Would you trade Bouchard?

Would you trade Bouchard?

  • yes

    Votes: 37 23.1%
  • no

    Votes: 119 74.4%
  • other

    Votes: 4 2.5%

  • Total voters
    160
I answered I would trade him but really it only drai and mcd I would be very unlikely to trade.

Given an offer on Bouchard I will listen to an offer. Or if the ask in the offseason gets too high I could become unwilling to keep him as I wouldn't want to have an Erik Karlsson like contract, where you have a good player but it is only the high contract that makes people want to give away the player
 
Honestly if say the Canes had offered Necas for Bouchard and RNH! I'd drive them to the airport In the nude.

Yes Bouchard is tradeable if the right deal comes along for a young player. Not old
You think that’s a good deal for Edmonton or you just like driving around in the nude? I’d need a lot more than Necas to give up on a RS dman who is just 25 years old and already has an 80+ point season.
 
Go back a decade and you'll probably see this exact same thread with Petry....except Bouchard is the far better Dman. This organization and certain fans never learn. Not enough that we undervalued basically all our young talent this summer and lost them, we want to do the same to a top 10 Dman in the league because he makes mistakes. Unbelievable.
You are judging a Dman by his point total.
Petry was much better at defense. Bouchard just scores at ppg pace.

Let's see how Klingberg produces once he settles in. I just do think Bouchard should be getting locked up at 10M+ just because of his point totals.
 
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The only situation in which I’d even entertain trading Bouchard is if it looks like an extension is going to be crazy expensive and we can trade for an upgrade on the blueline. The only name that really comes to mind is Josi but he’s getting old and I’m not sold he is the same player he was a few years ago.
 
I sometimes wonder if people on these forums actually watch some of the other top offensive defensemen in the league with the way they go on and on about Bouchard's mistakes and supposedly poor defensive prowess, too much grass is greener thinking going on around here.

Also kind of crazy that a few people somehow think that a PPG defenseman isn't worth a 10 million dollar a year contract. Do you guys not realize how rare it is? You can track back 25 years and the number of defenseman that have put up 80 points in a season is 9 in total, and Bouchard is one of them. Forwards that top out at a point per game get 9+ million in this league these days, let alone a big, right shot top pairing defenseman.

The only way the Oilers should ever consider trading Bouchard is if an obvious upgrade becomes available, most of the players that would qualify to get on that list are franchise defensemen that rarely ever change teams until they get too old to play at a high level.
 
Barrie and Bouchard aren’t remotely comparable. Bouchard is one of the best 5v5 dmen in the NHL, something Barrie has never been good at.

Bouchards value here isn’t his PP play. It’s his 5v5 play.

People see Bouchard making the odd poor mistake defensively but ignore the fact that inspire those occasional mistakes he still puts up results that are among the elite of the elite.
People like you also overrate Bouchard. He's not "one of the best 5 on 5" defensemen in the NHL. That sentence right there just shows the ridiculousness.

He doesn't make the "odd" defensive mistake, he is now starting to make the "same" defensive mistakes.

He processes the game to slowly, teams have figured it out and are pressing him.

Do we trade him? Probably not because our RHD depth would be horrendous. That said if he wants anything North of 10 Million AAV it's going to be a pretty big problem.

- Just want to give a shout out to Ty Embersson who as established himself as a top 4 NHL Defencemen!!
 
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Absolutely not.

Happy to see so many posters with the basic brain power to say similar.

Bouchard has always been a superstar defense that you desperately draft develop and retain for his career.

Very very obviously so.

As someone else mentioned his "off" year this year should help curb his contract demands. I just hope he/his agent isn't like Rantanans or Nurses. Pushing him off the team.

Side note. Gow ridiculous is Rantanans negotiations... He is an amazing winger but by points/talent/position simple a good 10 to 20 percent worse than Draisaitl at least. No shame being worse. Real dumb to negotiate like you are as good or better. Rantanans contract should have been 12.5 behind Mckinnon and Draisaitl's. Imo.
 
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You are judging a Dman by his point total.
Petry was much better at defense. Bouchard just scores at ppg pace.

Let's see how Klingberg produces once he settles in. I just do think Bouchard should be getting locked up at 10M+ just because of his point totals.
If you think Bouchard's value is strictly from points, I'd say you're still evaluating defensemen like its 2001 or something.
 
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Bouchard has elite numbers away from Ekholm?
Over the last 3 years his xGF% away from all of McDavid, Ekholm and Draisaitl is 59.81% in 617 5 vs 5 minutes. Since the start of 2023-2024 away from all three he has a 58.34 % GF% and an xGF% of 59.92% though in only 138 minutes.

Since the beginning of 2023-24 his numbers away from Ekholm are:

TOI 405 min CF% 59.83 SF% 59.82 GF% 55.81 xGF% 61.46 SCF% 59.76 HDCF% 61.98

This is sort of like the McDavid/Leon situation. The two players complement one another very well but both can be good at the same time.
 
Petry was better at defense than Bouchard?

No he wasn’t.

Totally agree. Petry might have been better as a 1v1 defender, but his positioning on the weak side was horrendous, absolutely horrendous. He was a huge puck watcher.

Bouchard is probably the smartest defender (all around) we've had since Pronger. He has exactly one GLARING weak spot, which is that his decision making at the opponent's blueline is... predictably biased toward making an offensive play that isn't there and therefore odd-man rushes against.

But that's what offensive defensemen are wired to do.

What he's also wired to do (and gets little credit for) is watching and anticipating how offensive plays against are developing. He's learned to use his offensive read of the game in the reciprocal end and is exceptional positionally in our zone. He is. Many just don't know it because any of his great defensive plays look routine. They are routine because he was already there. He looks like he lacks urgency, because he's already there.

And that big, brilliant, young head of his is still learning.
 

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