The Dallas Stars welcome reigning and defending Stanley Cup Champions Colorado Avalanche to the American Airlines Center on Monday evening as the countdown to the regular season continues. As it stands, the Stars are 2-2 heading into Monday’s preseason tilt and the roster continues to whittle down.
Most notably, on Sunday afternoon it was announced that winger Marian Studenic was placed on waivers along with Riley Tufte and Alexander Petrovic. Studenic came as a bit of a shock seeing as he was re-signed in the offseason to a one-year deal worth just $750,000. As of writing this, it is unknown if Studenic has cleared waivers. Studenic may not have made an impact on the stat-line but was a solid bottom-line forward with plenty of NHL experience. A move like this may mean that one of the Stars prospects could be playing themselves into an opening night roster spot. Or it’s a domino falling in hopes that more and more cap space opens up for wunderkind Jason Robertson.
Before we take a quick look at the Robo saga, the roster for Monday’s game against the Avs is interesting in that the one omission is center Logan Stankoven. His fellow prospects Mavrik Bourque and Wyatt Johnson get the nod on Monday as the roster is filled out by a vast majority of veterans.
Now, Jason Robertson. As it stands there really isn’t much to say aside from no. No, he won’t get traded. If anything Robo doesn’t play this season, which would absolutely suck for all parties involved including the fans. No, there is no update on if he has moved on his apparent asking price of above $8 million AAV. No, Jim Nill has not given us any update other than both camps are still having conversations but no new updates. No, I don’t know what is going to happen. Ownership has stated that they aren’t going to throw the bank at a younger player coming off a stellar season. This is obviously due to the fact that the last two massive contracts haven’t quite panned out as planned, and further buckling the franchise from being able to move on from Seguin and Benn thanks to each having a NMC placed on their contracts. Same with contracts like Ryan Suter which could realistically be an entire article in itself but we are practicing positivity.
Realistically I see this playing out with Anton Khudobin being traded away for a very late draft pick, or being bought out completely. Dobby hasn’t exactly helped his trade stock, so a buyout may be more likely at this point. However Dobby’s departure happens, it frees up $3.3 million dollars in cap space. That would give the Stars just over $10 million dollars in cap space and ideally allow them to make the deal with Robo and his camp. Will it be a bridge deal or will it be long-term? If I had to guess I would say bridge due to the fact that the cap is rumored to be around $100 million in 4-5 years’ time, giving both the Stars and Robo more room to work out a massive contract. (Benn and Seguin will be off of the books for their current contracts as well.)
All that being said, there really isn’t any good or solid update coming through any news outlets right now. Did I mention that Roope Hintz is due for a new contract next off-season? Yeah, so let that simmer. It could be worse, we could have a troll for a mascot.
UPDATE: As of releasing this article. Tufte, Studenic, and Petrovic have cleared waivers and been assigned to the Texas Stars of the AHL.
The Morning Skate 