Didnt see Nate coming

Don’t mind the Jensen trade. Beagle money isn’t really the concern. It’s more Eriksson.

Trading JV to get rid of Beagle sinks any chance of secondary scoring on this team. If your going to do that might as while substitute Eriksson in for beagle and include a draft pick with JV.

Frees up $6m this year and next. Sign a scoring FA.

I actually really like Jensen for this team - I wish it were a 2 year deal, but I think he would be a great addition to that 3rd pair.

There are some options from BUF too - Miller, McCabe, Montour - but they may have too high of AAV. Kulak in MTL is another option. And then FAs like Rutta, Koekkoek, Bowey, and even Hamonic if he signs for <$3m. Ian Cole may be an option from COL if then want to shed some salary/bodies after bringing in Toews and resigning Graves - I bet they'd be open to retention too since it's a 1-year deal. Or maybe a guy like Riikola from PIT.

I agree on some of those, but the cap hit would likely be too high on the better players. Jensen is a solid D-man at $2.5M AAV.

There are still a lot of options out there in FA and via trade that could help solidify VAN's defense -- I wonder which direction Benning is going to go...