Two surprise teams now appear to be the favorites to land Taylor Hall.

Two insiders name the same team.

HockeyFeed
HockeyFeed
Published 4 years ago
Two surprise teams now appear to be the favorites to land Taylor Hall.
Joel Marklund/Bildbyran/Zuma

The trade talk surrounding New Jersey Devils star forward Taylor Hall reached a fever pitch on Friday when it was suddenly announced that the Devils would be keeping Hall out of their line up. The news all but confirmed that the Devil's were closing in on what is likely to be the biggest trade of the 2019 - 2020 National Hockey League regular season, a trade involving Hall that has been speculated about since prior to the season even starting. 

The Devil's have had a terrible start to their campaign in spite of the fact that Devils' general manager Ray Shero had a pretty solid looking offseason for the organization and that has left little doubt regarding the future of Hall, an unrestricted free agent at the end of the season who has made it clear he wants to play for a winning team. The early rumors following the Devil's poor start to the season had the Colorado Avalanche looking like the heavy favorites to land the former Hart Memorial Trophy winner but now it sounds like the tide may be turning in a different direction.

National Hockey League insider John Shannon touched on the rumors in the early hours of Saturday morning when he revealed that two names were coming up over and over for him, with neither of them being the Colorado Avalanche. Instead Shannon revealed that two new, and frankly surprising, teams were now seemingly the frontrunners for the veteran winger. Shannon reported that the Arizona Coyotes, a huge surprise, and the defending Stanley Cup Champion St. Louis Blues were the two teams mentioned by his sourcers.

From Shannon

While there appears to be interest from multiple teams for Taylor Hall...keep hearing St Louis and Arizona at the top of the list.

Now that is some pretty wild stuff right there, but what makes it even crazier is that Shannon is not the only man reporting this news. According to a report from TSN National Hockey League insider Bob McKenzie, arguably the best insider in the business, his sources are also pointing to the Arizona Coyotes as the potential front runner for a Taylor Hall trade.

From McKenzie:

I’m not saying Hall will end up in Arizona, but I would say Coyotes appear to be one of the teams with notable interest in him and likely have the motivation/wherewithal to perhaps get it done. Though I suspect they are not alone on those counts. On that note, I’m going to bed.

Two highly respected insiders both pointing to the Coyotes is certainly extremely interesting. Might we see Taylor Hall playing alongside Phil Kessel this season? Who would have seen that coming?

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