Colorado Avalanche Shouldn’t Trade for Taylor Hall
The Colorado Avalanche Don’t Need the Other Taylor Hall Problems
Taylor Hall has upside. Playing on some bad Edmonton teams, he cracked the 80-point mark once, the 60-point mark once, and the 50-point mark two other times.
His career season was the year he stole the Hart Trophy from Nathan MacKinnon — 93 points. He followed that with an injury-plagued season that saw him earn just 37 points.
This season, he’s played in all of New Jersey’s games and has earned 21 points. That puts him on pace for another 60+ point season.
That seems like a low return for potentially beggaring our future.
What’s more, let’s look at the fact that Taylor Hall’s big claim to fame, besides that one Hart Trophy, is getting his team first-overall draft picks. Why is that? Why do his teams do so poorly when he’s on the roster?
Looking at his quote from above, I was uncomfortably reminded of a similar quote from Duchene when he was first traded to Ottawa. Fans and even some pundits claim Duchene is a locker room cancer, which is why his teams don’t succeed with him on the roster.
What if Hall was the same? What if we at least partially beggared our future just to get a locker room cancer back on the team? All for the hope of a 60+ point season. We’ve already got four players not named Nathan MacKinnon on pace for that or better this season.
And they’re part of the fabric that’s already making this team successful.
MacKinnon and Makar Honored in November. dark. Next
I get it. You see something shiny like Taylor Hall potentially come up for grabs, and you want to reach out. However, I trust Joe Sakic is more grounded. He’s not going to mortgage the future for a rental player — not when he’s worked so hard to create the successful Colorado Avalanche team we already have.