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STARS MAILBAG: Spezza, Shipachyov, secondary scoring, and Halloween candy

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Growing up in the Shapiro household Trick-or-treating wasn’t about dressing up, it was about acquiring assets.

Sure we would wear costumes, but the real prize of the holiday was building up a base of desirable Halloween Candy to last you through the rest of the year.

Candy was a bit of a finite resource in my house. We ate overly healthy (my sister actually became a dietician) and all of our cereals had to have less than three grams of sugar, which basically meant Cheerios or puffed rice.

But Halloween candy was different. Your stash acquired on October 31 was yours as long as it lasted.

So to maximize resources the Shapiro children, my two sisters and I, created a trade market. Each of us would lay out our haul from the evening on the floor, and then wheeling and dealing would begin. Reese’s and Snickers were always high-value assets, Starbursts were also a hot-button item. We also knew that my youngest sister overvalued lollipops and Bit-O-Honey, if you could stock up on those while Trick-or-treating you could easily get more desirable candy later that evening in a trade.

Why am I telling this story? It’s close to Halloween and trades seem to be on my mind.

Let’s get started with the mailbag…

Lots of Jason Spezza questions this week, so we’ll start with him.

What’s wrong with Spezza?

He’s older, slower, and having to adjust to a new system.

What happens if he has 10 goals and 25 points?

Well that would be the pace he’s on right now, roughly 0.3 points per game. If that pace continues it would be wildly frustrating production for a player making $7.5 million per season.

So what about a buyout?

It’s certainly possible.  But the Stars ideally would find a trade for Spezza at some point this season, a difficult but possible proposition.

At some point this season Matt Duchene will likely get traded by the Colorado Avalanche. Once that happens, a general manager who still needs center help could get desperate and believe that putting Spezza in a new environment, and giving him more than 12 minutes per game, will return him to old form.

If the Stars don’t trade Spezza and he doesn’t get better, a buyout might not be the best option since it would cost the Stars $2.5 million in cap space during the 2019-20 season. That’s the season the Stars need as much cap space as possible because Tyler Seguin will — in theory — be starting the a new contract likely close to $9 million in value.

So it becomes an interesting question. What’s more valuable? Spezza as a fourth-liner at $7.5 million next season? Or saving more cap flexibility to make your team better in the 2019-20 season? It’s a tough decision.

Either way, and to address your final question, Spezza getting bought out or not isn’t going to cost Jim Nill his job.

Possible, but we live in a world where contracts and past history hold weight.

If we look at Spezza as an offensive player waiting to break out, then there is only one AHL player that can currently fill that role and that’s Jason Dickinson. Dickinson has had a nice start to his AHL season and leads the Texas Stars with five goals in seven games.

You can read more about Dickinson in my story from Thursday.

We touched on Spezza already, and we will talk about him a bit more later in the mailbag.

I don’t have many issue with your proposed lines, but I wouldn’t take Brett Ritchie out of the lineup. With the Stars lack of depth scoring you need to keep a player with that potential in the lineup.

The scary thing is that I don’t know. I can see potential secondary scoring threats throughout the lineup, but there isn’t a candidate that stands out as a reliable option to put the puck in the net.

Ideally the Stars do something to get Spezza and Ritchie going, if not you might have to find an answer on the trade market.

I don’t know if he’s available, but Columbus Blue Jackets right wing Cam Atkinson could be a viable option and help solve the Stars depth scoring issues. Atkinson is 28 and has a $3.5-million cap hit with an expiring contract.

Columbus is also one of the teams looking for center depth, and with some retained salary they could be interested in Jason Spezza.

To be clear, this is speculation on my part about Atkinson and Spezza.

However, I can confirm, and this is according to two separate sources in Columbus, that the Stars have scouted the Blue Jackets heavily this season.

Typically I wouldn’t read much into a team overly scouting a team — for example the Carolina Hurricanes have Joe Nieuwendyk at nearly every Stars game — because scouts watch hockey and it’s their job.

However, the individuals scouting the games in Columbus may be something to read into.

Senior advisor to the GM Les Jackson, assistant GM Scott White, and Stars head professional scout Paul McIntosh have all watched the Blue Jackets at least once this season. That’s a trio that is somewhat involved in the decision-making process for the Stars, so they could be doing their homework for a potential future move with the Blue Jackets.

