It depends on Nill not only being a willing dealer, but also in terms of his assessment of his roster. Given his past behavior, there are no templates for what a big trade might look like. Nill had been on the job less than three months in 2013 when he swung the Tyler Seguin trade, a blockbuster seven-player swap. But that was less about trying to make the Stars a contender and more about pulling them out of mediocrity to punctuate what at the time was a flashy new image. Adding Jason Spezza the year after showed a willingness to part with futures—just not futures of any significance. The closest Dallas ever got to being a real contender was in 2016, and all Nill did that season was add Kris Russell at the deadline. So even if change is exactly what the blueline needs, on the surface, we don’t have a lot to go on when it comes to expecting change.  

In fact, Nill seemed almost cagey when asked about the defense at the year-end scrum, rattling off a bunch of superficial team stats in response. I call them superficial not because they weren’t valid or true, but because Nill was being diplomatic. Just because he didn’t throw his blueline under the bus doesn’t mean he and his colleagues aren’t in the war room right now finding out ways to make it better.

Still, if there’s no template for a big trade, and Nill is out here issuing a broad stamp of approval for the current group, why should fans expect anything except the status quo going into next year?

Because a couple of maneuvers could foretell what Nill has in store, and a critical context through which to view those maneuvers. The first was Nill’s trade for Nils Lundkvist last offseason. The second was Dallas’ failed bid for John Tavares in 2018. Taken together, they reveal a GM willing to learn new tricks and who’s always on the hunt, no matter the size of the fish. 

The context is equally important. Whatever potential trade Nill makes, he will have created the perfect window for it. Next year, Thomas Harley will be the only player due for a significant pay adjustment once he reaches free agency. And it just so happens that will come when Joe Pavelski, Jani Hakanpaa, and Colin Miller come off the books. The year after it’ll be Wyatt Johnston’s turn for a new, sizable contract … just as the salaries of Jamie Benn, Esa Lindell, and Ryan Suter expire. In other words, whatever the Stars can fit into their current cap, they’ll be able to fit for a long time.

So why not take a swing now for a player like, say, San Jose’s Erik Karlsson? The Stars were the frontrunner for Karlsson in 2018, so there’s plenty of history. Such a move would be way more difficult in terms of dollars. Karlsson has four more years on a contract at $11.5 million in annual cap, and while insiders say the Sharks want to get a trade done, and they’re willing to eat a portion of his contract that could bring his AAV down to at least $9 million a year, it won’t be easy. As Sharks beat writer Sheng Peng notes, retaining cap on a contract for more than three years would be the first of its kind in the cap era. However, all would-be suitors are up against the cap, so Sharks GM Mike Grier will be cornered regardless. At minimum, San Jose would need to take back a medium-sized contract, like Radek Faksa’s, to make it work for Dallas. Is this the move? Bringing in a super-charged version of John Klingberg?

Karlsson is coming off a career year (101 points) that will most likely earn him the Norris Trophy. However, this wasn’t just the case of a player shooting hot. If you saw him this year, you’d know. Beyond being rejuvenated, he was an altered beast of speed breaking out of the zone. Per Evolving-Hockey, his performance was good enough for six extra points in the standings—the same number as Jason Robertson and Roope Hintz. Karlsson’s presence might run counter to the Vegas “model” of having a big, burly blueline, but rosters have different strengths and weaknesses.  

And, as I’ve argued, the lack of clean breakouts is what killed Dallas against Vegas and to a lesser extent, Seattle. The Stars’ second pair was brutalized in the playoffs and couldn’t get out of the defensive zone to save their life. They also couldn’t capitalize on chances in the offensive zone. As a group, Dallas’ defensemen averaged 1.15 points per game; only four playoff teams (Winnipeg, Florida, Minnesota, New Jersey) were worse. Karlsson offers everything Dallas needs: someone to anchor a defensive pair who can power through the muck and grind of the opposing forechecks that defined the 2023 Stanley Cup Playoffs, and most likely will define them in the future.  

Of course, I’m sure some fans don’t believe Nill has it in him to do something bold. And he does trend toward the patient end of the spectrum. Craig Custance at The Athletic broke down those tendencies in 2018, when he examined the moves of 27 NHL general managers to assess patterns in their transactions. Nill ranked 21st in terms of activity, and his 0.40 trade per month was well below the average of 0.54. But tendency and temperament are not the same, and right now, Dallas has one of its deepest rosters ever. While losing Evgenii Dadonov and Max Domi will hurt, Johnston and Ty Dellandrea will only get better. Logan Stankoven is primed to strengthen the forward group, and you never know if seeing Vegas throw out the one-two punch of Eichel followed by Mark Stone might inspire Pete DeBoer to experiment with Robertson followed by Roope Hintz.          

Nill can be as frustrating as he is calculating. But I don’t buy the perception he is some hyper-loyal happy meal of hockey management. That’s not to say I believe Nill is secretly ruthless, nor that I think his affability is anything less than genuine. However, this is a man who called the infamous horses**t rant “dead-on” in its core message. He has been willing to get his hands dirty. When he was younger, he was willing to get them bloody too.    

You know the old quote, about people showing you who they are and believing them the first time. When Nill began his tenure in Dallas, he shook the hockey world with a blockbuster trade. With his watch nearing its end—his contract ends in 2024, whereupon he’s widely expected to make way for a successor at general manager—it would be fitting for him to exit the same way he entered: with a bang. Whether that’s now or at the deadline, don’t be surprised if Nill’s slow burn turns into an extended run after making an audacious move. That’s how it started. Why wouldn’t it be how it ends?      

The post The Stars’ Road Forward Winds Through the Trade Market appeared first on D Magazine.

Most of you are not Jim Nill, though. Most of you were simply rooting for this team alongside friends or families or loved ones, enjoying every playoff victory like a modestly successful scratch-off ticket. You submit yourselves to the emotions of each game and its competitors. You invest in their conflict and reap whatever the team has sown. Right now, there’s still some lingering heartache. 

Of course, if you were/are Jim Nill, it probably behooves you to talk about how the Western Conference Final was effectively for all the marbles. You might say the Stars were two wins from beating Vegas, which is basically two wins from winning it all. Two overtime games could’ve bounced the Stars’ way, and who would’ve been laughing then, eh? 

And you, Jim, you might even say it all happened despite Jake Oettinger (who was playing with a lingering injury for the last several months) performing well below expectations and Evgenii Dadonov’s knee injury taking him out of the series. It’s not as though the Stars caught lightning in a bottle like they did in 2020, after all. During the regular season, the Stars were a very good team: third in goals against, seventh in goals for, fifth in power-play conversion, and third in penalty-kill percentage. Not even a historically great Boston Bruins team managed to be top 10 in all four of those categories. 

If the goal of last summer was to move on from two moribund Rick Bowness seasons, then the Stars had a truly successful regular season. With Pete DeBoer at the helm, they could’ve finished atop the whole Western Conference had they just stepped on two or three fewer rakes during 3-on-3 overtime, and that seems like an eminently reasonable thing to ask. Surely a team this good can’t be this hapless two years in a row when the benches get shortened, right? (Please don’t answer that.)

However, the sting of that series lingers for good reason. Vegas is an excellent team that deserves the Cup it just won, but it’s hard not to think that the Stars squandered a rare opportunity to do something really and truly special—and that they squandered it in one of the more embarrassing ways imaginable. Jamie Benn had already written his own comeback story, finding a way to finish his hefty contract in Dallas with real contributions and restored dignity, only to throw much of it away in Game 3 when he went after Mark Stone like someone reenacting a mistranslated version of Hop on Pop. A garbage play brought garbage raining onto the ice, and while Benn’s teammates made a series out of it when all was said and done, the blowout loss in Game 6 brought back ugly memories of 2016. For the first time, comparing Kari Lehtonen to Jake Oettinger didn’t feel completely absurd. A sobering thought, indeed. 

While Nill didn’t rule out the possibility of a trade in his final interview of the season, he did stress that the Stars don’t have much wiggle room in their current salary cap crunch, which is a classy way to say the Stars may well have to run this group back and hope fewer things go wrong next time. Given the way it started, that seems … fine, I suppose? But given the way it ended, such an approach can ring hollow, if not downright timid. 

After all, the Stars just lost to a Vegas organization that made a name for itself by taking risks, ripping off bandages, and leaving people on the side of the road along the way, both literally and figuratively. The Stars might well be contemplating a buyout of Ryan Suter right now, but Dallas fans know Nill rarely operates with that sort of ruthless efficiency when it comes to veteran players. That’s part of what has made Nill such an admired figure from those who know him well or only by reputation. There’s nothing wrong with being a good man. 

Still, it’s hard not to think about how Vegas gave away fan-favorite Marc-Andre Fleury for nothing right after he won a Vezina Trophy, only to go on to win the Cup with a backup goalie a much worse team didn’t want. Vegas needed cap space to become a deeper team, and they did what had to be done to make it happen. I genuinely don’t know if that’s a good thing for the league, but it certainly seems to have been an effective approach for the team, if we’re judging by trophies. That’s not usually how Nill operates, though, even if Tom Gaglardi has not always shown the same compunctions about flouting decorum. 

Maybe that’s for the best. Over the last decade, the Stars organization has cultivated a reputation for being a place where veteran players are usually treated with respect. Joe Pavelski left the captaincy behind in San Jose to come to Dallas and wound up liking it so much he chose to re-sign. Alex Radulov surprised everyone by coming here. Even Corey Perry was happy to land here after a bumpy end in Anaheim, despite having multiple other offers on the table. Same story with Suter two years later. You don’t get those names on the back of a team’s jersey if the brand on the front isn’t strong enough to bear them.

That brand is what general managers and owners have to consider when it comes to bigger moves. Fans love to speculate about how the next big prospects might all be as good as Wyatt Johnston, how management might unload all of their least favorite players, how there’s no need to sign depth players because no one is likely to get hurt next year. 

But like all modern entertainment, hockey is equal parts economic and sentimental. “It’s a business” is the phrase used during salary negotiations, but that changes to “give everything you’ve got” when it comes to players feeling obligated to play through injury. Similarly, fans may want the team designed according to their dreams, but GMs tend to build it to withstand their fears.

