" I understand there's value in keeping guys like Lindholm but teams that full on tear down rather than do a half ass rebuild always come out better."

Ask Buffalo about that...From 2013-2018, the Sabres drafted Dahlin, Mittlestadt, Nylander, Eichel, Reinhart, Ristolainen, all within the first 8 picks of the draft. Add to that Cozens, Quinn and Power. You can throw the Coyotes into a similar boat, but they've also managed to f*ck themselves a bunch of other times. The Devils have been rebuilding since 2012, with 1 playoff appearance, and a whole lot of early 1st round picks to show for it (They'll be better this year though!).

Are there teams that come out better? Absolutely. But people seem to forget that there's very little guarantee that ripping everything apart will somehow magically guarantee that you're back to being a contender in a few years.

I don't think your opinion is at all unpopular...Should they have made a bigger push to move Manson/Rakell? Yeah, of course...but if the return wasn't there, there's not a ton of point in just moving them to move them, right? Honestly, someone at the deadline probably gives up a Foligno haul for Rakell if he's anywhere close to be decent. Put him with Zegras and Comtois and rak (see what I did there?) him up some points. Manson? I have a hard time believing that Winnipeg had their 1st on the table. Looking at the Risto return in Buffalo-If there was anything close to that, then it was a huge bogey, but yeah, I don't see it. Maybe something this deadline, maybe not. If it's not there though, don't force it! Manson will eat the tough minutes that ease Drysdale into the lineup, since Anaheim kind of put themselves into a situation where they either have to play him or send him back to the OHL (Which wouldn't make a ton of sense).

I don't know...if the deals were there then the team absolutely should have thought long and hard about them, I just don't really think they were anywhere close. With Eakins' $hit system sucking the life out of the offence, and making the team look like they're playing zone D in their own end, everybody's trade value was blown apart after last year.

hawks probably accept. I think the value is a little rich there, but I really want lindholm on the hawks so I would do it

Don’t think Jets would’ve took the trade, I get that it’s last season deadline and he had another year on his deal but we would’ve lost half the value cause we couldn’t protect him in expansion draft

You raise some really good points and make some really good arguments but my esteemed colleague @Lenny7 does a real good job providing counterpoints and counter-arguments. The only potentially valuable insight I can offer is to reinforce my fellow Anaheim adherent's ultimate conclusion -- if those deals were on the table, then we should have taken each one, but I doubt that they were. However, what makes me worry is that our GM is risk-adverse to such an extent that he might have turned down one or two of them.

I would hope this comes with an extension but I too would do this deal and try and deal into the 1st if there is a player that we are interested in.

I'd go a bit further, totally tear downs never work. Ever. You laid out excellent examples as to why it's so perilous to go that route. So many people just look at a bad team that has been struggling for several seasons and automatically go, "Oof, they suck. Blow up the team!" As if that that's a tried-and-true method for success when it's demonstrably not.

Yes, this team sucks. Yes, we're probably going to suck again (though more moves are coming, there's no way we're keeping all three of Steel, Lundestrom and Larsson. Maybe throw Guhle in there too) but we still need to ice a team that LOOKS like they're trying to get better. And we really should be this bad. We have a decent amount of talent and AT SOME POINT these young players, not named Comtois, SHOULD finally ascend into the players we drafted them to be. I feel like I've said this each summer for the last four years, but if we can stay healthy and turn Steel, Larsson and a pick into a quality d-man, this team should be competitive.

At the very least, we're no in rush to ship off guys like Lindholm, Manson and Rakell just for futures. Because we're either going to actually be pretty good this year and we'll need them or we'll suck again, which is what we'll do if we trade them away now so why not hold onto them until at least the deadline? If this team was going to get blown up it would have happened two weeks ago. There's still a tweak or two to go (or at least there better be Murph. we have way too many first rounders populating our bottom-6, trade some of them and get some effing value for them!) but this is our squad.