Trade #277, October 20th 2014 (Legion of Doom and Garden River Gamblers)

Trade #277, October 20th 2014 (Legion of Doom and Garden River Gamblers)


Garden River Gamblers receive:

1st round 2015 (shore)
2nd round 2015 (Row)
1st round 2016 (LOD)
Ales Hemsky


Legion of Doom receive:

Pavel Datsyuk
Jeff Carter
Wayne Simmonds
Clarke MacArthur

I'm Going all negative on this trade and putting in my vote for veto, if we are still allowed. We have always had teams trade top talent for draft picks, But the condition makes me nervous. I think the conditions should be concluded by the trade deadline. Feels like renting a player since I would bet all the money in this pool that LOD will make the playoffs. (especially after getting these guys)

And even though it's not against the rules, I voted to veto the last time I thought people traded top talent to a good team while the worse team seemed to be giving up their talent to solidify their top draft spot. I don't believe this is collusion, as both sides benefit. But if we are going to allow trades that stack teams I really think they shouldn't have a condition to get a player back after the playoffs.

I'm sure I have started a shit storm again. Sorry in advance if my veto vote ruffles everyones feathers again.

The last trade that occured had a condition that happens after the season is done. I voted against posting conditoons any everyone else wanted it. I could have just not put the conditon public and worked it out with scott.

The thing I don't like about this trade is that it leaves Gamblers with LWers of Matt Nieto, Tanner Pearson and Michael DalColle, so basically only 2 of any relevance-both being rookies, and one of those that has any impact really and that could dissipate as he is still a rookie... Trading away all his veteran LWers doesn't make his team competitive.

The components of the trades are fine and even though I do not care for conditions, that is just my personal preference. It's just how the trade leaves Gamblers as a shell of a team that bothers me. It apparent that he is looking ahead to next year and beyond and I have no problem with that but each team has an obligation to put a competitive team week-in and week-out, for the integrity of the league. In true competition, he would've traded for a defenseman being that Hedman is out 4-6 weeks and the rest of his defense are lower tier defensemen at best, excluding Krug & Giordano.

That's my take.

Pretty hard to veto any trade.

Im fine with it, its there money and there team let them do what they want.

Maybe Gamblers has something else in mind to fill some of thise voids we dont know.

As for LOD his team was stacked last year and he didnt win, its all about getting lucky at the right time.

Ive seen worse trades then this go down, if this gets veto'd its going to open a whole new can of worms.

I've already been in touch with Greg about this, but I think it's fair to post my thoughts on this thread. I agree with John 100% on this one. I think this smacks of "player rental" and that is something we discussed several years ago and agreed not to condone.

It is a completely different situation when you have conditions attached to draft picks. When you think about it, there are many occasions in the NHL where draft picks have conditional elements to a trade. However, I have never once seen a deadline trade where a team "rents" a player with any kind of conditions that the player would be returned to the original team at the end of the season.

Why is this? Well, if teams are allowed to "rent" players, what is to prevent one team from loaning Crosby or Giroux (or any top player) to another team for a draft pick, knowing there is little to no risk that the player being rented will not be returned to them at the end of the season?

There is a reason the NHL doesn't do this, which is the same reason we decided not to do it.

Brandon makes a fair point that Greg and Gord conducted a trade whereby a player might end up back at their original team. In all honesty, I did not see that condition of the trade and I would have raised this same point had I noticed it earlier.

I spoke to Greg about it last night, and he said that at least with their trade there's a reasonable chance that the condition wouldn't be met, whereas there is little to no chance Brandon won't make the playoffs. Nevertheless, I think it needs to be a level playing field and I don't think either trade should have been allowed with these conditions.

My personal preference would be that Greg, Gord, Brandon and Scott tweak their trades to do away with these particular conditions. It can't be THAT difficult to do this. However, as Greg mentioned, none of us want this to turn into a hugely divisive issue that fractures the league.

Understand that I am not making a demand here. This is merely a polite request. Based on my explanation above as to why "player rentals" would NOT be good for the league -- coupled with the fact that the NHL does not allow these types of conditional trades -- would the four of you consider tweaking your trades?