While some bold, Vegas-like moves are possible this summer—who saw the Nils Lundkvist trade coming last year?—this has been a franchise that can’t resist the siren song of safe, known quantities the minute adversity strikes. 

Jamie Oleksiak left for Seattle in 2021, so the Stars offered Suter four years and a no-movement clause right on the heels of Minnesota buying him out. Jani Hakanpää was always going to get top-four ice time this season despite rough results over the likes of Lundkvist or Thomas Harley. And there’s a reason that spring has long been known in these parts as “Joel Hanley Time.” When the Stars start to feel like they’re losing control, they pick up some comfort food, just like anyone else. 

But change rarely happens when you’re comfortable. Vegas has consistently chosen positive disruption, and they’ve proven that path to be an effective one. The question for Dallas now is whether they are in need of that sort of change or whether there’s a more graceful approach to follow, akin to diminishing Benn’s role instead of trying to run him out of town. If anyone can find that middle way, it’s probably Nill.

If you look at the regular season, some moderate tinkering to the NHL roster with a great prospect pool to draw from is a perfectly reasonable foundation for another great season. But if the Stars weigh playoff results more heavily and make bigger adjustments to their approach, fans may be in for a more dramatic summer, replete with all the same uncertainty, excitement, and tension every game brings. You may not have any control over what happens, but you’ll still mourn or celebrate each transaction like you did. And maybe you will, if you just dream big enough.

The post The Stars Aren’t the Golden Knights, Because They Don’t Want to Be appeared first on D Magazine.

It’s on the third pair, killing penalties, playing 16 minutes a night, and elevating in the lineup when injury or play of other players necessitates it. 

That’s where he belongs now, at age 38. Miro Heiskanen is the alpha on the Dallas defense, and the postseason showed Thomas Harley is ready to run as the Stars’ No. 2 defenseman, either on a pair with Heiskanen or anchoring his own top-four unit. Nils Lundkvist, whom the Stars spent a first-round pick on last summer, has to hit the accelerator on his learning curve. While it was the right decision this postseason, Lundkvist serving as a healthy scratch in the 2024 playoffs would be inexcusable. The Stars need to give him the space to let him grow and make mistakes.

Suter doesn’t have to disrupt any of that. In fact, Suter playing as much as he did in the playoffs was vital to the Stars’ success, even with that egregious turnover in Game 2 against Vegas. He’ll never be your favorite Star, but Dallas needed Suter’s play to reach the Western Conference Final. He can still make this team better in the right context.

But can and will are very different things. 

Suter could be repositioned. He can start near the top of the lineup, then slide down as the year progresses. It would be smart usage of a player who can help cover up some early-season mistakes, then relinquish ice time as needed. 

But that won’t happen. This isn’t a video game, where you can plug and play. It’s a human sport, where emotion and loyalty in-season are going to get in the way. And Jim Nill is loyal—sometimes to a fault. Meanwhile, Suter is one of Pete DeBoer’s favorite players. In theory, it’s fine to lay out a plan for Suter’s ice-time adjustment. But when the game is close and a coach is trying to win, he’ll trust his favorites, even if the same players he believes in most can sometimes let him down hardest.  

All of that is why Nill must make the difficult decision to buy out Suter’s contract when the window opens 48 hours after the Stanley Cup Final ends. It would be the second time Suter has been bought out, and it would make Suter a potential NHL first: collecting buyout checks from two NHL franchises, Minnesota and Dallas, at the same time. 

During his season-ending media availability, Nill said that, at this point, he had “no plans right now” for any buyouts. I trust that sentiment; I really do. But the answer left some wiggle room for Nill to go against that thought, similar to the way he changed his mind to buy out Valeri Nichushkin in 2019 when it became clear the move would be needed to sign Joe Pavelski. 

Buying out Suter wouldn’t open the door for a Pavelski-like signing. Instead, it would be the proper addition by subtraction. DeBoer can’t play the overly trusted veteran defenseman—and jeopardize the development of younger players, and water down the team’s power-play, and potentially hamper the Stars in critical late-game situations—if Suter isn’t on the roster. It would make Dallas a worse team in Game 1 of the regular season but a better team by Game 82 and beyond. 

For proof of concept, the Stars should look at what happened with John Klingberg a year ago. Dallas wanted to re-sign the defender, but their financial goals didn’t align, leaving Nill to let Klingberg walk in free agency. 

Miro Heiskanen responded by seizing the opportunity on the first power-play unit. His points jumped from 36 to 73, and the Stars were a better team because an obstacle was removed for a younger player to take a crucial step forward. 

The stakes are lower here. Suter isn’t as good as Klingberg, and neither Harley nor Lundkvist is a potential superstar like Heiskanen. But Suter is currently limiting Harley’s chances to be a bona fide No. 2. He’s limiting both Harley and Lundkvist’s chances at running a power play. The veteran’s unwillingness to play on his weak side even limits how the Stars can use Heiskanen, too. 

From a financial perspective, Suter’s buyout would also be a smart piece of business. Because it isn’t frontloaded like most veteran contracts, it almost makes more sense to buy it out than try to eat a larger salary cap hit the next two seasons. Dallas would save $2.86 million against the cap each of the next two seasons with a Suter buyout, while they’d lose $1.43 against the cap during the ‘25-’26 and ‘26-’27 seasons. Next season, the NHL salary cap is only expected to go up around $1 million, but many teams and agents are expecting a large cap increase in 2025. 

Add it up, and it makes too much sense to not buy Suter’s contract out, even if the Stars don’t use that cap space to bring in another defender from a weak free-agency class. One of the reasons Suter picked Dallas in free agency in the summer of 2021 was because the Stars were the only team willing to give him a fourth year on his contract. In other words, the market indicated he was a two or three-year player at best. We’re now at the midway point of that contract, and while Suter still has something to give, it isn’t enough to justify all the things he could take. It’s time for the Stars to realize the rest of the market was right. 

The post The Stars Need to Buy Out Ryan Suter, And Not For the Reasons You Think. appeared first on D Magazine.

Before getting into what makes the blueline a priority and how to fix it, let’s put a pin in any pie-in-the-sky notions about improving the blueline while keeping the band together. It won’t happen, nor should it. The Stars have $7.3 million in cap space to work with. Per Evolving-Hockey’s contract projections, new deals for Max Domi and Evgenii Dadonov—along with Ty Delleandrea—will cost a collective $7.5 million. That would be money well spent if the Stars weren’t up against the cap, but they are. Both trade deadline additions were excellent. But Nill must choose between keeping the forward depth or upgrading the blueline. The answer is the latter, and it always was.        

Because you’re all thinking what I’m thinking, and we’ve both been thinking it for a while, let’s cut to the chase: any blueline improvement starts with buying out Ryan Suter. Even ignoring his costly mistake in Game 2, Suter paired with Miro Heiskanen to produce the lowest expected goal share of Dallas’ three postseason duos. Elliotte Friedman brought up the buyout discussion on 32 Thoughts and offered the tired counterargument to doing otherwise: who’s gonna replace those minutes? Well, why not Colin Miller, the guy who played next to Heiskanen all year? In their share of shot attempts (55 to 52 percent) and expected goal share (54 to 49 percent), Heiskanen-Miller was superior analytically, and it kept Heiskanen on his strong side, where he always has been better able to create offense.  

This isn’t even getting into how Suter eats into what unquestionably should be Thomas Harley’s minutes on the second power-play unit. Buying out Suter would save $2.8 million in cap space for the next two years. As Suter fades, he’ll just be a heavier anchor for Heiskanen to haul around on his weak side. I know there’s a level of nuance I might be ignoring given Suter’s playoff performance (at least in the first two series), but nuance is overrated in the context of overwhelming evidence. It’s time to cut the cord, full stop. 

There’s just one not-so-small problem: Parting ways with Suter wouldn’t address Dallas’ biggest blueline problem. Every team in the Final Four boasts players who didn’t just stand in the shadow of their number one. Behind Alex Pietrangelo is Shea Theodore. Behind Jacob Slavvin is Brett Pesce. Behind Aaron Ekblad is the unheralded but quietly elite Gustav Forsling. These aren’t just defensemen who can play tough minutes; they’re defensemen who can control those minutes. The Stars have nowhere near that kind of talent, which is why Esa Lindell and Jani Hakanpaa were brutalized in the playoffs. Hakanpaa’s performance was palatable given his cost, but Lindell’s performance is a harder conversation. It raises questions about whether his $5.8 million annual salary is becoming an albatross. But that’s just where this conversation starts.   

I want to hang around on this point because improving the second defensive pair is more important than any discussion about a Suter buyout, or trying to keep Domi and Dadonov. Neither Lindell nor Hakanpaa will ever be point producers, so it’s important to find out if they were effective in other areas. Unfortunately, they weren’t.  

Below is their shot share (CF%), unblocked shot share (FF%), and expected goal share (xGF%) compared to the average second-pairing performance in the 2023 playoffs.    

These two were trounced—hard. When opponents are so much faster in the neutral zone, two players who only know how to exit the zone with board rims and dump-outs will just allow them to reload. And that’s exactly what happened. Without being able to drive play, Lindell and Hakanpaa controlled shot quality relatively well, but they were stuck in a groundhog’s day loop of having to control that shot quality instead of helping Dallas generate anything going the other way. Per Corey Sznajder’s tracking data, Lindell and Hakanpaa were only able to exit out of zone with possession 34 and 27 percent of the time, respectively. In 19 playoff games they finished a collective minus-13, combined for a meager five points, and were outshot 112-72. Their regular-season performance was no different; they were able to tread above water in keeping shot quality down, but not shot quantity. That’s 20 minutes a night that Dallas couldn’t gain territory from its backend, and it proved fatal. 

I understand why Stars fans don’t want to let go of Domi and Dadonov, two players who became fan favorites. But Dallas might have its next Domi and Dadonov in Logan Stankoven and Mavrik Bourque. Granted, improving the team on the hopes and prayers of two rookie performances is not exactly good engineering, but it’s worth remembering that Domi and Dadonov were both X-factors themselves. 

