It’s been a busy trade deadline in some ways. Ottawa was facing the biggest challenge.
Out were Duchene, Stone, and Dzingel. Duchene was a disastrous mistake last year. Stone simply wasn’t going to resign with the Sens and Dzingel was a sell high situation.
And the Sens needed to fill the cupboards and interesting enough are still chasing Swedes.
I’m not going to mention the fringe players or fill in. For Stone you get a core player of the future in Eric Brannstrom and a 2nd. Total win for the Sens as Stone who signed with Vegas for a gajillion dollars would never work for O town. Brannstrom is good to go for over half a decade with the team essentially safe dollar wise. The pairing of Eric with Chabot gives the Sens a top pairing to compare with almost any team in the league.
Dzingel goes for 2 second round picks. Again, would you rather have 2 seconds or a full price Dzingel? Win O town.
Duchene was the one hiccup for Pierre Dorion who only gets a mid level 1st and a conditional 1st if Duchene re signs with Columbus.
Marc Bergevin choked. We can talk about all the potential, but there was one easy trade that would’ve helped a team that has an aging core player in Shea Weber who desperately needed a LD to play with him.
The Anaheim Ducks sent out Michael Del Zotto for only a 6th. So much for that great relationship with Bob Murray. While not the perfect solution Del Zotto certainly might have helped the Habs secure the play off spot and even helped with a round. He also might have re signed with the team as they can use some help on LD.
The usual 4th line follies by Bergevin frankly are insulting to the hockey fans that pay the bills.
Toronto essentially stood pat. The team had made it’s big splash with Jake Muzzin and it’s vote of confidence to the depth of the current roster. The Leaf’s didn’t have a lot of excess draft picks to burn and have good team depth for a long run which you don’t want to play with.
Calgary failed to get a key addition to the squad and in particular in the net.
Edmonton was still, but then they still don’t really have a GM, but they did have some cogs to trade out and missed that boat.
Winnipeg was busy. It was garage sale time. Nathan Beaulieu, a Russian D man, Matt Hendricks, and their big pick up, Kevin Hayes for a 1st (and a 4th if the Peg win the Cup) and Brendan Lemieux.
Considering what Duchene went for it doesn’t seem to be an amazing trade.
Vancouver’s big deal was dumping Erik Gudbranson for Tanner Pearson. They save a few shekels and essentially swap out a meh D man for a meh forward.
In the end none of the Canadian teams hit a home run to steal a baseball cliche this trade deadline, but Montreal GM Marc Bergevin simply struck out. As one pundit voiced out today, with the team unexpectedly within the playoffs it was worth spending to make a run.
Jordan Weal is not making a run. Nor is it really a “Hockey trade”. It’s simply fodder for certain media pundits.