We have a trade!
The NHL season officially got under way on Oct. 8 and we had not seen any trades since. That changed on Tuesday, as the Canadiens acquired defenseman Sergei Gonchar from the Stars for forward Travis Moen.
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No, it’s not quite Thomas Vanek to the Islanders, but it is something.
The 40-year-old Gonchar has been sidelined for all but the last three games this year due to an ankle injury. However, he has shown himself to be a solid possession player on the blue line throughout his career, last year included, though he was about even compared to his teammates. Meanwhile, Moen’s numbers are far less rosy.
This seems a little strange for Dallas, especially given they’ve shown themselves to be a forward-thinking team enamored with #fancystats. Those don't rate Moen highly at all. But the real motivation for this deal may come down to salary.
Gonchar is in the final year of a two-year deal that paid him $5 million annually. Meanwhile Moen makes $1.85 million for this season and the next. The move doesn’t free up the entire difference in salary, as Dallas still has to pay eight percent of Gonchar’s contract, but the savings are significant.
The Stars were up against the cap, but now have a bit more flexibility if they want to swing another deal sometime down the road. If it costs them a solid, but aging blue-liner whose numbers were neutral compared to his teammates last year, so be it.
Meanwhile, most of Montreal’s remaining cap space gets eaten, but the move replaces a possession-deficient forward with a player who can slide into the Montreal blue line and contribute as a secondary player. Gonchar's always been considered a power-play asset, and while he's not going to see the minutes P.K. Subban and Andrei Markov do, they're not going to play every second, every time the Canadiens have a man advantage.
And if it doesn’t work out for the Habs, they can walk away from Gonchar at the end of the year with $1.85 million more in cap space than they would have otherwise.
So is this first deal of the NHL regular season a blockbuster? No. But it will be interesting to see how it plays out nonetheless.