Confirmed with Link: [ANA/PHI] Cutter Gauthier for Jamie Drysdale and 2025 2nd round pick

[GunnarStahl]

Says he doesn’t have a preference between wing or center.

 

[MCB]

After listening to light the lamp I'm pretty excited to have him.

 

[Gliff]

Seems like a typical 19 year old NHL prospect. Excited to have him, sad to see Jamie go.
Obviously this should get rid of any concern about him signing with the Ducks.

Also side note, this means 3 of the last 4 "best forwards" in the WJC are on the Ducks.

 

[Duck Off]

For those who were nervous he wouldn’t sign, I think you’re good to rest easy now. He’s clearly joining the team after his college season ends.

 

[ScarTroy]

Seems like a good kid. Hopefully he can just put all of the drama in the past. I like the bit where he says he’ll do whatever it takes to win, whether it be blocked shots, faceoffs etc.

 

[CrazyDuck4u]

For those who were nervous he wouldn’t sign, I think you’re good to rest easy now. He’s clearly joining the team after his college season ends.

Seems like it..

 

[Leonardo87]

Great interview. Think we can see him later this season depending when his college season ends. Really excited to get this kid. Will have a Top 6 of Zegras, Carlsson, McTavish. Terry, and Gauthier next year. Crazy. Then add the vet support to that as well. Going to push guys to where we have a 3rd scoring line.

I don’t like all the crap he is getting from Philly fans, something happened (not allowed to speculate) between him and the organization. This isn’t some kid who said “I want to play only here” totally different situation.

Heck, Adam Fox did that and he is one of my favorite players on the Rangers. So could care less. I mean Thrun did it to the Ducks and I didn’t lose sleep over it, lol.

 

[Goose of Reason]

Great interview. Think we can see him later this season depending when his college season ends. Really excited to get this kid. Will have a Top 6 of Zegras, Carlsson, McTavish. Terry, and Gauthier next year. Crazy. Then add the vet support to that as well. Going to push guys to where we have a 3rd scoring line.

I don’t like all the crap he is getting from Philly fans, something happened (not allowed to speculate) between him and the organization. This isn’t some kid who said “I want to play only here” totally different situation.

Heck, Adam Fox did that and he is one of my favorite players on the Rangers. So could care less. I mean Thrun did it to the Ducks and I didn’t lose sleep over it, lol.

Any Philly fan that is trying to call him a shitty guy for what he did better have the same opinions of Lindros and Michkov, but that's totally different of course.

 

[Dr Johnny Fever]

I don't think you can reasonably be worried about him not signing here at this time based on everything we know. He gave them 18 teams he'd play for i think, sounds like it might not even be about Torts after all, rather he wanted to play this season.

Friedman thinks it's because he wanted to sign at the end of last season and the Flyers explained they didn't want to because the bonuses in the contract would cause a small cap overage this year which they wanted to avoid.

Now if that's true it would seem a dumb thing for the Flyers to worry about (they aren't contending for anything this year). But it would also seem to be a dumb thing for him to get so upset over that he would just ghost them from that point on.

 

[Ducks DVM]

Friedman thinks it's because he wanted to sign at the end of last season and the Flyers explained they didn't want to because the bonuses in the contract would cause a small cap overage this year which they wanted to avoid.

Now if that's true it would seem a dumb thing for the Flyers to worry about (they aren't contending for anything this year). But it would also seem to be a dumb thing for him to get so upset over that he would just ghost them from that point on.

Hitting RFA status at 21 vs 22 is potentially quite a few million dollars lost over the course of his career. I can understand it if he told them that he really wanted to play there and they told him he wasn’t worth what would have been a pretty small overage.

 

[Dr Johnny Fever]

Hitting RFA status at 21 vs 22 is potentially quite a few million dollars lost over the course of his career. I can understand it if he told them that he really wanted to play there and they told him he wasn’t worth what would have been a pretty small overage.

Oh, I definitely think it would have been dumb on their part to say no. I mean, WTF difference would it mean to their cap status this year given they aren’t competing for anything this season?

 

[MMC]

 

[Trojans86]

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........ tl;dr ........
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Any RD we select in the 2024 draft will take 2-3 years of development. That's the big context missing here with trading away RD Drysdale. If the Ducks had selected scoring RW Snuggerud at 22nd overall, then we get a prospect that has played two seasons in college to potentially make the NHL jump next season and keep our RD depth at the NHL level.

