No Calm Before the Storm

There have been 24 trades in February so far. By the time I'm finished this post, I wouldn't be surprised if another were completed. Not only is the volume of movement unprecedented (last year there were less than ten during the same time frame), but the quality of players involved has been as shocking as it has been interesting.

Veteran impact players are typically a hot commodity at this time of year, and we have seen a good share of them change cities recently (Tomas Kaberle, Bryan McCabe, Alex Kovalev, etc.), but a new trend seems to be emerging: "hockey trades" involving up-and-coming skill players are acceptable too. The Wolski for Mueller swap was the surprise of the day in 2010, and leading up to the Deadline in 2011 the Avs were similarly active when they shipped Chris Stewart and Kevin Shattenkirk to St. Louis for Erik Johnson. James Neal and Matt Niskanen were later traded for Alex Goligoski. We aren't used to transactions of this variety. It's a dramatic change, but hey, change is good. Although, in my opinion, maybe not for Colorado or Dallas given the cited moves.