Monday Caterwaul - Panthers Open Forum

Interesting to have heard Randy Sexton last week on HockeyCentral talking about the Panthers roster, among other things. Management likes the roster as is and might be looking for a journeyman forward about 33-34 years old (haven’t we tried that already) that can score about 18-25 goals annually. Hmmmm, are there any of those out there?

What scares me is that they like the roster, and that he truly feels Booth is coming back. Whether he does, or doesn’t, they still have a move or two to make. Problem is, what do we give up? Olesz? Vokoun?
If we trade Vokoun we need a goaltender back. Biron is probably available from the Islanders, and Huet from the Hawks could be if the right package is put together.
That being said, we don’t have alot of cap space either, I think around 2 million, so that’s another issue.
If there’s any message to send to the players that the organization is serious about making a playoff push, then one would feel a deal to improve the club, rather than dump salary would have to be made.
I would hope that Randy’s cell phone is virtually dialing all the time. If he needs extra minutes I have a bunch to give him.

Meantime,I would be extremely disappointed if a trade isn’t made.

What scares me is that they like the roster, and that he truly feels Booth is coming back.

Regardless of the reality of Booth’s situation, Sexton has to pimp him as returning to the lineup, if only to give him a position of strength with which to go into negotiations for other players.

If he gives up the goat and publicly admits Booth is out for the year he appears desperate, which damages his ability to bargain with fellow GMs.

How about a 27-year-old, 30-goal scorer for a 2nd round pick?

Dom Moore was pretty solid last year, if we can get him some decent linemates and shake it up at the bottom we could have a surprisingly good bottom 6 and some secondary scoring to boot. I wouldn’t mind Svatos, maybe Petr Sykora since he feels unhappy about his playing time with the Wild.

He’s the guy to go. He just hasn’t really clicked with anyone and he’s signed for four more years. As I said in the Thrashers/Kovalchuk post, that could be a boon to other teams having trouble keeping players.

Moore is pretty solid, but he keeps getting thrown on different lines. Some of it has to do with the injuries, but now that Stillman’s back, we should see less swapping between the top and bottom six.

Sexton needs to go for it, though. Forget Booth. If he gets back and starts playing well, bonus. If he doesn’t, we need someone else on the top line who can score.

This organization is really good at sitting on it, though, so I don’t expect them to go for it and try to put the team over the top. At the deadline we’ll get a bunch of BS about how the team is playing well together and we didn’t want to get rid of any prospects, and then we’ll end up in tenth place.