I would do all those trades in a heartbeat, tho I doubt FLA or WPG would, and the guys I'd want to protect (that ik need to be... I forget the ED rules for forwards) are
Raks
Ehlers
Kase
Ritchie
Steel
Terry

Lindholm
Weegar
Mahura

Gibby

I wouldn’t mind that Ehlers trade

Overall, I don't like most of it. Too many changes that yield very little for us. I know there is a draft to consider, but there is no point in decimating the team to ensure Seattle gets very little from us. You'd be better off just paying an asset and having them pick who you want i.e. give up Mahura/Guhle/Larsson for Seattle to take Henrique as an example.

The BUF deal is awful for us. We give up the best piece for a cap dump + 1st (that would cost a 1st to dump alone) + Rodrigues who is quickly turned around into 2 x 7th round picks. Not smart asset management.

Julius Honka is trash. People need to forget about him being anything useful at the NHL level.

Larsson is sold cheap and too early in his development. He's a decent bottom 6er with above average mobility.

The Manson deal is ok, but moving a D-man for a winger always feels bad to me, especially when you've just traded an equivalent winger in Silfverberg for absolutely nothing.

Doubt FLA does that deal and it does nothing for us. Henrique isn't a cap dump and we need more than just 20 year olds in the team.

In case nobody else has noticed, the right side of that defense is considerably weaker than the right side of the defense we have now, and none of these trades has done anything to stock the pipeline there. I think that the prime purpose of at least one of our "sell-off" trades should be to get a near-future asset like the Montour move (Guhle).

Getting a top 10 pick in this draft is worth Silfverberg. I might consider taking away the draft protection. We don't need the cap dumps obviously, but getting two 7ths is smart asset management when no other team would likely want them.

Honka isn't trash his underlying numbers were actually really last year.

Larsson is expendable and he's starting to round out into what he is, better to get rid of him while we can get a somewhat decent return.

Drysdale, Honka, Drew and Weegar replenish the right-side for us. You probably don't know much about Weegar, but he is very much like what Manson was three years ago. Henrique isn't a cap dump in that trade the Ducks get a quality top 4 D and a 2nd, the reason FLA does it is because their bottom 6 is in desperate need of help and they can't afford another expensive defenseman after this year as they already have Ekblad, Yandle, Matheson and Stralman signed for >4 for the foreseeable future.

These trades make way for the youngsters to move up and gives the Ducks a better chance of acquiring game-breakers rather than living in mediocrity like the Minnesotas, Dallas, Philadelphias and Montreals of the world. It's riskier but makes way for definitively better payout than just keeping all our assets and letting them deteriorate while they aren't doing anything for building towards a championship.

The right side becomes Weegar, Drysdale, Drew, Honka. Those are all quality RHD defenseman/prospects. Weegar and Honka can play right away and based on previous seasons should perform near the same level of Manson from the last two seasons. Drew looks like he could move into a bottom pairing position next season and plays a lot like Manson and Drysdale will be a future top pairing RHD.

In the meantime, while waiting for Drysdale the Ducks can easily play Mahura, Guhle or Benoit on their off-wing, or use the current pairings I have up there. Honka will perform very well next to Lindholm because he did well in Dallas playing with a much worse Esa Lindell. Weegar, a quality two-way D, would likely excel next to Mahura as Mahura has been the best LHD out of our youngsters (Larsson, Guhle) and has mimicked Theodore's beginnings. And Fowler-Gudbranson has surprisingly been the Ducks' best defensive pairing this season.

I think that Weegar-Gudbranson-Honka > Manson-Gudbranson-Holzer/MDZ.

Weegar has been better than Manson this year and Honka is much better than either Holzer or MDZ based on last year's performance to this year's for Holzer/MDZ.

Don’t worry Sebby will be here soon to let you know that Manson doesn’t score enough points so he’s bad and a package of Manson and Steel could only net a return of Kapanen or Johnsson type players.

I'm not sure how anyone with any understanding of hockey and analytics could say that Manson is anything other than a top 4/top 3 D in this league.

