No one is giving Toronto that package regardless of what someone seems his value to be. How does giving up Vlasic and Meier/Hertl make the Sharks better? Good GMs aren’t in the business of actively making their team significantly worse just to get 1 good player. Marner is good, but he’s not good enough to part with a bonafide top pairing D-Man, top prospect, and another young first line player that’s already a 30+ goal scorer. That’s absolutely asinine.
This isn’t NHL19. Trades have to be mutually beneficial and gutting your NHL roster and prospect pool for one player doesn’t happen. You’re never going to get full perceived value when you’re trading an elite player because no other team is going to cave to that asking price. You can set the market at whatever you want, but when teams know you can’t afford said player, you become a price taker and the rest of the league sets the market (see EK65 last year where Dallas refused to include Heiskanen) and says this is the final offer from all of us so deal with it and pick your poison.
A couple of things I disagree with in this post.
1) The value you assigned the assets in the deal. Meier is a decent top line forward that put up 65 points in a career year. Marner put up those point totals for two years before exploding for 95 points this year, so he is a superstar top line forward. Meier had better possession #s this year but Marner had even better possession #s last year while putting up the same # of points (although Marner did have easier deployment that year). So while Meier is a better possession player, Marner blows him out of the water production-wise. Calling Merkley a top prospect is also generous unless you mean purely San Jose's top prospect, which doesn't mean much...he's high risk, reward (ie good chance of being great 2nd pairing puck mover and PPQB or a bust with both work ethic and character concerns, so we'll see how that plays out). And Vlasic is in no way, shape, or form a bonafide top-pairing D. He's 32 years old, on a pretty much guaranteed albatross contract in a few years, somewhat injury-prone, and coming off 2-3 years of continuous decline until one good playoff run playing alongside Burns, who was amazing. Those shifts where Vlasic was reunited with Braun and struggled really badly indicated that Burns played a huge role in that pairing succeeding. Vlasic was good too, but I don't think that playoff performance erases his age, contract, constant decline the past 3 years, and injury history.
2) Not sure where this idea that Toronto can't sign Marner comes from. They will pay dearly to get Marleau and Zaitsev (lucky that he requested out) off the books, but they can do it, and then they should have no problem signing Marner.
They aren't getting Meier in a package. I just don't see it. Meier has the problem of being worth more to the Sharks than in trade. Sharks would view meier + braun and a couple picks as the most they would want to part with. I get that to the league Meier isn't worth as much as Marner but to the Sharks and their roster construction he's almost priceless. Also the Sharks aren't giving up a 1st line winger and a 1st pair defenseman for a guy who at that point the leafs can't afford and won't resign. The leafs will need multiple pieces back that fit under the cap and make them better. And they NEED D-men. 2 roster players that can contribute and prospects and picks. In the end I think it's Nylander that draws the short straw and honestly he probably needs the change of scenery more than anyone. Leafs will likely need to entice a team to take on his $7mil per. This is the type of deal DW could take advantage of. But this will mean the leafs are ****ed from here on out with their salary distribution... Matthews, Marner & Tavares all sucking down more than $30mil. That's a team with first round exit written all over it for the next decade.
The Meier value to the Sharks argument I understand, but given their performance the past 3 years, I would take Marner any day of the week and twice on Sunday. Your argument about Toronto's needs in the trade is totally valid, and I wasn't the one suggesting that trade. The post I quoted proposed that deal with a + and I said that given the first 2 assets listed (Vlasic + Merkley), the + would have to be Meier. However, I totally agree with your point that there is no reason for Toronto to make that deal given the $$$ coming back with Vlasic's contract.
