Gardiner trade is reasonable, similar to Staal deal last year. Wings are supposedly considering buying out Dekeyser tho, even if they don't, it doesn't seem like they have plans to play him much, certainly not as 1LD

Not sure how I would feel about trading away Svechikov. Looking at this trade I'd say Carolina wins cause I'm high on him, definitely want the Red Wings to give him a actual shot in the lineup before shipping him off.
Also by comparison his PPG this season was 0.38 while Zadina was 0.39. I know Zadina has a higher ceiling and played more games but just showing as a comparison since Zadina is often considered one of Detroits top wingers

Maybe Vrana can motivate Zadina.

Doesn't give a reason to trade svech. If Detroit can find a line that's reasonable for him him to play on that works I think his value would be much higher than what it is now

I agree. They should played Svech more. So far Zadina has been a disappointment .

It's basically been confirmed today that Gardiner's an injury away from LTIRetirement, so if they want Svechnikov, this trade will not be it.

confirmed where? he is playing in a summer league, doesn't really seem like a move for a player that is "an injury away from LTIRetirement"

Hes trying his back out to see if he can still skate...

There are better deals to be had with Carolina.

Gardiner + Foegele for Svechnikov.

Canes probably accept. Svech likely doesn’t crack lineup but that’s probably price to dump Gardiner at this point and Svech doesn’t have too much value one way or the other. If anything just might make baby bro feel better. Wouldn’t pay any extra to get him in the deal tho

I doubt they buyout anyone this time. Neither Nielsen or DDK are blocking anyone's path to the NHL (Abs was blocking Brome, Smith, Svech, Veleno, etc in a way, so that was the right move, plus he had multiple years left on his deal). With 1 year remaining on the deals, and plenty of cap space, you are better off just letting them run out, even if they don't play. Can't keep throwing money into the future, especially when you don't need to.

I didn't mess with the lines too much, so I wouldn't read into DDK being on the top line. Hronek did play a majority of the season with him (31% according to Frozen Tools), but their numbers were awful. His best numbers were with Merrill or Djoos (surprisingly), and decent numbers with Cholowski.

My problem with anyone judging Zadina is his usage. He had no consistent linemates last year (he only had 1 line that spent more than 100 minutes together, which is nothing). But, if you take all his time with Larkin added up, the pair held their own playing against top competition (no matter who the 3rd linemate was).. If you take Zadina away from Larkin, Larkin's numbers are very upside down in play driving.

If Zadina can get a consistent, quality C (right now, Larkin is the only one, but Rass isn't far behind), I can see him taking off quickly in the counting stats. But until that happens, you'll have to look at his other numbers (non-counting stats) for the growth.