Rasmus hasn't done much in los angeles to be worth Jacob Middleton who just resigned to 3 years extension and big body on d..dumba I agree

Haven't seen much of Dumba, but his he worth a 1st rounder? From what I see on Capfriendly, every Min post he is traded. I don't think a contending team bites for Dumba at this cost

Middleton is redundant for the current D. So either he has to go or Merrill has to go. We can’t block Hunt/O’Rourke/Lambos/Peart for forever.

I’d say he is worth a 1st. Minnesota needs to use his cap elsewhere on the roster (Boldy contract) and they might as well get value for him before he’s gone.

Merrill he sucks. Plus we all know Guerin loves his cheap players and big body players he trades for, and resigns.
Plus dean needs to be fired if we want young players to have a chance before their 2nd or 3 year. Duhaime has only played since rookie year because he can fight. Look at mason shaw: he should have been in NHL since at least last year, also connor dewar.

Kulak whose like a 8th dman got a 2nd and more from Edmonton last year. Ben chariot got a 1st. Desperate contenders will pay especially if Minnesota retains

He will be Edmonton's 2nd or 3rd best dman. Toronto's best dman or up there

Middleton isn't redundant, he's one of the few big boys we have on the back end. Merrill is much worse and should be gone long before Middleton.

Also - those kids are all at least a full year away. But realistically, it's a couple years.

The difference between Merrill and Middleton isn’t a lot. Middleton has youth on his side and Merrill is in a rough patch currently. Over the course of a season, they are very comparable.

Middleton is redundant with O’Rourke and Merrill IMO. Plus, Middleton would return the most out of that group.

Middleton is signed for 3 years at 2.45M and plays top pair with Spurgeon. Merrill is a 7th D and ROR is currently bottom pair in Iowa. These aren't 3 interchangeable pieces just because they're all tall and play a stay-at-home style.

Idk what team you're watching if you think Middleton is the same as those other two and should be moved for an AHL tweener in Kupari.

Do you actually think Middleton is a top pair level defender?

No, but he's a heck of a lot closer to one than Merrill and ROR are. The point is that they're not interchangeable - not that Midds is a bona fide top pair player.

Their play style is the redundant part. I already said that Middleton was the best of the bunch, which means he would also return the most of the bunch.

He might be closer, but I don't think it's "a heck of a lot" closer. He's still just a bottom pairing guy. And last I checked, Brodin is the top pairing guy, so Middleton is playing with Spurgeon on the second pair.

Well if the elevated return is Rasmus Kupari, I'm not sure how that's a meaningful point at all.

At that return, you're basically dumping him for a chip and a chair, which I have no interest in.

I guess it depends on how you define close. If you go off the analytics, Middleton is outperforming Merrill by a statistically significant margin. I don't put much stock into that, since he's playing with Spurgeon and there's a lot of flaws with the NHL event data, but there are metrics that show them as being quite far apart in performance.

As for top pair...sure I guess. Last I checked, Brodin hasn't been playing, but I get the point. I'm not here to argue Middleton is top pair over Brodin.

Does it matter how I define close if we're talking about two bottom pair defensemen? They're both third pair guys. If one is better is better than the other, it's going to be a minimal impact on the game as a whole. Honestly I don't really care which one gets traded, except that Middleton earns twice as much money as Merrill. And I'm sure Guerin and Evason both prefer Middleton to Merrill, but in the end, they're both still third pair players, and neither of them have much of a significant impact on the games outcome each night.

TBF, Duhaime only got a chance last year because Boldy got injured during the preseason. The roster decisions are (mostly) on the GM, not the coach.

Dewar and Shaw being in the AHL/NHL isn't a hill I'd be willing to die on. They are just fringe players; the same as Steel, Pitlick, Petan, Rask, Jost, etc. that MN has gone though in the last couple of seasons. They would be afterthoughts if Fiala and Sturm had re-signed and Rossi did good things.

What exactly do you expect for a #4/#5 D?

They're not both bottom pair, though - one of them has to play in the top 4 with our current roster construction. So the difference gets magnified by way of the minutes and situations that one of them has to be in.

If we had 2 clear LD above them, then no I don't think it would really matter at all. You'd be splitting hairs over which 3rd pair guy is better, so I agree on that.

It's not about what I expect. You're arguing that Middleton should be the one to go, because he'd return more value. But the "more value" is so low, that it's not an important point. It's a completely insignificant difference in trade value between the two. So I would prefer to keep the better player.

Yeah he's "second pair" in the way that Sam Steel, Nic Petan and Freddy Gaudreau are "top six".

It doesn't mean much, other than our roster sucks.

Here’s the way I look at it: I’d rather have Kupari next to Boldy than Middleton next to Spurgeon.

Agree to disagree there I guess. Kupari is just another version of Jost. He’s not even in the NHL right now.

That is a remarkably bad comparison. Well done.

Lol no need to get salty. Kupari is a wannabe top 6 guy who can’t produce, same as Jost. Look at their stats and metrics. Just cuz Kupari is bigger doesn’t mean anything. He doesn’t play particularly hard and is yet another one of many tweeners that every team has.

tbh at this point, I’m starting to think you originally confused Vilardi with Kupari and are too far down to retract it…Kupari is literally playing in the AHL, what on earth makes you think he can step in and be effective with Boldy lol?