VHL Trade Wars: Edition 3 (Season 60)

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VHL Trade Wars: Edition 3 (Season 60)

 

 

This is the third edition of VHL Trade Wars as we will once again look at two trades that happened in Season 60 (the last two prior to the off-season).  Last edition we saw players of the caliber of a Lukas Muller and Vern Reinholdt being traded around, while picks acquired were used to take steals like Mikka Pajari.  This edition will be a little less laced with major talents or picks that were used to acquire future huge pieces that would play in the VHL, but still features a couple players that put in some solid time in the VHL. 

 

Just in case you aren’t as familiar with how I typically have ran these, I choose this timeline (starting in Season 60) as there is far more information regarding the seasons that would take place after this point due to the portal and how it tracks everything.  My typical focus is more on the face value of a deal as opposed to future moves that were made off of these since I will looking at them down the line anyway.  That being said, as you will see in this article, part of my verdict isn’t always as simple as looking at the names and the stats in the deal.  Sometimes, there are reasons to move a player like needing to create cap room or giving a guy a chance to go for a Continental Cup in a bigger role.  Perhaps that was a little bit of foreshadowing? Stay tuned and you will see.

 

Once again, feel free to respond with any opinions or critiques of the article as I know some of you may be a bit more familiar with the stakes of some of these transactions.  With that being said, lets get to the moves!

 

SEASON 60

To CGY 

Xander Finn @Jericho

 

To RIG 

S61 CGY 4th Round Pick (N/A)

S62 CGY 3rd (Jack Stucky) @stucky71

 

GM's: @Bushito (CGY), @hedgehog337 (RIG)

 

Date:  May 14th, 2018

 

Oh look, more friends…this trade saw the Wranglers acquire Xander Finn, a former 100 point player that was in the final season of his career and was eyeing the Continental Cup which he had never had the opportunity to win before.  Finn started his VHL career as a member of the Stockholm Vikings (Not the VHLE version) where he would play his first three seasons and found continued growth and development, reaching 90 points in Season 55.  The next season saw him off to Toronto for what would be the best season of his career; a mesmerizing 109 point and 131 hit campaign that saw the young center record what would become career highs in goals, assists and points.  Finn actually became far more of a depth piece after his first few seasons in the league, but had a pretty impressive offensive career recording 538 career points in 576 games and was even a pretty physical presence throughout with over 1400 hits.  This trade saw Finn joining the Wranglers for the rest of the season in what would be his last.  He finished his season with a solid 59 points in 72 games and went on to be pretty productive in the playoffs with 7 points and 28 hits in 9 games.  While he would fall short of winning the Continental Cup, he gave the Wranglers some really solid minutes for the rest of the year.

 

Riga acquired a third round pick that was used to select Jack Stucky, a player that sadly never made it past two seasons in the VHLM.  Recording 77 points in 137 career VHLM games over those two seasons, Stucky would choose to move on from professional hockey, with no specific reason sighted.  Much speculation has been made on whether or not there was a falling out with a teammate or some kind of health issue that prevented him from continuing to play, but it seems that we may never know.  Stucky has since stayed out of the public eye and hasn’t been seen in quite some time.  The fourth round pick the Riga Reign would acquire would end up being a rather useless addition as the draft never made it to a fourth round in the end.  Not exactly what they probably hoped would come out of those two picks, but ultimately the move was sending a depth player in his last year to a team that had perhaps a chance to use him in a better role and in a spot where he could potentially win a Continental Cup.  So while value wise, this is a pretty obvious one, cheers to the Reign for making a good move by Mr. Finn.

 

Verdict: Winner – Bushito (Calgary) – It has to be right? Finn actually ended up being a good piece for the rest of the season and had a very productive playoffs for the Wranglers.  He may have only been there for the rest of that season, but he was traded for a player who played two seasons in the VHLM and then retired, and a pick that wasn’t used as there was no fourth round.  Riga did a necessary move that I would have made myself had I been GM, but good on the Wranglers for getting a valuable rental for next to nothing.

 

SEASON 60

To QUE 

S61 SEA 5th Round Pick (N/A)

D – Matthieu Bourdon @Lunaro

 

To SEA 

S61 QUE 5th Round Pick (N/A)

 

Date: May 14th, 2016

 

This second trade is actually an interesting one as it was done as part of a three team deal that included the previous trade we looked at involving Vern Reinholdt in the previous edition of VHL Trade Wars.  The Seattle Bears were looking to move off of some cap space in order to bring Reinholdt in, and therefore used this deal to help with that, sending Matthieu Bourdon and a pick to the Quebec City Meute, in exchange for a pick of their own. 

 

Bourdon was a depth defenseman that was in just their fourth year in the league.  They had previously been a member of Quebec City back in Season 58 and would spend three seasons there in total (along with time with the Seattle Bears, Riga Reign and New York Americans).  While certainly Bourdon never moved the needle for any of their teams in a major way, constantly finding themselves on basement dwelling teams, they did actually have a pretty respectable overall career.  Bourdon, who played a pretty impressive 504 career VHL games, finished with 307 career points and 1261 blocked shots, showing a knack for getting their body in the line of fire while doing what they could to help out offensively.  Perhaps their best overall season came in Season 62, with the New York Americans, where they finished with 69 points, 119 hits and 250 blocked shots in 72 games.  The fifth round pick that accompanied Bourdon in this trade ended up being nothing as the draft didn’t end up going long enough for that pick to be made.

 

Verdict: Winner – Beaviss (Quebec) - There isn’t too much sense talking about the return given the pick that Seattle acquired was never used as the draft didn’t end up going five rounds, but this was simply a cap space move.  With that being said, I judge things purely on the value of the pieces going back and forth, and Bourdon was the only thing of value in this deal.  That being said, obviously one has to acknowledge that Seattle was doing this to clear cap space.  It’s just a shame that what they acquired wasn’t even like a late round pick on a lesser prospect where they could have went for the steal.  That being said, Bourdon actually played a depth role on that mediocre team for another season so ultimately, I am going to give the “win” to Beaviss and the Meute.

 

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As a little bit of an ending here for this article, I want to add that this will be the end of the Season 60 Transactions.  Next up will be the Season 60 off-season deals which will see a much more significant number of deals and a lot of higher quality being exchanged.  This may mean some articles will have more or less deals just so I don’t drag the articles on too much as I go through out very lengthy transaction log.  Due to this, I will also be looking for any advice you guys may have on how I can improve these articles.  I try to do what I can in terms of research and coming up with fairly detailed content, but I have also been considering doing interviews with some of the GM’s that may still be around, for some of the more significant moves.  Time will tell if adding something like that is necessary or not given the amount of time that has passed since some of these moves, but I’m just spitballing.  Hope you all enjoyed and got some insight out of this edition of the VHL Trade Wars, and we will see you in a couple more weeks where we will enter into the Season 61 Off-Season.

 

 

 

 

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