Quote:
Originally Posted by Lanny_McDonald
It is unlikely you're going to get a king's ransom at the deadline for anyone. Blue chip prospects are rarely traded at the deadline. Deadline deals are mostly centered around draft picks and middling prospects or may fill a more pressing need, or there to balance out contracts. Chiarot was traded for a couple picks and Ty Smilanic, who falls somewhere in the 8-10 range for Panther's prospects prior to this last draft, and the Panthers prospect pool is lower third of the league. When was the last time a blue chip prospect was moved at the deadline? I think you have to go back to the trade of Martin Erat and Michael Latta for Filip Forsberg. That required the team with the established player to kick in the extra player. Unless you're looking for 1st round picks, and are okay with late first round picks, the trade deadline is not a great time to go hunting for blue chip talent.
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I wonder if the next Forsberg-Erat type trade could occur with the Wild and Rossi. The Wild will be entering this season with the hopes of competing despite having a 38 year old as their starter, a 33 year old captain and arguably their most important player behind Kaprizov, Zuccarello, being 35 when they enter the playoffs.
They were just forced to give up on a nice young player because of their cap situation thanks to the Suter and Parise buyouts, but there's still three years on those. Are they just resigned to the fact they won't compete until 2025-2026 season? But then why sign a 37 year old starter? Why trade a 25 year old instead of the older players?
By the 2025-2026 season when they regain most of their cap space back, Zuccarello and Fleury will be retired, Spurgeon will be 36, Brodin and Dumba (if he doesn't walk) will be on the wrong side of 30, their somehow top line center in Hartman will likely test UFA for a much bigger payraise than the current 1.7M he makes, and Kaprizov will be a year from UFA after just wasting his prime years for a team that likely hasn't done anything.
If the Huberdeau and Weegar aren't signed then trade them crowd get their way (we won't
) I think Lindholm for Rossi might be awesome for a basis of a trade. Lindholm between Kaprizov and Zuccarello is a huge upgrade for the Wild, and his contract is about the only one that that the Wild could reasonably fit without huge team-changing moves. By the time it expires, Zuccarelo's is off the book and his 6M could be used to partially re-sign Lindholm and then the year after that they get 14M to spend thanks to Parise and Sutter mostly coming off the book.
They are in a similar situation as the Flames were as everything signals rebuild but the team isn't bad enough to tear it down and I think at least one team will benefit off the Wild being stubborn. Arguably, the Kings already have.