There's not a chance in hell that a 31 year old (1 year from UFA) that has never scored over 20 goals in his career was the target in the trade.
We can't rule it out. Breaking this down...
Facts
- Calgary was 2nd in the league at the end of February, which is where they ended up finishing as well.
- As such, even at the time of the trade Calgary's 1st likely to be around #26 at best.
Well-founded rumors
- The deal was Zucker for Frolik and "a high pick"
- The deal was largely agreed upon and fell through for unknown reasons
That leaves us with three possibilities.
1.) Fenton saw the pick as the main piece in the deal and Frolik was a throw-in to balance the cap and roster spot (and spare Treliving from having Walsh roast him on Twitter over Frolik's usage). This means that Fenton saw Zucker for the "high pick" as being a fair deal, and that pick sure as hell have been a 1st.
2.) Fenton saw both Frolik and the pick (1st or 2nd) as adding value to the deal. Frolik plays the RW, kills penalties, and is at least a serviceable 3rd line guy. Maybe he wasn't lying today when he said he saw Fiala as a natural RW and thought adding another RW that could pull the tougher defensive shifts while the young guys got the easier ones made sense.
3.) Fenton saw Frolik as the main piece and the pick (likely a 2nd, in this sceenario) as a sweetener. This again assumes that he saw Frolik as some kind of PK'ing RW that could take harder defensive minutes blahblahblah. Sound dumb? Well it's roughly the same justification we've gotten for the Nino trade: better fit positionally, some hope he bounces back with a change of scenery, etc.
The assumption seems to be that 3 or even 2 can't possibly be true, but it's absolutely no worse than a trade he's already made and relies on essentially the same rationale.