Instead, we've cannibalized our NHL RD depth b/c our GM lacked the foresight of needing top-6 scoring in our system when it presented itself at 22nd overall in the 2022 draft with two scoring forward options in 6'2 RW Snuggerud or 6'0 C/LW Kulich. Verbeek prioritized a bottom-6, shutdown center over a potential top-6 scoring forwards.

Verbeek should have been playing chess instead of checkers. Because Verbeek was playing checkers, we're definitely paying extra for things we like and covet.


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The Lord of the Rings breakdown
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Whoa, whoa, whoa... There's a whole lot of context missing here.

First, you're utilizing a "prospect ranking" and missing on it are Minty (a 2022 draftee like Cutter) and Carlsson, a 2023 draftee. Oh that's right... both Minty and Carlsson aren't considered prospects since they are considered NHL mainstays.

Second, you are only looking at this trade with a micro view and not realizing what we lost by selecting shutdown C Nathan Gaucher over scoring RW Snuggerud, especially knowing we already have 24 year old, shutdown C Lundy in tow.

• Drafted
  • LW Cutter = 5th, Philly
  • LD Mintyukov = 10th, Anaheim
  • C Gaucher = 22nd, Anaheim
  • RW Snuggerud = 23rd, St. Louis

Spoiler: D+0 to D+2 stats: Cutter vs Snuggerud

• Draft +0
  • Cutter
    • USHL: 22 games; 19g + 9a = 28 pts
    • NDTP: 54 games; 34g + 31a = 65 pts
    • WJC-18=: 6 games; 3g + 6a = 9 pts
  • Snuggerud
    • USHL: 26 games; 6g + 20a = 26 pts
    • NDTP: 59 games; 24g + 39a = 63 pts
    • WJC-18: 6 games; 3g + 4a = 7 pts

• Draft +1
  • Cutter
    • NCAA (BC): 32 games; 16g + 21a = 37 pts
    • WJC-20: 7 games; 4g + 6a = 10 pts
    • WC: 10 games; 7g + 2a = 9 pts
  • Snuggerud
    • NCAA (Minny): 40 games; 21g + 29a = 50 pts
    • WJC-20: 7 games; 5g + 8a = 13 pts

• Draft +2
  • Cutter
    • NCAA (BC): 17 games; 13g + 10a = 23 pts
    • WJC-20: 7 games; 2g + 10a = 12 pts
  • Snuggerud
    • NCAA (Minny): 20 games; 16g + 6a = 22 pts
    • WJC-20: 6 games; 5g + 3a = 8 pts

Snuggerud has improved on his goal scoring once he hit the college scene. He's kept up with Cutter (or exceeded him in raw goal scoring) in college and WJC's. As for the latest WJC-20s, Snuggerud was sick in the exhibition rounds, which is why he played only 6 games and he had to work himself up the lineup when he was cleared to play.

This isn't a direct exchange between Cutter and Snuggerud, which is what you're implying. Cutter went 5th (Philly), Minty went 10th (Ducks), Gaucher went 22nd (Ducks), and Snuggerud went 23rd (Blues). If the Ducks wanted to trade up for Cutter, then it would have packaged the 10th, the 22nd, and maybe a 3rd round pick. Two years later from the draft, Cutter nets Drysdale and a 2025 2nd round pick.

Remember, Verbeek stated we lacked top-6 scoring in our system (because 2019 Z, 2021 Mac, and 2023 Carlsson are staying in the NHL). If Verbeek had drafted Snuggerud, then there wouldn't be this dire need to trade for Cutter. We retain Drysdale and aren't pigeon-holed on what to do with our first round in next year's draft.

I don't understand why people keep including LD prospects as a reason why to get rid of Drysdale because not many can do the switch. Minty and Vaak cannot play on their off-side, but LaCombe can. Except, recently, the Ducks are keeping LaCombe on the left side and putting older vet Fowler on the right side (which they should have done from the very start).

