With nothing really coming out of Winnipeg Jets headquarters, we are left to our fantasy when it comes to dreaming up things that could happen. One of those fairly obvious things is Jacob Trouba being traded. But what should he garner in a trade?
One thing about trades is a team can shop a player around to get a package that fills their needs. When the Nashville Predators traded Seth Jones to the Columbus Blue Jackets for Ryan Johansen, they made a mutually beneficial trade because they looked around the league. Even if the Jets are dealing with a player who does not want to stay in Winnipeg, they can find a team elsewhere to trade Trouba to and Trouba has no trade protections so they are free to do whatever they want.
In a trade, the Jets should be looking to address a couple of needs: they do need more good defencemen and this might be a good time to look at who could come in a fill that role. There are younger defencemen who teams might be willing to trade for the more established Trouba or even one of Trouba’s contemporaries like Hampus Lindholm.
Another need that the Jets have is draft picks. These are not as urgently needed an actual defenceman to replace Trouba, but the Jets only have three picks this year and have not had a first round pick for the past two years. It is the reason why we have very little draft coverage this year. The Jets might not get a first round pick back if they trade Trouba, but they could start to re-stock their draft picks thanks to trading him.
It is hard to say what Jacob Trouba would garner in a trade because while many fans in Winnipeg speculate that Trouba is going to be traded soon, it is not in the collective minds of NHL fans everywhere. Now let’s let the games begin!