How can you be sure it's top 10? We're giving them a fantastic asset and they're giving up nothing of importance. They're going to improve having Silf and that pick is going to drop. We had the same thing happen last year with the STL/SJ 1st that ultimately ended up going lower than we probably thought it would. Unless you're dealing at the draft, 1st round picks are a gamble. More importantly though, the only asset of value we get from that deal is a 1st. For arguments sake, let's say it's top 10. With that pick, we're literally going to be drafting someone we hope turns out as good as Silfverberg... and he may not. He may end up like Alex Nylander (#8 OA) or Ritchie (#10OA). Even if the kid we draft does end up a good one, what do you realistically expect to get? A 30-30 winger like Ehlers? Is Silfverberg really that much worse than a player of Ehlers level? Sure, you'd get a bit more scoring, but sacrifice Silfs defensive game. I don't see the point and think it's a high risk deal with only moderate upside.



The kid can't defend and is more prone to brainfarts than Guhle. He's not even that dynamic moving forward. He's playing in Liiga for a reason and that's because he's not good enough. If NHL scouts thought he had potential, they'd have made a play for him by now. He'd be sold on the by DAL, but the interest isn't there. Advanced stats are useless if they don't support the eye test.



He's 22 years old! He's not even close to his prime. Look, I agree with you. I think Larsson ends up pretty much where he is now. A solid 3rd pairing D-man with above average mobility who always makes the safe play, but what's is wrong with that? Personally, I like him. He gets caught out every now and again, but he's still learning this level and that will improve with experience and as the team gets better. For me, his future is on the 3rd pairing alongside a RH offensive-minded D-man and PP specialist a la Sami Vatanen, Colin Miller, Adam Fox. He'll be cheap, secure that bottom pairing and provide his partner the freedom to do what they do best. Again, really don't see a need to move him at all. I mean, what do you hope to get from a 3rd and 6th round pick? Just terrible asset management.



Fine. I don't know anything about Weegar, so I'll concede to your superior insight on that one.



Tanking isn't the way to victory, NJ and EDM are good examples of that. You need experience from players who have been there and done it. Getzlaf, Henrique, Silf, Rakell and Fowler have all been deep or won the whole thing. You can't draft players that know what it takes to win the SC. They need to experience it for themselves and the best way to do that is with a strong team lead by experienced players. I disagree with your approach. It's a long season and frustrating at times, but you can't rush these things.

Well, he hasn't been one this season. Too many dumb errors. I don't know whether that gets picked up in the advanced stats.

Panthers aren’t gonna trade their probably second best dman for another top 9 forward.

Weegar-Drysdale-Drew may be acceptable in 2021-2022 but believing that they will be NHL-quality next season seems like wishful thinking to me. And I agree with others that if Julius Honka was such a potential asset, somebody would have taken him off Dallas' hands by now.

I agree with you that Jacob Larsson may be surplus to our needs but I would like to see an actual player or two coming back for him rather than a stab in the dark. And MacKenzie Weegar is on my short list of players Anaheim should go after. You and I just differ in the paths we think Anaheim should take to get to the Stanley Cup playoffs and, I think, when.

I don't see a scenario where Buffalo makes the playoffs even with Silfverberg. They just aren't anywhere near the level of BOS, TB, TOR or even FLA & MTL. So I'm pretty confident they give us a 1st in the top 10. I will concede that the pick should probably not be lottery protected.

In any other draft, I could see your point for why the drafted player may not be as good as Silfverberg, but this draft is supposed to be the deepest draft since the 2003 draft. The top 7 are all almost locked in elite prospects, with special talents at the top with Lafreniere, Byfield & Raymond and the skill doesn't drastically go down up through till pick 16. So this year a 1st is a lot more valuable than others.

Honka had the second-highest xGF% on the Stars out of defensemen who played >300 minutes last season. He's playing in Finland because he didn't feel that he'd get the right amount of playing time in Dallas in relation to how well he was playing. Advanced stats are there because the eye test is regularly wrong (see Jack Johnson) and advanced stats catch what the eye test misses. Honka is a very good defenseman considering his age, pedigree and his trajectory.

