First, I think it is important to recognize that through 49 games, the Carolina Hurricanes 2015-16 season has been a success. As a team that finished fifth from the bottom last season, spent very little adding players this past summer and planned to rely on youth, this team was not really supposed to still be in the playoff mix at this point in the season. At the point where, James Wisniewski tore his ACL on his first shift, the slim chances plummeted. But here we are looking forward to game #50 on Sunday, and the Carolina Hurricanes are still in the mix, even if barely so.
If this situation holds until the third week of February, the Canes place in the standings could impact what GM Ron Francis does at the end of February. I am going to save my thoughts on the big short-term stuff like Eric Staal, Kris Versteeg and other impending free agents for my all-star break posts, but I wanted to offer some thoughts on what the 2015-16 season success could mean farther out.
The baseline from this summer
This summer, the optimistic talk in the Hurricanes hockey community focused on the promising young batch of defensemen including Noah Hanifin who was added to an already strong prospect pool. Many thought that Noah Hanifin was NHL-ready, so his start of the 2015-16 season at the NHL season while not a sure thing was not a surprise either. But now in late January, the Canes have not just Noah Hanifin but also Brett Pesce and Jaccob Slavin playing major roles at the NHL level. They are not perfect and are encountering growing pains here and there, but they also look very good at times and clearly with the capability to be good NHL defensemen soon. If you rewind back to this summer, I think a reasonable timetable for Pesce and Slavin would probably have been something like a full 2015-16 season in the AHL possibly with a March trial run in Raleigh, followed by some combination of AHL and a limited NHL role in 2016-17 and finally the hope that 1 of these players could be on an accelerated path along with Noah Hanifin to be top 4 defensemen in 2017-18.
That timetable suggested that the Canes were in the middle of a rebuilding project that was probably at least 2 seasons out which also gave Ron Francis some time to figure out what he was going to do to build out the forward part of the future.
Updated schedule from January 2016
An updated assessment today looks quite different. Hanifin, Pesce and Slavin are now slotted to play key roles in 2016-17. Heck, they are already right now. And more than just learning on the job, there is at least the possibility that these players can start to push the team upward as early as the 2016-17 season. Again, they are already playing a role in doing that right now.
The result is that the development of the future blue line is even farther ahead of the forward development than it was thought to be just this past summer. Phil Di Giuseppe continues to look like he could be capable of taking a roster spot long-term, but past Di Giuseppe, I think there are more questions than answers in the system at forward.
Looking out to 2016-17
If the blue line was still a work in process that looked to be out 2-3 years, Francis would have time to build the forward prospect pool gradually primarily through the draft. And that will still be the primary vehicle for building a deeper prospect pool. But I think there is at least a chance that the team in total is ahead of schedule and with such a long playoff drought and attendance issues because of it, I think Francis will try to play for 2016-17 if he can do so without compromising the future beyond that to do so. So that is to say, the Francis will look to accelerate the rise of the team but not if it requires trading a bunch of futures to add older players to do so.
I think the key difference for Francis is in the tools he uses to build the forward prospect pool and the kind of players he adds. I think the change is that instead of relying on the draft to add forwards for 2-4 years out that he might accelerate the process by adding still young players via trade. I am not talking about 29-year old veterans but rather 20-24 year old players who are either in the NHL already or are very close to being NHL-ready. This makes sense for 2 reasons. First, with 3 young defensemen (plus Faulk who makes 4) already on a good path to filling NHL roster spots on defense, Francis suddenly has a few extra defensemen that he could part with. Second, if Francis wants to play at least a little bit for 2016-17 but at the same time go with a younger roster, then the 2016 draft has limited ability to help. Nowadays there is a greater possibility of even late first round/early second round picks making an NHL roster it is still not the norm.
So what kind of players might Francis look for in trade?
At a basic level, I think Francis would be shopping for forwards who are 2-4 years removed from their draft years, have at least solid AHL experience ideally with some NHL experience too and who are deemed ready or real close to ready to step into an NHL roster spot in a top 9 role with the potential to be a top 6 forward. Jonathan Drouin is the name in the headlines right now. He could be a possibility, but my hunch is that the asking price for Drouin is too high right now. But I think he fits the bill at a basic level as a player who could step into the Canes NHL lineup immediately and has the potential to be a difference-maker soon. Kerby Rychel is another name that has been bandied about this season who could be available. He is also more of the power forward mold that might be of interest to Francis. Past those 2 players who have been in the mainstream hockey headlines this year, there are any number of 20-24 year old players that the Canes scouting staff should have a read on and could be possibilities.
Summary
The biggest story of the 2015-16 season thus far is how far ahead of schedule the Canes young blue line is. I think that could pull in Ron Francis’ schedule for building his future team even to the point where he wants to play for 2016-17 as long as it does not require trading too much of the future past that. That puts some pressure on him to figure out the forwards sooner than he might have otherwise. I think the upshot is that he is likely to add a young forward or 2 who is ready or at least close to ready to slot into the NHL lineup. That could happen at the trade deadline, but more likely that is part of his summer’s work during the draft weekend and into the summer.
Go Canes!
1. Need a playmaker like Drouin. Use E. Staal (with picks and/or players) to get him. Don’t expect a drafted player to play any dividends for 3-4 years. The Hurricanes have a system that has been proven to work. They need skill players….not AHL offensive talent players. NHL.
2. Attempt to find a banging winger w/ skill. Currently have 0 on team or at Charlotte. Real skill. Ok to find depth players (Diguissepe sp?) but they aren’t enough.
3. Don’t put too much pressure on Slavin and Pesce to be saviors who are at best, 3-4 (and more likely 4 – 5) defenseman They are nice depth players, but have not shown any indication they are anything more than decent offensively. You need players like them so it isn’t necessarily a bad thing but not enough to say ok, we’re good – only look for forwards.
It is so hard to project defensemen so early in their development. Who had Justin Faulk as a top goal-scoring defensemen after his 1st season? That said, Pesce and Slavin are off to an incredibly good start. The big question is whether they are just hitting their ceilings on a fast schedule or if will continue to develop (like Faulk) and push much higher.
One thing that will be interesting to see is with E. Staal either gone or signed for a much reduced price, Ward gone, Liles gone, in terms of playing for 2016-17 is there money to add a big forward like a Backes or Ladd? Both seem like players Peters would like.
Regardless of whether Ward and EStaal leave or return,the team gets a bunch of salary $ back. It will be interesting to see if Francis gets to spend some of that or if that gets banked to better match current revenue/attendance with salary budget.
I like Ladd but am not a big fan of Backes. In terms of adding size, in today’s NHL, it must be of the ‘can skate too’ variety like Erik Cole in his prime.