Daily Faceoff: Tyler Yaremchuk and Frank Seravalli on the he said, he said situation between Mikko Rantanen, his camp, and the Carolina Hurricanes.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Yaremchuk: “The other one I wanted to ask you about. And listen, it’s kind of just been percolating over the last couple of days. And it was an Ask DFO yesterday as well that we didn’t get to from Adam.
But Rod Brind’Amour, more kind of airing dirty laundry in the media with the Rantanen thing. Then Rantanen’s agent went on Sportsnet yesterday and was like, ‘Nope, he’s misinformed.’
I don’t know how to frame this as a smoke or fire, so can I just put it on a tee for you? What do you make of the war of words here?”
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Seravalli: “I would say that the best way I can frame the Mikko Rantanen situation is that, just about everyone in this entire entanglement is unhappy, except for the Dallas Stars. A little bit unhappy, right?
So the Colorado Avalanche, they have to move on from Mikko Rantanen and they’re probably not happy about that. Then you’ve got the Carolina Hurricanes, who we’ve been saying and critical of them for a while that they don’t have a game breaker. They finally go out and get one, they make their big play and push put the franchise record contract on the table, and he slips through their hands like sand. So they’re unhappy. They’ve got to trade their game breaker.
Then you’ve got Mikko Rantanen who ends up with, I know he ends up in a spot where he likes in Dallas and obviously picked, but still ends up with eight years and $96 million. Definitely nothing to sneeze at, but probably could have gotten somewhat close to that and stayed in Colorado. So he’s got a tinge of unhappiness also, having bounced to these different places in between and, and the being the center of attention in it all has probably been really uncomfortable for him. So he’s unhappy.
And then, through all of that, the Colorado Avalanche end up with Rantanen in their division, so they’re unhappy even more so. They’ve got to stare down the moose for the next nine playoff runs. That’s tough.
What’s the best way to frame the Brind’Amour situation? And I’ve heard people ask me this question before, which has been, is he not in lockstep with his front office? The answer to that is no, a complete false alarm.
However, there’s definitely a difference of opinion in terms of how these two sides, the Rantanen camp and the Carolina Hurricanes, view the situation. They were given permission to talk to him before the trade from Colorado to Carolina. Now, the Rantanen camp would say, and there, his agent, Andy Scott has been unequivocal in saying that they told the Hurricanes that their focus was on remaining in Colorado.
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The Canes believe that they got an answer that said, if we make the trade, that yes, you would be on a relative short-list of teams where he would consider signing. Which one is right? Only those two sides know, and obviously there’s differences of opinion when it’s he said, he said.”
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