Quoting: BuFfaLOFaN
Except you don't know what it's like to trade good players lol. No one of Eichels value has been traded in a long time.
I think you are way overvaluing Eichel honestly. Yes, he’s considered a top young player and is paid as such (problem for the Sabres in trade value), but he’s definitely not a major value on the intangibles side and I’d be wary making him the centerpiece of your franchise, which is the value return you are expecting.
The Sabres have never had a winning season in his 5 years with the team and his line mates seem to regress playing with him instead of him elevating guys. He also isn’t known for doing the gritty little things on the boards and defensively to make plays, which when you combine the above to me suggests he’s not a leader and is perhaps just a skill guy. Then take into account that he’s not even a point per game player and I really start to question his value. Perhaps you can take a risk by thinking his talent is being hindered by the Sabres organization, but he was also like this at BU on loaded teams that came up short when the chips were down. Some team might take that risk still and the 10 million salary, but the big whopper is that he also has major durability concerns as well and wants out of the organization so that is going to limit his value to everyone but Sabres fans.
Lucky for you the Rangers are stupid enough to still trade for him and overpay because of james Dolan and maybe Drury/Quinn BU connections , but outside of maybe swapping Kratsov for buchnevich this is the best deal you will probably get in terms of multiple assets, unless you want to start taking about Zib with one to two more assets included and I doubt the Rangers go that direction.
He’s a the best player your organization has seen in a while and I get the attachment and frustration, but he’s definitely not on a level of McDavid, McKinnon, Mathews, Young Crosby, or even Barkov or you wouldn’t be in this place even with ****ty management. You could also validly argue that Gretzky didn’t fetch this big of a return when he was traded to the Kings since McSorely was also involved, but I agree that it’s not an apples to apples comparison.