Buyer vs. Seller: Who Wins Offseason Trades?

The deepest dive you'll find looking into the spiciest NHL offseason moves in recent memory.

Before trading opens up in the offseason around the summer of every year, 16 teams are left with little to nothing to look forward to for about two months. But those big splashes between their club and others around the NHL make the wait worth it.

Who tends to win these moves? Where does every current general manager (GM) rank? I have answers to those questions and a lot more.

Doug Armstrong and Don Waddell (The Hockey Writers)

I took the time to look at every single trade involving at least a second-round pick (the alternative being a first) from the 2014 offseason all the way through 2023. I compiled the stats from the players received into different categories and considered historical context to grade all of the 86 deals made that qualify. For some clarification, the “buyer” is the team trading draft picks for either a player or salary relief, while the “seller” is the one acquiring this future asset in my data.

I chose not to do prospect-only deals on behalf of the buyer, as we then get into the conversation of whether that player is equivalent to a second-round pick—I kept those kinds of trades out for simplicity. Additionally, I avoided trades where either a prospect or a rookie was dealt for a draft pick—those two are virtually the same thing.

There were some exceptions to my rules here, like the deal that saw the Ottawa Senators send Mika Zibanejad and a second-round pick to the New York Rangers for Derick Brassard and a seventh-round pick in 2016. Both teams were getting quality players and there really was no buyer or seller present. Even without trades like this, there was still a lot covered.

I’ve already looked at deadline trades if you want more moves to feast your eyes upon. But here, I’m diving deeper into the numbers, what kinds of deals to avoid, which teams hit the jackpot, and which GMs have the best and worst track record. Below are my findings:

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Should Buyers… Stop Buying?

In this section, I’m going to give a general overview of the data I collected and give some of my personal takeaways from that. Just like with the deadline piece I did, the conclusion I had was similar—the buyers lose a large majority of these moves.