I still can’t see how trading Pronger for anything less than the sun and the moon is a good idea. Trade off all the expiring contracts, thats probably a good idea, especially for guys you don’t think you’ll resign, but Pronger is an anchor you can build around. You gotta have key guys at each of forward, defense, and goalie. With the 3 kids + Selanne at forward, Pronger on D, and Giguere/Hiller in goal, thats a pretty good core of a team, and you still have plenty of cap room for flexibility to build around it. Lose a guy like Pronger, and you will have a very very hard time replacing that talent and those minutes (and those suspensions) on the blueline.

Also, something to keep in mind here is the issues of what happens to the cap in the next two years. Because of the nature of how/when revenues are calculated, the cap will likely remain fairly stable next year, but then is likely to take a somewhat significant bump in the year after. If the Ducks keep some of that flexibility over these next two years, they’re probably going to put themselves into a position to poach players that other teams simply had to drop for cap reasons, or be able to take advantage of a more limited overall (in terms of available dollars) free agent market than we’ve since in the previous years since the lockout. Getting a guy like Hossa this year at more like 7M/yr when he would’ve gotten easily over 8M/yr last year is a significant savings. Going a year past that, could create a situation to resign Pronger for significantly less than he would command now, help force Bobby Ryan and Hiller’s next contracts into team-friendly contracts, and thats not even considering other free agents coming available. If the money in Anaheim is comparable, its still a contender, you’re already living there, and its nice weather, why leave, right?

Scott N. to NYR for Gomez..

Scott N. would help out NY and Gomes would help the ducks. You could make this trade and still maybe win a playoff round. Gomez is a little over a million more than Scott, so maybe you would have to send some salary with Scott (like maybe Morrison who Gomez would negate)

If this did go through, I could see the Ducks keeping Pronger. Basically you would have:

Ryan LW – Getzlaf C – Perry RW
Kunitz LW – Gomez C – Teemu RW
3rd and 4th are the same.

This season we have 2 guys I’m really worried will get offers we can’t (or wont) match. Montador and Sammy. If we can keep Sammy, we can build that checking line with him, Carter and maybe Miller. replace the checking line guys like Marchant and Moen with League minimum guys. Montador is having a career year and we should sign him now or he might be due for a big raise (a mil or 2) that we might not want to match.

With those top two lines and a defense built around Pronger and Buchemin (I would try like hell to get Odonnell back this summer) We could have a better cheaper team for the next few years.

I guess we could send Rob with Scott as well. But thats not as important. It is easier to replace guys like Moen and Marchant with cheaper players, than it is to find wold class centers to anchor our 2nd line.

This might not be a bad option if we stand to lose Scott in a year or two anyway. Gomez is under contract til 2013. Of all the rumors I’ve heard, this makes the most sense to me. What do you people think?

tell us what you think of Gomez.

I can see why the Rangers would want out of that deal, but the notion that they want something back is silly.

Now that’s funny.