Yes it is rare that these castoffs become nhl players but that's not the argument. The argument is I don't think there is much of a difference by getting castoffs vs a pick from 2nd to 7th. Yes there are a players waive all the time but I am not counting the Grenier because they had never upside to begin with. I am stretching back because a trade is a different from a draft. From a draft there are 180 picks from round 2 to 7. 186 now. Trades there about 20 to 30 a year and not all of them are casts off trades. Also lot of players they don't stick around in the nhl organization for a long time and decide to go to Europe insteqd
There are more I thought of Stralman, Grabner, Sharp, B Clark, Kunitz, Muzzin, W Kalrsson, Haula, Schutz, Steen, Teravainen, Marchestsault, J Blake, Knuble,
Benning had 23 picks from round 2 to round 7 in the last 4 years. So if one of them become a a top 6 F/top 4 D. That means 4% our of all those pucks became top 6 f/top 4 D.
I randomly pulled up 2010 drafts from round 2 to round 7. I only saw 6 legit top 4 F/top 4 D. Fraulk, Toffoli, Zucker, Gallagher, Klingberg, Stone, that draft was about 3% chance.
Very hard you to convince me a castsoff doesn't have a 3% chance to become a top 6 F/top 4. I listed 20 examples already
Some drafts may harder but it won't be higher by that much.
Well part of the problem is you’re using rounds 2-7 interchangeably when there is a huge difference between round 2 and round 7. I’d suggest limiting it to rounds 2-5 since 6ths and 7ths are not really the complaint here and most of Benning’s trades have either involved giving up a pick in this range (Vey, Pedan, Pouliot, Baertschi) or acquiring reclamation’s in lieu of picks in this range (Goldobin, Motte, Leipsic). The bottom two rounds aren’t really a factor.