It’s a bad answer, but that was just an example of Ken Hitchcock being Ken Hitchcock.

He was sending a message to his team and it actually worked in that game — the Stars responded to Ben Bishop getting pulled and played better with the exception of one shift late in the second period.

Comment from discussion Mailbag, fire away with your questions.

To further expand on the Bishop question, and I touched on this after that game, I think both parties had a valid point after the loss to Colorado.

Hitchcock needed to do something to light a spark for his team, and he did his job as a coach by pulling Bishop. Bishop has every right to be pissed after getting pulled and not getting an explanation in a one-goal game. I liked seeing his competitiveness come out after he didn’t get an explanation, it was refreshingly honest for a professional athlete.

If I had to pick a side in this debate, and I don’t want to, it would actually be with Hitchcock — he needed to do something to send a message to his team. However, I do think he should have spoken to Bishop sooner than he did and I also think he should have pulled the goalie right after the third goal, instead of waiting for a media timeout, if he wanted to send a message.

There is a high possibility of that, I would expect Miro Heiskanen to play for Finland in the Olympics.

It doesn’t hurt that former Dallas Stars forward Jere Lehtinen is Finland’s general manager.

If Devin Shore was ever overrated it was in his scoring ability. I think there may have been an expectation that he would be a goal scorer in the NHL after his breakout AHL season (15 goals in 23 games before an injury), and that was a bit of a false narrative.

I also understand that the analytics aren’t in Shore’s favor. However, I believe that Shore’s lower corsi at 47.39 is a product of the role he plays. While Shore is getting offensive zone starts on the first power play uint — a role he’s done well in — at 5-on-5 he’s asked to do more defensively, which has led to more time spent in his own zone and therefore more shots against.

With that being said, Shore is amongst the players you’d like to see more from overall. After a pretty consistent rookie season he’s had some inconsistencies in his game this season, and you’d like to see that ironed out.

Brett Ritchie is a long-term fit if he can turn his streaky scoring into consistent scoring.

Ritchie has an all-pro shot and the size to be a finisher in the NHL, but we keep waiting for him to take a step toward consistency.

The problem with Vadim Shipachyov is we don’t know if he’s a viable NHL center worth the two-year, $9-million contract that he signed with the Vegas Golden Knights. While he’s been good (at least in my opinion) in limited usage there isn’t enough NHL track record to make him a must-have player on my list.

That being said, he’s been just as effective as Jason Spezza and trading Spezza for Shipachyov would save the Stars $3 million in cap space over the next two seasons.

Just food for thought.

Could be fun in theory, but none of those players are centers.

You could solve that problem by trading for Shipachyov and creating an all-Russian line next season if Valeri Nichushkin returns from the KHL.

Before opening night I actually asked Radulov about Shipachyov and he was rather complimentary of the now-demoted Golden Knights center. He also said he knew Shipachyov well from his time in the KHL and called the center a dynamic player.

Once again, this is just food for thought.

No great story behind it. Ryan mixed the audio and put it together using a demo track.

A little bit of time and patience on behalf of the coaching staff.

Marc Methot and I have talked multiple times about how he needs two or three weeks to get used to a defensive partner. And through three weeks we’ve seen his partner juggled multiple times, so developing a cohesive pair — and this applies to all the defensemen — has been quite difficult.

I understand juggling defense pairs for injury (like they did with Stephen Johns coming out), but the Stars have reached a point of the season where, when healthy, you should be trusting a group of six and allowing chemistry to grow.

They need to do something, but it’s a difficult situation. If you dismantle the top line and it doesn’t light a spark, you’ve effectively neutered your offense.

Personally I don’t like Jason Spezza and Martin Hanzal playing together. They are both off to horrid offensive starts, and pairing them together has created a slow, plodding unit that doesn’t play with speed or urgency.

Mattias Janmark seemed to be most effective offensively at wing, so I would move him back to that spot and either have Spezza or Devin Shore center that line. I also think it’s time to call up Jason Dickinson, who isn’t a quick fix to your problems, but provides an upgrade to to the finishing ability in your offense.

Comment from discussion Mailbag, fire away with your questions.

Julius Honka has been exactly what I expected him to be this season.