I can see why nothing may happen, though. The market makes improving the blueline tricky.   Let’s start with the most likely solution to the blueline problem: the unrestricted free agent class. It’s not exactly brimming with top-tier talent, but there are some options. Former Devil Damon Severson is a fantastic, play-driving defenseman. He’s also a right shot, which would be perfect next to Heiskanen or as an element for the second pair. If Suter is bought out, Dallas will have about $10 million to work with. Could Nill buy his way into a better blueline? In point of fact, yes. Below is a list of defensemen, along with their projected term and cap, I believe would be good additions.  

Adding John Klingberg and Scott Mayfield could be exactly what Dallas needs: reunite Klingberg with Lindell, and keep Heiskanen on his strong side with a proven shutdown defender in Mayfield. Mayfield stands out more for his potential to play next to Harley, though. It’s important not to jump the gun on Harley as top-four material, but there is no greater litmus test for a young defender than the high stakes of playoff hockey. Harley routinely passed that test. If the Stars were to groom him into a top-four role—or have the stomach to put Lindell’s bloated contract onto the third pair—they would essentially solve their top-four problem by elevating Harley’s role. 

That said, I’m more into the concept of a trade. Thanks to the Matthew Tkachuk deal, there seems to be an appetite for frisky moves, according to insiders. Calgary’s Chris Tanev has one year left on his $4.5 million deal. The Flames’ blueline is loaded, and they won’t be pushing their chips in next season. He’d be perfect next to Heiskanen or Harley. Rumors have swirled in the past about the Blues’ Colton Parayko. He and Tanev have strong defensive shot impacts that could more effectively transition Harley into the top four. The asterisk there is that Tanev has been injury-prone, and the 30-year-old Parayko, who is on the downside of his career, is signed until 2030. 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about Nils Lundkvist, who I believe is a really solid young player. His gifts in the offensive zone are impressive, and Harley’s presence alone shouldn’t be what makes Lundkvist obsolete. When all was said and done, Pete DeBoer had positive things to say about him. But we saw what happened when it got down to the marrow: not only was Lundkvist an afterthought, but Suter’s role got even bigger. Lundkvist’s role will always hang in the balance as long as he teeters on the bottom pair. If so, Nill has to decide now if he made a mistake, or if the long game is still the end game. 

Whatever the case, Nill has to work through a maze of challenges. Suter, Lindell, Lundkvist, Hakanpaa, and Miller all require long conversations. Nill has never had it in him to move out contracts for the sake of expediency. He wants players to see the end of their deals, and that has earned him an excellent quality reputation. But that’s also why I’m not sold on the narrative that the Stars will only get better, that they deserved better, or that they’re primed for another deep run. 

Not because the roster isn’t good enough, but because progress isn’t linear. That’s why this year felt like a lost opportunity to me. The Stars have one more year to get it right—one year to take advantage of the Joe Pavelski window (and did his absence ever highlight that), one year to get truly aggressive and fix what so desperately needs fixing. Past playoff runs offer no solace or guarantees of future success. Nothing about Dallas getting better next season makes sense if the blueline doesn’t improve. Nothing.

The post The Stars’ Next Step Begins With Fixing Their Defense appeared first on D Magazine.

Before getting into what makes the blueline a priority and how to fix it, let’s put a pin in any pie-in-the-sky notions about improving the blueline while keeping the band together. It won’t happen, nor should it. The Stars have $7.3 million in cap space to work with. Per Evolving-Hockey’s contract projections, new deals for Max Domi and Evgenii Dadonov—along with Ty Delleandrea—will cost a collective $7.5 million. That would be money well spent if the Stars weren’t up against the cap, but they are. Both trade deadline additions were excellent. But Nill must choose between keeping the forward depth or upgrading the blueline. The answer is the latter, and it always was.        

Because you’re all thinking what I’m thinking, and we’ve both been thinking it for a while, let’s cut to the chase: any blueline improvement starts with buying out Ryan Suter. Even ignoring his costly mistake in Game 2, Suter paired with Miro Heiskanen to produce the lowest expected goal share of Dallas’ three postseason duos. Elliotte Friedman brought up the buyout discussion on 32 Thoughts and offered the tired counterargument to doing otherwise: who’s gonna replace those minutes? Well, why not Colin Miller, the guy who played next to Heiskanen all year? In their share of shot attempts (55 to 52 percent) and expected goal share (54 to 49 percent), Heiskanen-Miller was superior analytically, and it kept Heiskanen on his strong side, where he always has been better able to create offense.  

This isn’t even getting into how Suter eats into what unquestionably should be Thomas Harley’s minutes on the second power-play unit. Buying out Suter would save $2.8 million in cap space for the next two years. As Suter fades, he’ll just be a heavier anchor for Heiskanen to haul around on his weak side. I know there’s a level of nuance I might be ignoring given Suter’s playoff performance (at least in the first two series), but nuance is overrated in the context of overwhelming evidence. It’s time to cut the cord, full stop. 

There’s just one not-so-small problem: Parting ways with Suter wouldn’t address Dallas’ biggest blueline problem. Every team in the Final Four boasts players who didn’t just stand in the shadow of their number one. Behind Alex Pietrangelo is Shea Theodore. Behind Jacob Slavvin is Brett Pesce. Behind Aaron Ekblad is the unheralded but quietly elite Gustav Forsling. These aren’t just defensemen who can play tough minutes; they’re defensemen who can control those minutes. The Stars have nowhere near that kind of talent, which is why Esa Lindell and Jani Hakanpaa were brutalized in the playoffs. Hakanpaa’s performance was palatable given his cost, but Lindell’s performance is a harder conversation. It raises questions about whether his $5.8 million annual salary is becoming an albatross. But that’s just where this conversation starts.   

I want to hang around on this point because improving the second defensive pair is more important than any discussion about a Suter buyout, or trying to keep Domi and Dadonov. Neither Lindell nor Hakanpaa will ever be point producers, so it’s important to find out if they were effective in other areas. Unfortunately, they weren’t.  

Below is their shot share (CF%), unblocked shot share (FF%), and expected goal share (xGF%) compared to the average second-pairing performance in the 2023 playoffs.    

These two were trounced—hard. When opponents are so much faster in the neutral zone, two players who only know how to exit the zone with board rims and dump-outs will just allow them to reload. And that’s exactly what happened. Without being able to drive play, Lindell and Hakanpaa controlled shot quality relatively well, but they were stuck in a groundhog’s day loop of having to control that shot quality instead of helping Dallas generate anything going the other way. Per Corey Sznajder’s tracking data, Lindell and Hakanpaa were only able to exit out of zone with possession 34 and 27 percent of the time, respectively. In 19 playoff games they finished a collective minus-13, combined for a meager five points, and were outshot 112-72. Their regular-season performance was no different; they were able to tread above water in keeping shot quality down, but not shot quantity. That’s 20 minutes a night that Dallas couldn’t gain territory from its backend, and it proved fatal. 

I understand why Stars fans don’t want to let go of Domi and Dadonov, two players who became fan favorites. But Dallas might have its next Domi and Dadonov in Logan Stankoven and Mavrik Bourque. Granted, improving the team on the hopes and prayers of two rookie performances is not exactly good engineering, but it’s worth remembering that Domi and Dadonov were both X-factors themselves. 

I can see why nothing may happen, though. The market makes improving the blueline tricky.   Let’s start with the most likely solution to the blueline problem: the unrestricted free agent class. It’s not exactly brimming with top-tier talent, but there are some options. Former Devil Damon Severson is a fantastic, play-driving defenseman. He’s also a right shot, which would be perfect next to Heiskanen or as an element for the second pair. If Suter is bought out, Dallas will have about $10 million to work with. Could Nill buy his way into a better blueline? In point of fact, yes. Below is a list of defensemen, along with their projected term and cap, I believe would be good additions.  

Adding John Klingberg and Scott Mayfield could be exactly what Dallas needs: reunite Klingberg with Lindell, and keep Heiskanen on his strong side with a proven shutdown defender in Mayfield. Mayfield stands out more for his potential to play next to Harley, though. It’s important not to jump the gun on Harley as top-four material, but there is no greater litmus test for a young defender than the high stakes of playoff hockey. Harley routinely passed that test. If the Stars were to groom him into a top-four role—or have the stomach to put Lindell’s bloated contract onto the third pair—they would essentially solve their top-four problem by elevating Harley’s role. 

That said, I’m more into the concept of a trade. Thanks to the Matthew Tkachuk deal, there seems to be an appetite for frisky moves, according to insiders. Calgary’s Chris Tanev has one year left on his $4.5 million deal. The Flames’ blueline is loaded, and they won’t be pushing their chips in next season. He’d be perfect next to Heiskanen or Harley. Rumors have swirled in the past about the Blues’ Colton Parayko. He and Tanev have strong defensive shot impacts that could more effectively transition Harley into the top four. The asterisk there is that Tanev has been injury-prone, and the 30-year-old Parayko, who is on the downside of his career, is signed until 2030. 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about Nils Lundkvist, who I believe is a really solid young player. His gifts in the offensive zone are impressive, and Harley’s presence alone shouldn’t be what makes Lundkvist obsolete. When all was said and done, Pete DeBoer had positive things to say about him. But we saw what happened when it got down to the marrow: not only was Lundkvist an afterthought, but Suter’s role got even bigger. Lundkvist’s role will always hang in the balance as long as he teeters on the bottom pair. If so, Nill has to decide now if he made a mistake, or if the long game is still the end game. 

Whatever the case, Nill has to work through a maze of challenges. Suter, Lindell, Lundkvist, Hakanpaa, and Miller all require long conversations. Nill has never had it in him to move out contracts for the sake of expediency. He wants players to see the end of their deals, and that has earned him an excellent quality reputation. But that’s also why I’m not sold on the narrative that the Stars will only get better, that they deserved better, or that they’re primed for another deep run. 

Not because the roster isn’t good enough, but because progress isn’t linear. That’s why this year felt like a lost opportunity to me. The Stars have one more year to get it right—one year to take advantage of the Joe Pavelski window (and did his absence ever highlight that), one year to get truly aggressive and fix what so desperately needs fixing. Past playoff runs offer no solace or guarantees of future success. Nothing about Dallas getting better next season makes sense if the blueline doesn’t improve. Nothing.

