helps their powerplay the same way he helped spark Calgary’s powerplay last season.

Mantha to Minnesota - they could use some size on their wing and 6’5” forwards with some scoring touch seem to always find a landing spot during the TDL.

Barrie to Carolina - not sure if a fit because there will be better options for them but they will need defence and Barrie will be inexpensive to acquire.

Andersson to Winnipeg - I kind of doubt Andersson gets traded this year but I could see the Jets being a good fit. They are likely to be all in this year after this start to the season and because their core is in their prime - they won’t want to wait much longer to make a big playoff push. Their team has looked “perfect” so far this season but most would have thought they could use some help on defence when looking at their roster. Plus the Jets have great center depth on their team and in their prospect pool (Lambert and Yager) so they could afford to include one as a necessary piece in an Andersson trade.