Four Years of Yzerman:
- Focuses on drafting young, exciting talent with accumulated draft capital
- Patiently lets talent develop in SHL, AHL, ECHL, etc.
- Brings talent on to team that is ready to be significant contributor in the role in which they were drafted for otherwise positions them in another league for them to develop
- Supports young players with middle of the road veterans so they don't get eaten alive and destroyed
- Trades away veterans for more draft capital when they are either at the end of their contract, want to resign for more than assessed role/age/skill (
- Repeats process, building larger core of talent
I don't know what is frustrating or confusing about this process in the least and why we need to constantly re-litigate it every offseason. Copp and Chariot have been perfectly fine.
In no way do their contracts hurt us in any conceivable way.
No, they do not suck but they aren't going to be in their roles when we are competing and our contending window is open so it doesn't really matter.
We do not have viable prospects who are better than them to take their spots on the team.
They are there to serve a role, provide some veteran leadership and support to a team of young players and prospects while they find their footing, and will be sent off for picks and prospects when the time is right or not resigned.
This is exactly the same as: Leddy, Ryan, Namesnikov, Ganger, Biega, Filppula, Nemeth, Staal, Stecher, Merrill, etc. etc. As it will be with Perron, etc.
Sometimes the guy sticks around for a little while longer (Mattaa, Erne) or they recover some of their discounted value and breakout a bit (Fabbri, Walman) or they are inbetween (Suter, Kubalik).
To continue to belabor this point that "Copp and Chiarot are terrible and their contracts are horrible" etc. etc. is just insanity. Neither have been terrible, I'd argue Copp has been as good as advertised and still has room to improve above the 2022 price market contemporaries (Trochek, Strome, Kadri, etc.) and Chiarot, despite everyone hating him is still very tradable. Why? He plays both sides, is a veteran D, at a perfectly fine contract, his stats and point totals are in line, and literally 14 months ago was traded for a 1st, 4th, and a prospect in a highly contentious bidding war for him the TDL, after making a serious run as a Top Pair with Petry to the Cup finals with MTL, and playing fine for FLA in a Top 4 role in their early flame out.
In their prime Defenseman with playoff experience who can contribute offensively (despite making repeated boneheaded mistakes) always have value. The reason we haven't moved him is because we need him right now because our D core looks pretty bleak without him, just like it did after we moved Leddy despite everyone hating him to. Also a guy you'd think had zero value with how much hate he got at the end, who had less points than Chiarot and still netted us 2nd, Walman (who we all love), and Sunny. Edit: A comparable to this? McCabe and Lafferty being moved to TOR, for multiple picks including a 1st, McCabe being the centerpiece and comparable to Chiarot at north of 4M (2M retained by CHI) for two more years, and being a veteran 33 year old D, who plays both side, yadda yadda.
We could move both Copp and Chiarot tomorrow and end up with picks and prospects.
These are not bad players and they are not bad contracts and both of them are playing important roles for the growth of our team, roles we've seen multiple players hold for the last
four years while our core grows into their own.