The post The Stars Were Good Enough to Win It All. They Could Be Even Better in 2024. appeared first on D Magazine.

Before getting into what makes the blueline a priority and how to fix it, let’s put a pin in any pie-in-the-sky notions about improving the blueline while keeping the band together. It won’t happen, nor should it. The Stars have $7.3 million in cap space to work with. Per Evolving-Hockey’s contract projections, new deals for Max Domi and Evgenii Dadonov—along with Ty Delleandrea—will cost a collective $7.5 million. That would be money well spent if the Stars weren’t up against the cap, but they are. Both trade deadline additions were excellent. But Nill must choose between keeping the forward depth or upgrading the blueline. The answer is the latter, and it always was.        

Because you’re all thinking what I’m thinking, and we’ve both been thinking it for a while, let’s cut to the chase: any blueline improvement starts with buying out Ryan Suter. Even ignoring his costly mistake in Game 2, Suter paired with Miro Heiskanen to produce the lowest expected goal share of Dallas’ three postseason duos. Elliotte Friedman brought up the buyout discussion on 32 Thoughts and offered the tired counterargument to doing otherwise: who’s gonna replace those minutes? Well, why not Colin Miller, the guy who played next to Heiskanen all year? In their share of shot attempts (55 to 52 percent) and expected goal share (54 to 49 percent), Heiskanen-Miller was superior analytically, and it kept Heiskanen on his strong side, where he always has been better able to create offense.  

This isn’t even getting into how Suter eats into what unquestionably should be Thomas Harley’s minutes on the second power-play unit. Buying out Suter would save $2.8 million in cap space for the next two years. As Suter fades, he’ll just be a heavier anchor for Heiskanen to haul around on his weak side. I know there’s a level of nuance I might be ignoring given Suter’s playoff performance (at least in the first two series), but nuance is overrated in the context of overwhelming evidence. It’s time to cut the cord, full stop. 

There’s just one not-so-small problem: Parting ways with Suter wouldn’t address Dallas’ biggest blueline problem. Every team in the Final Four boasts players who didn’t just stand in the shadow of their number one. Behind Alex Pietrangelo is Shea Theodore. Behind Jacob Slavvin is Brett Pesce. Behind Aaron Ekblad is the unheralded but quietly elite Gustav Forsling. These aren’t just defensemen who can play tough minutes; they’re defensemen who can control those minutes. The Stars have nowhere near that kind of talent, which is why Esa Lindell and Jani Hakanpaa were brutalized in the playoffs. Hakanpaa’s performance was palatable given his cost, but Lindell’s performance is a harder conversation. It raises questions about whether his $5.8 million annual salary is becoming an albatross. But that’s just where this conversation starts.   

I want to hang around on this point because improving the second defensive pair is more important than any discussion about a Suter buyout, or trying to keep Domi and Dadonov. Neither Lindell nor Hakanpaa will ever be point producers, so it’s important to find out if they were effective in other areas. Unfortunately, they weren’t.  

Below is their shot share (CF%), unblocked shot share (FF%), and expected goal share (xGF%) compared to the average second-pairing performance in the 2023 playoffs.    

These two were trounced—hard. When opponents are so much faster in the neutral zone, two players who only know how to exit the zone with board rims and dump-outs will just allow them to reload. And that’s exactly what happened. Without being able to drive play, Lindell and Hakanpaa controlled shot quality relatively well, but they were stuck in a groundhog’s day loop of having to control that shot quality instead of helping Dallas generate anything going the other way. Per Corey Sznajder’s tracking data, Lindell and Hakanpaa were only able to exit out of zone with possession 34 and 27 percent of the time, respectively. In 19 playoff games they finished a collective minus-13, combined for a meager five points, and were outshot 112-72. Their regular-season performance was no different; they were able to tread above water in keeping shot quality down, but not shot quantity. That’s 20 minutes a night that Dallas couldn’t gain territory from its backend, and it proved fatal. 

I understand why Stars fans don’t want to let go of Domi and Dadonov, two players who became fan favorites. But Dallas might have its next Domi and Dadonov in Logan Stankoven and Mavrik Bourque. Granted, improving the team on the hopes and prayers of two rookie performances is not exactly good engineering, but it’s worth remembering that Domi and Dadonov were both X-factors themselves. 

I can see why nothing may happen, though. The market makes improving the blueline tricky.   Let’s start with the most likely solution to the blueline problem: the unrestricted free agent class. It’s not exactly brimming with top-tier talent, but there are some options. Former Devil Damon Severson is a fantastic, play-driving defenseman. He’s also a right shot, which would be perfect next to Heiskanen or as an element for the second pair. If Suter is bought out, Dallas will have about $10 million to work with. Could Nill buy his way into a better blueline? In point of fact, yes. Below is a list of defensemen, along with their projected term and cap, I believe would be good additions.  

Adding John Klingberg and Scott Mayfield could be exactly what Dallas needs: reunite Klingberg with Lindell, and keep Heiskanen on his strong side with a proven shutdown defender in Mayfield. Mayfield stands out more for his potential to play next to Harley, though. It’s important not to jump the gun on Harley as top-four material, but there is no greater litmus test for a young defender than the high stakes of playoff hockey. Harley routinely passed that test. If the Stars were to groom him into a top-four role—or have the stomach to put Lindell’s bloated contract onto the third pair—they would essentially solve their top-four problem by elevating Harley’s role. 

That said, I’m more into the concept of a trade. Thanks to the Matthew Tkachuk deal, there seems to be an appetite for frisky moves, according to insiders. Calgary’s Chris Tanev has one year left on his $4.5 million deal. The Flames’ blueline is loaded, and they won’t be pushing their chips in next season. He’d be perfect next to Heiskanen or Harley. Rumors have swirled in the past about the Blues’ Colton Parayko. He and Tanev have strong defensive shot impacts that could more effectively transition Harley into the top four. The asterisk there is that Tanev has been injury-prone, and the 30-year-old Parayko, who is on the downside of his career, is signed until 2030. 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about Nils Lundkvist, who I believe is a really solid young player. His gifts in the offensive zone are impressive, and Harley’s presence alone shouldn’t be what makes Lundkvist obsolete. When all was said and done, Pete DeBoer had positive things to say about him. But we saw what happened when it got down to the marrow: not only was Lundkvist an afterthought, but Suter’s role got even bigger. Lundkvist’s role will always hang in the balance as long as he teeters on the bottom pair. If so, Nill has to decide now if he made a mistake, or if the long game is still the end game. 

Whatever the case, Nill has to work through a maze of challenges. Suter, Lindell, Lundkvist, Hakanpaa, and Miller all require long conversations. Nill has never had it in him to move out contracts for the sake of expediency. He wants players to see the end of their deals, and that has earned him an excellent quality reputation. But that’s also why I’m not sold on the narrative that the Stars will only get better, that they deserved better, or that they’re primed for another deep run. 

Not because the roster isn’t good enough, but because progress isn’t linear. That’s why this year felt like a lost opportunity to me. The Stars have one more year to get it right—one year to take advantage of the Joe Pavelski window (and did his absence ever highlight that), one year to get truly aggressive and fix what so desperately needs fixing. Past playoff runs offer no solace or guarantees of future success. Nothing about Dallas getting better next season makes sense if the blueline doesn’t improve. Nothing.

The post What We Saw, What It Felt Like: Stars-Golden Knights, Game 6 appeared first on D Magazine.

Before getting into what makes the blueline a priority and how to fix it, let’s put a pin in any pie-in-the-sky notions about improving the blueline while keeping the band together. It won’t happen, nor should it. The Stars have $7.3 million in cap space to work with. Per Evolving-Hockey’s contract projections, new deals for Max Domi and Evgenii Dadonov—along with Ty Delleandrea—will cost a collective $7.5 million. That would be money well spent if the Stars weren’t up against the cap, but they are. Both trade deadline additions were excellent. But Nill must choose between keeping the forward depth or upgrading the blueline. The answer is the latter, and it always was.        

Because you’re all thinking what I’m thinking, and we’ve both been thinking it for a while, let’s cut to the chase: any blueline improvement starts with buying out Ryan Suter. Even ignoring his costly mistake in Game 2, Suter paired with Miro Heiskanen to produce the lowest expected goal share of Dallas’ three postseason duos. Elliotte Friedman brought up the buyout discussion on 32 Thoughts and offered the tired counterargument to doing otherwise: who’s gonna replace those minutes? Well, why not Colin Miller, the guy who played next to Heiskanen all year? In their share of shot attempts (55 to 52 percent) and expected goal share (54 to 49 percent), Heiskanen-Miller was superior analytically, and it kept Heiskanen on his strong side, where he always has been better able to create offense.  

This isn’t even getting into how Suter eats into what unquestionably should be Thomas Harley’s minutes on the second power-play unit. Buying out Suter would save $2.8 million in cap space for the next two years. As Suter fades, he’ll just be a heavier anchor for Heiskanen to haul around on his weak side. I know there’s a level of nuance I might be ignoring given Suter’s playoff performance (at least in the first two series), but nuance is overrated in the context of overwhelming evidence. It’s time to cut the cord, full stop. 

There’s just one not-so-small problem: Parting ways with Suter wouldn’t address Dallas’ biggest blueline problem. Every team in the Final Four boasts players who didn’t just stand in the shadow of their number one. Behind Alex Pietrangelo is Shea Theodore. Behind Jacob Slavvin is Brett Pesce. Behind Aaron Ekblad is the unheralded but quietly elite Gustav Forsling. These aren’t just defensemen who can play tough minutes; they’re defensemen who can control those minutes. The Stars have nowhere near that kind of talent, which is why Esa Lindell and Jani Hakanpaa were brutalized in the playoffs. Hakanpaa’s performance was palatable given his cost, but Lindell’s performance is a harder conversation. It raises questions about whether his $5.8 million annual salary is becoming an albatross. But that’s just where this conversation starts.   

I want to hang around on this point because improving the second defensive pair is more important than any discussion about a Suter buyout, or trying to keep Domi and Dadonov. Neither Lindell nor Hakanpaa will ever be point producers, so it’s important to find out if they were effective in other areas. Unfortunately, they weren’t.  

