- Jan 18, 2016
- 35,066
- 26,260
Neither team was in a contention window for those trades so taking on prospects was fine as they didn't need them to be contributors day 1. If we did get an equal return as Ottawa did for Karlsson, we'd be adding a depth dman which is fine, another Ross Colton level player, which is fine and then a good prospect who would still be a year away from even being an NHL player let alone being an impact player. Losing Rantanen this year and ending up with a top 6 player in 2026(at best) would not be conducive to competing right now.Well I think it's not the same thing to put all our eggs in Landy/Nuke or keep Rants. People can be skeptical on Landy's health and Nuke's ability to stay on the straight and narrow but not want to be saddled by Rants' contract too.
Ottawa and San Jose both won the Karlsson trades and in Ottawa's case he wasn't even hinting at declining. It's possible to do a 3-4 piece trade with the right team and retool, ala Chicago moving Buff, Ladd, etc. If Rants was Kane it wouldn't even be a question.
Granted no trade is better than a bad trade. Which is always the possible outcome.
Even if we didn't end up going for a prospect and aimed for a younger top 6/potential top 6 guy you still have to add in the fact that Mikko needs to want to go to that team and want to re sign with that team or else no value is coming back. Then you need to add in the fact that the team Mikko is willing to go to has the cap space to actually sign him to the contract he wants.
I'm not anti trading Mikko. But the deal that everyone wants has so many moving parts that being able to get that trade done in a reasonable time is unlikely. Like that trade won't be done this offseason most likely, and there's minimal chance he's traded in season. If you let it get to next off season... well there goes any value.