Brown Traded To Victoria For Gregor & Picks

Noah Gregor during a camp with the Victoria Royals this season. (submitted photo)

Travis Brown said goodbye to the only WHL home that he’s known on Monday.

 

With the Moose Jaw Warriors on the outside looking in on the Eastern Conference playoff picture, the team dealt their veteran defenceman to the Victoria Royals to add assets for the future.

 

The tribe acquired 15-year-old forward Noah Gregor, third round WHL Bantam Draft picks in 2014 and 2016, as well as a condition pick in the trade.

 

“You never want to be in a position where you have to move a player like Travis Brown because of the realities of where we are as a team,” said Alan Millar, the Warriors’ general manager, moments after the trade became official.

 

“Our players and our coaching staff are working hard to try and get into the playoffs, unfortunately my position has to look at the big picture,” added Millar.  “We don’t want to be in this position where we’re moving older guys to get assets.  We’ve been here two years in a row and we have to get better.”

 

The individual success that Brown has had this season combined with the lack of team success opened the door for the trade.  While still surprised by the trade, the deal was something that many around the team had seen coming for a while.  Brown said there was still that element of shock when the phone call came.

 

“There’s a lot of things that go through your mind, there’s a lot of people that you’re going to miss, a lot of great teammates and coaches,” said Brown.

Former Warriors assistant captain Travis Brown.

Brown has paced the Warriors offensively being their leader on the back end.  He led the team in scoring for most of the season and has 38 points in 43 games this season.  He leaves with 182 games under his belt with the Warriors after being drafted in the fourth round of the 2009 WHL Bantam Draft.

 

“It was the best three years of my life so far,” said Brown.  “I can’t thank everyone enough for helping me mature as a player and a person, so I’ve got to thank all of Moose Jaw basically.”

 

While disappointed to be leaving his WHL home, Brown is looking forward to the opportunity that’s ahead and understands that this is the business part of the game.

 

“It’s going to be a little bit of a change, but I’ve only heard great things about Victoria and couldn’t be more excited to go down there,” said Brown.

 

“We’ve traded a good player, we’ve traded a good kid, we’re excited about the return, but not necessarily pleased with the fact that we’re in that position,” added Millar.

 

Gregor comes to Moose Jaw as he puts together a very strong rookie season with the Leduc Oil Kings of the Alberta Midget AAA Hockey League.  The 15-year-old sits third in the league in scoring with 12 goals and 35 points in 27 games.

 

“He’s certainly the key to the deal,” said Millar.  “We believe that he’s a very good young player, we consider him a top prospect in the 1998-age group.  We’ve watched him closely here of late, we think he’s certainly attributed himself well and probably projected himself as more than the third round pick he was in this most recent draft.”

 

The Alberta Midget League is one that is dominated by 17-year-old scorers, so for Gregor to be putting up the season that he is as a first-year midget speaks volumes for the type of prospect he is.

 

“He’s a 15-year-old playing in a very good Alberta Midget League,” said Millar.  “He has a high hockey IQ, he’s a good skater, he’s got good skill.  I watched him (Sunday), he played in all situations, key face-offs, penalty kill, half boards on the power play and had a goal, two points in a 3-2 win.”

 

Millar is very confident that if the Warriors would have had the second round pick that was traded away in the Cam Braes deal from last year’s draft that they would have targeted Gregor in that spot, so to be able to add him now is a bonus for the team.

 

“He was a guy that when we got talking to Victoria,” said Millar.  “Gregor was the guy that we wanted, Gregor was the guy that had to be in the deal.”

 

The Warriors have done their homework on Gregor with scouts getting an eye on him at the Mac’s Tournament in Calgary and again over the weekend, including Millar making the trip in on Sunday, in the lead up to the trade.

 

Friday’s move to acquire Spenser Jensen from the Medicine Hat Tigers worked into this deal, as the Warriors expect the 18-year-old defenceman to help fill the void of losing Brown this season.

 

“The fact that we put Jensen in the lineup and he’s a year younger, continues to help us in the future,” said Millar.  “Once we got that Jensen deal done, it allowed us to key on the best deal, and if that best deal was a prospect with picks and not a roster player, it allowed us to do that.

 

“Travis Brown leaves, Jensen goes in.  They’re different players, but Jensen brings a lot to our team as well.  He’s a 6-foot-4 body, he comes from a good program and plays the game the right way.”

 

Coming off the weekend, the Warriors have five wins in their last eight games.  Even with the trade of Brown, the message to the team — and fans — remains the same from Millar.

 

“Competitively I don’t think we need to take a significant step back here because of this trade,” said Millar.  “We’re going to lose some offence on the back end, but Jesse Forsberg has to continue to play well and this is an opportunity for guys like (Alexey) Sleptsov and (Reid) Zalitach.  They’re going to get more power play time, they’re going to develop offensively and they’ve got to be the future of our team in terms of the power play.”

 

There’s still four days remaining before the trade deadline hits on Friday afternoon at 1:00pm, but Millar said they would be comfortable with this being the only deal they make.

 

“We’re still in some discussions on other potential moves, we’re fine if this is it, but there’s still some on-going discussions,” he said.

 

The Warriors return to practice on Tuesday as they get set to face the Red Deer Rebels at Mosaic Place on Friday night.