Below is their shot share (CF%), unblocked shot share (FF%), and expected goal share (xGF%) compared to the average second-pairing performance in the 2023 playoffs.    

These two were trounced—hard. When opponents are so much faster in the neutral zone, two players who only know how to exit the zone with board rims and dump-outs will just allow them to reload. And that’s exactly what happened. Without being able to drive play, Lindell and Hakanpaa controlled shot quality relatively well, but they were stuck in a groundhog’s day loop of having to control that shot quality instead of helping Dallas generate anything going the other way. Per Corey Sznajder’s tracking data, Lindell and Hakanpaa were only able to exit out of zone with possession 34 and 27 percent of the time, respectively. In 19 playoff games they finished a collective minus-13, combined for a meager five points, and were outshot 112-72. Their regular-season performance was no different; they were able to tread above water in keeping shot quality down, but not shot quantity. That’s 20 minutes a night that Dallas couldn’t gain territory from its backend, and it proved fatal. 

I understand why Stars fans don’t want to let go of Domi and Dadonov, two players who became fan favorites. But Dallas might have its next Domi and Dadonov in Logan Stankoven and Mavrik Bourque. Granted, improving the team on the hopes and prayers of two rookie performances is not exactly good engineering, but it’s worth remembering that Domi and Dadonov were both X-factors themselves. 

I can see why nothing may happen, though. The market makes improving the blueline tricky.   Let’s start with the most likely solution to the blueline problem: the unrestricted free agent class. It’s not exactly brimming with top-tier talent, but there are some options. Former Devil Damon Severson is a fantastic, play-driving defenseman. He’s also a right shot, which would be perfect next to Heiskanen or as an element for the second pair. If Suter is bought out, Dallas will have about $10 million to work with. Could Nill buy his way into a better blueline? In point of fact, yes. Below is a list of defensemen, along with their projected term and cap, I believe would be good additions.  

Adding John Klingberg and Scott Mayfield could be exactly what Dallas needs: reunite Klingberg with Lindell, and keep Heiskanen on his strong side with a proven shutdown defender in Mayfield. Mayfield stands out more for his potential to play next to Harley, though. It’s important not to jump the gun on Harley as top-four material, but there is no greater litmus test for a young defender than the high stakes of playoff hockey. Harley routinely passed that test. If the Stars were to groom him into a top-four role—or have the stomach to put Lindell’s bloated contract onto the third pair—they would essentially solve their top-four problem by elevating Harley’s role. 

That said, I’m more into the concept of a trade. Thanks to the Matthew Tkachuk deal, there seems to be an appetite for frisky moves, according to insiders. Calgary’s Chris Tanev has one year left on his $4.5 million deal. The Flames’ blueline is loaded, and they won’t be pushing their chips in next season. He’d be perfect next to Heiskanen or Harley. Rumors have swirled in the past about the Blues’ Colton Parayko. He and Tanev have strong defensive shot impacts that could more effectively transition Harley into the top four. The asterisk there is that Tanev has been injury-prone, and the 30-year-old Parayko, who is on the downside of his career, is signed until 2030. 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about Nils Lundkvist, who I believe is a really solid young player. His gifts in the offensive zone are impressive, and Harley’s presence alone shouldn’t be what makes Lundkvist obsolete. When all was said and done, Pete DeBoer had positive things to say about him. But we saw what happened when it got down to the marrow: not only was Lundkvist an afterthought, but Suter’s role got even bigger. Lundkvist’s role will always hang in the balance as long as he teeters on the bottom pair. If so, Nill has to decide now if he made a mistake, or if the long game is still the end game. 

Whatever the case, Nill has to work through a maze of challenges. Suter, Lindell, Lundkvist, Hakanpaa, and Miller all require long conversations. Nill has never had it in him to move out contracts for the sake of expediency. He wants players to see the end of their deals, and that has earned him an excellent quality reputation. But that’s also why I’m not sold on the narrative that the Stars will only get better, that they deserved better, or that they’re primed for another deep run. 

Not because the roster isn’t good enough, but because progress isn’t linear. That’s why this year felt like a lost opportunity to me. The Stars have one more year to get it right—one year to take advantage of the Joe Pavelski window (and did his absence ever highlight that), one year to get truly aggressive and fix what so desperately needs fixing. Past playoff runs offer no solace or guarantees of future success. Nothing about Dallas getting better next season makes sense if the blueline doesn’t improve. Nothing.

The post The Stars Are Halfway to a Historic Comeback. Here’s How They Finish the Job. appeared first on D Magazine.

Before getting into what makes the blueline a priority and how to fix it, let’s put a pin in any pie-in-the-sky notions about improving the blueline while keeping the band together. It won’t happen, nor should it. The Stars have $7.3 million in cap space to work with. Per Evolving-Hockey’s contract projections, new deals for Max Domi and Evgenii Dadonov—along with Ty Delleandrea—will cost a collective $7.5 million. That would be money well spent if the Stars weren’t up against the cap, but they are. Both trade deadline additions were excellent. But Nill must choose between keeping the forward depth or upgrading the blueline. The answer is the latter, and it always was.        

Because you’re all thinking what I’m thinking, and we’ve both been thinking it for a while, let’s cut to the chase: any blueline improvement starts with buying out Ryan Suter. Even ignoring his costly mistake in Game 2, Suter paired with Miro Heiskanen to produce the lowest expected goal share of Dallas’ three postseason duos. Elliotte Friedman brought up the buyout discussion on 32 Thoughts and offered the tired counterargument to doing otherwise: who’s gonna replace those minutes? Well, why not Colin Miller, the guy who played next to Heiskanen all year? In their share of shot attempts (55 to 52 percent) and expected goal share (54 to 49 percent), Heiskanen-Miller was superior analytically, and it kept Heiskanen on his strong side, where he always has been better able to create offense.  

This isn’t even getting into how Suter eats into what unquestionably should be Thomas Harley’s minutes on the second power-play unit. Buying out Suter would save $2.8 million in cap space for the next two years. As Suter fades, he’ll just be a heavier anchor for Heiskanen to haul around on his weak side. I know there’s a level of nuance I might be ignoring given Suter’s playoff performance (at least in the first two series), but nuance is overrated in the context of overwhelming evidence. It’s time to cut the cord, full stop. 

There’s just one not-so-small problem: Parting ways with Suter wouldn’t address Dallas’ biggest blueline problem. Every team in the Final Four boasts players who didn’t just stand in the shadow of their number one. Behind Alex Pietrangelo is Shea Theodore. Behind Jacob Slavvin is Brett Pesce. Behind Aaron Ekblad is the unheralded but quietly elite Gustav Forsling. These aren’t just defensemen who can play tough minutes; they’re defensemen who can control those minutes. The Stars have nowhere near that kind of talent, which is why Esa Lindell and Jani Hakanpaa were brutalized in the playoffs. Hakanpaa’s performance was palatable given his cost, but Lindell’s performance is a harder conversation. It raises questions about whether his $5.8 million annual salary is becoming an albatross. But that’s just where this conversation starts.   

I want to hang around on this point because improving the second defensive pair is more important than any discussion about a Suter buyout, or trying to keep Domi and Dadonov. Neither Lindell nor Hakanpaa will ever be point producers, so it’s important to find out if they were effective in other areas. Unfortunately, they weren’t.  

Below is their shot share (CF%), unblocked shot share (FF%), and expected goal share (xGF%) compared to the average second-pairing performance in the 2023 playoffs.    

These two were trounced—hard. When opponents are so much faster in the neutral zone, two players who only know how to exit the zone with board rims and dump-outs will just allow them to reload. And that’s exactly what happened. Without being able to drive play, Lindell and Hakanpaa controlled shot quality relatively well, but they were stuck in a groundhog’s day loop of having to control that shot quality instead of helping Dallas generate anything going the other way. Per Corey Sznajder’s tracking data, Lindell and Hakanpaa were only able to exit out of zone with possession 34 and 27 percent of the time, respectively. In 19 playoff games they finished a collective minus-13, combined for a meager five points, and were outshot 112-72. Their regular-season performance was no different; they were able to tread above water in keeping shot quality down, but not shot quantity. That’s 20 minutes a night that Dallas couldn’t gain territory from its backend, and it proved fatal. 

I understand why Stars fans don’t want to let go of Domi and Dadonov, two players who became fan favorites. But Dallas might have its next Domi and Dadonov in Logan Stankoven and Mavrik Bourque. Granted, improving the team on the hopes and prayers of two rookie performances is not exactly good engineering, but it’s worth remembering that Domi and Dadonov were both X-factors themselves. 

I can see why nothing may happen, though. The market makes improving the blueline tricky.   Let’s start with the most likely solution to the blueline problem: the unrestricted free agent class. It’s not exactly brimming with top-tier talent, but there are some options. Former Devil Damon Severson is a fantastic, play-driving defenseman. He’s also a right shot, which would be perfect next to Heiskanen or as an element for the second pair. If Suter is bought out, Dallas will have about $10 million to work with. Could Nill buy his way into a better blueline? In point of fact, yes. Below is a list of defensemen, along with their projected term and cap, I believe would be good additions.  

Adding John Klingberg and Scott Mayfield could be exactly what Dallas needs: reunite Klingberg with Lindell, and keep Heiskanen on his strong side with a proven shutdown defender in Mayfield. Mayfield stands out more for his potential to play next to Harley, though. It’s important not to jump the gun on Harley as top-four material, but there is no greater litmus test for a young defender than the high stakes of playoff hockey. Harley routinely passed that test. If the Stars were to groom him into a top-four role—or have the stomach to put Lindell’s bloated contract onto the third pair—they would essentially solve their top-four problem by elevating Harley’s role. 

