Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814
I'll start a firestorm and say that I would trade TJ Brodie straight up for Matt Duchene right now now. Why? Glad you asked.
First of all, look at the big star player deals in recent memory. Weber for Subban. Hall for Larsson. Johanson for Jones. They are one for one deals. No prospects, no 1st round picks, nothing. When you trade established star players with term, you get back one player of equal or lesser value.
For all the talk of building a defense to compete with Connor McDavid, we might consider looking at this from another angle. Johnny and Sean combine to make $7.9M less than McDavid and Draisaitl. The contracts of our star players allow us to afford an extra star player plus something else.
Further to this point, if we're building to beat the Oilers, our forwards are going against a top 3 of Larsson, Klefbom and Russell? Nurse? Sekara?
Johnny, Monahan, Duchene
3M
Ferland-Bennett-Versteeg
Stajan-Jankowski-Brouwer
Lazar/whoever
Gio-Dougie
Hamonic-Stone
Kulak-Bartkowski
Now I know that defense doesn't inspire as much love as it would with a 24/7 pairing, but look at who wins the Stanley Cup.
Chicago: Keith plays have the game, Seabrook and Hjalmarsson battle, Oduya is a decent puck mover on the 2nd pair, and the 3rd pair plays ten minutes. Michael Roszival, Kimmo Timmonen, and Trevor van Riemsdyk are the calibre of player we're talking about here.
LA: Doughty is head and shoulders the best D on the team during the Kings first run. Then you've got Voynov *no slouch*, Martinez, Willie Big Stick, Rob Scuderi, and Matt Greene. Guys who get the job done, but who have never come close to 40 points and never will. And that's fine. The next time around, they added a noobish Jake Muzzin and a last legs Regehr.
Pittsburgh has always won with a group of Letang and friends - last year they won with 'And Friends'.
Calgary has that Norris calibre player in Gio. When he starts his decline (which may or may not happen, defensemen age differently) we have Dougie.
The goaltending still remains the biggest question mark, but the forward depth of this team with Matt Duchene is an awfully tempting gamble to make.
The only reason I'd be reticent is this: Duchene is up in 2 years - same as Bennett and Tkachuk. The year after that, Frolik, Brouwer, Stone, and Hamonic all come off the books. The timing sucks, because I don't see how you retain Duchene in that scenario.
Flame away.
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