On Friday, we opined in this space that the best possible trade for unhappy Columbus Blue Jackets star Rick Nash was a deal to the Vancouver Canucks for Roberto Luongo. It's simple enough: Nash gets to play with a top team and chase the Stanley Cup, Columbus GM Scott Howson gets a trade where he can actually make his team better, the Canucks clear the way for Corey Schneider and Luongo gets to play in a city where they'll be so happy to make the playoffs that he'll be forgiven for falling apart when they begin.
There's just one problem. Nash wants no part of it.
According to reports - including Blue Jackets beat writer Aaron Portzline of the Columbus Dispatch - Nash's list of "approved" destinations in a trade includes the New York Rangers, the Detroit Red Wings, the Boston Bruins, the Philadelphia Flyers, the Pittsburgh Penguins and the San Jose Sharks. There are no approved destinations in his native Canada.
So, if the Canucks are out, which of the six teams Nash likes make the most sense? The thing about trading for Nash is that Howson wants a lot, having insisted on getting Jeff Skinner in any deal from Carolina and Logan Couture in any deal from the Sharks. If a team is going to pay the price for Nash, it has to be a legitimate Stanley Cup contender that feels Nash can be the missing ingredient that helps his new team win it all. That's the only real justification for mortgaging the future in a way that Howson seems to expect (and in fairness to the guy, the trade where you give up a "quarter" to get two "dimes" and a "nickel" rarely works out in professional sports).
The Penguins are certainly the kind of team that has that sort of chance. Pittsburgh was one of the teams that missed out on Zach Parise, so they can be expected to look for some kind of forward help. They already have the pieces of a cup-winning team in place, and adding Nash would certainly be a big boost. The problem, however, is that Pittsburgh faces a big question: what if Sidney Crosby plays a full season in 2011-12?
There were two primary problems for the Penguins in their Eastern Conference quarterfinal loss to the Philadelphia Flyers. One was grit, which the Pens have addressed this summer by signing up former Winnipeg Jets winger Tanner Glass and former Minnesota Wild forward Warren Peters. The other was the fact that they started out against the Flyers, a very tough matchup for them. It's not hard to imagine a healthier Crosby leading that lineup to the top seed in the East (if not the President's Trophy) and avoiding that unpleasant matchup (Game 5 of the Penguins-Flyers series marked Philadelphia's second-ever loss at the CONSOL Energy Center in Pittsburgh). Does Nash give Pittsburgh one more offensive weapon? Sure. Is that worth what Howson would ask? Probably not.
Here's the reality: when Pittsburgh signed Crosby to a 12-year contract extension on July 1, Penguins GM Ray Shero was thinking about a long-term future. Under those circumstances it probably makes more sense for Shero and the Penguins to keep their team intact and try to win with the players that Howson would want, as opposed to the one he's trying to get rid of.