At the very least, I think we need to ban this type of conditional trade (or perhaps all conditional trades) until we get a better handle on what would be in the best interests of the league.

I also feel that, despite what Brandon says, this type of conditional trade would be self-limiting and could not really be conducted behind closed doors. Brandon could not simply return one of his players to Scott in the off-season without getting something in return, or the league would get very suspicious. So in that sense, a trade with conditions like this couldn't really be done "off the books."

if you wanted to remove the condition all i would have to do is give him a 2nd round pick or something in the deal. and then at the end of the season trade him 1 of the 3 players for the pick back.

no difference.

i just thought i would be 100% honest since we literally just had a huge thing on allowing conditions a week or two ago, and now we want to start it all up again the next trade. as a league we are all over the map with rules and polls that result in nothing. we need to clearly set a rule and a time period allowed to vote and then make a decision quickly and not revisit it until the off season.

i understand teams are not happy that my team is going to get better, but that 1st round shore pick was the key peice for me to move crosby because of the potential to get mcdavid or eichel.

as for being competitive each week to me that means not putting stars on your bench so you lose. if a team that wants to load up on first round picks they should be able to. if you have a feeling you are not a contender and what to make some moves to get better in the future then you should have the right to do so.

I agree with almost all of your points Brandon. And if you had traded him the second round pick, and then at the end of the season trade one of the three players back in exchange for the pick, I think that would be more palatable. Perhaps that is a way around this? Would you and Scott consider putting that on the books? (ie. not the condition, but the second round pick going to Scott?)

I do agree that those first round picks could be valuable, and I am not disputing that you are giving value in exchange for value. That is not the problem. The conditional part of the trade is the only problem I have with it, for the reasons already discussed.

I also tend to agree with you that the league has been all over the map recently. Part of the reason for this is that is the busyness of everyday life sometimes gets in the way.

However, a solution to this might be to create a thread that we stick to the top of the league forum where we can put issues for voting at the end of the season. Often, by the end of the season, many of us forget which issues need attending to. If we have a list of them at hand, I think it would be much easier to resolve these. Possibly even during the playoffs before everyone scoots off for the summer.

Buffalo Cab Co. schrieb:

The thing I don't like about this trade is that it leaves Gamblers with LWers of Matt Nieto, Tanner Pearson and Michael DalColle, so basically only 2 of any relevance-both being rookies, and one of those that has any impact really and that could dissipate as he is still a rookie...  Trading away all his veteran LWers doesn't make his team competitive.  

The components of the trades are fine and even though I do not care for conditions, that is just my personal preference.  It's just how the trade leaves Gamblers as a shell of a team that bothers me.  It apparent that he is looking ahead to next year and beyond and I have no problem with that but each team has an obligation to put a competitive team week-in and week-out, for the integrity of the league.  In true competition, he would've traded for a defenseman being that Hedman is out 4-6 weeks and the rest of his defense are lower tier defensemen at best, excluding Krug & Giordano.  

That's my take.

Patrick Sharp is a pretty good LW isn't he?  I think he is anyways....did finish second last year in LW scoring.....

I do not see how this leaves me with a shell of a roster.  Who is to say that I am done trading? I know I need to add a depth Dman with the injuries I have had to start the season and maybe another LW. Having Hedman and Muzzin out sucks and does leave me with having to start younger guys instead but that would happen to anybody if they had injuries?

I don't see why I need to justify this, but I will if you guys want me to....

Datsyuk is 36 years old and missed almost half of last season and the start of this season.
Simmonds had a career high 60 pts last year.
Carter had a career high 84 pts in 08-09 and has not come close to that since.
MacArthur....hes  a depth LW...

I added 2 first round picks to help build my team.  I did not get the opportunity to shape my roster from the beginning of this league and had to start with the team that I took over.  Im trying to build a solid team here and first round picks are hard to come by. I still have a lot of good players left on my roster and I am not trying to tank or solidify my draft position. Am I looking to the future a bit, yes. I don't see anything wrong with this.

I think the components of the deal are fair.

