Potential trade destinations for Philadelphia Flyers Rasmus Ristolainen
Daily Faceof: Frank Seravalli and Tyler Yaremchuk discussing some potential trade destinations for Philadelphia Flyers defenseman Rasmus Ristolainen.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Yaremchuk: “Over at DailyFaceoff.com, it was Matt Larkin taking a look at some potential destinations for Rasmus Ristolainen, and Pat you can throw up the board with just sort of the names and markets that Larkin had listed, Dallas, Detroit, Edmonton, Florida, Tampa, Toronto, Vancouver, Winnipeg.
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The interesting part with Ristolainen is obviously the term. $5.1 million, couple more years on that deal. I think Dallas stands out. But as Larkin points out, the Stars and Jim Nill, traditionally very hesitant to attach a first-round pick. That’s what Philly wants. Maybe that’s not a fit, but Dallas is at the top of their board, and I think they do make the most sense.”
Seravalli: “They do, and I think so does Detroit. That Detroit blue line needs to vastly improve. I’m not entirely sold that Ristolainen is the piece to do it, but just by the nature of the Dallas Stars right side, I think that’s their huge hole.
They’ve got tons of cap space to spend with Tyler Seguin LTIR injury money. But that team needs to, they’re a long way on the right side of their defense from being a true Stanley Cup impending blue line, in my view.
And I think the big thing is, are you attracted to the term on his deal, or does it scare you away of your Dallas? And I think that’d be certainly one thing to consider. He’s got one more year after this, so, is that right? No, two more years.
That’s, umm, look, it’s, I think the other part of this is you hear about the Flyers raving about him and John Tortorella, and he’s given some full-throated responses on Ristolainen in the last few weeks. Do they have to move him? My answer would be probably not.”
Yaremchuk: “Yeah. I mean, hey, with the term, you’re certainly not forced to do anything. That $5.1 million cap hit certainly throws a wrinkle in. Like if he was a pending UFA, and the Flyers put their hand up and said, hey, we’ll keep two and a half million and we want a first-round pick. Like that almost feels like an easier deal than you have to take the $5.1 million. And like you said, is the term attractive or not to some of these teams?
Because we’ve seen Ristolainen go through some tough stretches. As well as he’s played so far this year, he’s had years where he’s been really bad. So do you want to take that risk for two more seasons? I think it’s, I think it’s an interesting kind of angle and wrinkled the throw into this whole thing with him. But yeah…”
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Seravalli: “I would say my big thing with risk alignment, and I mentioned this on your show ‘Oilers Nation Every Day’ last week, is I can’t think of one team that Rasmus Ristolainen’s ever played on that he’s made better.
He’s, he’s 760 games into his career, and has never played in a playoff game. Not saying that’s all on him, but he’s never really pushed a team and been a top-end defenseman.”
Yaremchuk: “Yeah and again if he was a rental I think there would be a team that would convince themselves, hey let’s see if we can catch lightning in a bottle, but the three-year risk I think is just maybe a bit too much.”