When I say handcuffing, I mean it in the way that from the time he took over, Verbeek had limited options for the 3 pending free agents. Sure, he could have re-signed them (pending their acceptance of the amount the Ducks / Verbeek were willing to pay and for what term), but the limited time he had didn't give him a lot of flexibility in getting that done. His only other (good) option was to trade them if he wasn't going to re-sign them, and with them all being on expiring contracts, that also limits what teams are willing to trade for them, and which teams are even willing to acquire them. That is the handcuff...the inflexibility within those 2 options. If BM made some decisions significantly earlier on these players, that wouldn't have been an issue (though other issues would have taken their place).
At the same time, maybe it was the optimal situation for Verbeek, due to (as you said) making his job easier to remake the team the way he wants. But again, that's not the situation I was referring to.
Verbeek had options and time.
1. Verbeek did not talk to Manson's agent at all once he was GM.
2. Verbeek was strict on offering Lindholm a short term deal.
Verbeek knew what he wanted the moment he became GM. That's not handcuffing Verbeek when he already knew what he was going to do beforehand.
Murray protected Lindholm, Manson, Rakell, and Des in the Seattle expansion draft. Murray drafted Lindholm, Manson, and Rakell. Murray gave Manson an A and wouldn't trade him for the world. Murray traded for Des and signed him to a two-extension rather than trade him at the TDL for the 2019-20 season when we were losing. When the team started to perform well after the first 9 games, then that was probably what Murray wanted to see before handing out extensions. But Murray had issues that needed him to resign on Nov 10th. We were 7-4-3 (17 pts) at the time and on a 5-game winning streak, which ended up becoming an 8-game winning streak.
It seems easy to project that Murray would have kept the crew together and probably have added onto the NHL roster once he started to notice his defense failing to injury.
Everyone in the NHL world knew Murray resigned on Nov 10th. Between Nov 10th and early Feb, every GM candidate probably had several scenarios in their mind of what to do with the franchise. All those months of monitoring and waiting to be hired was more than enough time. Verbeek could have continued down the path of layering/insulation like Murray and Yzerman with the Bolts, but Verbeek didn't. Verbeek wanted to go younger as evidence by my first two points about Manson and Lindholm.
There's no handcuffing here for Verbeek when he had options. Handcuffing Verbeek would have been having all four already signed to extensions that probably Verbeek did not want b/c he wanted to go younger. Lindholm would have an an 8-year extension, Manson a 4-year extension, Rakell a 4-6 year extension, and Des with a 2-3 year extension under Murray. What you're talking about is receiving more from the four players traded, which is what you're highlighting. What you're missing is that Verbeek still wanted them traded away b/c you wanted more in the return. But if Verbeek did trade away all four under contract, then how would that look knowing Verbeek ripped apart the backbone under multi-year contracts? Verbeek could not have traded them away if they were all signed to multi-year contracts. Verbeek would have been "handcuffed" to do what he truly wants done.