As for the condition, I can understand the "rental player" argument.  But there would be a loophole around this too.  If doom were to send me his 2nd in 2015 as part of this deal and I were to send it back to him after the season for one of those players it is essentially doing the exact same thing, but without having posted any condition. The only way around this really is to not allow a player to be traded back to a team for a certain period of time, ie. a whole season or year. I don't like conditions really either, but did not know there was any rule against this. I would be willing to talk to Brandon about it and discuss an alternative.

My apologies as I did not see Sharp on your roster when I made my comment.

Gamblers schrieb:

Buffalo Cab Co. schrieb:

The thing I don't like about this trade is that it leaves Gamblers with LWers of Matt Nieto, Tanner Pearson and Michael DalColle, so basically only 2 of any relevance-both being rookies, and one of those that has any impact really and that could dissipate as he is still a rookie...  Trading away all his veteran LWers doesn't make his team competitive.  

The components of the trades are fine and even though I do not care for conditions, that is just my personal preference.  It's just how the trade leaves Gamblers as a shell of a team that bothers me.  It apparent that he is looking ahead to next year and beyond and I have no problem with that but each team has an obligation to put a competitive team week-in and week-out, for the integrity of the league.  In true competition, he would've traded for a defenseman being that Hedman is out 4-6 weeks and the rest of his defense are lower tier defensemen at best, excluding Krug & Giordano.  

That's my take.

Patrick Sharp is a pretty good LW isn't he?  I think he is anyways....did finish second last year in LW scoring.....

I do not see how this leaves me with a shell of a roster.  Who is to say that I am done trading? I know I need to add a depth Dman with the injuries I have had to start the season and maybe another LW. Having Hedman and Muzzin out sucks and does leave me with having to start younger guys instead but that would happen to anybody if they had injuries?

I don't see why I need to justify this, but I will if you guys want me to....

Datsyuk is 36 years old and missed almost half of last season and the start of this season.
Simmonds had a career high 60 pts last year.
Carter had a career high 84 pts in 08-09 and has not come close to that since.
MacArthur....hes  a depth LW...

I added 2 first round picks to help build my team.  I did not get the opportunity to shape my roster from the beginning of this league and had to start with the team that I took over.  Im trying to build a solid team here and first round picks are hard to come by. I still have a lot of good players left on my roster and I am not trying to tank or solidify my draft position. Am I looking to the future a bit, yes. I don't see anything wrong with this.

I think the components of the deal are fair.

As for the condition, I can understand the "rental player" argument.  But there would be a loophole around this too.  If doom were to send me his 2nd in 2015 as part of this deal and I were to send it back to him after the season for one of those players it is essentially doing the exact same thing, but without having posted any condition. The only way around this really is to not allow a player to be traded back to a team for a certain period of time, ie. a whole season or year. I don't like conditions really either, but did not know there was any rule against this. I would be willing to talk to Brandon about it and discuss an alternative.

Hi Scott,

I answered this above and tend to agree that you got good value with the two first round picks. Nothing wrong with the trade other than the conditional element. I suspect Ray just missed seeing Sharp.

While the example you and Brandon have used about the second round pick being given is very similar, there is always the possibility that one of you might change your mind at some point. There is something on the line, at the very least, that would not be backed by the league (because we wouldn't know about your condition).

Since it's close to being the same, would you and Brandon consider doing this?

My turn.

Darn you Gambler!!!!! You got Storms pick before me!!!!!!!!

Oh by the way, I sent you a trade offer!!

Sorry Matt, was writing that when you posted above. No worries Ray, figured you just missed him

We were just trying to be honest about the deal. I would consider the pick instead of the condition as it really doesnt make a difference.

I will edit it so that this trade includes my 2nd round 2015 pick. what we do after that is between me and scott.

as for all over the map- i mean polls that never got 10 votes, teams don't know if we are still voting or if a rule has changed, and we let it linger for so long. also since we put a sticky on it it is more difficult to see if there is a new post. we should have a seperate thread for any type of rule discussion.

I think this is a good idea, Brandon. And I think we should allocate a time in the spring, at the end of the season, when everybody is expected to be present to vote on an issue. Perhaps we should even set a timeline or limit on the amount of time allotted for a vote.

I will start a thread about issues to vote on in April.

