If the Senators win the draft lottery and get the 2nd or 3rd overall pick, they can draft a centre like Fantilli who could reasonably jump into the top 9 right away.

Alex Debrincat is almost certainly going to be traded due to the salary cap, and his probable unwillingness to extend.

Shane Pinto is a 10.2(c) free agent. This means that he has no leverage in any negotiation with his rights holder because he has not accrued the experience required to sign an offer sheet. The Rangers could likely sign Pinto to a cheap 2 year bridge deal in the 2M range. This will not be possible with Lafreniere.

Pinto is only a year older than Lafreniere. He had 20 goals last year. He plays the more valuable position.

Lafreniere has the higher ceiling, plays the less valuable position, and will cost more to extend. He is also possibly an offer sheet risk since a team can take the same approach as Carolina did with Kotkaniemi by overpaying Lafreniere in the short term to exploit the Rangers cap situation and acquire him for a late 1st+late 3rd.

Maybe throw Boucher into the trade for a late round pick or something if the Rangers still like him. He's done, and is a bust, but the Rangers loved him at one point.

That helps both teams politically. Ottawa washes their hands of the Boucher pick, their fans can feel like they got value for him because they don't know it was Boucher for a 4th rounder. They think it was Boucher+Pinto for Lafreniere+4th rounder. As far as the Rangers go, their fans don't have to know it was Boucher for the 4th, they can present it like they got two top young pieces for Lafreniere and it wasn't just Lafreniere for Pinto 1 for 1.

The Rangers will not trade Lafreniere for Pinto. Draft position alone 1st OA vs a 2nd round pick is enough to kill that idea before it starts.

When Ottawa lands Fantilli, it makes way more sense for Ottawa to have him start as the 2LW. I'm a big fan and think that he's gonna be top 6 ready day one, so I think he'll be wasted as a 3C. If anything, being able to replace DeBrincat's roster spot with a 3 year ELC gives Ottawa even MORE reason to keep Pinto. They'll have so much more cap breathing room and they'll be able to build a 3rd line for Pinto to thrive on. Would be a huge game changer for Ottawa's competitive window.

What? They were drafted 3-4 years ago.

If you're not familiar with the players, Lafreniere was taken in 2020, Pinto in 2019. We're not talking about picks in the upcoming draft.

You can't just stick to draft position 3-4 years after a draft. Players rise and fall dramatically in a year before or after a draft, let alone 3-4. It's why we see players who were selected in the top 10 traded for 2nd or 3rd round picks at the end of their ELCs, or traded for absolutely nothing as they approach arbitration RFA years.

This is a fair point, that if they land a 1C they may want to start him on the wing to ease the transition into the NHL.

Ottawa also may not have much cap space if they go after a top end goalie. So the ability to exploit Pinto's 10.2(c) status and get him signed either to a 1 year deal at his QO, or to a 2 year deal at 2M or so is a huge point of value compared to a player like Lafreniere, who will require a lot more than that to re-sign.

Spending the #7 overall pick + a second + a third on one subpar season from Alex DeBrincat is pretty wasteful.

When was the last time a GM in the history of the NHL was as wasteful of high first round picks as Pierre Dorion??



As for swapping Pinto for Lafreniere when we draft Fantilli, Rangers say no because they already have Zibanejad, Trocheck, Chytil and Goodrow for centre depth.

no Fantilli for OTT.

Complete nonsense. Teams simply do not trade 21 year old players who were taken 1st OA for a player like Pinto. Pinto is a year older has played less than half as many games due to injury and scored fewer points this year (the first time he managed to play a full 82 games) too. Lafreniere not only still has far more upside potential he's been the better player to date too.

Hey, at least they will get a decent player at 12!

You're back peddling.

Your originally post was "Draft position alone 1st OA vs a 2nd round pick is enough to kill that idea before it starts."

That's an absurd idea, that teams aren't going to look at the asset as they are 3-4 years after they were drafted. There are enough trades that happen in both directions (players drafted high 3-4 years earlier sold off for mid picks/players drafted low who have high values 3-4 years later) that it's pretty easy to disprove your criticism.

I'm not backpedaling. It's your problem if you can't understand the short version and need everything expanded and explained in great detail. Quite frankly it's a waste of time explaining anything to you since you'll just post another wall of text full of absurd rationalizations, jump to illogical conclusions and outright make things up just like you always do when trying to justify yet another of your homer trades.