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Predators trade for James Neal, Draft Kevin Fiala


Mercalius

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Traded Hornqvist and Spaling for Neal. Drafted Fiala at 11.

Big fan of both moves. Neal has some goonish moments and undoubtedly benefited from playing on those Penguins lines, but he's easily an upgrade to our top six. Sad to see Horny go though.

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I like the move. We definitely needed some offensive firepower but the best teams are a balance of offense AND defense. I hope Poile remembers that during this coaching transition.

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Looks like DelZotto is a goner. No qualifying offer on the table at start of free agency. Truthfully it looked like the guy was never hustling. And the shitty thing about it was we gave up Klein who was solid and working under a very reasonable contract. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Mike Fisher out for 4-6 months with a ruptured Achilles. Shit the bed! We're already center poor. Guess the young guns will get an opportunity to show their stuff. We'll miss Fish on the power play and penalty kill. 

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Did anyone ever find out what this dude's big personal issue is that got him released? 

 

Never liked him. 

 

I don't think anything official has come out, but the most common suspicion is cocaine (for the repeated rumored substance problems).  On top of his relationship issues with his wife, that is.  From reading over incidents over the years, they have/had a pretty volatile relationship that spills over into his professional life when things are going poorly.  He talks fairly openly about that stuff, but I'd read from numerous places that it led to a lot of missed meetings/practices in the past and caused him to get confrontational with the coaching staff when reprimanded.  Supposedly, they've patched things up and are looking at living in Nashville longterm, which was what he was lacking last year as he lived away from his family while in Phoenix.  I'm not a huge fan of the guy, but you can't argue with the contract and on paper he drastically improves our offensive potential.  The contract is pretty safe, and the upside is certainly there - mixed with the successes of other players with similar issues here (Tootoo, Clune), it could be mutually beneficial for both parties though I'd be extremely hesitant to ink him longterm even if he does bounce back with a good season.  One thing that's pretty neat though is that him and Neal will be reunited from their Dallas days and Neal sounded pretty excited that we were bringing him in.

Also, we signed Derek Roy to a 1 yr 1 million deal today too.  Have a bit of a logjam going on with our forwards at the moment, so we'll see where that goes.

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No question he has some offensive ability the Preds need and the contract makes it well worth the risk.

 

I bet you get one great year out of him. He'll be hungry as hell this year. I'll be betting it's a mistake if Poile resigns him after that. 

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Most think he needs a year minimum before he's NHL ready, maybe two.  I thought he would stay in Europe for the remaining season as he was progressing really well there in an adult league.  Yet I believe they've gone ahead and signed him to his entry-level deal meaning he may very likely start out with the Ads this season.  From what folks there said, he was pretty impressive during his time at the training camp, and there was a video that came out during the draft during the Neal-trade window where Poile was almost glowing that he got to keep the 11th pick as he saw Fiala as being really special.  

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