Daily Faceoff hockey insider Frank Seravalli took to Vancouver airwaves on Sportsnet 650 earlier this week to discuss the Canucks’ strategy leading up to Monday’s trade deadline.
During his segment, Seravalli touched upon the two moves the Canucks made on March 20: specifically, them trading Travis Hamonic to the Ottawa Senators for a third-round pick before turning around a flipping another third-rounder to the Toronto Maple Leafs for Travis Dermott.
“Even just going back to the weekend, it’s not a substantial change but moving out Hamonic and bringing in Dermott, the cap change, the change in the room, like, you know, multiple players have reached out to say just what a breath of fresh air it was after getting rid of Travis Hamonic. This is the first, sort of, step forward for this new management regime, it wasn’t necessarily what everyone wanted it to be, in terms of significant movement, but it also means they weren’t going to back themselves into a corner and make any moves that they didn’t need to.”
Hamonic, 31, is in the first season of the two-year extension (with a $3 million AAV) he signed with the Canucks last summer. The right-handed defenceman only appeared in 24 games for Vancouver in 2021–22, playing exclusively in Canada for part of the season before being fully vaccinated against COVID-19.
In moving Hamonic without retaining salary and replacing him with Dermott, the Canucks are in line to save $1.5 million against the salary cap for the 2022–23 season. Dermott, 25, plays the right side despite being left-handed and has five points in 43 games with the Maple Leafs this season.
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