Leafs trade Steen and Colaiacovo to Blues for Stempniak

Posted by Richard Pollock in General NHL,St.Louis Blues,Toronto Maple Leafs on November 24, 2008 — 2 Comments

From TSN:

The Toronto Maple Leafs aren’t waiting for Brian Burke to come in and start making moves, as the club traded defenceman Carlo Colaiacovo and forward Alex Steen to the St. Louis Blues for forward Lee Stempniak on Monday.

Read the entire story here.

First of all, I find it odd that the Leafs are making trades considering that the Brian Burke rumors are gaining steam and some believe he will be GM by the end of the week. If that is the case, then why is Cliff Fletcher making trades before the new GM comes in? That aside, I personally think this deal could work well for both sides, however, I give the edge to the Blues.

For the Leafs, it gives them a scoring winger who tallied a career high 27 goals in 2006/07. Stempniak is only 25 years old and is just under a point-per-game so far this season. That said, he almost certainly isn’t going to continue his point-per-game pace and is more likely going to end up in the 50-60 point range. Stempniak is under contract this season at $2.5 million and next season at $3.5 million. Most importantly, he adds some scoring up front to a Leafs team that can use all the talented forwards they can get.

In terms of the Blues, they have a fair amount of depth up front (when healthy) and can really afford to trade Stempniak without having much of a drop off in terms of offensive production. The Blues receive Steen who is slated to make $1.7 million both this year and next year and Colaiacovo who is slated to make $1.4 million both this year and next year. So total, the Blues take on $6.2 million in salary as part of this deal and trade the $6 million remaining on Stempniak’s deal.

Taking into account the fact that Steen has a career points-per-game of .49 and Stempniak has a career points-per-game of .55, these players aren’t much different than each other in terms of production. They both are career minus players, and neither plays an overly physical, penalty-ridden game.

Also, we can’t forget about Colaiacovo who was the defenseman of the future in Toronto for what seemed like years. He didn’t live up to his potential in the center of the hockey universe but if he can stay healthy (big if), the Blues could use a player just like him on their blue line. He is a good puck mover and has nice offensive skill and with a reasonable contract already signed, Colaiacovo doesn’t carry much risk aside from his injury history.

Considering Steen is cheaper than Stempniak and he was traded along with the talented but oft-injured Colaiacovo, I really see this deal having more upside for St. Louis.

Bob Roberts

BB was quoted as saying that the Leafs are neither required to notify him nor to seek his approval. Being a good lawyer that means “I’m avoiding answering yes or no to the question did I know about or did I have a hand in this transaction, while seeming to do just that. Now you have to ask yourself a question: why would I do that? Am I just being difficult or do I really want to avoid the question? Can you guess the answer? Can you, punk?”

What are your reasons for saying Stempniak won’t continue as he has begun? I think he will if Wilson plays him the 19 or 20 minutes a game he was getting in St. Louis.
http://www.illegalcurve.com Richard

So far he has looked good and I do think an extra two to three minutes per night over what he logged last season will help his point totals. That said, I don’t think he’s going to keep up his almost point-per game clip. That’s venturing into into the game’s elite scorers and I don’t think Stempniak has the offensive skill set to join that group. Additionally, the Blues have far more offensive weapons than do the Leafs, so that should probably hurt his cause as well.