What is the best win-win trade in recent NHL history?

With another historic night from Tage Thompson, it’s made the Ryan O’Reilly trade look a lot better for the Buffalo Sabres than it once did. The St. Louis Blues got a Conn Smythe winner on route to their franchise’s first Stanley Cup, and the Sabres got a superstar level player in Thompson, so it’s a trade that both sides are probably happy with.

For today’s #AskDFO question on Daily Faceoff Live, Tyler Yaremchuk and Frank Seravalli talked about some other notable win-win trades in recent NHL history.

Frank Seravalli: “I don’t think you have to look too far or to a different franchise to really find one. It’s last season with the Buffalo Sabres for me trading Jack Eichel, a guy that was clearly reaching the end of his rope with the medical issues that he had with the Sabres, also his cap hit and how big of an issue that was for a player that was mostly disgruntled and had a significant medical issue.

To be able to really get anything in return, let alone someone that came in and really helped their team last year and the vibes in Alex Tuch, a western New York native, plus a former first round pick in Peyton Krebs, and a first-round pick and a second that has not been drafted yet.

It’s still a ways off from being a total win-win because Jack Eichel has looked really good, but I think you could have a real debate and discussion at this point as to which team won the deal, which probably gives you a good indication that it was pretty balanced.”

Tyler Yaremchuk: “I looked back through the last three or four years of trades, and I agree with you, there’s no better example of a deal that could work to be a win-win than that Eichel deal.

But there’s another trade that’s on the total opposite side of this that I looked at, and it’s the three way deal between Philadelphia, Nashville and Vegas where Philly got Ryan Ellis, and he’s barely been able to play for them due to injuries, Vegas gets Nolan Patrick, and you’re thinking ‘He’s going to go reunite with Kelly McCrimmon and it will be this great story’, but he’s barely played for Vegas due to injuries, and Cody Glass, great story making the [Predators], has one goal in 24 games at the NHL level over the last two seasons.

That’s probably the most unfortunate deal where all three GMs are just sitting there going ‘That really didn’t go the way we wanted it to.'”