A fan pitch posted late last night ships Alexander Nikishin to the Toronto Maple Leafs, and the price tag raises eyebrows.
The proposal from @Banx_Leaf offers Oliver Ekman-Larsson, a Colorado first-round pick and "a few minor assets." It has already pulled 10.3K views.
Nikishin turned 25 on October 2. He's coming off his first NHL regular season, all of it with the Carolina Hurricanes.
He dressed in 81 games and put up 33 points from the back end.
The +18 rating jumps off the page. That's serious value from a guy Carolina took in the third round of the 2020 draft.
So why would Eric Tulsky even pick up the phone? His Hurricanes sit 2-1-1 and host Vancouver tonight.
The contract that carried the Russian blueliner through 2025-26 came with a $925,000 cap hit and restricted free agent status at the end of it.
Jim Hiller's blue line has a points problem in Toronto
Toronto's defense has produced four points through four games. Morgan Rielly owns three of them.
Darren Raddysh carries an $8.5 million cap hit and sits at a -3. That gets a coach's attention fast.
Jim Hiller took over in June. His group is 2-2-0, with 11 goals scored and 11 allowed.
And Ekman-Larsson, the centerpiece of this pitch, has been held without a point. He carries a $3.5 million cap hit.
A left-shot defenseman listed at 6-foot-3 and 218 pounds would change the look of that group overnight.
But the pitch reads like trading in a used minivan and a scratch ticket for a new pickup truck. Then tossing in your neighbor's lawnmower.
Carolina hangs up on this one. A front office that turned a third-rounder into an everyday NHL defenseman doesn't cash him out for a 35-year-old.
There's a catch for Toronto, too. Nikishin's playoff line was thin, with one assist across 17 games last spring.
The Leafs play in Vegas tonight, then visit Colorado on Saturday. The club whose first-round pick headlines this pitch will be across the ice.
Toronto doesn't see Carolina until December 5. By then, this blue line has either found some offense or the trade chatter gets a lot louder.
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Should the Maple Leafs give up a Colorado first-round pick to land Alexander Nikishin?
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