Because moving him frees up ice-time for players like Guhle and Mahura and even Benoit who have shown more promise while getting lottery tickets in draft picks in one of the best deepest drafts since 2003. And with how good kids are these days and the Ducks' incredible drafting staff there's a good chance they could get a hit on one of those picks, maybe get a player like: Point, Arvidsson, Lebanc, Devon Toews, Cirelli, Terry, Simon etc. All these players were selected from rounds 3-7 and have better upside than Larsson, I'm not saying the Ducks for sure get a player like this, but it's better to take a chance to get one of these guys and let Mahura and Guhle have more ice time instead of wasting one of Mahura, Larsson or Guhle's development.

This isn't a full tank. They still have quality players in their primes/veterans who perform Rakell, Getzlaf, Ehlers, Kase, Ritchie, Fowler, Lindholm, Gudbranson and Gibson. And Honka and Weegar are 24 & 25. While Terry, Steel, Jones, Sprong will all be in their third years. The roster would be young but they wouldn't be inexperienced, 12 of the 20 man roster would be >25-years-old, the next 4 would have 2-3+ years of NHL experience each and then the next 4 would have 0-2 years NHL experience each.

The method I have put forward isn't a true tank. They're still keeping their best overall players in Getzlaf, Rakell, Lindholm, Fowler, Gibson and newly acquired Ehlers. They're just getting rid of the players who would become redundant in 2 years but have the most value now while the Ducks aren't able to contend. The Ducks need to make room for their youngsters and they shouldn't wait until their assets become deteriorated.

This would depend on Dale Tallon doing Dale Tallon things for sure. But Henrique is definitely a bonafide 2nd line center.

True Manson hasn't been as good since coming back from his injuries this year, but his resume speaks for itself and many would expect the numbers to regress back to his career average. On a Ducks team that hasn't been great since 2017 Manson has been great since joining the main club in 2015.

Well yeah, that's why our D line would be Weegar-Gud-Honka. The reason why people didn't sign Honka was because if they offer-sheeted him Dallas would've matched and made him play. And Dallas was asking for a 3rd at the time. And by the time the season got started teams already had their set rosters. Now Dallas must see that Honka is never playing for them again and they should just want to recoup some assets before his value deteriorates more. His numbers when he played last year were very good both offensively and defensively. Idk where people are getting the idea that he was bad defensively.

The reason why I didn't want a player for Larsson is that we don't want another player we need to protect in the expansion draft. Better to trust the Ducks' superb scouting staff by giving them more lottery tickets in the best draft selection since 2003.

I could also do a Larsson for Honka trade as it's quite possible that Rowney and MDZ aren't enough to get Honka. Then Rowney and Honka would be shipped elsewhere for a 6th and a 5th respectively.

Well, in addition to the obvious (Marino, Addison, Wilde, Brook), there are a variety of expansion-exempt defense prospects, including but not limited to Axel Andersson (Boston), Casey Fitzgerald (Buffalo), Chase Priskie (Carolina) and Johnny Kovacevic (Winnipeg), and I'd rather our superb scouting staff directed their attention to those players already in the developing stage rather than absolutely raw recruits.

Still not needed. Defensive is this teams worst issues and trading one of their better ones without getting one back doesn’t help them take the right steps forward. Henrique doesn’t do this team justice since trochek is cheaper and younger.

Ok, you can be confident all you want, but that doesn't remove the big risk associated with that deal.



Wasn't 2015 a really strong draft too? Even so, Zacha and Strome went top 10, Crouse not far behind at #11. None of those guys are as good as Silf. I wouldn't even say Meier is that much better than Silfverberg. The point is that the return really has to warrant the risk and that deal really doesn't do that. You're assuming everything goes right i.e. BUF miss the playoffs, the pick doesn't get screwed by the lottery draft, the player you draft is good and reaches his potential, the draft turns out to be as good as everyone else says, etc. It's a huge gamble.

I am not saying that Silf isn't movable, but that deal is terrible for us.



The NHL disagrees, but you clearly know more than them, right?



Who has said this? It's considered to be good draft, but we won't know if that's true until many years later.

Lol... such terrible logic. Better go and buy a $500,000 worth of lottery tickets in case you hit and win a million, right?

