The Friday Four is a collection of thoughts and information on some intriguing player storylines from around the NHL. On deck this week:
• Canucks face tough choices with Miller and Pettersson
• Kane dragging the Red Wings back into the playoff race
• Reaves’ role becoming extinct
• Samsonov finding his groove in Vegas
Elias Pettersson and J.T. Miller, Vancouver Canucks
Can’t we all just get along?
That would make things so much easier for the Vancouver Canucks, who now appear to be at least entertaining the thought of a seismic roster shakeup in the wake of the reported rift between J.T. Miller and Elias Pettersson. Whether a deal for either player comes together remains to be seen, but reports suggest the Canucks are listening to their trade options on both players.
This is a potential outcome that probably seemed unfathomable last spring, when the Canucks were just one win away from the Western Conference Final. Vancouver has a solid core of Miller, Pettersson, Quinn Hughes, Thatcher Demko and Brock Boeser all in their primes and seemed poised to contend for championships for the foreseeable future. That could still be a reality, but it hinges on a positive resolution to the Pettersson/Miller drama, which won’t be easy to navigate.
The ideal solution is the situation gets resolved internally and the Canucks keep both players, though if that’s not possible, Vancouver management must ask itself which player is more valuable to the team moving forward.
There’s a seemingly easy case to be made that it’s Pettersson. He possesses elite talent and Pettersson also is a much better two-way player. He can impact the game at both ends of the ice when he’s playing at a high level. I’m not sure too many players are going to have an opportunity at a Selke Trophy as long as Aleksander Barkov is around, but Pettersson has the potential to be in the tier below the Panthers captain if he’s at his best. There are very few players that can net you 100 points and still be strong in their own end.
Sportsnet’s Adam Vingan did a great job of illustrating what Pettersson brings to the table in the defensive zone in this piece from right before Pettersson got injured. At the time, Pettersson had 164 blocked passes. He also ranked just outside the top 10 in puck battles won. Even when Pettersson is going through a scoring slump, he can still be a really positive influence on the game.
The other thing to consider here is age. Pettersson is five years younger than Miller and just entering his prime. Miller will be 32 in March and it would be much easier for the Canucks to build around Pettersson and Hughes going forward, while using the assets and potential cap space from a Miller trade to re-stock the roster.
With all that said, there is an argument to be made for Vancouver to keep Miller. He’s actually been the better offensive player by a decent margin during the previous three campaigns. Miller and Pettersson both have played exactly 242 games over that stretch, with Miller recording 284 points to Pettersson’s 259. That includes 99- and 103-point years for Miller, whose game is a little more consistent than Pettersson’s. There aren’t as many highs and lows with Miller and Pettersson has disappeared for significant stretches. For instance, Pettersson had a six-game pointless drought in December and managed just four points in October. Let’s not forget last year’s post-season as well, where Pettersson really struggled and Miller averaged close to a point per game.
Miller also is much more of physical player, a style that can be more conducive to winning in the playoffs. He’s had back-to-back seasons with at least 200 hits and Miller can bring a lot of energy to his teammates and the arena when he starts throwing his weight around shift after shift. He also comes much cheaper than Pettersson, as Miller makes $3.6 million less per season. If the Canucks traded Pettersson and kept Miller, they’d likely be sitting with more cap space to add to the roster when the dust settled on the deal.
One other concern the Canucks have to consider is if they move one of them, how will that impact the other? Dealing Miller or Pettersson will be an immediate blow to the team’s centre depth. Sure, they’ll likely want a centre back in return, but it’s very unlikely Vancouver will be getting a better player than it is giving up. That means whoever stays is going to have more difficult matchups and the opposition can target them with a top defensive pair frequently.
On the flipside, it could mean more ice time and more opportunities. Pettersson recently got a taste of what life would look like without Miller, and he thrived. Pettersson had 15 points in 10 games with Miller out of the lineup on a leave of absence, and had just two in seven games before he got hurt following Miller’s return.
Any way you slice it, moving either of them is an unenviable task for general manager Patrik Allvin. It’s hard to win a trade when you are giving up the best player in the deal, something the Canucks would almost certainly be doing. If it were up to me, I’d do everything I could to keep them both in the fold, but would begrudgingly trade Miller if the two simply couldn’t co-exist.
This has all the makings of a trade that player, team and organization will eventually come to regret.
Patrick Kane, Detroit Red Wings
You can’t count anyone out of the Eastern Conference playoff race.
That includes the Detroit Red Wings, who recently fired their head coach and appeared headed for a freefall down the standings. The Wings, though, have come alive, thanks in part to a new-coach bump after the hiring of Todd McLellan. Detroit has won five consecutive games and is being powered by Patrick Kane, who has carried the Wings to within striking distance of a playoff spot.
During this five-game winning streak, Kane has tallied four goals and eight points, including a vintage overtime winner and celebration against the Ottawa Senators.
This scoring surge from Kane is somewhat surprising, given where his game was a month ago. The veteran forward endured a stretch through November and into early December where he found the scoresheet just once in 13 games. Add in the fact that Kane is 36 and has undergone major hip surgery not too long ago, and it’s easy to see why some were writing him off.
