The Athletic’s Max Bultman engages in a thought experiment today, questioning the direction of the Red Wings’ franchise had Ken Holland not continued to trade away picks and prospects to extend the Wings’ playoff streak to 25 years.
I’ve thought about this often myself, and I really believe that the trading of Patrick Eaves and Calle Jarnkrok to Nashville and Mattias Janmark to Dallas were the final nails in the coffin as far as the GM’s ability to navigate a rebuild are concerned…
Instead of limiting this admittedly revisionist history to the draft, we’re going to open it up to all the types of transactions relevant to team building. When we run into picks Detroit traded away, I’ll discuss the player selected in that spot, as well as an alternate name the Red Wings could have had a reasonable chance to pick there had they kept it (within the next 30 picks or so).
It might be a little less exciting that way, but going back and getting every decision correct is a quick way to be found out as being a time traveler. Or Doug Wilson.
Plus, we’re already testing the Butterfly Effect enough as it is.
Simple enough? Honestly, it might not be. But, it’s late July, and we’re gonna do it anyway. Let’s ride.
Bultman continues (paywall)
The Cole/Legwand trades were bad, but there was still plenty of time after this to adjust. We could have sold Helm as a pending UFA and then used that cap space that summer to absorb a bad contract while picking up an asset (like Terovainen). Same thing with how we wasted cap space on Nielsen. That was another chance to acquire a useful asset. Then we balked at trading Mike Green because we might be close to a playoff spot, only to see him get hurt and have zero trade value. Death by a thousand cuts. Literally one dumb decision after another.