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PFellah · 11-27-2018, 09:50 PM

Firebirds Make Their Mark In Free Agency, Trade Market

The bad news: the free agent market wasn't quite as strong as I hoped it would be -- not a lot of game-changing players on the move.

The good news: the Firebirds were able to get creative and give their roster an overhaul with 11 free agent signings, and 5 trades.

Let's get right to it...

FREE AGENCY

General goals for free agency were as follows:

Improve the top lines in general
Depth signings on defense -- I have solid defensemen at the NHL level, but the minors are pretty empty. They don't have to be stars; mostly just warm bodies. If they happen to have some upside... cool.
At least one veteran "swing" defenseman who won't suffer from not playing a lot.
A veteran backup goalie who won't mind sitting the bench.

In order of signings, here's who came into the fold (parens are years/salary).

LW Rick Nash (1/3.05M). Full disclosure, at least 30% of the reason I went after him is to have Rick Nash and Riley Nash playing on a line together. That's just how I roll. That said, a 1-year commitment works well.
G Jaroslav Halak (2/1.525). Veteran keeper. Seemed good to have one.
Brief "The One That Got Away" detour -- James Van Riemsdyk. I offered him 4 years at $6M per, but he decided he wanted to play for a better team and took less money to sign a 1-year deal to return to Toronto. Ah well. At which point I shifted my attentions to David Perron.
D Erik Gustafsson (1/950k). Depth signing.
D Slater Koekkoek (1/1.3M). Depth with a little room to grow. Since he was an RFA, I had to wait and see if Tampa would match, but they didn't, so he eventually joined the fold. At 1.3, he didn't even cost me a draft pick.
D Kevin Bieksa (1/1.7M). Veteran swing guy. Originally offered around 1.4 or 1.5 but he turned it down, landed him at 1.7.
C Mark Letestu (2/2.4M). Also turned down the first offer at 2.2ish, signed for 2.4. Moderate upgrade to the 3rd or 4th line.
LW David Perron (4/5.5). Comes in a little cheaper than I was offering on JVR; I assume he's headed for the top line.
C Dominik Simon (1/850k). Surprised to find him available. Seems like he's got some upside.
A few more "warm body" depth signings: D Niko Mikkola (2/650k), LW Brandon Pirri (1/850k), G Niklas Rubin (2/700k)

And for the record, I'm still more than $13M under the cap, so I still have more room to take on salary if any good deals come up as the season progresses.

TRADES
Five deals in total. A mix of executing the plan, responding to CPU offers, and chasing the occasional fetish item. All picks are 2019 picks.

Firebirds trade C Tom Pyatt, RW Josh Leivo, and their 4th round pick to Winnipeg for Winnipeg's 2nd round and 7th round picks. Offered by the CPU. Leivo and Pyatt had been pushed pretty far down my depth chart, so it was two guys of marginal value for a chance to move up.

Firebirds trade RW Taylor Raddysh to Anaheim for C Ryan Kesler. BEHOLD the big fish! Anaheim was looking to clear cap space, offering both Kesler and Henrique, but Henrique was expiring whereas Kesler sticks around a while. OK, Kesler scares me in the same way Giordano did -- I could be paying $7M for a 4th-line C at the tail end of this -- but for today, it gives me a #1 center. Raddysh? Might be good some day, but he was a throw-in when I first got him, so easy come, easy go.

Firebirds trade G Joonas Korpisalo to Colorado for RW Nail Yakupov and a 3rd round pick previously obtained from Ottawa. Full disclosure: Yakupov is a bit of a fetish item, so I might have overpaid for him a little. On the other hand, you can only put one guy in net at a time -- Grubauer and Ullmark already give me two decent guys, so what the heck.

Firebirds trade C Marcus Kruger to Montreal for their 4th round pick. Offered by CPU. With Kesler and Letestu in the fold, Kruger wasn't really doing much for me, so I went ahead and pulled the trigger. I'm having a twinge of second-guessing because his $3M salary wasn't really hurting me and maybe I could've gotten more waiting until the deadline, but it's done now.

Firebirds trade LW Matt Puempel to Detroit for LW Darren Helm. A lesser fetish item; I've always kinda liked Helm, and Puempel didn't pan out as well as he scouted, even if he's still got some room to grow. Detroit is another team that seems to be in salary dump mode, so they had a bunch of old, expensive guys on the block. I kept trying to squeeze an extra draft pick out of the deal, but eventually settled for a one-up just to get the deal in the books. It was a little frustrating that at one point I had Puempel and... Froese, I think?... for Helm and a 2nd, the reds and greens looked right, the bars looked even, and Detroit still said I was way off.

The "One That Got Away" here was Daniel Sprong of the Pens. I probably offered 15 or 20 different permutations of "young defenseman + cheap forward" that looked like it made the bars happy, but never got them to budge. (Olofsson/Puempel was probably the closest to succeeding). If the Pens are contenders, maybe I'll take another run at it as the season progresses.

