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Jeremy Morin: Should the Arizona Coyotes Make A Bid?

By Catherine Silverman

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So Jeremy Morin is the new hip player to try and acquire, but the Arizona Coyotes approach with caution

I’ll be the last person to pretend that I don’t want Jeremy Morin in Arizona.

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    • Drafted 45th overall by the

    Winnipeg Jets

    Atlanta Thrashers in 2009, Morin has not-so-happily found himself the odd man out on a stacked Chicago Blackhawks roster where players in slumps don’t get ice time: period.

    Past seasons have suggested that Morin going for 0 points in fifteen games with the Blackhawks is, uh, not normal for the kid. Last season alone saw eleven points out of the then-22-year-old forward (5G, 6A) in only 24 games — with five of those points in his first fifteen games, it’s clear that production this season isn’t what we should look for from the left wing long-term.

    (Although can we talk about the thirty combined penalty minutes Morin has in two back-to-back games last season? Uh.)

    Anyways, back to what I was getting at —

    Morin has been a thirty-goal scorer in both the OHL (Kitchener Rangers, 47G, 2009-2010 season) and the AHL (Rockford IceHogs, 30G, 2012-2013 season); if the Coyotes take a chance on him and he finally finds his feet in the NHL, that could pay out some serious dividends.

    Unfortunately, that’s not a secret — so he’s not the bargain we’d assume.

    As of Tuesday, the Chicago Blackhawks have reassigned Morin to the AHL to give the forward some ice time; he requested they play him or trade him, and looks like he got his wish without being placed on waivers. Coach Quenneville seemed to be under the impression that putting Morin on waivers would result in him getting snapped up — which, ya know, is pretty obvious — so they’re trying to condition him without letting him go.

    What does this mean for the Coyotes?

    Well, for starters, it looks like the entire league is salivating over him; since the Philadelphia Flyers currently suck more than Arizona does, they’d get his right by default if he went on waivers (which is kind of a long and complicated process and Capgeek explains it better than I would). It also means that, were he to get traded, the Hawks can ask above market value. Not good for Arizona.

    A guy like Morin would arguably thrive on a team like the Coyotes, though. The lack of a bottleneck would give him more of an opportunity to play the style he likes, which seems to be aggressive, high-scoring, and close to the net.

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    • (Think of a Chris Kreider – Shawn Thornton hybrid. Can you imagine anything better?)

    Sounds crazy, but this is the kind of player the Coyotes should strategize for. If he goes on waivers, go ahead and attempt to claim him; if a lower-ranked team is awarded the waiver claim but ultimately decides they don’t want him, the Coyotes would probably be next in line to receive him. If no lower teams want him? Awesome — he’s all ours.

    If the Blackhawks request a trade for him, though, this is a player that Arizona should only look at if the trade comes later in the season (preferably after the team has welcomed Andrew Barroway with open arms).

    Being purely hypothetical, though, let’s say it’s early February and the Blackhawks want to trade Morin.What should the Coyotes do?

    To start, look at what the Hawks are missing… may seem like the answer is ‘absolutely nothing”. They’ve got a full arsenal of draft picks for next season (including two picks in both the second and fifth rounds), and a full docket of picks for the season after that. They’ve got a pretty well-rounded team, and they’ve got a healthy pool of prospects — especially on defense, where they took David Rundblad from the Coyotes already in recent years.

    What they don’t have, though, is much cap space — so asking for Morin and then a player who’s either already pricey or will be soon enough could work in Arizona’s favor if they’re willing to strike a bargain. The Blackhawks aren’t going to be able to afford paying Andrew Shaw $2mil per season for much longer — he and Morin could probably get packaged for Lauri Korpikoski (whose $2.5 million won’t go up, unlike Shaw’s) and either a few prospects or yet another draft pick for Chicago.

    Not likely, but could work.

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