Not sure what Laine's value will be given his situation and the uncertainty surrounding whether or not he can come back and be a gamebreaker, but let's say for argument's sake that he does come back happy and healthy and re-kickstarts his career in sunny, relatively pressure-less SoCal. Laine has told the Jackets he wants a fresh start, and this feels like one of those, let's get the best we can for a struggling asset who can put up 40 goals when he's on. The Ducks have a ton of cap space with no expensive guys to re-sign. The Jackets make room for Gavin Brindley and/or James Malatesta, continue Nylander's tryout with Gaudreau, and try out an all-skill "2nd line".

Vatrano put up a little over 30 goals, and 60 points in 2023-24, but he has only one year left on his contract, and that does lower his value a bit as opposed to having two or three years on it. Verbeek wanted a top six upgrade and a top four defenceman. He upgrades the top six with Laine over Vatrano (remember, Laine is happy and healthy by this point, and in any case I'm putting Gauthier there already too), and gets a 26/27 year old top four RHD in John Marino, a great guy to pair with Mintyukov. The Devils are looking for an upgrade on the wing, and get that in Vatrano. They'll hope to re-sign him themselves, and replace Marino's presence on the D with a UFA, and still probably add another UFA depth D-man. Gives them a bit of flexibility to trade someone like Mercer or Holtz in a deal for perhaps Saros.

Prior to this deal, you must pretend that the Jackets traded Adam Boqvist to Nashville for a pick, and replace him with Vaakanainen, a pretty decent defensive D-man, with whom they pair Jiricek on the 3rd pair to shelter him a bit. Svozil spends another year developing in the AHL, then makes the jump when Provorov's contract is done.

New Jersey:
Allen - Daws

Siegenthaler - Hamilton
L. Hughes - Nemec
Bahl/I. Cole - C. Tanev/T. Myers/A. Carrier/J. Hakanpaa

Vatrano - J. Hughes - Bratt
Holtz - Hischier - Meier
Palat - Haula - Mercer
MacDermid - Lazar - Clarke/Halonen/Bastian/Willman

Anaheim:
Gibson - Dostal

Fowler - Zellweger
Mintyukov - Marino
LaCombe - Gudas

Zegras - Carlsson - Laine
Gauthier - McTavish - Terry
Killorn - Strome - Colangelo
Johnston - Lundestrom - Leason

Columbus:
Merzlikins - Tarasov

Werenski - Severson
Provorov - Gudbranson
Vaakanainen - Jiricek

Gaudreau - Jenner - Nylander
Chinakhov - Fantilli - Marchenko
Sillinger - Brindley - Voronkov
Texier - Kuraly - Danforth

Yeah maybe like a Strome for Laine swap but that’d be it for me

Certainly not giving up a 1st AND Frank for Laine

Not really big on Marino, probably pass there

Nah, that deal gets offered, we're taking it.

NJD will keep marino