Interesting, but Laine will likely sign for more

Not too bad of a proposal IMO, but the Jets might be looking for more quality than quantity in a Laine trade (there's definitely quality pieces, I just mean that they might want another super high end player like a Dumba for Laine compared to 3 really solid players). You also want Laine with a playmaker so I'd make the lines:

Laine - Staal - Zuccarello
Parise - Kunin - Fiala (Boudreau has said he thinks this will be our "2nd" line to start the season and I really liked how these 3 played together last year)
Eriksson Ek - Koivu - Donato
Foligno - Sturm - Hartman

If you want him at RW, then I'd probably go
Fiala - Staal - Laine
Parise - Kunin - Zuccarello

for the top 6.

I'd also bet Laine signs for a bit more. The guy scored 30 goals in a down year!

Even if the trade was fair, the buyout window already passed so the money wouldn't work for Minnesota.

I was actually gonna propose this yesterday. The Wild have a lot of forwards and should do a quantity for quality type trade. I originally had it as Brodin + Staal, Greenway, 1st so Winny can have thie r#2C but this would likely be closer

I could not agree more with your 2nd sentence. We need a high-quality guy by giving up some good-but-not-spectacular players, but the problem is that most teams that would listen on their high-quality players won't give them up unless it's for another high-quality player. Laine is honestly a pretty solid target for us since we need a right shot goal-scorer, but I'm not sure Chevy would be to keen on moving a player like Laine to a division rival. Maybe, but I have my doubts...

If not a high end player, I figure the Jets are on the lookout for a quality 2nd line center, so I was considering trying to fit Staal in there, but I'm not sure I see him being moved, although maybe Guerin takes no solace in Staal's desire to stay like it appeared Fenton did. Winnipeg only adds a couple hours to the drive to Staal's hometown, too.

You beat me to the Staal comment while I was typing mine out lol, but yeah, I wonder if that would be enough of a draw to make the quantity-quality swap.

The biggest issue I see with trading Staal is that we don't have a player that can fill his role right now. If we did move Staal, I'd guess that our top 6 centers are Kunin and Eriksson Ek, which isn't exactly confidence inspiring... Kunin has definitely shown flashes, but my guess is that he becomes a player that's a solid 2C on a contender. Eriksson Ek had a really solid end of the year, but I'm not convinced he's more than a 3C. I guess there's Koivu, too, but he's coming off a torn MCL at 36 years of age, so it's really TBD if he has/can recover(ed) fully from that.

If you wanted to put Staal in there you could probably swap Zucker for Staal and then maybe upgrade the pick to a 4th or retain half of Staal's salary.

Laine is seeking way more then $7.5 million per.

That might be something Winnipeg would be more willing to do, especially if the money works for both teams, so Winnipeg isn't forced to trade a guy like Ehlers to fit everything under the cap. Minnesota sends them cost effective players like Staal and Greenway while taking back Laine and a cap dump could be something that works for both teams. Other pieces would obviously need to be involved to even it out.

As the Jets quality is definitely more important than quantity.

That being said, and speaking off of trade value here, I doubt they would trade him within their own division. You never want to trade a star player who you face more often throughout the year and potentially in the first 2 rounds of the playoffs.

I think the narrative of not trading within your own division is only a worry to a GM who lacks confidence! A confident and competent GM should absolutely want to trade with rivals!

I completely disagree with you @TanSor about worrying about the 2C spot if they trade Staal. It would be a perfect move for this team because it would allow the kids to play big spots, and it might give this team another mediocre year to help draft more futures to build with. This is why I, if GM, would work my arse off to move Zuccarello...if he’s even tradeable. I don’t buy into the suicide crap so many people talk about if this was done. It’s a new regime and any player or agent with 1/2 a brain would understand. Those that don’t, I would gladly welcome to a debate on the subject...and easily kick their butt! In fact, Staal and Zuccarello would be the first 2 Fenton mistakes I would try to fix. Tradind Zucker and Spurgeon would be priorities 3 and 4, respectively.

I just haven't seen enough "good" from Eriksson Ek to outweigh all of the bad we've seen from him. He has some potential, but seriously the guy has 37 points through 148 games... Having him as your 2C could destroy the little developmental progress he has made. Ideally, you have Kunin and Ek as your middle 6 C's to start the year, then if both look good there you move Staal. Idk, we've seen how rushing development can ruin players (Puljujarvi as a recent example) and I'd just rather not rush Ek into a role he isn't ready for.