Stephen
Moderator
- Feb 28, 2002
- 83,060
- 61,965
I see a few posters saying it didn't make sense to take him now that we have Rielly and Finn. A pretty silly argument. If anything, the stockpiling of defensive prospects may allow the Leafs to deal for a forward (or forward prospect). It`s not a bad thing to stockpile assets in a certain position..not that it`s the Leafs plan, it just seemed to unfold that way. If the draft is BPA, then Leafs had Finn (specifically) fall into their lap last year based off where they had him ranked. They didn`t know who they were going to pick a year prior to the draft. Just like many around here didn`t assume the Leafs would be taking Morgan Rielly at 5 (and thought for sure the Leafs, needing a skilled center, would have selected one).
I actually hate the stockpiling philosophy because given what was available, and what we need, we could have just used our immense scouting staff or whatever Burke has built up to draft a player who better suits long term needs instead of hoping to correct the imbalance at a later date hoping to get fair trade value after you've already spent time developing a kid.
If you're looking at another Aulie for Ashton deal, the effectiveness of that kind of trade can be debated.