Stars Stuff: An argument in favor of the trade, a power play reborn and musings on Wyatt Johnston's next contract
They're not the Mavericks!
I’ve written and said a lot about my personal feelings on the Mikael Granlund, Cody Ceci trade. My initial reaction hasn’t changed, despite both players looking good in their lone appearance. I’m not trying to be negative. I want them to succeed. I want Dallas to succeed. And when the facts change, I’ll change my mind. But rather than get into the weeds all over again, I want to propose a more powerful argument for the additions, and one I haven’t seen.
When it comes to the business of hockey, it’s better to make the playoffs and go as far as you can with the core you’ve already invested in than to fall into the hubris of thinking that all the right decision-making can lead you to a Cup. This, to me, is a strong argument. It’s not a convincing one, but it’s strong. Carolina is one of the smartest run organizations in the business. If I were to construct the ideal philosophy for how to run a sports organization, they have all the elements I’d want. Yet how many playoff rounds have they won over the last five years? When Vegas was able to leverage their LTIR money into a top six forward, and a top four defender, how long did it take for them to be eliminated? Small steps can be more meaningful if you’re already well ahead of the pack. And Dallas is ahead of the pack. Perhaps this is how Jim Nill thinks of this team. And perhaps he’s right.
Framed that way, I can step off the ledge a bit. That doesn’t mean I’m throwing all those stats out the window, nor am I convinced of the conventional wisdom. Instead I say that to emphasize that the bulk of Nill’s work was done in 2017 when he drafted Jason Robertson, Miro Heiskanen, and Jake Oettinger. The emerging core of Thomas Harley, Wyatt Johnston, Logan Stankoven, and Lian Bichsel is also a critical element in Dallas’ success. However far the Stars go, it’ll be Nill’s work that occurred long before the trade that will drive it.
As far as Sunday night is concerned, Dallas couldn’t have asked for a better result, save for Mavrik Bourque taking a puck up high in their 5-3 win over the Columbus Blue Jackets. It wasn’t pretty, but the team counterpunched their way into the final period until they were the only ones punching.
Mason Marchment’s return
Without Tyler Seguin forming a line with Marchment and Duchene, it’s easy to get lost in how good all three were to start the year. And with Marchment absent, we must have forgot. Marchment’s deflection was great (thanks to a point shot from Lian Bichsel), but I thought the sequence right before the goal was even better.
That move to scoop the puck out of Zach Werenski’s reach was sublime. I’ve always been impressed by how nimble Marchment is for such a big guy, not to mention a choppy skater, but it’s also easy to see why: he’s great of leveraging his puck handling to create space. He’s a clever player, and always has been. And it’s great to have him back.
The new top PP unit
Robertson-Hintz-Johnston-Duchene-Harley.
Keep it. Protect it. Don’t change it. It’s obviously too early to be celebrating, but the difference without Heiskanen and Benn—their weakest links—is stark, to say the least. Harley’s movement at the top is more natural because his offensive instincts are more natural, but Duchene is also simply a better player at this point in his career than Benn. However, even if we weren’t quibbling over spots, it would behoove Dallas to stack the top unit anyway. If you’re not scoring, then what’s even the plan? Obviously, the change didn’t happen the way anyone would have wanted, but hopefully Dallas can move on, and continue nourishing it. And for what it’s worth, it helps that Johnston and Robertson have never looked better.
Wyatt Johnston’s next contract
Johnston is gonna get paid. And right now, he’s earning every penny. Although he had two points on the night, it was his work on the penalty kill and the forecheck that inspired the most.
Because of stuff like this, it’s easy to see why Nill had no interest in taking back a single penny of term.
Right now, Evolving-Hockey has Johnston’s next contract set at $8.82 million AAV to the full term of eight years, which would take him until he’s 30. The only thing EH’s model hasn’t accounted for is the cap going up. I don’t know if that necessarily changes things. Johnston is on pace to hit just shy of 70 points. Is he a 70-point player? I don’t think so. I think he’s better than that. But it’ll work out for Dallas financially if he doesn’t hit that 70-point barrier right before being given a max deal. Whatever the case, Johnston is earning that Heat money.
“The Beautiful Game” (Copyright, Dimitri Filipovic)
If you know your meme, then you know there’s a sequence in every game. Maybe Sam Steel is simply stronger than he looks.
The Columbus perspective
This is a tough one if you’re Columbus. Not only did you lose after being in the lead multiple times, but you lost Kirill Marchenko to injury after taking a puck to the mouth, Dante Fabbro was hurt, and Dimitri Voronkov and Zach Werenski had to leave for stretches. Beyond that, a Detroit win last night put them in the second wild card spot. The Blue Jackets are firmly in that hurt locker called the East. Five teams are within two to three points of one another, and one of the teams behind said five is New York. If anyone can go on a run, it’s probably the team that added J.T. Miller being backed up by Igor Shesterkin.
Columbus has been, far and away, the best story of the year. The tragedy of Johnny and Matthew Gaudreau’s deaths still hang over the team’s mission. To lose such a great player on a struggling team only to see them succeed is in keeping with Gaudreau’s own theme: beating the odds.
It’s unlikely they’ll score a wild card spot when all is said and done, but it’s impossible not to think positive. Not only do they look decent, but they’ve been scraping together wins without key players (Sean Monahan, Yegor Chinakhov, and Boone Jenner remain out), and Adam Fantilli and Denton Mateychuk look every bit the players they were drafted as.
Tomorrow
It’s been awhile since we’ve looked at Corey Sznajder’s data, so that’s what we’ll do. It’ll be paid, but it’ll be worth it because it’s always fun to dig deeper and see how well Dallas is doing on the rush, on the cycle, et cetera.
As mentioned, I’m also gonna bring back the prospect reports. This Thursday, we’re gonna talk about a prospect that we’ve cataloged with some consternation, but also some faith: Emil Hemming.
The Other Stars: Mini mixtapes for Antonio Stranges and Emil Hemming, and an complete update of Dallas' top 10 prospects
Let’s start with Dallas’ loss to Anaheim.
Has he finally arrived? It’s certainly looking like it. We’ll do a quick recap of Dallas’ other stars too.
Finally got my wish . Been beating the drum about removing Miro from the 1st PP . Unfortunately it took a serious injury to Miro .hopefully he recovers and receives good news from that specialist he is seeing in New YORK today . PP has been better with Harley no doubt.. Finally Duchy gets to play as well . Sure took the coaching staff long enough with that failed PP experiment
I still don't like the trade. Not because it doesn't improve the team, because it does, but because Nill just spent a first and $8m of space to not move the needle very much. It doesn't hurt the team's chances, exactly, but it doesn't improve them much either, and it uses up the best avenue to improve the team. We'll have to wait to see who else gets moved this deadline to judge how much of a missed opportunity this turns out to be.
On the bright side, Nill's stubbornness about only trading for expiring UFAs means the impact is muted. There won't be any cap crunch over the summer fitting Johnston and Benn's extensions around Miller or Jones' contracts, for example. I think I'd rather have had that problem though.