I would like to see us come up with a rule that prevents all this. I agree that after the season ends players could have had secret conditions anyway and trade back(could be seen as collusion). The idea of renting players sucks imo. And in this league we have a pretty big advantage(drive) for tanking when you feel you are having an off year. I've made suggestions in the past to try to prevent this but it didn't really work out in some cases but in other i think it did help. (lottery between the bottom two, and changing keepers). I think those rules help. my suggestion in the past was to increase keepers. I couldn't get this passed which is fine. But hopefully someone can come up with a better idea to prevent this.

Wow... quite the discussion.

I looked twice when I saw the deal. I've never seen one quite like it before.

At the end of the year, I would suggest that it would be prudent that we vote on whether trades may or may not have conditions.

It does appear we have encountered some stress, which is not something I prefer to see. It's in no ones best interests.

Lots of wonderful chitter chatter on this. I must ask however.............has anything been resolved?

Infact what are we trying to resolve? The trade as a whole or just the conditional part? The trade as a whole would appear that Gamblers team will be weaker giving him a better chance at higher draft picks. Is there anything wrong with that? I wonder if all this would be an issue if we all didnt have MCDAVID fever?!?!?!

My thought is that we are supposed to be as competitive as possible each year but how does a team make solid improvements to their team(core 10 players) so that they can come higher then 3 each year. This would be one way to do it just like making a 3 or 4 player for 1 player trade. Weakens your team for a short time but allows youto build a better core team. This was my goal over the next few years. Maybe not now?!?!?! Having said that there have been lots of lopsided trades - and I am NOT calling this one lopsided but if one was to - that have passed without anyone saying anything publically. Or when something were said years ago it was stated that a trade cannot be evaulated on its face and it could be years before the full value of the trade can be seen - or something similar to that anyway.

As far as the conditional part this trade, it really is no different then the one Greg and I made except that we identified the potential player to return. So if changes are needed then it should include both trades. So it would be nice to take a month at the end of a season or before the start of a season to discuss and ahmmer out changes but this one should really be hammered out now. If not the we will need to allow these trades and any others that follow which include conditions to pass until we decide what we are going to do. Having said this there really is NO way that this league will be able to prevent conditions on trades. As it was said before they will just go underground.

Fellas, we have discussed tanking and collusion a lot of the past few years and havent really gotten anywhere in my opinon except for the lottery system for the draft. I personally dont see anything wrong with the tanking part if it is being done to improve your overall team. As far a collusion, we will never know if/when this is actually happening unless someone invites their preist that they give regualar confessions to into the pool. On the small scale it is probably happening anyway.

Enough already. So what are we doing with the trades? Leaving them alone? Altering them? Hammering this out now? Waiting till the off season?

Rock On

Very well put Gord

I pretty much agree with all of this.

One other thing as well in my opinion anyways is that just cause 1 or 2 people out of 10 have an issue with something, i dont think it automatically warrants a poll or a huge discussion. Just cause I have an issue shouldnt mean im right and a solution needs to be resolved, If theres more then half the league with an issue then it defintely needs a solution. Maybe thats one of the reasons we never get 10 votes.

Im not saying that this topic falls under this but i know a few topics we have had polls on lately is cause 2 or 3 people out of 10 had some concerns about it. While the other 7 or 8 were fine with it.

I"m totally good with tanking. I just want us to be honest about it and either just allow it or try and stop it. We have talked a lot over the years about tanking and I know I started the discussion. Back in my first year all I said was I think I want to lose this week. I was in 3rd spot and 4th got an extra keeper but still stayed in the same position for playoffs. Everyones response was that the integrity of this league would never have people purposely tank. But it looked otherwise to me. So I just wanted to either have the ability to join other tankers. Or make it less advantageous to tank. The votes are always about 50/50. I think people are concerned but don't want to change the rules. I tried to suggest rules that would curb tanking without huge changes because no one wanted drastic rule changes. Sometimes I got a change made(democratically)then had it turned over without even a vote because a few were upset at the outcome. We just had a vote on FAAB for next year and all 10 finally voted but now we have to redo the vote? Why? Was someone not happy with the outcome?

