It takes a certain temperament and level of objective rationale to be good at trade predictions. However, that doesn't stop the majority of fan bases from putting their Armchair GM hats on, heading to CapFriendly and letting loose.
That’s never been me, though. I may dabble in trade predictions, but I never truly try as I can’t get them right, and to be quite honest, none of us can. We all run into the problem of overvaluing our own players. The “Brown, Bracco/Nielsen and a second” was an ongoing meme on Leafs Twitter, but there was always a proposed justification behind it as each of the players, at the time, were valued in the organization. It’s been three years since the last BB2 trade meme, and only one of them is a regular in the NHL.
This brings me to the current season.
Despite being on a skid, the Leafs are playing the best hockey we’ve seen out of them in the Auston Matthews era. The guarantee of a North Division team being one of the final four on the way to a Stanley Cup is all the motivation Kyle Dubas should need to go all-in for an opportunity to do the thing. That’s linked the Leafs to a star-studded list of names pushing the fan base to scratch their heads and wonder what a deal would look like.
But let’s keep in mind Dubas’ track record during his time as Leafs GM. Of all the additions he’s made, I feel like the John Tavares and Joe Thornton signings were the only two we had any information about before they happened (relatively-speaking).
The Jake Muzzin trade was a surprise, a positive one, though a surprise nonetheless. The same goes for the deal that brought the magic angel golden retriever from Michigan Jack Campbell and the Kapanen deal, which brought Hallander over and the first-round pick that became Rodion Amirov.
Sure, the Mattias Ekholm’s and Mikael Granlund’s of the hockey world are front-and-centre of the Leafs’ supposed wishlist right now. That doesn’t change the fact that Dubas will probably make a couple of additions we didn’t see coming at all.
Rip on the glasses all you want, but Lou Lamoriello trained Kyle. He always has the ‘a lot of words that don’t say much’ canter down, and he’s proven time and time again that we won’t know what the Leafs are doing until Leafs PR tweets it.
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