Worst trades in Sabres history?

[pi2000]

Kassian for Hodgson

[Doohicksie]

1 hour ago, Thorny said:

You know what they say..

 You smelt it, you dealt it 

[Archie Lee]

1 hour ago, Thorny said:

A bad trade is a bad trade, just because it’s made in combination with a series of other bad decisions meaning success was theoretically never possible under said GM doesn’t therefore alleviate the badness of said trade. Why would it? 

again, if Adams traded Dahlin today, and Thompson tomorrow, and Power the next day, it would be like saying, “well, I guess the Dahlin trade wasn’t that bad, cause looking back, it didn’t matter cause we were never going to succeed in light of how bad Adams turned out to be.”

I’m not really sure what odd, backwards mental gymnastics are going on but none of it makes any sense anymore lol 

I don't think it takes more mental gymnastics to factor in what was or wasn't theoretically possible at the time of the trade, than it does to not factor in that we don't yet know what Thompson and R. Johnson will accomplish as Sabres. O'Reilly never wins a Conn Smythe with us.  Tage might. As you said earlier, we likely just see it differently.

 

 

[Thorner]

7 minutes ago, Archie Lee said:

I don't think it takes more mental gymnastics to factor in what was or wasn't theoretically possible at the time of the trade, than it does to not factor in that we don't yet know what Thompson and R. Johnson will accomplish as Sabres. O'Reilly never wins a Conn Smythe with us.  Tage might. As you said earlier, we likely just see it differently.

 

 

I suppose, but whether it is for you or not, time is a big factor for me. It’s not merely about value in value out with no regard to ETA, for the same reason an NHL GM would value a first in 2024 more than a first in 2029. But especially with us, the 6 years we’ve been bad since is just a huge factor in my calculation. If we trade Tage today for a draft pick that’s ends up even better, it’s still not a good trade for me. 

Time is of the essence and has been for a good long while. But, I understand you are evaluating by different metrics and, I can respect that. 

Edited January 16 by Thorny

[shrader]

2 hours ago, Archie Lee said:

 

We drafted 4 Hall of Fame players between 1982 and 1987, completely lost patience and traded them all for a sum that got us a 1st round win over the Bruins in 1993.  Yuck.  

 

To be fair, two of those traded hall of famers shouldn’t be mentioned in this thread. The returns on Housley and Turgeon worked out pretty well. 

[xzy89c1]

Evander Kane

[Taro T]

5 hours ago, JoeSchmoe said:

I've said it here many times. The worst trade easily is when we traded Andreychuk and Puppa for Fuhr.

We already had Hasek, and though he was still young, he was starting to show glimpses of what he could be.

In the end, Muckler shipped out Andreychuk - a guy who scored 54 goals that year, for a goalie who at the time was about as good as the guy we already had... Maybe worse. For whatever reason, he thought Fuhr's "experience" was more important than the 54 goals he gave up.

We win the cup that year if Muckler doesn't make this trade.

Would argue trading away Hasek was worse.  But this should be hands down the bridesmaid of bad trades.

That trade also included a 1st that became Kenny Jonsson.  All for a goalie that wasn't as good as what was already on the roster.

[PromoTheRobot]

My worst trade? A 1st for Robin Lehner.

[Pimlach]

21 hours ago, mjd1001 said:

They were a bad team with him here, they were a bad team after he was traded. I didn't see them getting better with him on the roster. End the story all I need.

Just as much as my argument is incomprehensible to you, Yours is to me. I didn't see them turning the corner and turning into a playoff or cup contender with him here. So how could trading him away... Were you got arguably a top 10-20 scorer in the league in return.... Be awful? I don't get it.

The object of a trade is to improve your team.  The Blues added a great player, plus they dumped two players past their prime and on bad contracts, and won a cup that ended up with ROR getting the MVP.  The Sabres got no immediate help improving their team.  The two vets were garbage.  They got a future pick in Ryan Johnson, and they got Tage, who 3 years later has developed into a good player that might be a great player - maybe.  
 

The Sabres did not improve their team.  They have continued to lose.   It’s been 6 years with no playoffs since that trade.  

[shrader]

16 minutes ago, Pimlach said:

The object of a trade is to improve your team.  The Blues added a great player, plus they dumped two players past their prime and on bad contracts, and won a cup that ended up with ROR getting the MVP.  The Sabres got no immediate help improving their team.  The two vets were garbage.  They got a future pick in Ryan Johnson, and they got Tage, who 3 years later has developed into a good player that might be a great player - maybe.  
 

The Sabres did not improve their team.  They have continued to lose.   It’s been 6 years with no playoffs since that trade.  

I’m going to talk about trades in general and not that specific trade. There are very few trades that occur where both teams are trying to add immediate help. 

[Pimlach]

26 minutes ago, shrader said:

I’m going to talk about trades in general and not that specific trade. There are very few trades that occur where both teams are trying to add immediate help. 

