Let the Guerin to Caps rumor mill begin

HNIC just came back from break and said Pierre LeBrun is checking each Eastern Conference team and that Carolina, Florida, Pittsburgh, Boston, New Jersey, Montreal and Buffalo “all said no to Guerin and Washington is believed to be the team.”

I can’t believe that Nylander would waive his NMC to go to Long Island. At the very least it will probably need to be a team that’s going to the playoffs. Not that I don’t want to see Nyls in another color jersey…that’d be like Christmas/Chanukah/Kwanza coming early.

In terms of Guerin, I’m not sure what he brings to the table…aside from experience what does he bring to the team? And is whatever he’s bringing what this team needs? IMO, if GMGM does anything it needs to be a top 3 stay at home dman and a top 6 winger with grit…Guerin is neither of those.

Well, he does have a Stanley Cup ring, albeit from 1995. And beyond experience of playing a lot of playoff games, that’s what someone wants on a team.

If McPhee is looking for anything out of Guerin, assuming he’s ours, it’s the leadership and respect intangibles that analysts like to boast about what makes a Stanley Cup team.

I’ve read (sorry, too tired right now to link) that there’s not exactly that voice in the Caps locker room that will point the team in the right direction as Fedorov and others are more of lead by example guys, so perhaps it’s that what the Caps need: someone to hold young players accountable; someone to say “hey dumb ass, nice goal earlier, but what the hell are you thinking about that hook?” to help cut down on penalties.

You need a guy on the bench providing a calm voice on the bench getting the guys to focus, and I can see Guerin help eliminate those playoff jitters.

I don’t see him putting up gaudy numbers, even with this group of talen. But he’s worth it to me for a clutch game-winning goal or two in the playoffs.

this is great news, if it’s true

OV-Backs-Koz
Semin-Feds-Guerin
Flash-Laich-Fehr
Brash-Steckel/Gordon-Brads

David Lee on Comcast Sportsnite:

“One quick note, The Caps are closing in to finishing a trade for New York Islander forward Bill Guerin. The deal could be done by day’s end. That’s gonna do it right now for Sportsnite presented by Geico, I’m David Lee. Do yourself a favor, go out and have a great day”

For this to work, the Caps would have to be trading a player, not just a pick, back to NYI as they have 50 players under contract.

Salary-cap wise, it would work if it would be Nylander (but as Yoshietree said, why would he approve to go to NYI? Just to get the hell out of town?).

Nylander’s cap hit isGuerin’s is $4.5 million, coming off the books this summer.

But it’s my understanding that Jay Beagle sat out last night’s game and Bob Woods wouldn’t say why, even when pressed. We know the Islanders are probably looking at a rebuild. Would Jay Beagle be a good fit on the Islanders’ team? Probably.

FYI, I’ve been following this on Islanders Point Blank, which has been fantastic. The latest:

10:10 am: Although you’ll probably stay with this story til the very end, it would be so tempting for me to assist in dragging you along. But we’ve now gotten to the part where I can advise that if you want to go to church, go for a jog, grab some pancakes at the diner or hang out with your families (nooooooo!), it’s fairly safe to say you have a few hours. This is based on a text from a friend I trust big-time: This could take all day.

One report has the latest as Caps trying to free up cap room.

The Caps could do worse than Guerin. A lot would depend on what was headed the other way, but Guerin is a valuable player with lots of experience. He can chip in on the PP (although probably not on the PK anymore).

My big concern with Guerin is his lackadaisical attitude toward defense. In his two best scoring years with the Bruins in 01-02, he was a combined -5 on good teams. He backchecks like Ovie. . . when Ovie was a rookie – which is to say, that he doesn’t really backcheck at all. This is the tendency that has caused him to bounce from team to team despite his scoring prowess.

The weird thing with Guerin is that he clearly has the speed to backcheck, unlike say, Andrew Brunette. He won the fastest skater competition a few years ago, so this is clearly just a matter of willingness. Maybe Bruce can motivate him where Hitchcock et. al failed? Regardless, at least he has the speed to keep up with the Caps’ top six, unlike Nylander.

But who knows?

I’m all for adding Guerin if it means moving Nylander. I’m all for a bag of pucks if it means moving Nylander too, though.

In seriousness, I thought about Guerin as being a good add for this team and think he would be – but I’ll be a little let down if this is the big move, if the team only gets him for Mo, or if it sends something even better out the door.

Some aspects to this that are not making sense to me:

1. Why would the Islanders want Nylander, who has to be paid for another year, and why would the Caps add Guerin without subtracting Nylander?

2. On the salary cap issues, don’t the Capitals have some room with Chris Clark on the LTIR and Alzner in Hershey?

I’m tending to think Tarik has got this one right, in the end.

I kinda feel that if a player was yanked out of warm-ups, they’d be traded by now. I’m kind of looking at this latest Long Island-sponsored circus in two ways, and it could still affect us.

Could this be a three-way trade? Now that Tarik said Guerin’s probably not heading to Washington, we still have Nylander out for a third-straight game. And both GMs appear to be mum on both ends for their respective situations.

Or more on the second point of that last one. Forget Guerin now. What’s happening to Nylander? Where is he going? Having him out healthy for three games trumps the dramatic Guerin marathon that now may not involve us at all.