We need to draft better than that or the offer sheets aren’t gonna matter... so I’d stop using that as the baseline.
Guess it feels a little self-defeating or like we should ideally have more faith in our drafting to me.
I want to be drafting players we wouldn’t want to give up as opposed to would... know what I mean?
I wasn't saying so much that I would want to give them up... but that you are asking a lot to have even four 1st round picks give you what you'd land if you signed Auston Matthews. There is a very high likelihood that he's worth what all four of them would be. And that's not even anticipating bad drafting.
I guess it was more used as a barometer that what draft picks actually turn into on average are far less than what you think. And if the options are 100% landing a generational talent by paying a lot of money and 4 1st rounders or rolling the dice and hoping that you get the same or more value out of those four firsts, I go with the lock.
Think of it like this. The game show deal or no deal. You can either have four cases of your choice or pay 250,000 and be guaranteed the $1M case. What is the likelihood that the four cases you have equal or surpass 750,000 in value?
And again, the Wings have been getting a bunch of extra picks and have several rental type pieces that could land more. They actually have reasonably priced guys and have in multiple TDLs that could feasibly draw a high second or low first. I'd only consider an offersheet as part of a gigantic plan to supplement my draft stock before I do it, so I'm not left without draft picks, and for a guy at the level of an Auston Matthews. So, yeah, it's a very conditional thing, but I don't think that it's belittling your draft record to do it in that case.
Doing it for a Jacob Trouba type (4 1sts level) is lunacy. But draft picks are kinda Schrodinger's assets. They're always worth way more than they're truly worth (prior to the draft) and WAY less than they were (after the draft)