I’m honestly over it, but I don’t know what you mean “lateral move rather than taking a step back”. How is losing a 2nd round pick lateral?
Because on the morning of June 25th, Detroit's organizational assets included Walman and Gibson. On the evening of June 25th, Detroit had the
exact same assets, minus Walman and with Kiiskinen instead of Gibson. Dropped Walman and all it cost was a lateral move from Gibson to Kiiskinen.
The level of attachment around here to this 2nd round pick we had for all of 20 minutes is downright bizarre. Here's the plain, obvious truth:
we were never meant to have that pick. He wanted to get rid of Walman, he found out what it would cost, and he found a way to do it without having to take any steps back as an organization. He clearly already knew that 2nd round pick was destined for San Jose when he acquired it from Nashville, it was never intended to be ours. Therefore we didn't 'lose' anything.
We don’t know exactly what went on behind the scenes, but he could have shopped him saying “he just doesn’t fit our vision. Want him for a 3rd? Ok fine we’ll settle for a 5th”. The guy may have some warts, but they weren’t very public and we didn’t have to let the whole world know he was a bad cancer before getting rid of him
I said this in a previous comment at some point, paraphrasing here: The simplest explanation is that people around here need to consider the possibility they were wrong about Walman's trade value.
Other NHL teams aren't stupid. They have scouts and the decision-makers also pay attention to what's happening around the league. The undefined background issues are only one part of the problem, his on-ice play was the other one. He was not good in Detroit in 2023/24, simple as that. In fact he was quite bad, notwithstanding a few flashy goals.
At a time when cap space was at a major premium, that not only limited which teams could even fit him under the cap, but also which teams would even see value in him with his contract relative to his performance. 2 years at 3.4M for a defensive chaos agent is not a "how much are you willing to pay me" situation, it's a "how much will it cost to take him off my hands" situation. Yzerman had to pay to get rid of Walman for the same reason he would need to pay to get rid of Holl. They had/have negative value relative to their cap hits.
And like
@Gniwder said, there are consequences for dishonest, underhanded tactics. No other GM would want to deal in good faith with Yzerman if they had no confidence he'd do the same.