P.S. Players need to earn their play time. Larsson is only blocking Guhle and Mahura because they aren't beating him out of his spot. If they want that spot, they need to step up and take it, not have it gifted so we can have a few low chance tickets in the draft lottery.



How many have been to the SC finals or even the CFs? I count 3 players and one is coming up to retirement. Half the team have very limited NHL experience, let alone playoff experience. No chance you even go deep with them, let alone win the whole thing. Every team that has ever won the cup has had a mix of vets, youth and prime players. You just need to accept that.



You have no depth and are relying on inexperienced kids. You may not view this team as a tanking team, but it most certainly would be at the bottom of league, and for a number of years. I mean, Lundestrom as our #1C. Come on!

Yea there's risk, but it's not a very big risk, and worth that the payoff.

Not really a big gamble the only thing is that Buffalo misses the playoffs and is around 20th which isn't that much of a stretch at all. Picks 1-16 would all be worth Silfverberg on his current deal. 2015 was a great draft and this draft is supposed to be better than that one. Strome is nearly a point per game player since going to Chicago so i don't think he can be counted out, just a late bloomer. Zacha and Crouse are outliers, you look at picks 1-35 and it's littered with superstars and top 6/top 4 D players:

McDavid, Eichel, Strom, Marner, Hanifin, Provorov, Werenski, Meier, Rantanen, Debrusk, Barzal, Connor, Chabot, Boeser, Konecny, Beauvillier, Dermott, Aho.

And then there's a bunch of players in-between that haven't fully developed yet and look like they're going to be studs in: Gurianov, Eriksson-Ek, White, Samsonov, Roslovic, etc. not to mention a bunch below them who were drafted lower i.e.: Cernak, Cirelli, Sprong, Terry, Bracco, Carlo, Andersson, Gaudette, Nutivarra etc.

The point is that almost all of the players mentioned either exceed, are equal or will likely exceed or be equal to Silfverberg in value in a few years. And this is from the 2015 draft which is supposed to be less deep than 2020. When you consider how good the Ducks are at drafting, especially in the middle/lower end of the draft, it's imperative that they get as many lottery tickets as possible. In the 1st round of the 2015 draft 51% of the 1st 35 selections were elite/1st line/Top 4 D players, with 14% of them looking like they'll develop into that, 11% who are serviceable NHLers and 24% who look like they're either busts or late bloomers. Those are great odds, especially considering that a lot of those star players were drafted after pick 15: Barzal, Connor, Chabot, Boeser, Aho, etc.

I've looked further into the Honka holdout. Apparently, there are a lot of GMs who have asked about him according to Elliotte Friedman's last 31 thoughts article. The problem is that Dallas seems to recognize he is valuable so they're asking for more than GMs are willing to give. I would have to change my Honka proposal to Larsson for Honka probably. Then trade off Rowney and MDZ somewhere for a 5th and a 6th.

Also, the whole point of Armchair-GM is because we think NHL GMs are dumb a lot of the time. The argument that "GMs know better because they have their jobs for a reason" is one of the dumbest arguments out there. Chiarelli was GM for how long? Garth Snow was GM for how long? Jim Benning is still GM. Paul Fenton? It's an appeal to authority argument and is a logical fallacy for a reason.

Sam Consentino, Jeff Marek, Craig Button, CBC Sports, etc., lots of people have compared it to the 2003 draft depth. This makes sense because kids are getting better, hockey players are getting better, programs are getting deeper, so on.

It's not so much a lottery ticket as an investment in your scouting staff's stock. It's called utilizing your assets before they become depreciated. Right now Larsson has less upside than Guhle and Mahura and having three prospects who all play generally the same role limits the ice-time for all three of them. Better to move one of them (the least likely to improve being Larsson) out for an asset that won't restrict your other assets while not wasting the asset you have in Larsson.

