How will the Tyler Toffoli trade impact the market?

Hockey fans were treated to a blockbuster trade on the morning of February 14th, when the harrowing and underperforming Montreal Canadiens traded away star player and cornerstone-like player (in their organization, at least), Tyler Toffoli, to the battling and vigorous Calgary Flames.

The Flames sent a conditional 5th round pick, a 2022 1st round pick, Tyler Pitlick, and Emil Heineman off to the Habs in compensation.

With the Flames battling for first place in the pacific division, they had the urge to add a high-scoring winger onto their already flaming squad. With Toffoli’s arrival, he’ll be sure to make the Flames a stronger and a scarier team to play against. As for the Montreal Canadiens, they’re on the complete opposite side.

In search of picks, prospects, and younger future talent, the Habs appear to be heading off into a rebuild, moving out their star players for picks and prospects. Could this signify an official rebuild for the Canadiens, or could this just be a simple re-tool with a few tweaks? If I were a betting man, I’d bet that this is the start of a legitimate rebuild within the Montreal Canadiens organization. Fairly, it’s been long overdue. With mediocre talent and an unbearable cap hell, the Canadiens haven’t seen any success this season. Their fall from grace after the Stanley Cup loss was insufferable, and now the team has nowhere to go.

Now that the Habs have moved on from a top talent player, and the Flames have acquired that player for picks and a prospect, it could be the official horn that sounds off the trade deadline. With only 5 weeks to go, the rumors and trades have officially begun. With names such as Ben Chiarot, Pavel Zacha, JT Miller, and Jakob Chychrun getting thrown around, it’s perked up fans and insiders all over the world. Who will go where? Who will overpay? Who’ll underpay? It’s sparked up a big controversy, and one of the most exciting and crucial times of the NHL season is in session.

Last year it was Kyle Palmieri and Travis Zajac’s departures from the New Jersey Devils that kicked off the trades, as Lou Lameriello (the current GM of the New York Islanders) traded for the two veterans giving up AJ Greer, Mason Jobst, and a first round pick in the process. Even though the trade backfired on both teams (somehow?), it commenced the market and the moves that were made at the 2021 deadline.

By the way, they both lost the trade because the first round pick was used to draft Chase Stillman, an underperforming forward from the OHL, and the Islanders ended up extending Kyle Palmieri to a lucrative 4 year deal, carrying a $5 million dollar AAV. Palmeiri has put up a total of 5 goals and 13 points in 48 total games played with the Islanders. And they gave him a NTC for the first two years and a M-NTC for the last two.

As the trade happened, the other deals began to slowly roll in. Savard was moved from the Blue Jackets to the Lightning for a first and a third, Mattias Janmark from Chicago to Vegas for a second round pick, and David Rittich from Calgary to Toronto for a third round pick, along with many other trades.

This year, the trade deadline will look a tad bit antithetic. Based on recent reports, most of the players lined up to be traded are relatively young players with a ton of talent and term left on their contracts. With players like Brock Boeser, Jakob Chychrun, Travis Konecny, and Conor Garland on the trade block, it’s got people’s gears grinding and amped up to see what will happen with the younger group of players.

Even though there are the young guns who can and will be moved, there are still a handful of upcoming unrestricted free agents who are on their way out of their respective teams due to the recent lack of success. Claude Giroux, Ben Chiarot, Tomas Hertl, and Calle Jarncrok are just a few of these upcoming UFAs who’ve been rumored to get the boot.

We’ve seen the opening kickoff trade with Tyler Toffoli, but he isn’t even considered a rental player due to him having more years on his contract after this season. But, what if we were to find out what the average cost of a rental player would be this deadline, purely based on hat deal?

That’s exactly what I went to do.

I took a look at the last 10 trade deadlines– since 2012, that is– and using some comparables and mathematics, I found out what the four closest kickoff trades to the recent Toffoli trade were.

The graph above shows us the four closest comparables to the Tyler Toffoli trade that happened a few days ago. As you can examine, the Blake Coleman trade to Tampa Bay that originated the 2019-20 deadline was our closest match. Coming in at 78.2%, it almost makes sense. Having that first go to New Jersey along with prospect Nolan Foote, was the rough equivalent to having Calgary’s first round pick go to Montreal along with Heinamen and a later round pick.

The other three trades came from the 2015-16, 2012-13, and 2016-17 seasons. All three trades included a main piece going one way, and a first along with a few other finer assets. Even though some of these moves aren’t as close as the others (the 2016-17 deal was only a 49.9% match), these were the top four comparables. Every other kickoff trade wasn’t close enough to be considered part of the top four.

