3 unprecedented players moved before the NHL trade deadline who will reward their new team
NHL Trade Deadline Day has arrived, but there have already been several unprecedented moves that will pay off across the league.
The NHL trade deadline may be arriving today, but there are quite a few moves made over the past week that should excite fan bases of teams that will contend now that the playoff races are really starting to pick up.
There have been some blockbuster moves, two of which occurred on Wednesday when the Vegas Golden Knights brought Noah Hanifin to town. Earlier that day, we saw another memorable trade when the Edmonton Oilers made a splash to bring in Adam Henrique and Sam Carrick.
The trades for Hanifin and Henrique will more than excite Golden Knights and Oilers fans, and they know what they are getting from their new players. However, you can’t say the same with other moves that may have raised a few eyebrows or at least trades that didn’t carry the blockbuster label.
A few enticing under-the-radar trades occurred before the NHL trade deadline
The flurry of moves started on Tuesday, and they continued through Thursday night on ‘Trade Deadline Eve,’ and they involved moves that will see newcomers join the middle and even lower lines or bottom-pairings. But just because those players won’t receive a ton of ice time at any point during their respective stints in a new city, the last thing we need is to underestimate their value.
So between Tuesday and Thursday, which three trades could some fans have questioned, or may not have gotten too excited over that they should find incredible value in? None of the names listed in the following slides have been all-stars this season, and you won’t consider any of them to be great players.
But they will help their new teams win games, and they could even parlay what have been good seasons into memorable ones. Let’s talk about three unprecedented trades that will pay dividends come the 2024 Stanley Cup Playoffs.
Casey Mittelstadt was a sensational find for the Avalanche
If you watched Casey Mittelstadt play over the first few seasons of his career, you may scoff at this trade. But the Avalanche made a brilliant move not only for Mittelstadt, but also for Sean Walker. However, let’s focus on Mittelstadt, whose last two seasons with the Buffalo Sabres showed us how productive he can be for a serious contender like the Avalanche.
Colorado just acquired one of the league’s best passers to fill the middle-six of a team that’s first in scoring with 239 goals, or 3.73 per game. Over his past 144 games, Mittelstadt has 77 assists, and he led the Sabres in points when the team traded him for Bowen Byram.
Put someone on a team with some of the best scorers in the game, like Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen, and Valeri Nichushkin, and watch the Avalanche parlay their league-best offense into something ultra-spectacular. Not that Mittelstadt will share ice time with them often, but he will further make Colorado’s middle-six come to life in the offensive zone.
Sure, the Avalanche are taking a loss with Byram heading elsewhere, but at least for the rest of the season, Sean Walker (formerly of the Philadelphia Flyers) makes a great consolation prize for the rest of the season. That said, the Mittelstadt deal was an ideal move.
The Anthony Mantha trade was a brilliant move for the Golden Knights
Like Mittelstadt, Anthony Mantha wasn’t the biggest name in the rumor mill, and he’s never excelled in any one season, scoring a career-high of 48 points in 2017-18 and 2018-19. But also like Mittelstadt, the Vegas Golden Knights don’t need to put him on the ice for more than 15 minutes a night to get value out of the 29-year-old.
Instead, they can put him onto most likely their lower lines and let him supplement them with his ability to find the net. In just 90 shots on goal this season, Mantha has scored 20 times, and his unprecedented 22.2 shooting percentage is one basic statistic that should excite Golden Knights fans.
If you want more fun, Mantha’s adjusted goals sit at 27 for the season, and this was with a team that had struggled to find the net all year, as the Washington Capitals currently rank 30th with 160 goals scored. Vegas has fared much better in the offensive zone than Washington, and by putting someone who has been a prolific scorer on a bad hockey team into their lineup, Mantha could easily supersede that 27-goal pace.
Scoring isn’t the only way Mantha will help the Golden Knights, but when you look at what he accomplished in Washington this year despite pedestrian play in the offensive zone, you can’t help but get excited for this one.
Joel Edmundson was a sneaky good move for the Maple Leafs
On Thursday, the Toronto Maple Leafs traded for Joel Edmundson, and this came roughly a week following the Ilya Lyubushkin trade. While Lyubushkin was good at adding depth to what has been an underperforming defensive rotation, the trade for Edmundson should give Maple Leafs fans some relief.
While he’s a physical player, finishing checks isn’t the only thing Edmundson can do for Toronto on what should be the third-pairing. Edmundson also isn’t on pace to be as effective as he was last season in getting in front of scoring lanes. However, he will do an adequate job in landing some hits and getting in front of pucks, but let’s talk about an underrated aspect of his game this season: Helping to create opportunities in the offensive zone at a better rate than his numbers may show.
Nobody will claim Edmundson is a two-way player, but a 47.7 Corsi For at 5-on-5 is his highest since he logged a 54.5 during that magical 2020-21 season with the Montreal Canadiens. Now that Edmundson will be playing for a Maple Leafs team that is more capable of scoring than the Capitals, don’t be surprised if he surprises us and gets more involved in the offensive zone during his 16 to 17 minutes per game in Toronto.
Not to mention the fact Edmundson could give the Maple Leafs some solid shorthanded minutes, something Toronto can still use.
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(Statistics provided by Hockey-Reference as of March 7th)