Weird junk swap. But seems like it works for both teams. Win-Win. Or like...No Loss deal.
Avs were presumably just going to waive Brannstrom anyway...but this saves them his $900k salary since he'd likely go unclaimed (though if Poolman's deal isn't fully insured, that's a bigger salary out of pocket, but i'm sure owners are fine with that since...It also nets them a "free" draft pick. Also gives them extra LTIR to operate in when they need it later when other guys are back. And if you're a contending team owner these days, you pretty much have to be okay with signing cheques to screw around with LTIR and operate with a payroll well above the salary cap.
Canucks get themselves out of LTIR, and can just immediately waive Brannstrom...hope he's claimed, but worst case, they just completely bury him and can start to operate outside of LTIR. Which is very important to
their deadline flexibility.
So everyone kinda swaps their trash and sets up their cap situation better for what
they need out of it. Good deal i guess...even if it's really just paper shuffling since neither of these players are likely to play for their new organization.