That said, I’m more into the concept of a trade. Thanks to the Matthew Tkachuk deal, there seems to be an appetite for frisky moves, according to insiders. Calgary’s Chris Tanev has one year left on his $4.5 million deal. The Flames’ blueline is loaded, and they won’t be pushing their chips in next season. He’d be perfect next to Heiskanen or Harley. Rumors have swirled in the past about the Blues’ Colton Parayko. He and Tanev have strong defensive shot impacts that could more effectively transition Harley into the top four. The asterisk there is that Tanev has been injury-prone, and the 30-year-old Parayko, who is on the downside of his career, is signed until 2030. 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about Nils Lundkvist, who I believe is a really solid young player. His gifts in the offensive zone are impressive, and Harley’s presence alone shouldn’t be what makes Lundkvist obsolete. When all was said and done, Pete DeBoer had positive things to say about him. But we saw what happened when it got down to the marrow: not only was Lundkvist an afterthought, but Suter’s role got even bigger. Lundkvist’s role will always hang in the balance as long as he teeters on the bottom pair. If so, Nill has to decide now if he made a mistake, or if the long game is still the end game. 

Whatever the case, Nill has to work through a maze of challenges. Suter, Lindell, Lundkvist, Hakanpaa, and Miller all require long conversations. Nill has never had it in him to move out contracts for the sake of expediency. He wants players to see the end of their deals, and that has earned him an excellent quality reputation. But that’s also why I’m not sold on the narrative that the Stars will only get better, that they deserved better, or that they’re primed for another deep run. 

Not because the roster isn’t good enough, but because progress isn’t linear. That’s why this year felt like a lost opportunity to me. The Stars have one more year to get it right—one year to take advantage of the Joe Pavelski window (and did his absence ever highlight that), one year to get truly aggressive and fix what so desperately needs fixing. Past playoff runs offer no solace or guarantees of future success. Nothing about Dallas getting better next season makes sense if the blueline doesn’t improve. Nothing.

The post What We Saw, What It Felt Like: Stars-Golden Knights, Game 5 appeared first on D Magazine.

Before getting into what makes the blueline a priority and how to fix it, let’s put a pin in any pie-in-the-sky notions about improving the blueline while keeping the band together. It won’t happen, nor should it. The Stars have $7.3 million in cap space to work with. Per Evolving-Hockey’s contract projections, new deals for Max Domi and Evgenii Dadonov—along with Ty Delleandrea—will cost a collective $7.5 million. That would be money well spent if the Stars weren’t up against the cap, but they are. Both trade deadline additions were excellent. But Nill must choose between keeping the forward depth or upgrading the blueline. The answer is the latter, and it always was.        

Because you’re all thinking what I’m thinking, and we’ve both been thinking it for a while, let’s cut to the chase: any blueline improvement starts with buying out Ryan Suter. Even ignoring his costly mistake in Game 2, Suter paired with Miro Heiskanen to produce the lowest expected goal share of Dallas’ three postseason duos. Elliotte Friedman brought up the buyout discussion on 32 Thoughts and offered the tired counterargument to doing otherwise: who’s gonna replace those minutes? Well, why not Colin Miller, the guy who played next to Heiskanen all year? In their share of shot attempts (55 to 52 percent) and expected goal share (54 to 49 percent), Heiskanen-Miller was superior analytically, and it kept Heiskanen on his strong side, where he always has been better able to create offense.  

This isn’t even getting into how Suter eats into what unquestionably should be Thomas Harley’s minutes on the second power-play unit. Buying out Suter would save $2.8 million in cap space for the next two years. As Suter fades, he’ll just be a heavier anchor for Heiskanen to haul around on his weak side. I know there’s a level of nuance I might be ignoring given Suter’s playoff performance (at least in the first two series), but nuance is overrated in the context of overwhelming evidence. It’s time to cut the cord, full stop. 

There’s just one not-so-small problem: Parting ways with Suter wouldn’t address Dallas’ biggest blueline problem. Every team in the Final Four boasts players who didn’t just stand in the shadow of their number one. Behind Alex Pietrangelo is Shea Theodore. Behind Jacob Slavvin is Brett Pesce. Behind Aaron Ekblad is the unheralded but quietly elite Gustav Forsling. These aren’t just defensemen who can play tough minutes; they’re defensemen who can control those minutes. The Stars have nowhere near that kind of talent, which is why Esa Lindell and Jani Hakanpaa were brutalized in the playoffs. Hakanpaa’s performance was palatable given his cost, but Lindell’s performance is a harder conversation. It raises questions about whether his $5.8 million annual salary is becoming an albatross. But that’s just where this conversation starts.   

I want to hang around on this point because improving the second defensive pair is more important than any discussion about a Suter buyout, or trying to keep Domi and Dadonov. Neither Lindell nor Hakanpaa will ever be point producers, so it’s important to find out if they were effective in other areas. Unfortunately, they weren’t.  

Below is their shot share (CF%), unblocked shot share (FF%), and expected goal share (xGF%) compared to the average second-pairing performance in the 2023 playoffs.    

These two were trounced—hard. When opponents are so much faster in the neutral zone, two players who only know how to exit the zone with board rims and dump-outs will just allow them to reload. And that’s exactly what happened. Without being able to drive play, Lindell and Hakanpaa controlled shot quality relatively well, but they were stuck in a groundhog’s day loop of having to control that shot quality instead of helping Dallas generate anything going the other way. Per Corey Sznajder’s tracking data, Lindell and Hakanpaa were only able to exit out of zone with possession 34 and 27 percent of the time, respectively. In 19 playoff games they finished a collective minus-13, combined for a meager five points, and were outshot 112-72. Their regular-season performance was no different; they were able to tread above water in keeping shot quality down, but not shot quantity. That’s 20 minutes a night that Dallas couldn’t gain territory from its backend, and it proved fatal. 

I understand why Stars fans don’t want to let go of Domi and Dadonov, two players who became fan favorites. But Dallas might have its next Domi and Dadonov in Logan Stankoven and Mavrik Bourque. Granted, improving the team on the hopes and prayers of two rookie performances is not exactly good engineering, but it’s worth remembering that Domi and Dadonov were both X-factors themselves. 

I can see why nothing may happen, though. The market makes improving the blueline tricky.   Let’s start with the most likely solution to the blueline problem: the unrestricted free agent class. It’s not exactly brimming with top-tier talent, but there are some options. Former Devil Damon Severson is a fantastic, play-driving defenseman. He’s also a right shot, which would be perfect next to Heiskanen or as an element for the second pair. If Suter is bought out, Dallas will have about $10 million to work with. Could Nill buy his way into a better blueline? In point of fact, yes. Below is a list of defensemen, along with their projected term and cap, I believe would be good additions.  

Adding John Klingberg and Scott Mayfield could be exactly what Dallas needs: reunite Klingberg with Lindell, and keep Heiskanen on his strong side with a proven shutdown defender in Mayfield. Mayfield stands out more for his potential to play next to Harley, though. It’s important not to jump the gun on Harley as top-four material, but there is no greater litmus test for a young defender than the high stakes of playoff hockey. Harley routinely passed that test. If the Stars were to groom him into a top-four role—or have the stomach to put Lindell’s bloated contract onto the third pair—they would essentially solve their top-four problem by elevating Harley’s role. 

That said, I’m more into the concept of a trade. Thanks to the Matthew Tkachuk deal, there seems to be an appetite for frisky moves, according to insiders. Calgary’s Chris Tanev has one year left on his $4.5 million deal. The Flames’ blueline is loaded, and they won’t be pushing their chips in next season. He’d be perfect next to Heiskanen or Harley. Rumors have swirled in the past about the Blues’ Colton Parayko. He and Tanev have strong defensive shot impacts that could more effectively transition Harley into the top four. The asterisk there is that Tanev has been injury-prone, and the 30-year-old Parayko, who is on the downside of his career, is signed until 2030. 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about Nils Lundkvist, who I believe is a really solid young player. His gifts in the offensive zone are impressive, and Harley’s presence alone shouldn’t be what makes Lundkvist obsolete. When all was said and done, Pete DeBoer had positive things to say about him. But we saw what happened when it got down to the marrow: not only was Lundkvist an afterthought, but Suter’s role got even bigger. Lundkvist’s role will always hang in the balance as long as he teeters on the bottom pair. If so, Nill has to decide now if he made a mistake, or if the long game is still the end game. 

Whatever the case, Nill has to work through a maze of challenges. Suter, Lindell, Lundkvist, Hakanpaa, and Miller all require long conversations. Nill has never had it in him to move out contracts for the sake of expediency. He wants players to see the end of their deals, and that has earned him an excellent quality reputation. But that’s also why I’m not sold on the narrative that the Stars will only get better, that they deserved better, or that they’re primed for another deep run. 

Not because the roster isn’t good enough, but because progress isn’t linear. That’s why this year felt like a lost opportunity to me. The Stars have one more year to get it right—one year to take advantage of the Joe Pavelski window (and did his absence ever highlight that), one year to get truly aggressive and fix what so desperately needs fixing. Past playoff runs offer no solace or guarantees of future success. Nothing about Dallas getting better next season makes sense if the blueline doesn’t improve. Nothing.

The post What We Saw, What It Felt Like: Stars-Golden Knights, Game 4 appeared first on D Magazine.

Before getting into what makes the blueline a priority and how to fix it, let’s put a pin in any pie-in-the-sky notions about improving the blueline while keeping the band together. It won’t happen, nor should it. The Stars have $7.3 million in cap space to work with. Per Evolving-Hockey’s contract projections, new deals for Max Domi and Evgenii Dadonov—along with Ty Delleandrea—will cost a collective $7.5 million. That would be money well spent if the Stars weren’t up against the cap, but they are. Both trade deadline additions were excellent. But Nill must choose between keeping the forward depth or upgrading the blueline. The answer is the latter, and it always was.        

Because you’re all thinking what I’m thinking, and we’ve both been thinking it for a while, let’s cut to the chase: any blueline improvement starts with buying out Ryan Suter. Even ignoring his costly mistake in Game 2, Suter paired with Miro Heiskanen to produce the lowest expected goal share of Dallas’ three postseason duos. Elliotte Friedman brought up the buyout discussion on 32 Thoughts and offered the tired counterargument to doing otherwise: who’s gonna replace those minutes? Well, why not Colin Miller, the guy who played next to Heiskanen all year? In their share of shot attempts (55 to 52 percent) and expected goal share (54 to 49 percent), Heiskanen-Miller was superior analytically, and it kept Heiskanen on his strong side, where he always has been better able to create offense.  