11-27-2018, 09:50 PM	#7
PFellah Rookie OVR: 5 Join Date: Oct 2011 Location: Pittsburgh, PA	Re: Third Time's The Charm(?) - Atlanta Firebirds Firebirds Make Their Mark In Free Agency, Trade Market The bad news: the free agent market wasn't quite as strong as I hoped it would be -- not a lot of game-changing players on the move. The good news: the Firebirds were able to get creative and give their roster an overhaul with 11 free agent signings, and 5 trades. Let's get right to it... FREE AGENCY General goals for free agency were as follows: Improve the top lines in general Depth signings on defense -- I have solid defensemen at the NHL level, but the minors are pretty empty. They don't have to be stars; mostly just warm bodies. If they happen to have some upside... cool. At least one veteran "swing" defenseman who won't suffer from not playing a lot. A veteran backup goalie who won't mind sitting the bench. In order of signings, here's who came into the fold (parens are years/salary). LW Rick Nash (1/3.05M). Full disclosure, at least 30% of the reason I went after him is to have Rick Nash and Riley Nash playing on a line together. That's just how I roll. That said, a 1-year commitment works well. G Jaroslav Halak (2/1.525). Veteran keeper. Seemed good to have one. Brief "The One That Got Away" detour -- James Van Riemsdyk. I offered him 4 years at $6M per, but he decided he wanted to play for a better team and took less money to sign a 1-year deal to return to Toronto. Ah well. At which point I shifted my attentions to David Perron. D Erik Gustafsson (1/950k). Depth signing. D Slater Koekkoek (1/1.3M). Depth with a little room to grow. Since he was an RFA, I had to wait and see if Tampa would match, but they didn't, so he eventually joined the fold. At 1.3, he didn't even cost me a draft pick. D Kevin Bieksa (1/1.7M). Veteran swing guy. Originally offered around 1.4 or 1.5 but he turned it down, landed him at 1.7. C Mark Letestu (2/2.4M). Also turned down the first offer at 2.2ish, signed for 2.4. Moderate upgrade to the 3rd or 4th line. LW David Perron (4/5.5). Comes in a little cheaper than I was offering on JVR; I assume he's headed for the top line. C Dominik Simon (1/850k). Surprised to find him available. Seems like he's got some upside. A few more "warm body" depth signings: D Niko Mikkola (2/650k), LW Brandon Pirri (1/850k), G Niklas Rubin (2/700k) And for the record, I'm still more than $13M under the cap, so I still have more room to take on salary if any good deals come up as the season progresses. TRADES Five deals in total. A mix of executing the plan, responding to CPU offers, and chasing the occasional fetish item. All picks are 2019 picks. Firebirds trade C Tom Pyatt, RW Josh Leivo, and their 4th round pick to Winnipeg for Winnipeg's 2nd round and 7th round picks. Offered by the CPU. Leivo and Pyatt had been pushed pretty far down my depth chart, so it was two guys of marginal value for a chance to move up. Firebirds trade RW Taylor Raddysh to Anaheim for C Ryan Kesler. BEHOLD the big fish! Anaheim was looking to clear cap space, offering both Kesler and Henrique, but Henrique was expiring whereas Kesler sticks around a while. OK, Kesler scares me in the same way Giordano did -- I could be paying $7M for a 4th-line C at the tail end of this -- but for today, it gives me a #1 center. Raddysh? Might be good some day, but he was a throw-in when I first got him, so easy come, easy go. Firebirds trade G Joonas Korpisalo to Colorado for RW Nail Yakupov and a 3rd round pick previously obtained from Ottawa. Full disclosure: Yakupov is a bit of a fetish item, so I might have overpaid for him a little. On the other hand, you can only put one guy in net at a time -- Grubauer and Ullmark already give me two decent guys, so what the heck. Firebirds trade C Marcus Kruger to Montreal for their 4th round pick. Offered by CPU. With Kesler and Letestu in the fold, Kruger wasn't really doing much for me, so I went ahead and pulled the trigger. I'm having a twinge of second-guessing because his $3M salary wasn't really hurting me and maybe I could've gotten more waiting until the deadline, but it's done now. Firebirds trade LW Matt Puempel to Detroit for LW Darren Helm. A lesser fetish item; I've always kinda liked Helm, and Puempel didn't pan out as well as he scouted, even if he's still got some room to grow. Detroit is another team that seems to be in salary dump mode, so they had a bunch of old, expensive guys on the block. I kept trying to squeeze an extra draft pick out of the deal, but eventually settled for a one-up just to get the deal in the books. It was a little frustrating that at one point I had Puempel and... Froese, I think?... for Helm and a 2nd, the reds and greens looked right, the bars looked even, and Detroit still said I was way off. The "One That Got Away" here was Daniel Sprong of the Pens. I probably offered 15 or 20 different permutations of "young defenseman + cheap forward" that looked like it made the bars happy, but never got them to budge. (Olofsson/Puempel was probably the closest to succeeding). If the Pens are contenders, maybe I'll take another run at it as the season progresses. Last edited by PFellah; 11-28-2018 at 08:17 AM.