I would love to see data on this statement. 
 

The Sabres were not rebuilding when they trade ROR, they were reaching and reacting, which is what chronic losers do.   The two vets were supposed to improve the club at the time, the rest were futures.  We are lucky to have two good players 6 years later, which salvages the trade.  But to the hockey world,  the Blues won a cup in large part because of this trade.  

[mjd1001]

1 hour ago, Pimlach said:

The object of a trade is to improve your team.  The Blues added a great player, plus they dumped two players past their prime and on bad contracts, and won a cup that ended up with ROR getting the MVP.  The Sabres got no immediate help improving their team.  The two vets were garbage.  They got a future pick in Ryan Johnson, and they got Tage, who 3 years later has developed into a good player that might be a great player - maybe.  
 

The Sabres did not improve their team.  They have continued to lose.   It’s been 6 years with no playoffs since that trade.  

The Sabres did not improve their team at the time of the trade, but what Tage has turned into has improved the team.  And what St. Louis does with what they get...has zero impact on whether it was a bad trade for the Sabres.  St. Louis winning the cup did NOT cause the Sabres not to win it.

Buffalo now is likely better for the trade. ROR did not make this a good team when he was here...and the couple years after he was here they were not going to be a contender if he was still here by his addition alone. However the team IS better for for what Tage has turned into comared to what ROR would give to this team. 

If anything I can not only say it wasn't a bad trade for the Sabres, it probably actually was a pretty good one.  Why?  If that trade could be 'un done', the Sabres wouldn't be much better (again, you had ROR for years and you didn't have a good team), but you would also lose Tage and i for SURE would not want to do that.

If I'm pretty sure that un-doing a trade would not have turned this into a winning team in the past, but undoing it would take away that is likely your 2nd best player (and a top 20 goal scorer in the league), then I'm not un-doing it and its a positive trade.

 

Edited January 17 by mjd1001

[Norcal]

@Thorny"Eichel and Reinhart and Ullmark leaving, and the lack of depth we still see today: because we are still in the process of rebuilding"

They had to go. They had to go? 

Looking back now at these 3 players and the amount of success they've gone on to have with other teams leaves a little but if a sting.

When you combine the efforts of the current rebuild and the fact that it seems to have stalled out again, it stings even more. 

 

[Archie Lee]

1 hour ago, mjd1001 said:

The Sabres did not improve their team at the time of the trade, but what Tage has turned into has improved the team.  And what St. Louis does with what they get...has zero impact on whether it was a bad trade for the Sabres.  St. Louis winning the cup did NOT cause the Sabres not to win it.

Buffalo now is likely better for the trade. ROR did not make this a good team when he was here...and the couple years after he was here they were not going to be a contender if he was still here by his addition alone. However the team IS better for for what Tage has turned into comared to what ROR would give to this team. 

If anything I can not only say it wasn't a bad trade for the Sabres, it probably actually was a pretty good one.  Why?  If that trade could be 'un done', the Sabres wouldn't be much better (again, you had ROR for years and you didn't have a good team), but you would also lose Tage and i for SURE would not want to do that.

If I'm pretty sure that un-doing a trade would not have turned this into a winning team in the past, but undoing it would take away that is likely your 2nd best player (and a top 20 goal scorer in the league), then I'm not un-doing it and its a positive trade.

 

This kind of summarizes it for me.  The trade did not work out as intended at the time, but has worked our positively in the long run.  I understand that some would argue that the trade can't possibly be deemed to have worked out positively because the team has failed to have any on-ice success (playoffs) since. To me though, this is like saying that none of our player acquisitions (draft picks/trades) have worked out for the past 12 years. 

[Thorner]

3 hours ago, Pimlach said:

I would love to see data on this statement. 
 

The Sabres were not rebuilding when they trade ROR, they were reaching and reacting, which is what chronic losers do.   The two vets were supposed to improve the club at the time, the rest were futures.  We are lucky to have two good players 6 years later, which salvages the trade.  But to the hockey world,  the Blues won a cup in large part because of this trade.  

That’s the key point. The Sabres weren’t *trying* to make a long term trade with the deal. It torpedoed *their intent*. It being salvaged later on by a future GM doesn’t take away from its terribleness 

[shrader]

3 hours ago, Pimlach said:

I would love to see data on this statement. 
 

The Sabres were not rebuilding when they trade ROR, they were reaching and reacting, which is what chronic losers do.   The two vets were supposed to improve the club at the time, the rest were futures.  We are lucky to have two good players 6 years later, which salvages the trade.  But to the hockey world,  the Blues won a cup in large part because of this trade.  

Data? So do you think all those player for draft pick deals at each deadline, both teams are expecting immediate impact?

[Pimlach]

1 hour ago, shrader said:

Data? So do you think all those player for draft pick deals at each deadline, both teams are expecting immediate impact?

