The Z trade is the biggest swing that Verbeek has taken since the rebuild. How he has shaped the roster with trades (present and future) has been in the over-positives. The next 2 years are the make-or-break for PV imo and we will noticed the fruition. I would rather have a GM taking swings and being "risky" to get us to a point where we can compete on the regular.
It seems that there are a couple arguments for/against the Z trade:
- Could of gotten more. Aight, lets say we got a 1st round pick for Z instead of this package (solid bottom 6er +2nd +4th). What does that look like? 20th-30th? over all the Z? I would of liked to package Z + a pick of our own for someone, but maybe the market doesn't allow for us to do that since a lot more teams are trying to compete. Why would someone else want to give up the "best" player as a GAMBLE. No one knows what Z is, and based on history his reputation is a defensive liability who can MAYBE play center, sub-par winger, injury prone, with a dynamic offensive mind.
- Let him play under Q and see what we have. There are 2 possible outcomes:
First - He doesn't develop/play well in our system/still absent defensively.
Second - He finds a place on our roster as an offensive winger; demands 7-8m once the contract is up
If the first scenario happens we have created a problem. We are losing games because of the roster composition. Instead of having a player who is responsible defensively and has a defined role, we now have a player who is "figuring it out". Where does that leave us? Remember how invisible Zegras is when he is not producing. We might lose out on 8-15 points because we have a player that NEEDS to be playing on the 1st/2nd line to develop.
2nd scenario - Let's say he regains form and hits 65 points next season. Great! He's putting in the points. Now let's look at the future a little bit. The Ducks are looking to be a fast team; Z does NOT fit that mold. He is not strong enough to win board battles and not get knocked off the puck. Now we have a player who needs to puck to be effective but doesn't have body to gain/retain control. Where does he fit in a CONTENDING team's line up?
I will say if he does put up 65-75 points as a 2nd liner this looks horrendous and most teams would be willing to ignore the defensive/control issues. If he is putting up 75-80 points as a first liner with Michkov I will be VERY curious to see how many they are letting in.
Overall, let PV cook and give him the rope to continue transforming this team into a new era. We NEEDED change in some form. I am disappointed that Z doesn't fit into our future. He was the bright spot on our roster for many seasons,
let the beeker cook fellas 
