When the Panthers acquire a player, it’s fair to envision the best version of that player immediately coming to light. The Panthers are a savvy organization that has shown time and again that they know exactly which players to target and they know exactly how to get the most out of them. They know how to make different skills mesh perfectly to maximize a player’s full potential.
Enter Vladimir Tarasenko, a flawed scorer who looks like the perfect player for Florida’s second line.
For starters, he is not Nick Cousins. That Cousins, who has five goals all season, was the man most recently skating beside Matthew Tkachuk and Sam Bennett shows just how large of a need a scoring winger was for Florida.
What Vladimir Tarasenko is, is a pure finisher who can put up numbers at five-on-five. That’s a huge addition for Tkachuk who has grown into one of the game’s very best play-makers. Tarasenko is a solid offensive play-driver too which should mean the second line can spend even more time going to work there. Tarasenko should fit perfectly here with the other two doing all the dirty work.
Where there’s concern with Tarasenko is his defensive ability. In each of the last three seasons, his teams have bled a lot of chances against with him on the ice and that reached new heights this year on a bad Senators team. It shouldn’t be as big of an issue on a more structured Panthers team with a lot more support, but it is a red flag in his game that his offense comes with a price.
Fortunately for the Panthers that price was very cheap: A 2024 fourth-round pick that can turn into a third if the Panthers win it all, and a 2025 third-round pick. And that’s with Tarasenko’s salary retained at 50 percent.
That’s some tidy risk-free business on Florida’s end and makes this deal a slam dunk for the Panthers. A perfect fit at an extremely reasonable cost. This is a pretty big win for them.
As for the Senators, the return is obviously not ideal. It would’ve been nice to at least get a second-rounder here, but trade protection and a crowded market meant a lower return. It’s hard to fault them too much for that, but that doesn’t make this deal feel like any less of a loss for them.
GO FURTHER
NHL trade grades: Vladimir Tarasenko is a great get for the Panthers
First appeared on theathletic.com