Oskar Sundqvist

The final rosters have been set, and we're gonna kinda go through the forwards first.

Um, the big surprise, I think, was the fact that Sundqvist, Walker, and Finley, all three of them being the kind of main big guys, uh, that got sent down to the AHL with Zach Dean and Dylan Dube earning a spot on the roster.

Um, Matt, go ahead and give me just kind of your thoughts on those three getting sent down or those two staying up.

[clears throat] I, uh, I was really, uh, annoyed that they re-signed Sundqvist, uh, for like one year, 'cause like I was, I was for sure that last year was gonna be his final season And I was like, "Okay, if he's, if he's signing for one year, surely he's gonna be permanent fourth line/scratch guy." And then they sent him down and I'm like, "Well, why'd you even bother re-signing him then if you weren't gonna keep him on the roster?" And I love me some Nathan Walker, being the only Australian player in the league, and he's, he's like Scrappy-Doo.

He's, he's so small, but yet he wants to fight everybody.

It's one of the best, best things, uh, on the team currently.

Zach Dean.

Yeah.

They traded Jordan Cairo to the Capitals for Connor McMichael and Milton Gastron.

They signed Oscar Sundqvist.

They signed Dylan Dubé.

They signed Yonatan Berggren from the Red Wings.

So now it brings you to the five guys that are up here, or six guys that are up here, that they have to make their decisions on.

You've got Dube, Sundqvist, Walker, Zach Dean, and Jack Finley.

I thought out of that group there were only two guys that stuck out to me last night.

It was Jack Finley and it was, uh, Dyl- um, Zach Dean.

He was 88% in the face-off dot, which is never a bad thing if you're him.

And then Zach Dean came up with multiple scoring opportunities with Booch and McMichael.

I didn't really feel like I noticed Walker in that game, I didn't really feel like I noticed Sundqvist in that game, and I didn't really feel like I noticed, um, Dylan Dube in that game.

So if it were me, I would put my money down on Dean and Finley make this roster.

Because I think what you have is, is you've got, you probably got 12 surefire guys on, on the forwards that are gonna make the roster, and they're, and more than likely, they're gonna, they're gonna bring with them 14.

So, you know, you're talking Oskar Sundqvist, you're talking Jack Finley, you know, you're talking Dylan Dube.

Um, you're talking Otto Stenberg, who's one of those younger guys.

Uh, Nathan Walker is another one.

Oh, that son of a rat dude.

You know? And so Twister gets up and walks straight over to Sundqvist and takes Sunny's baby and starts, like, rocking the baby.

[laughs]

[laughs]

I think Suter, Bergren, Dube, Carbonneau are gonna be guys fighting for that third line spot.

I think s- what, Sundqvist, Walker, um, a guy like Peterson, Kaskimaki, are gonna be fighting with Toropchenko, Johnston, and Finley for that fourth line spot.

That's how they'll divvy them up, but you are gonna have guys playing on a prospect set of ice that you're like, "Wait a minute, is this guy even gonna make the NHL team?" Because they wanna see what it looks like with the NHL guys first, and if it struggles, then you switch back to those NHL guys and put prospects in.

Alongside Alex and T-Bone, I'm PK.

So that might be a little, look a little different this year.

Um, but speaking of another veteran that we signed, we resigned, um, Oscar Sundqvist.

So this is a one-year, two-way extension.

So a two-way contract means that he plays both a- in the NHL and the AHL.

Uh, and then the next one, number 70, is a very interesting roster topic.

Oskar Sundqvist-

Mm-hmm

... um, will not be coming on the podcast because my friend didn't talk to him.

Just release him.

Just release him

... signs a two-way contract, so it's kind of the opposite of what we were talking about with Dube and the fact that Oskar Sundqvist was like, "Sure, I'll take a two-way contract," so he can go wherever.

Um, also kind of fits what Dakota was talking about with Nathan Walker just being a locker room guy.

That second round pick came from the trade that flipped Andreas Athanasiou to Edmonton.

Nick Leddy, they go and turn around and trade to the St. Louis Blues for Oskar Sundqvist, a 2023 second round pick, and Jake Walman.

Jake Walman would become an effective partner for Mo Seider while he was here, and sign a three-year extension in that season.

But the end of that season was awful, and there was some serious concern about that contract immediately after it was signed.