Elliotte Friedman is reporting that Vincent Trochek is being traded to the Carolina Hurricanes. As part of the deal, it appears Chase Priskie is coming back to the Florida Panthers.
Trocheck is not a rental as he’s got term left on his deal. It means that there’s going to be a pretty decent return coming to Florida. Early word is that Florida will receive Lucas Wallmark, Erik Haula and two prospects, one of which is AHL defenseman Chase Priskie.
As for what the Hurricanes are getting in Trocheck, he looked like he was on his way to being a huge star two years ago when he put up 75 points in 82 games but he’s been unable to repeat that type of performance since. That said, most of the panelists on both trade deadline shows called Trocheck a guy they’d like to have on their team.
Trocheck had 34 points in 55 games last year and is on a similar pace this season with 36 in 55 games.
The Hurricanes have been busy on the phones and in adding players. Speculation is that they still want to address their blue line, and have a 1st round pick still to package up for a top-four defenseman. Of course, their goaltending has been talked about all morning by panelists when there’s no trades worth discussing and it’s not likely the Hurricanes are happy with their current situation.
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What Might Trockeck Bring to the Hurricanes?
Obviously, the Hurricanes believe Trocheck can return to his former goal-scoring abilities. As noted, he has scored only 36 points in 55 games this season, which is far from his 75-point career-best 2017-18 season where he had 31 goals and 44 assists.
Although the 26-year-old center is unlikely to reach the 20-goal mark again, even with the trade to the Hurricanes, he might still register 50 points. He has done that for three of his last four seasons with the Panthers.
It’s likely that Trockech will become a top-six forward with Carolina, in addition to being used on the powerplay. He’s a strong second-line playmaking center who’s great on the powerplay and he’s good at even strength; however, he’s below-average defensively.
Trocheck had a string of good goal-scoring seasons, with 25 (2015-16), 23 (2016-17), 31 (2017-18) goals. And, during the 2017-18 season scored 75 points in 82 games. However, his scoring has dropped off considerably over the past few seasons and it looked as if the Panthers had given up on him.
He has a cap hit of $4.75 million for two more seasons, so Trocheck comes with term. And, should he regain his former form he would be a good pick up for the Hurricanes.
In return, the Panthers have taken on two players who can help now with two prospects joining their organization. It seems as if they are playing and planning for the future.
