Brutal trades that later turned out good.

[Kyle McMahon]

Stuart was gone the next season and Sturm is a reliable 25 goal scorer when healthy. The Bruins are leaning on keen drafting (Lucic, Krejci, etc) and more importantly free agents (Chara and Savard.)

Getting the return they did on Thornton was horrendous, and the deal is the classic case of an old man (Sinden) scapegoating his team's problems through a 25/26 year old player.

That's the point I'm making. If the Bruins keep Thornton, they probably don't end up with Chara or Savard. They were starting to spin their wheels with Joe, who was already building up his reputation as a player who didn't deliver when the chips were down. The franchise seems headed in a much better direction without him as the centerpiece. The return was completely awful, but the premise of sending Joe packing and going in a new direction, was not. I'm hardly saying this was a good trade, but it's definitely not as bad as it seemed in 2006 given the final outcome.

 

[Briere Up There*]

That's the point I'm making. If the Bruins keep Thornton, they probably don't end up with Chara or Savard. They were starting to spin their wheels with Joe, who was already building up his reputation as a player who didn't deliver when the chips were down. The franchise seems headed in a much better direction without him as the centerpiece. The return was completely awful, but the premise of sending Joe packing and going in a new direction, was not. I'm hardly saying this was a good trade, but it's definitely not as bad as it seemed in 2006 given the final outcome.

I agree but I don't think that's the premise of this thread. Marco Sturm didn't score 30 and Brad Stuart isn't a number one or even two defenseman. It was a bad trade, a terrible return for a player of Thornton's caliber.

And if anyone actually thinks trading Jumbo was a pure O'Connell decision, I've got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. It was an organization decision and while moving away from Joe helped the Bruins in the long run (though really who knows how the team would've turned out with him, it's not like Chara is a playoff warrior or anything,) the trade was a debacle and harmed their image in the city and forced Jacobs to throw down some money for free agents worth a hoot. He also finally released Sinden's grip on management.

 

[S E P H]

More currently, but I would say Wolski and Mueller. We traded away our leading scorer at the time for a washed up player in Mueller who turned it around in Colorado at the same time Wolski helped Phoenix with primary scoring in the playoffs.

 

[EventHorizon]

Park and Ratelle for Esposito and Vadnais turned out awful for the Rangers, but Esposito went on to become gm of the Rangers and draft Leetch (arguably the single most important pick in Rangers history).

Leetch was a Craig Patrick draft pick. In fact they interviewed Patrick and Leetch about it between periods of the Rangers' home opener this year. Leetch was the #1 guy on the Rangers list and Patrick was thrilled that he was still available at #9. A month later Patrick was gone and Trader Phil was in. Really makes you wonder what might have been if Patrick was left in charge.

 

[Zil]

Leetch was a Craig Patrick draft pick. In fact they interviewed Patrick and Leetch about it between periods of the Rangers' home opener this year. Leetch was the #1 guy on the Rangers list and Patrick was thrilled that he was still available at #9. A month later Patrick was gone and Trader Phil was in. Really makes you wonder what might have been if Patrick was left in charge.

Really? That makes that trade doubly awful then.

 

[arrbez]

Howabout the Joe Thornton trade? Brutal that Boston got such miniscule return, but they're better off with the core they have in place now than with one centered around Thornton.

Sir, I strongly disagree.

So addition by subtraction > addition by addition?

Maybe Thornton wasn't the answer in Boston...but they got a garbage return for him. Marco Sturm is a consistent goal scorer. Stuart is a good D. Primeau is a dime-a-dozen bottom 6 guy. On the other side, only Alexander Ovechkin has more points than Joe Thornton since the lockout.

It's not bad that they traded him. It's bad that they didn't go to every GM and see what they could get. At the time of the trade, Joe Thornton was a 6'5 230lb centre, two years removed from a 100 point season in the dead puck era, and scoring at a 115+ point pace in his 23 games with Boston prior to the trade.

Even if all they wanted was to clear cap space or shake up the dressing room, they sure as hell could have gotten more. They may be better off with their core now, but the Joe Thornton trade did nothing to help that core (unless you conside Sturm a core guy). They could have gotten a blue chip prospect or a high first-rounder and still signed Chara and Savard, etc. That was a classic quantity for quality trade, and terrible asset management.

 

[Nalyd Psycho]

This isn't a blockbuster deal, but it sticks out in my mind:

4th overall pick in 2002 (Joni Pitkanen) for Ruslan Fedotenko and 2 2nd round picks (which turned out to be also-rans in Tobias Stephan and Dan Spang).

Everyone thought Tampa should have kept the 4th overall pick, as Pitkanen was the consensus 4th best player and seen as a potential #1 defenseman, which is what most felt Tampa needed at the time.

But then Fedotenko goes ahead and scores the Stanley Cup-winning goal after a monster 2004 playoff season.

I'd say Feaster knew what he was doing, but to this day I am really not sure. I think that may have been blind luck.

Another one like that was Tony Amonte for Stéphane Matteau and Brian Noonan. Amonte was having a rough year, but, he was a 23 year old with two 30+ goal seasons under his belt. Matteau and Noonan were never more than solid but unspectacular 3rd liners. Both of them went on to have clutch post seasons as New York went on to win the cup.

Not that the Hawk's made out bad on the trade...

 

[arrbez]

The Brad Boyes trade looked this way for a year or two.

At first we were all like "lol, Denis Wideman?"

And then we were all like "actually...Wideman is pretty good"

And now we're all like "Wideman...meh"

 

[Briere Up There*]

Think everyone in St. Louis did the same thing for Boyes. Forty goal season followed up by thirty then just an awful season.

 

[Kyle McMahon]

Sir, I strongly disagree.

So addition by subtraction > addition by addition?

No, not at all. But that this trade can now be viewed as addition by subtraction (not everyone will agree on that point, however) is leaps and bounds ahead of how it was viewed at the time it was made.

 

[BlueSinceBirth]

I remember Leafs fans on these boards insisting that they had fleeced the Blues when Carlo Colaiacovo and Alex Steen were dealt for Lee Stempniak.

This one went either way at the time. I liked Stempniak but knew we were selling him high. Stemps is still a solid secondary scorer but I will take Steen any day over him and thats not even counting Colaiacovo. I dont blame the Leafs for making the deal though as Cola was pretty much always hurt for them and who knew he would stay relatively healthy for us.

 

[Analyzer*]

The Brad Boyes trade looked this way for a year or two.

At first we were all like "lol, Denis Wideman?"

And then we were all like "actually...Wideman is pretty good"

And now we're all like "Wideman...meh"

Who was then used to get Horton.

 

[arrbez]

Who was then used to get Horton.

Sure, but they didn't trade Boyes for Horton, and I don't imagine they were already scheming on that deal three years before it happened.

 

[Jumptheshark]

For the Ducks, Sergei Fedorov for Tyler Wright and Francois Beauchemin immediately comes to mind.

At the time, the whole trade was basically considered a salary dump by the Ducks who were trying to get rid of Fedorov's $8 million(but was reduced to $6 million due to the 25% cut-back). The Ducks also had exclusive rights to picking Todd Marchant up who was waived at the time due to his $2.25(something like that) million dollar contract.

For the Jackets, Fedorov was decent but was a shell of his former self.

For the Ducks, Marchant was a veteran leader, Wright played well on the 4th line but the big story was the unknown that was Francois Beauchemin.

Were the ducks last place in the league at the time?

The ducks had agreed to put a claim in on Marchant who nuked a trade a few days earlier(NMC became a fad because of this) and any team below the ducks in the standings could have grabbed him. So the word exclusive is a little misleading