Ron Francis Wrap Up

Carolina Hurricanes General Manager Ron Francis addressed the media on Monday afternoon and answered questions concerning his dealings over the weekend and on trade deadline day.

In review, the Hurricanes dealt away Eric Staal, Kris Versteeg, and John-Michael Liles for a total of five draft picks, (one is provisional) and three prospects.

The picks consist of second rounders this summer and next summer, a third rounder this summer, a fifth rounder next summer, and a provisional fifth rounder if the Kings make their conference finals.

One never knows how prospects will turn out but at least two of the three seem to have promise.  We will speak more about them later.

Francis did not reveal any secrets during the interview.  He would not answer when asked if he tried to move any other players.

He spoke a bit about next year's plans and said that he had to be careful going all young.

"I do think that we will have some situations where we have draft picks we can move, we might be in a position where other teams, if the cap doesn't go up as much as people think, that  they may have to move assets.  This summer I think we are going to be in good position to acquire some of those assets.  We are also in the position where we can draft some good young players.  We will be looking at all those options."

When asked about patience from fans, this is what Francis had to say.

"I'm sure there are fans who are not happy with what has happened the past couple of days.  For the first time in awhile, we were legitimately in a playoff race in February, which has not happened around here for some time.  But you run the risk of chasing that and you look at whether you really have legitimate odds or not.  It certainly could happen and I wouldn't rule it out against our guys, but if you chase that and you don't get there then you almost take the progress that we've taken so far and step backwards.  I don't think we can afford to do that as an organization or as a team.  That's why we went in the direction we did."

The entire media session is below.