This whole problem could be solved if we just admit we can tank. We do it every season anyway just like Gord talks about. I feel this trade is fair minus the condition with how we have been doing this pool since I started. But it's also tanking.

The issue with renting a player is that the person setting themselves up for the next season doesn't lose anything. I trade Gord my top 3 guys for a first round pick, Then at the end of the season if he makes the playoffs (which he would) I get all three back. This trade is just stacking Gords team while I get to keep the players and get first overall pick. It's one step further than this trade here. We either allow it or make rules to prevent it.

And Gord is also right that his trade with Greg should also not be allowed. the reason I said nothing there is because it's Backes.... and he sucks. LOL.

From private discussions and thoughts shared on this thread, I think the main (only?) real issue with the trades between Brandon and Scott, Greg and Gord, is that a player could end up back on the original roster at the end of the year. As mentioned previously, the NHL does not allow this type of trade, and for good reason we also choose not to accept these types of trades a few years back.

For that reason, I think this type of rule is just common sense. No team should be allowed to "rent" a player, only to have them returned at the end of the season.

This is a very slippery slope that I don't think any of us want to go down.

To maintain harmony in the league, I am willing to let these trades through, but I do think we need to place a temporary hold on conditional trades until we can discuss this further.

Gord, at this point nothing is being done to avoid rocking the apple cart. But we should figure out a way to deal with this in the off season. I personally prefer a simple rule disallowing this type of trade coupled with a basic trust between all of us that funny deals behind the scenes could destroy the fun and competitive nature of our league. I think we have a quality group of guys here, all of whom want to win honestly and fairly. Nobody wants an "asterisks" beside their league championship.

Now now Johnny........I never said that the the trade between Greg and myself should not be allowed you crazy man!!! Just that it should be held in the same light as the other one and if changes were needed then that would apply to both. Plus I dont want BACKES back either!! Hehehehe just kidding Greg.

I am certainly not trying to rock the boat(that much) and will say my peace and follow along with what is decided or not decided. I just think that having things clearly defined is the way to go. Prevents things from popping up again and again. It may case some debate/disagreement along the way but I think we are all able to handle it and move on after a decision is decided.

Anyway, I am done.

Thank you and Goooooooood night!

I'm hoping to get some managers thinking about the tanking issue. Just once and for all have some kind of vote that says it's ok to tank. Or make some rule to discourage it. I've suggested increasing keeper number. I think this trade would not happen (or at least be much more painful for the tanker) if we could keep 15 players. Right now we have about 120 top players as keepers. if it got to 170 or 200 then more valuable players would be off the table. If Doom could keep all these guys he is getting for the following season, then tanking and trading for draft picks would be more fair imo. But as it stands Doom is sacrificing next season to make a  serious run this season. Then will likely have to trade those players back at less value or drop them. This is the way the pool runs and I understand it(don't much like this really) but can live with it. This pool has never been about drafting and watching players develop. It's about boom and bust and trading to take advantage. All of which is fun, I just prefer to make my team and watch it rather than play this buy and sell game. If I can convince a majority of people that tanking sucks the life out of pools so be it. If I can't I will play the way it's set up. Just want us to be honest so I can join in the fun rather than all this integrity and we would never tank talk.

I would like to add one thing on this. I think Scott killed in this trade. And I only voted to veto because I want everyone to see how this pool operates. There is nothing illegal about the trade and can only be stopped if all 8 of us vote to veto, which won't happen. It's early for this type of trade and usually it's closer to mid season draft once teams really believe they have no shot at the money that we see the tanking/stacking trades. For this season I think we should just allow these types of trades, unless we actually ever get the 8 vote veto. These are the rules for better or worse. For next season we can discuss and promote our ideas. But my opinion is that a trade can only be stopped by the rules which is an 8 person veto. And Brandon did well in this trade for this season. It's the perfect trade really. Brandon won't be able to keep all those guys anyway, and Scott will get his choice of the best player for next season.

I expect another team or two to jump on the McDavid ride eventually, Scott will be hard to catch I think.

It's a deep draft next year. Let the games begin.

I am with Scoop. I hate the stress!

So, I have created another Forum for this discussion called Housekeeping. Let's haul things over there shall we?