Ducks RD youths in the org (without Drysdale)

• NHL
  • Luneau (2022 draft):
    apparently knee infection at WJC... probably the same knee he had surgery on years ago
    still not an NHL product and projected to be returned to juniors once infection is healed
• AHL
  • Helleson (2019 draft):
    still not looking like an NHL product, but is a top-pairing RD in San Diego
    he's not an offensive guy nor a shutdown guy, passed up by LD Zell (offensive) and LD Hinds (shutdown)
• non-pro
  • Warren: looks to be years away
  • Moore: in junior season at Harvard and has been injured since Nov 27th. Probably could stay another year at Harvard to work on his offense, but would be prudent to sign him after this season due to necessity.
  • Port: is probably a longer term project than Warren, but NHL outlook for him looks bleak

It seems painfully obvious that we need a RD with our own 1st round in the 2024 draft. Using Minty and Drysdale as our past/current experiences of defensemen making the NHL, we are going to be waiting three years to look NHL established. Minty hit a rookie wall early in his D+2 season, mostly as a 3rd pairing, sheltered LD. Drysdale was barely hanging on in his D+2 season as a top-pairing RD.

• 2024 projected top-15, Defensemen focus
  Using myNHLdraft's Jan 10th iteration:
  • 5. LD Dickinson (OHL): 6'3, 205 lbs
  • 7. LD Silayev (KHL): 6'7, 207 lbs
  • 9. RD Levshunov (NCAA): 6'2, 198 lbs
  • 11. LD Buium (NCAA): 6'0, 185 lbs
  • 12. RD Yakemchuk (WHL): 6'3 190 lbs
  • 15. RD Jiricek (Cze): 6'2, 175 lbs

Great. Now were limited only to Lev, Yakem, and Jiricek. We probably have to hope to land the 2nd overall pick to ensure we snag Lev. (Tankathon's Jan 6th, 2024 mock has Lev as the first D-man drafted at 4th overall.) What I like about Lev is he's already at the NCAA level this year and may need only one more year in the NCAA before jumping over. The extra year in the NCAA will help Lev continue to develop his body on a better schedule than whatever the Ducks are doing with Carlsson.

=========
Conclusion / tl;dr
=========

Any RD we select in the 2024 draft will take 2-3 years of development. That's the big context missing here with trading away RD Drysdale. If the Ducks had selected scoring RW Snuggerud at 22nd overall, then we get a prospect that has played two seasons in college to potentially make the NHL jump next season and keep our RD depth at the NHL level.

Instead, we've cannibalized our NHL RD depth b/c our GM lacked the foresight of needing top-6 scoring in our system when it presented itself at 22nd overall in the 2022 draft with two scoring forward options in 6'2 RW Snuggerud or 6'0 C/LW Kulich. Verbeek prioritized a bottom-6, shutdown center over a potential top-6 scoring forwards.

Verbeek should have been playing chess instead of checkers. Because Verbeek was playing checkers, we're definitely paying extra for things we like and covet.

You can’t just expect the gm to draft perfect. If anyone did that they would win the cup every year. It’s not like they intentionally drafted a worse player…maybe I’m missing your point here

 

[Fighter]

It would be so Ducks if Drysdale breaks out and lives up to his potential for the Flyers and Gauthier stays in school and does not sign with the Ducks. I really do hope the best for Jamie and I hope he goes on to have a good NHL career. At least he was traded to an EC team.

Or he becomes our next Shea Theodore. Though with Shea it turned out even worse as we protected the wrong guy and it backfired... Damn...

 

[Dr Johnny Fever]

So, are we now allowed to root for the BC Eagles to get bounced early in the playoffs this year? lol

 

[Leonardo87]

 

[Gliff]

I want him to succeed more then anyone now.

 

[Terry Yake]

anyone see how drysdale looked in his first game with philly?

 

[GunnarStahl]

anyone see how drysdale looked in his first game with philly?

I watched the first two periods, played well, got a PP assist

 

[All Mighty]

anyone see how drysdale looked in his first game with philly?

He was good, but not great in regulation. He definitely played safe in his first game. However, in OT, he was the best player on the ice.

 

[GunnarStahl]

anyone see how drysdale looked in his first game with philly?

I watched the first two periods, played well, got a PP assist

 

[All Mighty]

 

[Steppin Razor]

Great interview. He's pretty well-spoken for a 19 year old. Think he'll fit in perfectly here. It's an absolute shame that people have nothing better do than threaten him. Stay classy, Philly. Proving Bill Burr right yet again.

 

[All Mighty]

Huge props to Torts for this.

 

[Zegs2sendhelp]

I watched the first two periods, played well, got a PP assist

I assume this is like our “jacket” thing, team player of the game