Are the Silvertips about to make a splash in the trade market?
There were a couple hints following Saturday’s season-opening 1-0 victory at Seattle that something is in the works, and it’s possible that something could be big.
It’s no secret Everett could use some additional offensive punch. The Tips brought back most of their team from last season, but the players who didn’t return were the heart of the offense, particularly winger Joshua Winquist. Winquist was that gifted offensive player who could go out and get the team a goal when it needed one. But he graduated as an overager, and there’s no one on the current roster who can do what Winquist did for last season’s team. So the Tips undoubtedly would be in the market if a Winquist-like player became available. The problem is those type of players aren’t exactly littering the trade wire, and when they do become available they tend to be extremely expensive.
However, Everett is in a unique position where it may be positioned to land that kind of player at a discount, and that’s because of Mirco Mueller. The Swiss defenseman was supposed to be Everett’s lynchpin on defense this season. However the indications out of San Jose continue to be that Mueller has a legitimate shot at sticking with the NHL’s Sharks as a 19-year-old — San Jose Mercury News beat writer David Pollack listed the chances of Mueller making the Sharks as better than 50-50. Whether Mueller makes it or not, he’s expected spend at least the beginning of the NHL season in San Jose, getting at least some of the nine games he can play before his contract kicks in. If he’s sent back to Everett, it might not be until November or later.
So for the time being Everett has an opening for a European player, as Russian center Ivan Nikolishin is the only import with the team, and the Tips are currently the only team in the WHL with room to add an import. It just so happens that there are several high-profile Euros who could be available because of roster squeezes. Four teams (Saskatoon, Brandon, Calgary and Edmonton) are still carrying three Euros and will soon have to get down to two, and all four of those situations see the possibility of a player who has already produced offensively in the WHL having to be dealt. Saskatoon general manager Bob Woods has already implied publicly that electric 1995-born Russian winger Nikita Scherbak, a first-round pick by the Montreal Canadians in this year’s NHL draft, is available. Could Everett be in play for someone like Scherbak?
If something’s going to happen, I expect it to be announced soon.
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