Gosh darn

Lots going on here, but Arizona wouldn’t take up two of their retention slots for that long of term. If they did it’d probably cost quite a bit more than that.

No team is going to make this many moves at the deadline.

For a team that has less than $3,000,000 in cap space, No team is going to make that many moves when a vast majority of buyers are up against the cap.

If all we are offered for Adam Henrique with 50% retention is Niemela and two thirds, we'll just have to hang onto him for another season. After all, he leads our team in goal scoring and is our best and most reliable faceoff man, in addition to being a key penalty killer, and has another year left on his contract.

Nice of all six teams dealing with you to retain, by the way.

I really don't see the strategic sense of trading several years of Rasmus Sandin for 30 games (plus one playoff season) of Vladi Gavrikov. On October 1, you might have neither (and Justin Holl, too).

I don’t think we part ways with Rico unless there’s a 1st attached

If you want that offer to get you a retained Henrique, come back next season when he is a rental.

1st or no Gavrikov. We're not doing a Sandin exchange because Sandin doesn't have the skillset or experience we need, and adding wingers makes your package less attractive to Columbus.

Pretty sure the Jackets would do Gavrikov for Sandin 1-1 and wouldn’t hesitate. Sandin would be Columbus’s what, 2nd best dman after this deal? At 22 years old.. seems like a no brainer to me. Why would you prefer a late 1st round pick that needs 2-3 years to develop over a young player you already know can play well in the NHL. Who also happened to be a late first round pick..

I repeat: Sandin doesn't have the skillset or the experience we need, and so is not suitable as a return.

If Gavrikov isn't traded he could likely walk away as a UFA unless he wants to be a part of rebuild at this point in his career which I think would be unlikely.
With Sandin you have a RFA still controlled that can grow with the rebuild and be a top 4 D-man. He's already a better passer than Gav although Gav is better defensively which is the Leafs need right now.
Seems like a fair hockey deal

You can stop right there. You're attempting to argue as though this is the only offer we'll get and therefore we have to take it. That's nonsense and everyone knows it. The Leafs are not the only team interested in him.

Oh there will be other offers and he will be moved forsure. Highly doubt Sandin will be offered for him as he holds more value than a rental on D imo. But if you insist that he wouldn’t fit the Blue Jackets team that’s fine. I’m just curious what “skillset” or “experience” it is that he doesn’t fit? A young puck moving dman that actually throws the body a bit, seems like that type of player would fit most rebuilding teams no?

The Jackets are in a weird place right now when it comes to defense. Almost the entire top of the prospect pool is defensemen, many of whom are high-end prospects (Jiricek and Ceuelemans at RD, Mateychuk and Svozil at LD), but the actual NHL team D is total garbo. What the team needs is either a Gavrikov, already an established defenseman in his later 20s who is not a work in progress, or a pure prospect or a pick. Sandin falls somewhere in between that. Speaking as a Jackets fan, he's a player I'd love to get for the team, but not in a Gavrikov trade, if that makes sense? Trading Gavrikov is an opportunity to bring in a late first round pick or a higher end prospect who'd be in the same age bracket as the Ceulemans, Mateychuks, etc. Sandin is good, but he isn't that, and using Gavrikov to acquire Sandin feels like a high opportunity cost vs what they could get. I can't speak for what Viqsi means on skillset about Sandin, though.

Don't know if it's already been said, but there's no way in hell Arizona is retaining on either of those contracts for that return. That's 5M for three years and 2M for the fourth year. Value of the return doesn't even cover the players you're getting.

In terms of skillset, I think we badly need more pure shutdown types and that's not really Sandin's thing. He's competent but not exceptional at that part of the job.