IMO, championship winning teams are built through the draft.

I also think you are less likely to get fleeced in a trade if you're not giving up a 1st round pick.



Looking at Ottawa, I feel that Pierre Dorion has a tendency to trade away a really high 1st round pick for the biggest name on the market.

Duchene, DeBrincat, Chychrun, etc.

A big part of me thinks that it needs to stop.



What are some teams that prohibit their GMs from trading 1st round picks?

I curious if there are any.

Let me know your thoughts.

Avs very rarely trade their 1st round picks - have only traded one since Sakic took over in 2013 (sent 2022 1st in a package for Kuemper). They do often trade the prospects they drafted in the 1st round though

I disagree about not building a team through trades though. You definitely need the draft to get your core but once you have that trades are the best way to add to the team. Avs cup team had tons of players acquired by trade:

E Johnson
Girard
Burakovsky
Kadri
Toews
Kuemper
Compher
Manson
Lehkonen
Sturm
Cogliano

OTT has their core already and if they can get good value in a trade for someone with term they should go for it to fill out the rest of the roster

Of the players you listed, I would guess at least half of them were offered to Sakic by their former teams with a price tag of at least one 1st.

And that Sakic time and time again showed tremendous discipline while resisting the urge to cough up a first.

Kudos to him.

We need someone like that in Ottawa



I will say that teams should indeed build themselves up by trading and adding pieces.

And that any draft pick and any asset should be on the table.

As long as it's not an unused first round pick.

IMO, in a cap league, teams almost always have to be successful in the draft. If their draftees become NHLers as ELCs....well that's excellent value and helps the cap. Keep your ELCs and good chance you can sign them to long term contracts, cheaper than would you would pay for similar on ice value UFAs.

You mentioned the Avs above.....but they needed McKinnon on his cheap 6.5m second contract .

One problem the Maple Leafs have is few cost efficient ELCs or their on RFAs. Every year it's scramble to find cheap aging UFAs.

I'm not sure that they're prohibited from trading 1sts but in Nill's 10 year tenure as Stars GM he's only traded a 1st once and that was for a 22 year old. I think that's worked well for them given how valuable ELCs are in a tight cap world.