Early Trading: Utah, Montreal exploring NHL trade market

NHL teams aren't too keen on making trades early in the season but some injuries around the league could force some clubs to take some action. TSN Hockey Insider Pierre LeBrun sheds some light on the injury situation in Utah, discuss where the Canadiens are at in their rebuild process and whether or not they would be open to making changes with their roster.

Utah Hockey Club exploring their options

Gino Reda: Teams hate making trades early in the season, but there are a couple of situations unfolding right now that could force the hands of teams like the Utah Hockey Club and even the Montreal Canadiens to do something. To discuss that, here's insider Pierre LeBrun with Early Trade Talk.

Let's start in Utah, where the Hockey Club has got some holes on the blue line right now.

LeBrun: Yeah, long-term injuries to Sean Durzi, who's the latest, and of course we know about John Marino from earlier this month. Marino gone at least until the new year, and Durzi gone until April in all likelihood, very hurtful to what Utah's trying to do here.

Context is important here. If this was the old Arizona days, they'd probably say "Eh, we're rebuilding, if we lose we lose, we'll probably get a higher draft pick." That's not the mindset with the Utah Hockey Club. New market, new owner, they want to be way more competitive this year.

And so because of that, there's some added pressure this year to see how they'll cope with these injuries. The early decision, from what we're told by the Utah front office and general manager Bill Armstrong, is that they're going to try to cope from within, they have internal options. They've already made a call-up and basically try to survive these injuries.

But I do think if the losses pile up then they're going to be forced into more meaningful trade discussion and already, from talking to other sources around the league, I'm told that Armstrong certainly is calling around at least to get an idea if he decides to go down that route.

One of the players I'm told he's checked on is Ivan Provorov, the pending UFA defenceman from the Columbus Blue Jackets and Provorov is going to be in high demand closer to March 7’s trade deadline. My sense is that the Blue Jackets may not be ready at this point to deal him. They want to leave this roster alone for now, let this team have a chance, let them fight it out this year, and I don't think they want to take away from the roster too early in the season.

The fact is, all things being equal, if the Blue Jackets go with the kind of projections that most people go with for their season, Provorov will be one of the rental players moved by March 7.

The reason, I think, for Utah that a rental player would be more appealing than a guy with term is because Durzi and Marino are coming back at some point.

I know that a lot of people might look at that and say "Hello, the Leafs might be open to moving Timothy Liljegren, who might be looking for a change of scenery. Why wouldn't Utah look at Liljegren?" and who knows, maybe they will eventually, but for right now, I don't think he's that appealing because he has term on his deal.

Where does he fit after Durzi and Marino come back? I think the rental piece is where Utah probably will go if  they decide to make a trade, but for now, they want to stay internal and see if they can survive these injuries.

Could the Montreal Canadiens make changes?

Reda: What about the Canadiens, Pierre? The plan out of the gate was to take a step towards challenging for a playoff spot, but they're dead-last in the division right now, second-last in the conference.

I know it's still early, but could they be looking to fill some holes before they fall so far behind that they can't recover?

LeBrun: Well Gino, first of all, let's be real here, I know what was said or not said at the start of the year, but the reality is, internally, my understanding is I don't think they felt the playoffs were realistic. But, certainly, I think there's pressure internally and externally to take a meaningful step this year and play some meaningful hockey later into the year.

That's true, and because of that, I don't think the slow start is being ignored here. What I'm being told, after talking to teams around the league, is that general manager Kent Hughes has started to call around, doing his due diligence, at least getting a sense of what, potentially, is out there because I think the Canadiens would be open to making a move here that would help sort of shake up the makeup a bit here, and help this team win some games. The reality though is there is almost no trades at this time of year - we know that in a cap system.

I don't think there's anything imminent for Montreal, but I think it's noteworthy that the Habs aren't just sitting there and saying, ‘Oh well, we're off to a slow start, that's life.'

No, it has fuelled Kent Hughes to maybe make more calls than he might have this early in the season. We'll see where it leads.

A couple things that I'd have to point out.

One is that the Habs aren't going to mortgage the future in any kind of deal - the long term still trumps all. The other thing is that they're right at the cap, so it's got to be apple to apple, in terms of a salary coming in, a salary going out, which also adds to the difficulty of making that kind of trade this early in the year.

Again, the point being, from what we're hearing from other teams around the league, Hughes is making his calls, so we'll see where it goes.

Finland dealing with wealth of options for 4 Nations Face-Off roster

Reda: We're now just over five weeks from the deadline where teams have to submit their rosters for the 4 Nations Face-Off that will be played this February. We've spoken a lot about Team Canada's scouting, and you just spoke to Team Finland's general manager Jere Lehtinen this morning?

LeBrun: Yeah, Lehtinen is pretty excited about putting this team together. Just like Canada, the U.S. and Sweden, that Dec. 2 deadline is pretty early. Obviously Finland doesn't have as many NHL players to choose from as Canada and the US, but they've got a good-looking lineup, potentially, already.

This is - and Lehtinen agreed with this - the deepest Finland has ever been down the middle. You have Aleksander Barkov, Sebastian Aho and Roope Hintz one-two-three down the middle. That's the kind of depth, star-wise, that - and Lehtinen agrees - Finland has never had in best on best competition. So, there you go from the get-go.

What that has produced, in terms of that kind of depth, is the question of "Who plays a fourth-line centre role for Finland?"

You have candidates - Mikael Granlund has been around forever, he kind of plays centre and wing, Erik Haula is a veteran, you have Anton Lundell, who is a young blossoming player for the Florida Panthers who just won a Cup, and Jesperi Kotkaniemi, the former first-round pick of the Canadiens playing for the Carolina Hurricanes.

Kotkaniemi is very much a bubble player in this conversation I think, but he has played on the second line so far this year Gino, centering Martin Necas and Jack Roslovic, and he's playing well, so these are big moments for Kotkaniemi if he wants to get in more seriously in this conversation and get Lehtinen's attention. But I think it speaks to the depth at centre for Finland that they're having these conversations, and they're fun ones to have for them.