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Leafs claim Primeau and Blais off waivers

Berube would have some familiarity with Blais I guess. I don't really understand the move though.

Primeau I guess makes sense if Woll is gone for a long time (I get keeping personal lives private but kind of odd that nothing has leaked out about timelines)
 
I would have preferred DiPietro over Primeau, but I Primeau does have more NHL experience so I guess that played a big role.

Blais has been a guy I've wondered if the Leafs would have interest in ever since Berube arrived, so that one's not a big surprise.
 
L K said:
Berube would have some familiarity with Blais I guess. I don't really understand the move though.

Primeau I guess makes sense if Woll is gone for a long time (I get keeping personal lives private but kind of odd that nothing has leaked out about timelines)
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Certainly suggest Woll is going non-roster for a bit (and Reimer isn't getting a contract). Carolina can have Primeau back when Woll returns.

As for Blais, he's certainly capable of being an effective 4th liner and had a good year in the AHL last season. He was highly thought of at one point.

Other moves are coming to make the roster make sense. Hildeby going to the Marlies, obviously, but the other shoe has yet to drop.
 
L K said:
Berube would have some familiarity with Blais I guess. I don't really understand the move though.
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For some reason I thought that he had some centre experience, but after double checking that doesn't seem to be the case. If he's not just replacing Laughton for a bit then yeah it's an odd one. Maybe bounces Jarnkrok out of the line-up I guess?
 
Sammy Blais adds yet another forechecky LW to a team with oodles of it (to varying degrees of efficacy)

Knies (perfect)
McMann (fast, but inconsistent)
Joshua (slow, but hard to handle)
Lorentz (offensively limited)
Sammy Blais (familiar with what Berube wants) can do the off-puck stuff that Max Pacioretty stood out for last season
 
The Leafs technically don't have to make a move other than send Hildeby to the minors at this point.

They have 14 forwards with Laughton on the IR and Kampf in the minors. I still think Cowan should start the year in the AHL.
Thave have 7 defensemen and Rifai on IR
They have 4 goalies with Woll on IR and Hildeby eligible for waivers
 
L K said:
The Leafs technically don't have to make a move other than send Hildeby to the minors at this point.

They have 14 forwards with Laughton on the IR and Kampf in the minors. I still think Cowan should start the year in the AHL.
Thave have 7 defensemen and Rifai on IR
They have 4 goalies with Woll on IR and Hildeby eligible for waivers
Click to expand...
I count 8 D, since Thrun was skating with the NHL group this morning. Easy enough to send him down, as well, though.

(Also, just a nitpick - Woll won't be on the IR, he'll be non-injured, non-roster)
 
L K said:
The Leafs technically don't have to make a move other than send Hildeby to the minors at this point.

They have 14 forwards with Laughton on the IR and Kampf in the minors. I still think Cowan should start the year in the AHL.
Thave have 7 defensemen and Rifai on IR
They have 4 goalies with Woll on IR and Hildeby eligible for waivers
Click to expand...
I think you meant Hildeby is waivers exempt

The one wrinkle is if they were thinking of bringing Kampf back to fill in for Laughton. If they try, they have 24 on the roster and cap space issues. So the 'simple' alleviation would be to send Cowan to the AHL - which I'm not sure is their intention based on Berube's remarks.
It is also interesting they're keeping Thrun (waived yesterday) around. Maybe a dman is nursing an injury or they expect something else to happen (or Thrun to be claimed ..).
 
Bender said:
Is Primeau really any better than Hildeby? I wouldn't want him backing up...
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Primeau destroyed the AHL last season but also doesn’t need the development time that Hildeby does. Better to have the Beast playing regularly than once every 3-4 games.
 
CarltonTheBear said:
I would have preferred DiPietro over Primeau, but I Primeau does have more NHL experience so I guess that played a big role.

Blais has been a guy I've wondered if the Leafs would have interest in ever since Berube arrived, so that one's not a big surprise.
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Should have grabbed Nico Daws. Grabbing Blais makes zero sense to me. I suspect Primeau will be on waivers at some point and so will others when Woll returns.
 
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