Joined: Jul. 2021
Posts: 1,052
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Cap dump for Vegas so they can bring back one of the players they have on LTIR before the end of the regular season. I’m sure this was part of the plan when they traded for Eichel. Presumably whoever it is they’re bringing back from LTIR is better than Dadonov, so it’s a bit like trading a 2nd for a rental, except that the rental is somebody they already have but couldn’t activate without this trade. They don’t want to wait until the playoffs to get him off LTIR because it’s no longer a given that they’ll make the playoffs if they don’t ice their best lineup.
Dadonov was better in Vegas than he was in Ottawa, but still not as good as he was in Florida. Still a useful NHL player though, and the cap hit won’t hurt Anaheim, so very little risk for them to take him on.
I don’t know how the hot potato John Moore fits into this. He’s going to cut into that cap space that Vegas just freed up, so unless they think he’s an upgrade over one of their existing NHL defensemen, I don’t know why he was included. Anaheim has lots of cap space and you’d think they would have been able to get more if they’d kept him.