that gaudreau trade is beyond terrible. mittelstadt is nearing bust territory, or at least not being worth much at all, and right defence is the least of Calgarys concerns. I also think a ufa entering his prime will want more than 2 years at 3.5 million

Gaudreau is going to cost too much. Your offer is light, either calgary declines or it gets beat by somebody else. Which means that you will have to add reinhart/cozens/our 20 1st to get gaudreau, and then we will have fewer assets to fix our putrid forward depth. We have a bottom 9 with too many guys that dont score, are physically and mentally soft, and not especially fast. I mean if you could sign gaudreau as a ufa for 10m and move reinhart (hes going to get paid soon, probably not a great idea to have gaudreau at 10, skinner at 9, and reinhart at 8) and ristolainen for help up front, it makes a little sense, but thats not happening. Mittelstadt is starting to get talked about as a bust, which isnt particularly fair, but also isnt particularly wrong. Mittelstadt has already been moved to the wing to focus on his offense, he probably needs to be sent down for the rest of the year. The problem here is that he is botterills first pick, the 8oa on a team that deperately needs a center, a position that has been heinously ignored, probably in the hopes that mittelstadt is legit.