But Kane is a perfect fit on a Wings team that has a number of young and talented players still trying to find their way. Lucas Raymond and Moritz Seider are the future of this Detroit team, and there are more young prospects on the way. Having someone around like Kane, who has seen and done it all, is invaluable for their development.
Every player reaches a point in their career where their skills diminish and Kane’s certainly have started to, but counting out a player with three Stanley Cups and more than 1,300 points is unwise. It appears Kane still has plenty left in the tank for this season and he seems very motivated to get another taste of playoff hockey.
It would be risky to bet against him.
Ryan Reaves, Toronto Maple Leafs
It’s hard to believe we’re approaching mid-January and Ryan Reaves still doesn’t have a fight yet this season.
Part of that is simply the way the game has changed. There is significantly less fighting these days and there are fewer dance partners for a player like Reaves to tussle with. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing. With the prevalence and seriousness of concussions and head injuries, any time you can limit those it’s a positive. That said, it does bring up the question as to what Reaves’ role really is at this point if he isn’t fighting?
Many people questioned the Toronto Maple Leafs logic with Reaves’ contract when he signed it two summers ago and this past week illustrated why there just isn’t a fit for him on the roster anymore. Reaves, who will soon be 38 and has a history of knee issues, is no longer good enough to be an every-day player for the Leafs, which is why he wasn’t in the lineup Sunday when Garnet Hathaway of the Philadelphia Flyers not so subtly bumped into goaltender Dennis Hildeby. Jake McCabe stepped in to stick up for Hildeby and ended up injured during the ensuing fight.
There’s a fair bit to unpack here, with the first note being McCabe probably should’ve avoided the fight entirely. He gave Hathaway a couple of shots to let him know he wasn’t pleased his netminder was targeted and should’ve stopped there. Hathaway is a more seasoned fighter and McCabe is critical to the Leafs blueline, so he simply can’t risk getting injured in a fight. If anyone was to fight Hathaway, it should’ve been Reaves later in the game, but because he’s often a scratch and not always available to step in, his role as an enforcer is diminished. So instead, the Leafs have lost one of their best defensemen to injury for the foreseeable future.
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Reaves was inserted into the lineup for the rematch with the Flyers on Tuesday, where one assumed a scrap with Hathaway would be inevitable. Nothing materialized, though, other than a brief verbal exchange between Reaves and Hathaway near the benches. This is the other issue with Reaves’ role: he’s reliant on someone from the opposition to oblige him for a fight. There are very few Ryan Reaves’ left in the NHL at this point and he doesn’t have many counterparts around to square off with.
Reaves seems like a great locker-room presence and somewhat of a leader for this group, but it’s becoming increasingly clear his $1.35-million cap hit would be better utilized elsewhere. The fourth line is more effective when he’s out of the lineup and Reaves doesn’t bring anything to the table beyond physicality. He doesn’t kill penalties or provide secondary scoring, and you can’t trust him in most situations. The thing Reaves does best is rapidly disappearing from the game.
It’s going to become increasingly challenging to insert Reaves into the lineup, even for a coach like Craig Berube, who scratched and clawed his way to 1,000 games in this league playing a similar role to Reaves. In today’s NHL, every player’s performance has to justify their salary and the percentage of the cap they occupy, and there really isn’t an argument with enough merit to make for Reaves.
Ilya Samsonov, Vegas Golden Knights
It was a little over a year ago where it appeared there was a chance Ilya Samsonov’s career may be over.
He was placed on waivers by the Maple Leafs last January after a really rough stretch of play and was shut down to regroup and find his game. Samsonov bounced back enough in the second half of 2023-24 to earn a modest one-year deal with the Vegas Golden Knights last summer, perhaps the perfect landing spot for a goalie trying to rebuild his value.
Bruce Cassidy is one of the most goalie-friendly coaches in the league, known for giving both netminders on his roster plenty of action and a great defensive structure. Look no further than a couple of years ago when Vegas captured the Cup and utilized five goalies during that season. Logan Thompson, Adin Hill, Jonathan Quick, Laurent Brossoit and Jiri Patera all had save percentages above .900 and finished with a combined team mark of .916. The Golden Knights have arguably the deepest defence corps in the league this season and they really help protect any netminder that’s behind them.
This, combined with Samsonov’s sharp play, has powered the 27-year-old to an impressive six-game run. He’s 6-0-0 with a .937 save percentage and one shutout over this streak, allowing only nine goals in the six contests. That’s pushed him to an 11-3-1 record on the season and Samsonov has been one of the biggest reasons the Golden Knights find themselves atop of the league standings.
If things continue to trend in this direction, Samsonov may have a chance at a couple of things that have eluded him thus far in his career. One is a Stanley Cup and the other is a long-term contract extension. Samsonov went from his entry-level deal to a pair of one-year deals, then arbitration with the Leafs and finally this current one-year pact with Vegas. He’s going to turn 28 in February and this very could be his best/last chance to land a significant contract.
Right now, Samsonov is making the most of it.
