Good article, Bingo. Thanks. A few things:
1) Reading again about how the Flames delayed the rebuild through the latter part of the last decade got me to thinking about what the team might have looked like had they pulled the trigger in 2009. They would have been rebuilding in the same period as Edmonton v. 2.0, and drafting in the top-end for players like Taylor Hall, Tyler Seguin, Ryan Nugget Hopkins, Gabriel Landeskog, Nail Yakupov, Ryan Murray, Nate MacKinnon and Seth Jones. Hindsight is 20/20, and the Oilers' incompetence for so long dramatically skews the results, but I have to say that with how the drafts in 2010–12 turned out I am not terribly disappointed about the delay in retrospect.
2) Elliott Friedman said on the FAN 960 this AM that he will be doing some legwork to discover the currency of draft picks in today's NHL. I think your valuation makes very good sense, but I am also interested to hear his take on this in the near future.
3) I completely agree about how you have defined the cycles of NHL teams. One of the things that I find irritating is the insistence of so many fans that a team must have their cake and eat it too; in other words, teams must build and continue to improve to win a championship while simultaneously perpetually increase their draft stock. It's completely unrealistic. I like Treliving's approach which seems to indicate that he will focus in the draft on smaller windows: two or three drafts with an overabundance of picks; two or three drafts where those picks are currency.
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