IN THE MIDDLE
Cap-space issues may Pageau expendable with Islanders' glut of centers
DETROIT — During an extended chat with beat writers last week in St. Louis, Islanders general manager Lou Lamoriello acknowledged something that has been obvious for a while.
“We don’t have much [salarycap] space left right now today,” he said. “You can always make transactions to create space. So whatever we can do, if we can, to make ourselves better, we’re certainly gonna do that. As far as cap space, we have to create it.”
Exactly how the math plays out for the Islanders depends on whether Hudson Fasching and Robert Bortuzzo are still on longterm injured reserve on the March 8 trade deadline. But either way, absorbing more than — at most — $200,000 or $300,000 in cap dollars is not going to be possible.
So any deal the Islanders make for an NHLer between now and then will almost assuredly involve salary retention and/or someone from their roster going the other way.
That brings us to Monday’s 3-2 win over the Stars, in which coach Patrick Roy fashioned a lineup featuring six different players whose natural position is at center.
If there’s a place on the roster where the Islanders have excess talent — and salary — it would be right there.
Mat Barzal and Bo Horvat are, of course, all but untouchable and under contract until 2031. Casey Cizikas, at age 33 and under contract through 2027, probably isn’t moving. Kyle MacLean is eight games into his NHL career and does not carry a cap hit high enough that moving it would be much help to the Islanders.
But if the Islanders have seen enough in those eight games to trust MacLean — and after he added a second career goal against the Stars, it’s hard to see why not — does that make Jean-Gabriel Pageau a little more expendable?
At $5 million AAV through 2026 and with a 16-team no-trade list, recouping the trio of picks the Islanders sent to Ottawa in February 2020 for Pageau does not seem all that likely. But as a veteran middlesix center with defensive acumen, Pageau could help a team in the playoffs and perhaps help the Islanders add some balance to a roster that is missing scoring on the wings.
Or, if the Isles felt restocking a relatively bare prospect cupboard was more important than chasing the postseason this year, they could use Pageau to do that while clearing out cap space ahead of free agency. But Lamoriello is not one to give up on the playoff chase early.
As for Brock Nelson, who played left wing Monday for the first time in a long time, there are some parallels between him and Jake Guentzel, the Pittsburgh winger whose name has been thrown around trade rumors for the last month.
Both are pure scorers who have spent their careers with one team, though Guentzel is younger, a winger and on an expiring deal, as opposed to Nelson, who has another year on his contract and a natural center.
Really, though, the difference in these situations comes in organizational philosophy. Trading Nelson, a longtime piece of the core, would signal a major shift in direction for the Islanders, even if it may not constitute a rebuild. The 32-yearold also has a 16-team no-trade clause.
Surely Nelson is the most valuable asset the Islanders have who could conceivably be moved. But without a major shift in how Lamoriello views his roster’s capabilities, that scenario looks more like fodder for social-media debate than something that could happen.
“If I didn’t think and believe in the group, you wouldn’t make a coaching change,” Lamoriello said last week. “I believe in the group. I feel that. But we have to play to our capabilities, like any other team.”
The Islanders have not played inspiring hockey since then, so never say never. But if you were placing odds, Nelson being an Islander for life would be a heavy favorite over him being traded in the next 10 days.
Even so, the deadline will be quiet for the Islanders if Lamoriello isn’t willing to part with a member of the core. That is what the salary cap dictates.
And Lamoriello has not shied away from surprising people before.