Vancouver looking to trade Elias Lindholm?

Have you ever played Franchise Mode on NHL 24? Well, Jim Rutherford is living out everyone’s fantasy of making non-stop moves. According to TSN’s Chris Johnston, the Canucks are now looking to potentially flip Elias Lindholm to the Boston Bruins and acquire Jake Guentzel.

It’s certainly a weird idea, as they gave up their first, a fourth (with conditions that won’t be met), an exciting prospect in Hunter Brzustewicz, another defence prospect in Joni Jurmo, and Andrei Kuzmenko. Elias Lindholm has four goals and six points in 14 games with the Canucks, while Kuzmenko has five goals and six points in 10 games with the Flames.

That’s a significant price to pay for a rental, no matter if he once scored 42 goals and 82 points and is a good two-way centre. Now attempting to flip him for Jake Guentzel is a weird decision at best, and awful for team chemistry at worst.

Here’s a bold take: the Vancouver Canucks are getting bounced in the first round.

Players held out of the lineup

The Arizona Coyotes are holding winger Jason Zucker out of the lineup, and is drawing interest from “multiple teams,” according to TSN’s Chris Johnston.

This season, Zucker has nine goals and 25 points in 51 games, but is just a season removed from scoring 27 goals and 48 points in 78 games with the Pittsburgh Penguins, his second-best season in his career. His best came in 2017-18 with the Wild, when he scored 33 goals and 64 points. The 32-year-old has a cap hit of $5.3 million and is a pending unrestricted free agent.

On Monday evening, the Seattle Kraken withheld Alexander Wennberg from the lineup as well due to “trade-related reasons.” Speaking of which…

Contenders in on Wennberg

Held out of the Seattle Kraken for a second game in a row Tuesday night, Alex Wennberg is drawing interest from a couple of contenders.

And on Tuesday’s edition of Daily Faceoff Live, Frank Seravalli said a few teams are in the mix.

“For Wennberg, those three or four teams, I think the New York Rangers are one of them as they have kept tabs on him, the Colorado Avalanche are another team as we just talked about their need for a center, and he checks the box in Colorado because they place significant value to high IQ players and Wennberg is that. They added Artturi Lehkonen a couple of deadlines ago and similar mould, not the same player, but a smart player to add to your team and he has been pretty consistent as well. 

I would add the Boston Bruins there, they’ve certainly increased heightened attention to their center position when Pavel Zacha went down but he did play in last night’s game. The wildcard team for me is the Florida Panthers, he had been with Florida recently before he signed with Seattle as a free agent, but I think potentially he could be added to that center core that is already strong.”

“This season, the 29-year-old left-shot centre has nine goals and 25 points in 60 games for the Seattle Kraken. His career-high in points came all the way back in 2016-17 with the Columbus Blue Jackets, where he had 13 goals and 59 points, while scoring a career-high 17 goals in 2020-21. Wennberg has a cap hit of $4.5 million and will be an unrestricted free agent at the end of the season.”

The section where Seravalli talks about the Kraken and Wennberg can be found below.

Bogosian re-signs with the Wild

According to Daily Faceoff’s Frank Seravalli, the Minnesota Wild are re-signing Zach Bogosian to a two-year, $1.25 million deal.

Bogosian is a right-shot defenceman who could’ve filled the depth defender role for the Oilers, as his prior cap hit was $850,000. However, it looks as if the Wild will look to push for a playoff spot, as they are eight points out of the final Wild Card spot.

Either way, the Oilers will have to look for a depth defender elsewhere.