Now that we’ve found the closest kickoff trades, we can extend the search to find out the average cost for a rental in all four years would be. In this case, what I did was find the average price of a rental in each of the four seasons one by one, and then took all of those results, and found the average of all of them together.

It’s important to note that not every year will be the same. There are years where the rental players are stronger than the others, and that plays into the result. The cheaper the rental, the more proof there is to make the point that the UFA class was weak. The 2016-17 trade deadline saw the cheapest average rental price out of the four years, at only one third round pick, and three fourth round picks. For a rental player, that’s a pretty reasonable price.

The most expensive cost of a rental was back in 2012-13, where the average cost was three second round picks, one fourth round pick, and one sixth round pick. For an upcoming UFA with no safety or promise of an extension, that’s a pretty hefty price.

I also took a look and counted how many prospects (no matter how good) were traded at the deadline that year. The results weren’t too bad, seeing that in the four years, the average prospect giveaway was just 4. From my years of studying hockey, I’ve always found teams and general managers to be somewhat lucrative with prospects, so this felt relieving… in a sense.

Now that we have the averages of all the years, we now know what the average price of the rentals are. That would be, two second round picks, one third round pick, and one fourth round pick. We will never know the exact average until after the deadline is complete, but we now have a rough estimate of what the average cost of a rental skater will be. Of course, the skill always plays into the cost, but that’s what we’re working with here.

A first round pick and a third round pick is the analytical equivalent to the price mentioned above, so it’s basically pick and choose between those two different price points.

So, we understand what the average price of a rental player is. It’s two seconds, one third, and one fourth OR, it’s one first, and one third. It’s great that we know this little part of the deadline, but what if we were to look deeper into the actual players that are proposed to be moved?

Very recently, Frank Seravalli of The Daily Faceoff, wrote about the top trade bait in the NHL.. Some new names that were on the list were Brock Boeser and Pavel Zacha. He never really listed the asking prices, but that’s why we have other insiders and analytics. I wanted to see which of the top players were going to fetch more than what they’re worth, and which players were going to fetch less than they’re worth.

And that’s exactly what I did. I took the top 5 players on Frank Seravalli’s list, and found out their value using multiple microstats (trade comparables, WAR, SPAR, and other tiny things). Then, I stepped into the mind of basically any other general manager, and tried to evaluate what they would get in return for the said player.

The top 5 players on Seravalli’s list were Claude Giroux, Ben Chiaort, Tomas Hertl, Brandon Hagel, and Jakob Chychrun.

All of them have legitimate trade value, except for Ben Chiarot. I kid you not when I say this, but after I entered his value multiple times, it came up that he had zero value. Yet, there will be a team that will pay a first and a third to have him on their team.

The stats speak for themselves, but let’s revise. Giroux’s a talented player who’ll continue to tear up the NHL for a few more years, and he’s worth two firsts, one fifth, and an A- tier prospect. The actual Haul that the Flyers may get for the 34 year-old, would be one first, one third, and an A tier prospect. It’s not too bad at all.

Ben Chiarot sucks, and he shouldn’t be in the NHL. But, NHL GMs like big body players who can hit. Montreal’s asking for the defenseman is a first and a third, and sadly, they’ll probably get that for the player.

Tomas Hertl’s name has been thrown around in a lot of rumors, but he is now the third player on Frank’s list. Hertl is very good. He’s an exceptional talent who should bring a first, a B+ tier prospect, a bottom 6 forward, and one second round pick to San Jose, but NHL GMs might not be too keen on giving up that much for a rental, and will probably give the Sharks a first, a top nine forward, and a third.

Brandon Hagel is one of the most underrated NHL players, and he’s on the market. We know that the Hawks are asking for a mid round pick, an A- prospect, and a first round pick for the player. It’s a bit much though. By the analytical value, Hagel is really only worth a first and a B- tier prospect. That being said, he’s one of the safest investments and he’ll only grow to become better and better. So even though it may not be worth it now, it will be a few years down the road.

Jakob Chychrun is self-explanatory. He’s having a bad season, but it’s justified due to the Coyotes being god-awful. Whatever the 23 year-old defenseman hauls back to the Yotes, it’ll be worth it for both teams. Don’t let the bad season fool you, because he’s a legitimate star and he is worth so much more than people suggest him to be.

The NHL trade deadline gets so much closer everyday, and the rumors start to spring up. There are countless of players available this year, and it’ll be fun to see which player goes where. This year’s deadline will be unreal, and it’s all thanks to all the young talent that can very well be moved. Don’t be surprised if a team overpays, or if a team gets less than expected for a player, because with every year, the market gets crazier and crazier thanks to some wild GMs who’ll do whatever it takes to figuratively make their team better.