Sekeres and Price: Jeff Paterson on the Sekeres and Price show on how the Vancouver Canucks should address their blue line needs.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Matt Sekeres: “Should they address the defense here via trade or Ethan Bear? We got the rink live video of him skating on his own in West Kelowna, as he prepares for an NHL comeback,
Paterson: “Yeah, just quickly on that video, I will say that, you know, it was encouraging to me. Remember, it was a shoulder injury, so, you know, the fact that he looked to have pretty good range of motion. Winding up big slapshot, and even a little bit of contact with his skating coach, not that you can judge a lot there. But, you know, I think he’s trying to replicate some of the things that he’s going to have to ramp up here as he gets closer to a return wherever that is, and whenever it is. But for the most part, just based on that video, I mean, it looks like he has progressed fairly nicely here to the point that he could be an NHL player before too long.
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Now, that seems like it would be a relatively easy add for the Vancouver Canucks if they can figure out the dollars on a prorating contract and those types of things. Any talk of a trade Matt, comes back to the idea that they have been trying so hard to consummate trades for the better part of a season and a bit now.
The same cast of characters, if you’re bringing in a body, it’s going to be one that likely has a price point and they just don’t have the cap flexibility unless you can make a trade that one of those same names that we talked about for a while, you know. The Brock Boeser trade talks seems to have faded away.
But (Conor) Garland or (Anthony) Beauvillier, you know, I think you have to find a way to include one of them in, in a deal out the door, but on their own, they’re not going to fetch you a defenseman that’s gonna come in and play on your top four. So that brings it back to sweeteners and how prepared are the Canucks to part with either prospects or that are relatively high draft picks.
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So it’s sort of the same conversation in that regard. I would think the short-term solution to me, would take a long hard look at Ethan Bear. It would be a pretty seamless transition for a guy that was here. Familiar with his teammates and familiar with the coaching staff. I do think that you can plug and play with a player like Ethan Bear once he gets the green light from the doctors to resume his NHL career.
