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Originally Posted by Jay Random
So you want to make matters even worse? Nice.
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If by worse you mean lean hard into developing talent, then yes.
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Originally Posted by Jay Random
All through the 1990s, the Flames had to trade their top players to other teams, or else watch them walk as free agents. They couldn't afford to sign them.
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Yes. But in the 1990's there was no salary cap, there was no relief for a weak Canadian dollar and the Flames' track record in drafting and developing talent was something of a sad joke. This is the forum that turned Rico Fata into a meme.
But even then there are cases where this strategy I am proposing worked. Nieuwendyk in his prime got us Iginla. Fleury in his prime got us Regehr.
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Originally Posted by Jay Random
You don't get the benefit of that talent if you trade it away the minute it's done developing.
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Sure you do. You get the benefit on the incline. You arguably get a player's best years (23-27), then you cash in your chips.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jay Random
At some point you also need to win hockey games. Your plan doesn't include that stage.
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If you focus on acquiring futures and you invest in your scouting and development eventually you will have a talent pipeline where you are able to graduate 2-3 players every season. Fast forward 9 years (from an 18 year old to 27) and you now have 18-27 players pushing for NHL roster spots. And they're all 27 years or younger. You now have an amazing problem. You have more players than you can use, so of course, you trade the pending UFAs for futures to replenish the talent pool. If your scouting and development teams have done their jobs, you'll have 2-4 valuable pending UFAs to trade at every trade deadline. And you
should trade them, no matter where you are in the standings. The hope for a deep playoff run isn't worth the long term damage to your talent pipeline that losing highly valuable assets for nothing will impose. This is probably the most counter intuitive aspect of this approach, but the math checks out.
But to address your concern regarding winning. Most teams are cobbled together. Some drafted players, some free agent signings, some acquired through trade, etc. But with the approach above, the entire roster will effectively be developed together. Players will know each other from the day they are drafted to the day they are traded as pending UFAs. They will have up to 9 years to develop chemistry as opposed to the 1-2 year average most players in the NHL get. As such, again as long as scouting/development does its thing, you'll be able to maximize the team dynamic, which will result in better team performance, which leads to more wins.
The catch is that if the scouting/development teams fail in identifying and developing talent then there will be lean years where wins are hard to come by. But that is not much different from the antiquated methods hockey teams are managed today.
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Originally Posted by Jay Random
Running a perpetual farm team for other clubs, and paying those farm players NHL salaries, is a great way to lose money.
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As opposed to spending to the cap and still being in sixth place in your division?