They gave up a prospect as well, so it was pretty much the prospect for Santorelli. Jokinen's gonna get flipped at the deadline to someone desperate for veteran depth for a 7th rounder. Also hearing some significant rumors about Kessel to the Islanders. They're one of few teams with the prospects to pull that trade off, so if they do before the playoffs, may as well hand them the cup (and bragging rights....damn)
It scares me to death, but they're one of the few teams with the young assets to pull it off. Strome, Reinhart, Dal Colle, Ho-Sang etc. I hope they don't, cause if the do JT puts up 100+ points a year and they can absolutely ride those two plus their depth to a cup or two
The rebuild is in full force. What kind of voodoo magic did the Leafs do to pull that shit off though? Thought that contract would be unmovable.
columbus ownership wanted ANY kind of contribution for their money, and the leafs don't mind paying millions of dollars to a guy who's never going to play again as long as they have no cap hit
Columbus physically couldn't insure his contract due to Hortons past injury history
Columbus has some serious cash flow problems, they couldn't afford to be paying Horton's 5M a year to not play for them. Acquiring Clarkson means that for the same cost they get a warm body to play for them. So yeah it's basically ownership being cheap except that they borderline couldn't afford to pay Horton+another
Ownership wants Connor McDavid in Ohio, so bringing in Clarkson helps out that effort tremendously.
yeah, it was almost all ownership motivated from what i've read
