This is my own opinion. Tell me a team that won just being "fine"? It doesn't win. I'm not overly concerned with next year because everyones in the same boat, but post-Byfield we should have been rebuilding for two years anyways to go for it while the Delic/Goyette core are peaking, it's literally the path every team but London takes. Thompson did do excellent as a Wolf, one of my favourites up there with Murray and Phillips since Capo, and I think giving him a shot at a championship would be best for both him and the organization. If we're winning our division, by all means hang on to him! But realistically we will probably be a mid to bottom of the pack team next season, and if that's the case I would personally sell in order to load up the for two years later.
Path 1: 15-20 team, sell Thompson, get assets, go for the championship when Goyette and co are ready. Keeping Thompson is a borderline fireable offence in my opinion if this is the case. This is also what I expect us to be.
Path 2: 10-15 range team, keeping Thompson would be bad asset management, we'd likely be out in R1, with no assets to trade the following year because we used them last season and won't have recouped what we spent this past year. On the flip side, flipping Thompson would likely get us the same playoff result but also assets.
Path 3: 5-10 range team, we could keep Thompson, win a round or two, everyones happy and we get some experience. This wouldn't be the worst asset management but we again wouldn't have assets to use when the next wave was ready, though it's justifiable so okay. On the flip side, selling him could change our trajectory to a 10-15 team, so this really depends on the GMs opinion.
Path 4: top 5 team, we load up, hell yeah go for it. Not loading up would suck.
I'm very firmly an asset management person, I believe the long-term outlook is significantly more important, and also doing right by our players by giving them championship shots makes our organization more reputable. We have had an excellent few years in terms of development and results, we lost out on a playoff run last year sadly, but I believe with the right moves we could see another very shortly. Everyone has their own opinions on this though of course. The total wildcard for next season is if Murray comes back and if OAs are allowed an extra year, if so, I think that'd really boost our depth.
