Weird. I figured the team's own coach would be a pretty good source...
Here's the timeline, based on comments from Friedman, Tulsky and Rantanen's agents:
- During the course of contract negotiations, the Avs approached Rantanen's camp about the possibility of a trade and asked if he'd be willing to re-sign in Carolina.
- Rantanen's camp thought this was a negotiation tactic by the Avs and basically "called the bluff" and said "Sure, we'll re-sign."
- The Avs pass this on to Tulsky and give him permission to talk to Rantanen's camp about working out a deal
- Rantanen's camp tells Tulsky their focus is getting a deal done with Colorado.
- Tulsky weighs his options, decides that the opportunity to take a swing at a star player like that is one they shouldn't pass up, and makes the trade, knowing that even if they couldn't get him to resign, they could flip him at the deadline to recoup some assets.
- Rantanen's camp is apparently shocked by the trade, since again, they didn't take the Avalanche's ask as seriously as Colorado and Carolina did.
- Rantanen struggles in Carolina, tells Rod after 4 Nations that there's only four teams that he'll play for and Carolina isn't one of them.
- Trade happens