I’m talking about good old fashioned “hockey trades”.   Like the ROR trade.  
 

Deadline trades of sellers would skew everything. 

[Pimlach]

15 minutes ago, seer775 said:

The blues got their impact. We sold our 1C and got another one a handful of years later. 

Result? Down a top C for years on years. Bad trade.

Plus we took their worst two vets and their contracts, allowing the Blues to bring up and play some good young forward talent. 
 

Im not even saying it’s a bad trade, it was a stupid and impulsive trade.   Pegula directed it and he wanted it done before the bonus kicked in.  To accommodate, we got Sobotka and Berglund, the nut job that went back to Sweden. 
 

The only way this trade can even out is we win a Cup with Tage and Ryan Johnson.   Unless you don’t have winning the Cup as your goal.  

[shrader]

1 hour ago, Pimlach said:

I’m talking about good old fashioned “hockey trades”.   Like the ROR trade.  
 

Deadline trades of sellers would skew everything. 

So in describing the purpose of trades, we want to exclude a large portion of trades that are made? Seems fair. 

 

1 hour ago, seer775 said:

The blues got their impact. We sold our 1C and got another one a handful of years later. 

Result? Down a top C for years on years. Bad trade.

As I said, I’m not talking about that trade. 

[PerreaultForever]

1 hour ago, Pimlach said:

Plus we took their worst two vets and their contracts, allowing the Blues to bring up and play some good young forward talent. 
 

Im not even saying it’s a bad trade, it was a stupid and impulsive trade.   Pegula directed it and he wanted it done before the bonus kicked in.  To accommodate, we got Sobotka and Berglund, the nut job that went back to Sweden. 
 

The only way this trade can even out is we win a Cup with Tage and Ryan Johnson.   Unless you don’t have winning the Cup as your goal.  

We traded away our 2C for a younger 1C and a defenseman (plus some garbage). While it seemed to be the worst trade ever at first, in total it's really not that bad. Unless you don't like Thompson as a top center. 

[Pimlach]

18 minutes ago, PerreaultForever said:

We traded away our 2C for a younger 1C and a defenseman (plus some garbage). While it seemed to be the worst trade ever at first, in total it's really not that bad. Unless you don't like Thompson as a top center. 

Well Thompson was not a center when we got him, and no where near a 1C.  He has worked out well after several more years of development.   Johnson looks to be a good pick at 31oa.  

[Pimlach]

57 minutes ago, shrader said:

So in describing the purpose of trades, we want to exclude a large portion of trades that are made? Seems fair. 

 

 I don’t think this thread was written for the rental player, the salary dump, and rebuilding and moving on from vet type of trades -  in fact read the OP and it isn’t.   But if want to include them in a worst trade in history thread, go ahead. 
 

As for the purpose of a trade.  If you are not getting better, you're getting worse.  
 

 

 

Edited January 17 by Pimlach

[shrader]

3 minutes ago, Pimlach said:

 I don’t think this thread was written for the rental player, the salary dump, and rebuilding and moving on from vet type of trades -  in fact read the OP and it isn’t.   But if want to include them in a worst trade in history thread, go ahead. 
 

As for the purpose of a trade.  If you are not getting better, you're getting worse.  
 

 

 

The point is that it’s a strange standard to apply to all trades. They’re not all made today. The gold standard has to be Nieuwendyk for Iginla. Calgary didn’t get better from that deal, only adding 14 points over 31 games. But not teams won that deal: a cup for a long hall of fame career. 
 

So clearly we know what this talk branched off from. It’s not a good deal but there’s still so much to be written with the two key pieces still in place and very early in their careers. So bad today, but it doesn’t approach the worst of all time label, particularly when you’re talking  about a team that got absolutely nothing in return for the greatest goalie who ever set foot on the earth (hey, I can counter hyperbole with some of my own).

[Pimlach]

1 minute ago, shrader said:

The point is that it’s a strange standard to apply to all trades. They’re not all made today. The gold standard has to be Nieuwendyk for Iginla. Calgary didn’t get better from that deal, only adding 14 points over 31 games. But not teams won that deal: a cup for a long hall of fame career. 
 

So clearly we know what this talk branched off from. It’s not a good deal but there’s still so much to be written with the two key pieces still in place and very early in their careers. So bad today, but it doesn’t approach the worst of all time label, particularly when you’re talking  about a team that got absolutely nothing in return for the greatest goalie who ever set foot on the earth (hey, I can counter hyperbole with some of my own).

There you go. Now you’re on track.  The Hasek trade was far worse than the ROR trade.  

[PerreaultForever]

3 hours ago, Pimlach said:

Well Thompson was not a center when we got him, and no where near a 1C.  He has worked out well after several more years of development.   Johnson looks to be a good pick at 31oa.  

Right, so when younger players are involved you can't evaluate a trade fully until those players reach their prime. Thus the ROR trade was not that bad.