He’s a playmaking defender that can drive possession, but you have to learn to live with mistakes as he gets used to a full-time NHL role on the fly. The biggest issues for me is the fact the Stars aren’t giving him a full-blown opportunity to learn from those misgivings.

For Honka to be a success he needs to play on a consistent basis. You need to let his confidence grow even further and allow him to learn what works and what doesn’t work in the NHL. As the season progresses the positive moments will start to greatly outnumber the mistakes.

This is a very good point and one we need to examine.

Defending is a full-team effort and the Stars coaches preach attention to detail for all five players on the ice. I think the game-winning goal by the Oilers is a perfect example.

While it’s an unlucky bounce off of Alexander Radulov, he actually shouldn’t be in that spot on that play. In the Stars system he’s supposed to covering the point in that situation, and if he’s doing that he’s not tipping the puck past his goalie.

Overall, I believe that’s the final step for the Stars overall team defense. It’s been good at home and the Stars are 4-1 at American Airlines Center, but the attention to detail seems to go out the window on the road — particularly for the forwards in their own zone.

It’s something the Stars need to fix and fix rather quickly with three more road games in the next week.

This is more of a home and road thing, again.

The Stars have simply looked like a different team at home than they have  been on the road.

It’s a faster game, but it’s also a bigger game. So it’s a balance of size and speed. And while I disagree with some decisions, for the most part the bigger players are able to skate well enough for today’s NHL.

Julius Honka is one of the best pure skaters on the team.

There are simple answers, but not a simple fix.

Look at what the Oilers did to win the 5-on-5 battle on Thursday. Edmonton went hard to the net, didn’t turn the puck over, and created a bit of their own luck. The Stars need to do more of that.

https://twitter.com/slopstock/status/923773839817003008

Gemel Smith isn’t waiver exempt, so you’d have to risk losing him on waivers to send him down to the AHL.

I actually don’t think Smith would get claimed, and in theory you’d like to have him playing in the AHL. However, you also need a 13th forward with speed in case of an unexpected injury. On top of that, calling up another young player just to sit in the press box is foolish.

It’s a situation that’s working for now. If it starts to reach a stretch where Smith hasn’t played for 20-something games, that’s when I would consider waiving him or sending him to the AHL for a conditioning stint.

Comment from discussion Mailbag, fire away with your questions.

The power play is more diverse, but it’s also more effective because of the players running it. John Klingberg has taken another step in his game this season, while Jamie Benn and Tyler Seguin are both living up to their potential after last season.

The drop pass in particular is also more effective with Seguin on the zone entry versus Spezza.

We also can’t shower too much praise on Stu Barnes, because the second power play unit is still struggling. Yes, they scored against Edmonton on Thursday, but that group has yet to be a consistent threat and has failed to generate sustained zone time whenever given the opportunity.

Now your second question….

First of all, Martin Hanzal does have a reputation of hitting people in the head. He hasn’t been suspended since 2013, but there is a past history of him hitting players high and getting disciplined for it.

We also have to remember the optics of each hit. The hit by Matt Duchene on Stephen Johns was behind the net and along the glass, it wasn’t a big-open ice like Hanzal’s hit on Yannick Weber. Officials, and the league, are being pressured to eliminate head shots, and an open-ice hit like that quickly grabs more attention than Johns getting hit behind the net.

It’s also a fallacy to use a potential missed major penalty as a reason the Stars lost the game in Colorado. The Stars still got a power play out of the situation and didn’t capitalize. Losing three potential minutes of power play time didn’t force the Stars into a slow start or develop a general malaise amongst the team that lasted until Bishop got pulled.

They don’t seem too far off to me in person, I think coloring just looks off on television.

Markus Ruusu is the Stars most athletic goalie prospect, and that’s a nice base to work with.

For me the biggest concern with Ruusu is his technique. He needs to build a better foundation with his footwork and overall positioning. He also relies on his quickness too often. That’s a lesson he’s learning the hard way in Liiga this season, so maybe that’ll be a positive eye-opening experience for the Finn.

This isn’t a decision I have any control over, but if the Stars started winning on a more consistent basis Fox Sports Southwest would probably consider giving them first chair treatment on nights the Dallas Mavericks are also playing.

Comment from discussion Mailbag, fire away with your questions.

They don’t have a taco giveaway at Mavericks games anymore either. I think it’s a result of Taco Bueno no longer having a presence in the arena.

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