Agree. We need all the defensive prospects we can round up & Philly has a pile. Any forward currently with the Moose is available (Armia/Kosmo/Lipon/DeLeo) if we have a decent defensive prospect coming back.
The other consideration in this is that Philly is close to the cap, therefore in a Buff deal we would have to take back salary as well. I don't think B.Schenn would be in play there (2.5m), but perhaps Simmonds (3.9) or Read (3.6), plus L.Schenn on D (3.6; definitely not worth that but may take this to make it work)
Philly has also made it very clear that they are not going to trade young for old so any deal involving Buff has to both take back cap hit and give them some youth to balance the age. Simmonds is attractive to us as part of that salary take back but they love Simmonds and his contract. That is a lot of hoops we have to jump through to make it work.
I want to give them Buff and get back Sanheim and Simmonds. We also have to take L. Schenn for cap purposes. The good thing is his contract expires after this year. To get Sanheim and Simmonds we have to give more. The 'more' has to be both young and inexpensive as well as good. I don't think any of those Moose forwards you named get it done. Young and cheap but not good enough. Burmi might or Lemieux might. Until recently I think Philly would have loved Lemieux. The fans still would. I think it would take both (Philly really loves Simmonds).
To Wpg:
Simmonds + Sanheim + Schenn + '16 2nd
To Philly:
Buff + Burmi + Lemieux
I added the 2nd because I think we were giving up too much. Still might be but I think it takes something like that to make it work. Fans of both teams probably say no which would mean it is probably good value both ways.
Cap hits:
We take back 3.975 + 3.6 = 7.575 + Sanheim .894
We give them 5.2 + 1.55 + 6.75 + Lemieux .87
We don't need Schenn. Maybe if we retain some salary we could flip him. If not maybe we could get a pick for him at the TD. Otherwise we just swallow the 3.6 mil loss.
So, is Simmonds + Sanheim + a 2nd worth
Buff + Burmi + Lemieux?
We can spare those players. The surplus status of Buff has been discussed to death. Simmonds more than replaces Burmi. So no empty holes are left.