A whole bunch of upsets would have to happen in the playoffs for that to be the case.
I just pulled these pick values from
Sound of Hockey, showing the historical trade values of NHL picks:
28th pick in 1st round: 158.84
28th pick in 4th round: 5.40
Total: 164.24
29th pick in 1st round: 151.85
29th pick in 3rd round: 15.26
Total: 167.11
30th pick in 1st round: 145.17
30th pick in 3rd round: 14.83
Total: 160.00
At the moment, the Canucks are 2nd in the league by win percentage. If that stands up, they will draft no higher than 27th, and that
only if the Rangers also fail to make the conference finals. If the Rangers make the conference finals, they will get a bottom-four pick and the Canucks will be left at 28th.
The difference between 28th and 29th is not worth the difference between a 3rd and a 4th – especially to a team like the Flames, which has a good record of finding useful players in the middle rounds of the draft.