so if Murray couldn’t hire a decent coach the entire time he was here, or win a trade of his elite players the entire time he was here, or develop any of his top tauted prospects (Lazar, Cowen, Weircoche, Lehrer) and make more then 1 decent FA acquisition - I guess Muckler did that to him?
Murray was a horrible asset manager, the worst Ottawa has ever seen, literally beyond Rundlbald(which if he just took Tarasenko he would of been perfect) and Anderson I can’t think of a single asset he turned into something equivalent or better - he lost value on almost every move he made and some of them were straight up giveaways of top talent. Bishop, Spezza, Heatley, Fisher, Kelly, Vermette, the 1st round pick for the NYI D, Foligno.
And that’s why Ottawa sucked in Murray’s time here because he was a horrible asset manager and pro evaluator and not because amuckler didn’t draft well - Muckler wasn’t amazing at the draft but he got some decent players
Bishop you seem to be neglecting the fact that Murray acquired him for peanuts in the first place, so thats a wash. I will agree that mistakes were made in goal for Ottawa, might have been wiser to hold onto Bishop instead of Anderson.
Plus you seem to be ignoring the context for most of those trades. Spezza, Heatley and Fisher all wanted out. First round pick for Fish was fair at that point in his career. As was the second round pick for Kelly. Heatley fizzled out fast, so Michalek probably held more value overall after the trade. Spezza trade was bad, but Spezza himself also vetoed a much better trade to Nashville.
Vermette trade was fine. Leclair just couldn't stay healthy. The Nick Foligno trade is probably half the reason Ottawa's defense was ok until Methot left. Foligno is the better player at this point in his career, but Methot stabilized that defense in a serious way. That wasn't a bad trade at all.
The Turris trade was baller.
Muckler made a few good moves. The Smolinski trade. The first Comrie trade. Ummmm, the Salo Schaefer trade wasn't terrible, but Salo was the better player of the two. Aside from that, his trades run from meh to god awful. The Hossa Heatley swap . . . absolute franchise cracking move. Heater had a few good seasons, but Hossa loved the city and would have played here till he retired. Like 2 years ago. Another side effect from that trade? Fellow slovak and best buddy Zdeno Chara ended up leaving via free agency shortly there after.
How bout Peter Bondra? Brookes Laiche had a hell of a career and was exactly the kinda player Ottawa needed for years. ANother second round pick lost as well.
Picks and prospects constantly traded away for rentals and non impact players.
Muckler pissed away everything the franchise had, aside from Redden, Fisher and the big three.