A new direction

Jason Zucker is not worth a 1st on its own let alone a 1st and a former mid 1st round pick.
Beauvillier is not worth Eakin alone, let alone eakin and smith. I also love how you went off on one, how leddy is so important and shouldn't/won't be traded yet you have im slotted in the third pairing. nothing screams good cap management like a 5.5 million dollar 3rd pairing defenseman.

That is absolutely roughly what Jason Zucker is worth. And Vegas needs to drop cap. And Leddy is important, unless you think Trotz gives him the seocnd most minutes because he's an idiot. If you think it's good practice giving playing time based on salary, it's a good thing you're not running this team.... Andrew Ladd would be on the top line LW. I've got the six defensemen spread out so all six can be used in all situations. Leddy would still be getting the bulk of 5V5 time.

Thanks for the productive addition to the conversation.... your handle is only half right...

Lol, when you design a cap strategy or any asset management plan for that matter, each position or asset category in the line up has an allocation of cap space or % of expenditure. a third pairing defense man, on avg is about 2-2.5 % of the cap. if you're paying someone 5.5 million dollars to play on the third pair you are mismanaging your cap facts end of story case closed. the fact that Garth snow paid 5.5 mil for Ladd who was at that stage in his career showing he was rapidly declining, is cap mismanagement. It's really not a difficult concept to understand. furthermore, leddy can absolutely handle 20 minutes a night playing against the top or middle 6, Mayfield, a defensive D, cannot. Mayfield has almost exclusively been matched up against the bottom 6 all season and last season. he's a solid 5th/6th slot D but that's all he'll ever be. so unless you're actually moving leddy up the line up, keeping toews essentially in the same spot he was last year even though he was clearly light years more effective than leddy, you have leddy playing 3rd pair minutes of 18 a night. I also adore your commitment to large minutes means a player isn't expendable. herdadeerrrrrr, Trotz gave Leddy lots of minutes there for he isn't expendable. yes he is expendable and as previously stated, minutes a player gets has no direct correlation to a player's expendability. I can rattle off the plethora of examples since you seem to have already forgotten the proof that you're wrong: Hamilton from BOS to CGY, Hamonic from the Isles to CGY, Muzzin Hjalmmerson all those guys got traded: all thoses guys played 20+ minutes a night. by your logic no top 4 defenseman will ever be moved ever bc they're bc they play 20+ min a night. Fact is teams trade heavily utilized players all the time, either because they have to or have better younger options or both. As has been reported, the organization is actively shopping Leddy (and Hickey), because unlike clueless dolts like yourself, management realizes Toews is ready to step in to the role that they admittedly said they envisioned him in: top 4 LH Off D, and that leddy's value in trade (and he will 100% at some point need to be traded for cap purposes) will only diminish if they wait another year. Smart people understand the declining value of assets over time, and benefit of low replacement value options while they are available.

now that that's over and you have been thoroughly explained why you're completely wrong on the leddy front, lets move to Zucker. lets find some comparables shall we. Most recent: Gustave Nyqvist. similar player, not as speedy as zucker, slightly worse shooter, better player maker, better east west skater, both wings. Zucker has proven himself to be a poor playoff performer, and a very streaky and arguably erratic shooter. it's a very long term commitment w some trade protection and an average/slightly above average contract for what is a 40-45 point guy good for 20-25 goals. like I said he's a winger, and wingers are by their very nature the least valuable trade asset in the league. you're probably looking at 2 2nds, maybe MIN can squeeze a first out of it but it's doubtful. certainly not worth Bellows and a first. If anything, MIN will trade zucker for a 1 for 1. MIN front office has made it clear if you've been paying attention, a commitment to winning now, right now. so not only is the value wrong, the proposition doesn't even fit the other team's direction.

I'm not reading that mountain of a response. You take this too seriously, and if you think smart management is doling out play time based on salary.. we will never come to an agreement.

Peace