Dallas loses in every of these trades. Ritchie's worth a 3rd and no one wants Staal because getting rid of his contract is almost impossible.

Ok a third for Ritchie is fine, but I think for 2.5 years Staal on the third pair would be totally fine as well. In the event methot costs them more than he does now, to have an experienced defenseman playing limited minutes could help the team overall. It's not like he would be taking Heiskanen's spot or anything, but his contract expires when you need to pay Heiskanen, so I think it works out well. Very limited risk for potential upside.

“Replacement for Methot to play bottom pairing minutes”
scratches him for Heiskanen

STOP I've had too much pain from Oleksiak, Nemeth, Honka being scratched for veterans that didn't help us make the playoffs OR were part of our future for more than 2 years

Next year- Methot leaves..Heiskanen plays top pairing...Staal is 6th defenseman...

Sorry if that was not clear.

A 31-year old defenseman, who has regressed every year for the last 4 seasons? You do know that both Gavin Bayreuther and Dillon Heatherington are in the AHL and both are NHL ready, right? At this point in their career, either of those two guys would be able to produce at the level that Staal would, and they are going to be far cheaper than him as well. Why spend $4.5M on an aging Staal when you can just promote Heatherington or Bayreuther for over $3.5M less, and get the same kind of play and the same level of production?