This isn’t even getting into how Suter eats into what unquestionably should be Thomas Harley’s minutes on the second power-play unit. Buying out Suter would save $2.8 million in cap space for the next two years. As Suter fades, he’ll just be a heavier anchor for Heiskanen to haul around on his weak side. I know there’s a level of nuance I might be ignoring given Suter’s playoff performance (at least in the first two series), but nuance is overrated in the context of overwhelming evidence. It’s time to cut the cord, full stop. 

There’s just one not-so-small problem: Parting ways with Suter wouldn’t address Dallas’ biggest blueline problem. Every team in the Final Four boasts players who didn’t just stand in the shadow of their number one. Behind Alex Pietrangelo is Shea Theodore. Behind Jacob Slavvin is Brett Pesce. Behind Aaron Ekblad is the unheralded but quietly elite Gustav Forsling. These aren’t just defensemen who can play tough minutes; they’re defensemen who can control those minutes. The Stars have nowhere near that kind of talent, which is why Esa Lindell and Jani Hakanpaa were brutalized in the playoffs. Hakanpaa’s performance was palatable given his cost, but Lindell’s performance is a harder conversation. It raises questions about whether his $5.8 million annual salary is becoming an albatross. But that’s just where this conversation starts.   

I want to hang around on this point because improving the second defensive pair is more important than any discussion about a Suter buyout, or trying to keep Domi and Dadonov. Neither Lindell nor Hakanpaa will ever be point producers, so it’s important to find out if they were effective in other areas. Unfortunately, they weren’t.  

Below is their shot share (CF%), unblocked shot share (FF%), and expected goal share (xGF%) compared to the average second-pairing performance in the 2023 playoffs.    

These two were trounced—hard. When opponents are so much faster in the neutral zone, two players who only know how to exit the zone with board rims and dump-outs will just allow them to reload. And that’s exactly what happened. Without being able to drive play, Lindell and Hakanpaa controlled shot quality relatively well, but they were stuck in a groundhog’s day loop of having to control that shot quality instead of helping Dallas generate anything going the other way. Per Corey Sznajder’s tracking data, Lindell and Hakanpaa were only able to exit out of zone with possession 34 and 27 percent of the time, respectively. In 19 playoff games they finished a collective minus-13, combined for a meager five points, and were outshot 112-72. Their regular-season performance was no different; they were able to tread above water in keeping shot quality down, but not shot quantity. That’s 20 minutes a night that Dallas couldn’t gain territory from its backend, and it proved fatal. 

I understand why Stars fans don’t want to let go of Domi and Dadonov, two players who became fan favorites. But Dallas might have its next Domi and Dadonov in Logan Stankoven and Mavrik Bourque. Granted, improving the team on the hopes and prayers of two rookie performances is not exactly good engineering, but it’s worth remembering that Domi and Dadonov were both X-factors themselves. 

I can see why nothing may happen, though. The market makes improving the blueline tricky.   Let’s start with the most likely solution to the blueline problem: the unrestricted free agent class. It’s not exactly brimming with top-tier talent, but there are some options. Former Devil Damon Severson is a fantastic, play-driving defenseman. He’s also a right shot, which would be perfect next to Heiskanen or as an element for the second pair. If Suter is bought out, Dallas will have about $10 million to work with. Could Nill buy his way into a better blueline? In point of fact, yes. Below is a list of defensemen, along with their projected term and cap, I believe would be good additions.  

Adding John Klingberg and Scott Mayfield could be exactly what Dallas needs: reunite Klingberg with Lindell, and keep Heiskanen on his strong side with a proven shutdown defender in Mayfield. Mayfield stands out more for his potential to play next to Harley, though. It’s important not to jump the gun on Harley as top-four material, but there is no greater litmus test for a young defender than the high stakes of playoff hockey. Harley routinely passed that test. If the Stars were to groom him into a top-four role—or have the stomach to put Lindell’s bloated contract onto the third pair—they would essentially solve their top-four problem by elevating Harley’s role. 

That said, I’m more into the concept of a trade. Thanks to the Matthew Tkachuk deal, there seems to be an appetite for frisky moves, according to insiders. Calgary’s Chris Tanev has one year left on his $4.5 million deal. The Flames’ blueline is loaded, and they won’t be pushing their chips in next season. He’d be perfect next to Heiskanen or Harley. Rumors have swirled in the past about the Blues’ Colton Parayko. He and Tanev have strong defensive shot impacts that could more effectively transition Harley into the top four. The asterisk there is that Tanev has been injury-prone, and the 30-year-old Parayko, who is on the downside of his career, is signed until 2030. 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about Nils Lundkvist, who I believe is a really solid young player. His gifts in the offensive zone are impressive, and Harley’s presence alone shouldn’t be what makes Lundkvist obsolete. When all was said and done, Pete DeBoer had positive things to say about him. But we saw what happened when it got down to the marrow: not only was Lundkvist an afterthought, but Suter’s role got even bigger. Lundkvist’s role will always hang in the balance as long as he teeters on the bottom pair. If so, Nill has to decide now if he made a mistake, or if the long game is still the end game. 

Whatever the case, Nill has to work through a maze of challenges. Suter, Lindell, Lundkvist, Hakanpaa, and Miller all require long conversations. Nill has never had it in him to move out contracts for the sake of expediency. He wants players to see the end of their deals, and that has earned him an excellent quality reputation. But that’s also why I’m not sold on the narrative that the Stars will only get better, that they deserved better, or that they’re primed for another deep run. 

Not because the roster isn’t good enough, but because progress isn’t linear. That’s why this year felt like a lost opportunity to me. The Stars have one more year to get it right—one year to take advantage of the Joe Pavelski window (and did his absence ever highlight that), one year to get truly aggressive and fix what so desperately needs fixing. Past playoff runs offer no solace or guarantees of future success. Nothing about Dallas getting better next season makes sense if the blueline doesn’t improve. Nothing.

The post Alexa Is Out Here Gaslighting People About the Dallas Stars appeared first on D Magazine.

Before getting into what makes the blueline a priority and how to fix it, let’s put a pin in any pie-in-the-sky notions about improving the blueline while keeping the band together. It won’t happen, nor should it. The Stars have $7.3 million in cap space to work with. Per Evolving-Hockey’s contract projections, new deals for Max Domi and Evgenii Dadonov—along with Ty Delleandrea—will cost a collective $7.5 million. That would be money well spent if the Stars weren’t up against the cap, but they are. Both trade deadline additions were excellent. But Nill must choose between keeping the forward depth or upgrading the blueline. The answer is the latter, and it always was.        

Because you’re all thinking what I’m thinking, and we’ve both been thinking it for a while, let’s cut to the chase: any blueline improvement starts with buying out Ryan Suter. Even ignoring his costly mistake in Game 2, Suter paired with Miro Heiskanen to produce the lowest expected goal share of Dallas’ three postseason duos. Elliotte Friedman brought up the buyout discussion on 32 Thoughts and offered the tired counterargument to doing otherwise: who’s gonna replace those minutes? Well, why not Colin Miller, the guy who played next to Heiskanen all year? In their share of shot attempts (55 to 52 percent) and expected goal share (54 to 49 percent), Heiskanen-Miller was superior analytically, and it kept Heiskanen on his strong side, where he always has been better able to create offense.  

This isn’t even getting into how Suter eats into what unquestionably should be Thomas Harley’s minutes on the second power-play unit. Buying out Suter would save $2.8 million in cap space for the next two years. As Suter fades, he’ll just be a heavier anchor for Heiskanen to haul around on his weak side. I know there’s a level of nuance I might be ignoring given Suter’s playoff performance (at least in the first two series), but nuance is overrated in the context of overwhelming evidence. It’s time to cut the cord, full stop. 

There’s just one not-so-small problem: Parting ways with Suter wouldn’t address Dallas’ biggest blueline problem. Every team in the Final Four boasts players who didn’t just stand in the shadow of their number one. Behind Alex Pietrangelo is Shea Theodore. Behind Jacob Slavvin is Brett Pesce. Behind Aaron Ekblad is the unheralded but quietly elite Gustav Forsling. These aren’t just defensemen who can play tough minutes; they’re defensemen who can control those minutes. The Stars have nowhere near that kind of talent, which is why Esa Lindell and Jani Hakanpaa were brutalized in the playoffs. Hakanpaa’s performance was palatable given his cost, but Lindell’s performance is a harder conversation. It raises questions about whether his $5.8 million annual salary is becoming an albatross. But that’s just where this conversation starts.   

I want to hang around on this point because improving the second defensive pair is more important than any discussion about a Suter buyout, or trying to keep Domi and Dadonov. Neither Lindell nor Hakanpaa will ever be point producers, so it’s important to find out if they were effective in other areas. Unfortunately, they weren’t.  

Below is their shot share (CF%), unblocked shot share (FF%), and expected goal share (xGF%) compared to the average second-pairing performance in the 2023 playoffs.    

These two were trounced—hard. When opponents are so much faster in the neutral zone, two players who only know how to exit the zone with board rims and dump-outs will just allow them to reload. And that’s exactly what happened. Without being able to drive play, Lindell and Hakanpaa controlled shot quality relatively well, but they were stuck in a groundhog’s day loop of having to control that shot quality instead of helping Dallas generate anything going the other way. Per Corey Sznajder’s tracking data, Lindell and Hakanpaa were only able to exit out of zone with possession 34 and 27 percent of the time, respectively. In 19 playoff games they finished a collective minus-13, combined for a meager five points, and were outshot 112-72. Their regular-season performance was no different; they were able to tread above water in keeping shot quality down, but not shot quantity. That’s 20 minutes a night that Dallas couldn’t gain territory from its backend, and it proved fatal. 

I understand why Stars fans don’t want to let go of Domi and Dadonov, two players who became fan favorites. But Dallas might have its next Domi and Dadonov in Logan Stankoven and Mavrik Bourque. Granted, improving the team on the hopes and prayers of two rookie performances is not exactly good engineering, but it’s worth remembering that Domi and Dadonov were both X-factors themselves. 

