In no world does a team ever have to pay to get rid of a 40-50 point guy with 1 year left on his contract...

Canucks, Flames, Oilers, Jets, the Habs, and your aforementioned Leafs. All closer to contention. Period.

Umm...wrong, take a closer look at the Sens, their prospect pool is near the top of the League and the team doesn't have any dead cap space (Zaitsev is borderline, I believe he can be Top 4 material again)

The Leafs are the center of the Universe and Dubas a genius, but he paid a 1st Rd'er to get rid of a 40 point player with one season left on his contract.

Sens overpay, but they will have solid bottom 6. If they carry on and sign Stutzle they may be a threat

He hasn't hit 50 pts since 17-18... The price should not have been a second rounder.

Good trade Derek because he gets the heck out of Arizona before the whole things crashes and he gets to play with some youngsters for the shortened season. Ottawa gets a steady leader type player who put up 50 points every year in NY but nobody does well in AZ. Costs Ottawa only 2 million and they can trade him for a good pick at the deadline if he's playing well and they are not. Either way, I think its solid for both but More so AZ because they cleared Cap Space and got a VERY high draft pick for him.

Not really sure why OTT had to give up a 2nd rounder for a guy whose stats have fallen off a cliff. ARI gets desperately needed cap space AND a 2nd! Huge W for the worst run organization in the NHL over the last few seasons.

Stepan's salary is actually only $2M, I believe. So the Sens take the AAV, but they're nowhere near the cap. Only a couple other teams that could've made this deal so I'm a little unsure of why the Sens paid such a steep price. 4th rounder would've been more appropriate.

Soderberg (way more productive) just signed for only $1M and it didn't cost Stan Bowman any draft picks, lol. This deal is lunacy.

Stepan is a right shot version of Tierney. I’m thinking White gets pushed to the wing, and the top6 is

Tkachuk, Stepan, Dadonov
CBrown, Tierney, White

A 2nd was too much, but if Stepan gets his assist per 60 back up, then it’s not a horrible trade. I still voted Arizona won the trade because they’re not tacking any risk in the trade.

Best hope if you’re an Ottawa fan I guess

I read that as: "Dubas is a genius, but he made a very bad trade"

Dubas is not a genius nor has he done anything to warrant such a title. Just because the Leafs seem to be "the center of the universe" doesn't mean they set the tone for anything and teams have to follow suit. Do you see every teams best players charging their teams 11M+ on short term contracts that send them to free agency? Dubai has done nothing but bad trades and bad signing since he's been there with the exception of the Muzzin trade.

Marleau was playing with good linemates and also happened to be 39, do you know how old Steppan is?

Arizona is not in as bad of a cap situation compared to Toronto at the time.

My bad, 35-50 point player, that better?

One with common sense should be able to figure out that any player that plays for the Coyotes production goes down.

On Ottawa, playing with any of Tkachuk, Dadonov, Stuetzle, he's a 40-50 point player.

I think a 2nd rounder is fine, but that's not the argument. I was told AZ would have to pay to send Steppan to OTT and that's just nonsense.

I think the Stepan situation in Arizona was more complicated. Arizona wasn’t in cap trouble because they just need to place Hossa on LTIR and the cap is fine with Stepan. So basically, not being in cap trouble means they don’t need to trade Stepan, which means they don’t need to pay, because he’s not a cap dump. Yes they’re dumping his cap, but he’s not a cap dump because they don’t have to.

Trading Stepan to a team with cap space is, one team that does not need to dump cap, trading to another team with plenty of cap space, so it’s player for value, and Ottawa probably overpaid, or at the very least, assume all the risk.

Coyotes win. 2nd-round pick, $6.5M off the cap, dump a regressing C and give Hayton/Schmaltz/Dvorak some more ice to play with.

Sens might get the old Stepan but I kinda doubt it. 10 for 28 is not 2nd round worthy especially with that contract.

Thought Stepan to OTT will happen several months ago. Acquiring a contract like his would fit in Melnyk's MO so well.

Surprised about the price though. Was expecting the cost to be much less than this.

Fair deal, Ottawa gets a decent middle 6 center for one of their many picks and Arizona sheds cap and gets a decent pick

Fair deal and im not sure why so many people are confused.

Stepan is owed a few million while carrying a massive cap it. For a team that is towards the cap floor that's huge. Not only that Stepan hasn't exactly played with much quality talent the last few years vs his time w/ NYR.

Habs by a fair marging over Laugh and Sin ... why would you dream of a cup while your team might work in only 5 yrs .... need a Kleenex for such faping?

habs are 3rd in the last 5 yrs and now number 6 for rookie depth quality and still have a bonafide generational goaltender with a fully stacked d-corp ... you have 3 guys ..... COMMON !

Yah but Montreal know how to do this

Ottawa has their own trade market, just like Toronto has their own market for RFA's signings

I mean no matter how much your helping arizona if there was 4/5 going for Stephan his value would go up.

I guess Dorion saw Germany getting crushed by Canada yesterday and though he needed a better option than Stutzle on his top 6😁