The asking price on Shane Wright is starting to look crystal clear, and it is not cheap.
According to Rick Dhaliwal, who covers the Vancouver Canucks, Seattle has been talking with Vancouver about a possible Wright deal and is looking for a major return for its young center. The names that come up are Zeev Buium and Tom Willander, with the Kraken reportedly wanting one of those young defensemen in exchange for Wright.
That kind of demand says plenty about how Seattle views the player - and how high the bar is for anyone trying to pry him loose. Buium, after all, is only 20 years old, but he has already played 76 NHL games and put up 26 points. From Vancouver’s side, that price tag looks hard to justify for a player whose latest season did not exactly scream breakout.
Wright’s production dipped last year. After a rookie season that produced 19 goals and 44 points, he finished with 12 goals and 27 points in 74 games. He is still just 22 and has shown flashes of what he can become, but the value conversation clearly has some tension baked into it.
Jason Botterill, though, is doing what any team executive would do: trying to get the most he can for one of his assets. There is no pressure to move Wright, and if Seattle keeps setting the price this high, he may simply stay put.
For Montreal, that’s the key takeaway. If the Kraken are asking Vancouver for that kind of return, then a Canadiens pursuit would almost certainly start with David Reinbacher at minimum. Reinbacher is one of Montreal’s top defensive prospects, a 21-year-old who has appeared in just two NHL games so far.
So while the idea of Shane Wright alongside Juraj Slafkovsky may be easy to imagine, the cost attached to Wright makes that path look awfully unlikely. As long as Botterill holds firm, Wright is probably staying right where he is.
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Lalonde arrives with championship pedigree from his time with the Tampa Bay Lightning, where he was part of a staff that reached the leagues biggest stage year after year. For a Canadiens team trying to give St-Louis the support fans have wanted, the move adds a proven voice and a steadier hand to a coaching setup that should look a little deeper now than it did before. [Read more 🡒]