Uh, Vegas went to the Cup Final in 2018, the only players on that squad that made it past the 2nd round before were Neal, Fleury, and Theodore. So you don't need SCF or CF experience to go far. Plus, Rakell, Getzlaf, Fowler, Lindholm, Gibson, and Ehlers all have CF experience. The main roster of the Chicago Blackhawks in 2010 when they won the Cup had an average age of 26.6, the average age of LA is 2012 when they won was 26.7, the average age of Pittsburgh when they won in 2009 was 26.6, the three "near dynasties" of the last decade started winning with teams that had average ages around 26.6. If the Ducks used this roster next season their average age would be 25.3, assume the Ducks have some random 28-year-old vet scratches instead of Morand & Drew and it becomes 25.9. No one is expecting the Ducks to contend for a Cup next year, but wait another year and their average age is 26.8. So yea, age is not a restriction that would hamper this team from winning, elite talent is, which is why they need to trade to get better draft selections to acquire that talent. Holtz, Drysdale and Zegras are all elite talents that would propel this team to contender status again, other prospects the Ducks could get in this scenario that are elite (Lafreniere, Byfield, Stutzle, Rossi, Perfetti, Raymond, Lundell) there's a group of about 9 elite prospects the Ducks could get and then there's a tier below of near-elites in: Barron, Holloway, Lapierre, Poirier, Guhle & Amirov.

The lines can be manipulated and changed, this is just a generalization of what the lines could look like. You can't look at the individual players for the lines, it's more about the trios. Rakell-Lundestrom-Ehlers = Fast, skilled, dominant, responsible. Comtois-Steel-Kase = Skilled, energetic, lots of shots. Ritchie-Getzlaf-Terry = Always have the puck, poise, skilled. Jones-Zegras-Sprong = Fun, fun, fun. The 1st line is reminiscent of Montreal's first line of Tatar-Daneault-Gallagher one of the best 1st lines in hockey despite Daneault and Tatar not being top-tier talents. The 2nd and 3rd line will alternate between ice-time amounts and the 4th line has so much skill and speed on it that it should be able to run circles around most bottom-6 lines.

You're looking at these young players like they won't improve at all from this year to next. I would be shocked if this roster didn't perform better than this year with all the improvements from the young players and additions of Weegar, Ehlers, and Honka. They would for sure be better than DET, OTT, NJ, NYR, LA, SJ, BUF & MIN, probably better than: CBJ, CHI & EDM, and probably competing with: WPG, FLA, VAN, CGY, NSH & PHI. So they'd likely be competing in that 13-20 ranking in the league which is a decent place to be when you're a young team and have players developing on your team with others like Drysdale, Zegras, Tracey & Holtz on the way.

I don't want to build a team that will be able to compete for a Cup in two-years, I want a team that will be able to contend for the playoffs by next year, compete for a Cup in three years, and be "dynasty-esque" for the next decade. Players like Henrique, Silfverberg, and Manson are all very good players, but they're expendable because they won't be in their primes in 3 years when the Ducks will want to compete, so might as well exchange them for assets that will be greatly beneficial for the Ducks' Cup contention throughout Gibson's contract.

Yea I figured Henrique would center the 3rd line because Trochek is their 2nd line center, but Henrique would be one of if not the top 3rd line center in the league. Also, because of the expensive contracts on the Panthers defense (Yandle, Ekblad, Matheson, Stralman) I figured next season they'd call up Brady Keeper who is a 23 RHD who looks pretty good, also Max Gildon should be coming up soon as well. With Weegar's expiring contract it seems like he's in for a raise I don't think FLA can afford on the backend right now.

We have capable third line forwards that are cheaper. They’ll resign weegar and dadonov keep hoffman as their own rental. They’re losing a couple contracts this off season so they’ll be able to keep weegar. His raise won’t be that much.

I don't see BUF taking this deal. They're building for the future, not just now, they have ZERO need to "dump" Bogosian, and it certainly wouldn't cost a 1st to do so. He's playing well in their top-4 when healthy and his contract expires next summer.

Buffalo currently holds the 9th overall pick (by points percentage), I don't see them selling the future for a long-shot playoff push this year. Your argument that an aging player who has never hit 50 points who is on a long term contract is worth MORE than a 9th overall pick in the upcoming draft doesn't hold water with me. Silfverberg is no doubt worth his $5.25M today, but I doubt he will be over the lifetime of that contract either.

Yea I suppose, but they'd just be tying up a lot of money in their defense cuz Weegar is going to be at least +3M.