Supplied — Ines Hegedus GarciaOne of the most difficult things about making transactions in the NHL, whether it’s through trade, free agency, or the draft, is trying to figure out how a player’s game will translate to a new situation.
That’s the dilemma general managers are facing when the deadline rolls around. It’s one thing to be willing to sacrifice assets like draft picks and prospects, the main form of currency used in a salary cap world, but it’s another to find a deal for the right player and be confident enough to pull the trigger.
First round draft picks and prospects are treated like gold — and they should be. With a tight salary cap ceiling keeping teams in check and forcing them to be shrewd with the way they spend money, nothing is more valuable than a player one a cheap, rookie deal. An NHL player can’t hit the open free agent market until they’re 27 years old, or until they have seven years of service time in the league. So when you’re giving up a draft pick, it may seem like you’re just trading away a magic bean, or something that might be, but you’re actually gambling away some of the most important building blocks to your team’s long-term success.
What am I getting at? Draft picks and prospects aren’t just chips to throw around at the poker table, they have a tremendous amount of value to a team’s long-term success. So when a general manager is going to make a deal, especially one that involves a high draft pick, they better get it right.
Lats year, the Washington Capitals spent a second and a third round pick on Curtis Glencross, which ended up being a pretty big flop for them considering the hefty price tag he had. With Glencross, this is something the Caps could have seen coming. His possession numbers dropped mightily as he aged, meaning, when he was on the ice, the other team ate the Flames alive in terms of generating shot attempts. So it shouldn’t really have been all that big of a surprise when Glencross didn’t mesh in Washington, and he scored just four goals in 18 regular season games, and one goal in the playoffs.
So, did anybody make a big mistake this year? Are there going to be players who aren’t worth the valuable assets that teams gave up for them?
The Dallas Stars gave up a decent young defenceman, a second round pick, and a prospect for Kris Russell, a tremendously overrated defenceman playing for the Flames. That’s a massive price to pay for a player, so he better damn well be worth it.
The Stars have trouble on defence, as we know, but Russell won’t be a solution to that problem. He has the worst relative possession numbers of any defenceman on the Flames, and as a result, when he’s on the ice, the other team generates a whole bunch of high danger scoring chances. The general sentiment is that he’s a valuable player because he can munch minutes and he blocks a lot of shots. Well, anybody can play heavy minutes if their coach asks them to, and the reason he’s blocking shots all the time is because he’s always in his own zone, which is indicated by his poor possession numbers.
Trade deadline blunders tend to happen when a team becomes enamoured with the idea of getting a hard-nosed, gritty guy who can be regarded by traditional knowledge as a “true hockey player.” Obviously you can’t quantify everything, like leadership and the value of being a great person in the dressing room, but you can measure the extent in which players are helping their team generate chances, and in contrast, the extent in which they’re limiting their opponent’s ability to do the same.
If your team dealt high draft picks away for a player who brings his former team’s possession numbers down like a boat anchor, then you’re quickly going to realize that the deal wasn’t worthwhile.