I can see why nothing may happen, though. The market makes improving the blueline tricky.   Let’s start with the most likely solution to the blueline problem: the unrestricted free agent class. It’s not exactly brimming with top-tier talent, but there are some options. Former Devil Damon Severson is a fantastic, play-driving defenseman. He’s also a right shot, which would be perfect next to Heiskanen or as an element for the second pair. If Suter is bought out, Dallas will have about $10 million to work with. Could Nill buy his way into a better blueline? In point of fact, yes. Below is a list of defensemen, along with their projected term and cap, I believe would be good additions.  

Adding John Klingberg and Scott Mayfield could be exactly what Dallas needs: reunite Klingberg with Lindell, and keep Heiskanen on his strong side with a proven shutdown defender in Mayfield. Mayfield stands out more for his potential to play next to Harley, though. It’s important not to jump the gun on Harley as top-four material, but there is no greater litmus test for a young defender than the high stakes of playoff hockey. Harley routinely passed that test. If the Stars were to groom him into a top-four role—or have the stomach to put Lindell’s bloated contract onto the third pair—they would essentially solve their top-four problem by elevating Harley’s role. 

That said, I’m more into the concept of a trade. Thanks to the Matthew Tkachuk deal, there seems to be an appetite for frisky moves, according to insiders. Calgary’s Chris Tanev has one year left on his $4.5 million deal. The Flames’ blueline is loaded, and they won’t be pushing their chips in next season. He’d be perfect next to Heiskanen or Harley. Rumors have swirled in the past about the Blues’ Colton Parayko. He and Tanev have strong defensive shot impacts that could more effectively transition Harley into the top four. The asterisk there is that Tanev has been injury-prone, and the 30-year-old Parayko, who is on the downside of his career, is signed until 2030. 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about Nils Lundkvist, who I believe is a really solid young player. His gifts in the offensive zone are impressive, and Harley’s presence alone shouldn’t be what makes Lundkvist obsolete. When all was said and done, Pete DeBoer had positive things to say about him. But we saw what happened when it got down to the marrow: not only was Lundkvist an afterthought, but Suter’s role got even bigger. Lundkvist’s role will always hang in the balance as long as he teeters on the bottom pair. If so, Nill has to decide now if he made a mistake, or if the long game is still the end game. 

Whatever the case, Nill has to work through a maze of challenges. Suter, Lindell, Lundkvist, Hakanpaa, and Miller all require long conversations. Nill has never had it in him to move out contracts for the sake of expediency. He wants players to see the end of their deals, and that has earned him an excellent quality reputation. But that’s also why I’m not sold on the narrative that the Stars will only get better, that they deserved better, or that they’re primed for another deep run. 

Not because the roster isn’t good enough, but because progress isn’t linear. That’s why this year felt like a lost opportunity to me. The Stars have one more year to get it right—one year to take advantage of the Joe Pavelski window (and did his absence ever highlight that), one year to get truly aggressive and fix what so desperately needs fixing. Past playoff runs offer no solace or guarantees of future success. Nothing about Dallas getting better next season makes sense if the blueline doesn’t improve. Nothing.

The post What We Saw, What It Felt Like: Stars-Golden Knights, Game 3 appeared first on D Magazine.

Before getting into what makes the blueline a priority and how to fix it, let’s put a pin in any pie-in-the-sky notions about improving the blueline while keeping the band together. It won’t happen, nor should it. The Stars have $7.3 million in cap space to work with. Per Evolving-Hockey’s contract projections, new deals for Max Domi and Evgenii Dadonov—along with Ty Delleandrea—will cost a collective $7.5 million. That would be money well spent if the Stars weren’t up against the cap, but they are. Both trade deadline additions were excellent. But Nill must choose between keeping the forward depth or upgrading the blueline. The answer is the latter, and it always was.        

Because you’re all thinking what I’m thinking, and we’ve both been thinking it for a while, let’s cut to the chase: any blueline improvement starts with buying out Ryan Suter. Even ignoring his costly mistake in Game 2, Suter paired with Miro Heiskanen to produce the lowest expected goal share of Dallas’ three postseason duos. Elliotte Friedman brought up the buyout discussion on 32 Thoughts and offered the tired counterargument to doing otherwise: who’s gonna replace those minutes? Well, why not Colin Miller, the guy who played next to Heiskanen all year? In their share of shot attempts (55 to 52 percent) and expected goal share (54 to 49 percent), Heiskanen-Miller was superior analytically, and it kept Heiskanen on his strong side, where he always has been better able to create offense.  

This isn’t even getting into how Suter eats into what unquestionably should be Thomas Harley’s minutes on the second power-play unit. Buying out Suter would save $2.8 million in cap space for the next two years. As Suter fades, he’ll just be a heavier anchor for Heiskanen to haul around on his weak side. I know there’s a level of nuance I might be ignoring given Suter’s playoff performance (at least in the first two series), but nuance is overrated in the context of overwhelming evidence. It’s time to cut the cord, full stop. 

There’s just one not-so-small problem: Parting ways with Suter wouldn’t address Dallas’ biggest blueline problem. Every team in the Final Four boasts players who didn’t just stand in the shadow of their number one. Behind Alex Pietrangelo is Shea Theodore. Behind Jacob Slavvin is Brett Pesce. Behind Aaron Ekblad is the unheralded but quietly elite Gustav Forsling. These aren’t just defensemen who can play tough minutes; they’re defensemen who can control those minutes. The Stars have nowhere near that kind of talent, which is why Esa Lindell and Jani Hakanpaa were brutalized in the playoffs. Hakanpaa’s performance was palatable given his cost, but Lindell’s performance is a harder conversation. It raises questions about whether his $5.8 million annual salary is becoming an albatross. But that’s just where this conversation starts.   

I want to hang around on this point because improving the second defensive pair is more important than any discussion about a Suter buyout, or trying to keep Domi and Dadonov. Neither Lindell nor Hakanpaa will ever be point producers, so it’s important to find out if they were effective in other areas. Unfortunately, they weren’t.  

Below is their shot share (CF%), unblocked shot share (FF%), and expected goal share (xGF%) compared to the average second-pairing performance in the 2023 playoffs.    

These two were trounced—hard. When opponents are so much faster in the neutral zone, two players who only know how to exit the zone with board rims and dump-outs will just allow them to reload. And that’s exactly what happened. Without being able to drive play, Lindell and Hakanpaa controlled shot quality relatively well, but they were stuck in a groundhog’s day loop of having to control that shot quality instead of helping Dallas generate anything going the other way. Per Corey Sznajder’s tracking data, Lindell and Hakanpaa were only able to exit out of zone with possession 34 and 27 percent of the time, respectively. In 19 playoff games they finished a collective minus-13, combined for a meager five points, and were outshot 112-72. Their regular-season performance was no different; they were able to tread above water in keeping shot quality down, but not shot quantity. That’s 20 minutes a night that Dallas couldn’t gain territory from its backend, and it proved fatal. 

I understand why Stars fans don’t want to let go of Domi and Dadonov, two players who became fan favorites. But Dallas might have its next Domi and Dadonov in Logan Stankoven and Mavrik Bourque. Granted, improving the team on the hopes and prayers of two rookie performances is not exactly good engineering, but it’s worth remembering that Domi and Dadonov were both X-factors themselves. 

I can see why nothing may happen, though. The market makes improving the blueline tricky.   Let’s start with the most likely solution to the blueline problem: the unrestricted free agent class. It’s not exactly brimming with top-tier talent, but there are some options. Former Devil Damon Severson is a fantastic, play-driving defenseman. He’s also a right shot, which would be perfect next to Heiskanen or as an element for the second pair. If Suter is bought out, Dallas will have about $10 million to work with. Could Nill buy his way into a better blueline? In point of fact, yes. Below is a list of defensemen, along with their projected term and cap, I believe would be good additions.  

Adding John Klingberg and Scott Mayfield could be exactly what Dallas needs: reunite Klingberg with Lindell, and keep Heiskanen on his strong side with a proven shutdown defender in Mayfield. Mayfield stands out more for his potential to play next to Harley, though. It’s important not to jump the gun on Harley as top-four material, but there is no greater litmus test for a young defender than the high stakes of playoff hockey. Harley routinely passed that test. If the Stars were to groom him into a top-four role—or have the stomach to put Lindell’s bloated contract onto the third pair—they would essentially solve their top-four problem by elevating Harley’s role. 

That said, I’m more into the concept of a trade. Thanks to the Matthew Tkachuk deal, there seems to be an appetite for frisky moves, according to insiders. Calgary’s Chris Tanev has one year left on his $4.5 million deal. The Flames’ blueline is loaded, and they won’t be pushing their chips in next season. He’d be perfect next to Heiskanen or Harley. Rumors have swirled in the past about the Blues’ Colton Parayko. He and Tanev have strong defensive shot impacts that could more effectively transition Harley into the top four. The asterisk there is that Tanev has been injury-prone, and the 30-year-old Parayko, who is on the downside of his career, is signed until 2030. 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about Nils Lundkvist, who I believe is a really solid young player. His gifts in the offensive zone are impressive, and Harley’s presence alone shouldn’t be what makes Lundkvist obsolete. When all was said and done, Pete DeBoer had positive things to say about him. But we saw what happened when it got down to the marrow: not only was Lundkvist an afterthought, but Suter’s role got even bigger. Lundkvist’s role will always hang in the balance as long as he teeters on the bottom pair. If so, Nill has to decide now if he made a mistake, or if the long game is still the end game. 

Whatever the case, Nill has to work through a maze of challenges. Suter, Lindell, Lundkvist, Hakanpaa, and Miller all require long conversations. Nill has never had it in him to move out contracts for the sake of expediency. He wants players to see the end of their deals, and that has earned him an excellent quality reputation. But that’s also why I’m not sold on the narrative that the Stars will only get better, that they deserved better, or that they’re primed for another deep run. 

Not because the roster isn’t good enough, but because progress isn’t linear. That’s why this year felt like a lost opportunity to me. The Stars have one more year to get it right—one year to take advantage of the Joe Pavelski window (and did his absence ever highlight that), one year to get truly aggressive and fix what so desperately needs fixing. Past playoff runs offer no solace or guarantees of future success. Nothing about Dallas getting better next season makes sense if the blueline doesn’t improve. Nothing.

The post What I’m Watching: Nathan For You appeared first on D Magazine.