When Hockey Trades Go Bad: The Biggest Blunders in NHL History

Bad Trades: Who made the biggest blunder in NHL history???

With the NHL trade deadline having come and gone, my thoughts quickly turned to the worst trades in NHL history. The list is longer than you think, but for the purpose of fitting this article into this publication, I have created a list of 12 horrific trades.

1. Pavol Demitra gets traded from the Ottawa Senators to the St. Louis Blues for Christer Olsson. Well, we all know who Demitra is, who the heck is Olsson? Demitra has over 700 points in his NHL career, while Olsson played 25 games for the Sens, scoring two goals and adding three assists for a total of five points.

OUCH! Pass the vaseline, that trade hurt!

2. The Los Angeles Kings Trade Wayne Gretzky to the St. Louis Blues for Craig Johnson, Roman Vopat, Patrice Tardif, a first and a fifth rounder. In case you didn’t remember, Gretzky played a total of 18 games for the Blues, while the players who went to L.A. hit the beach more than they did the ice. This trade was a dud for both teams.

3. The Detroit Red Wings trade Adam Oates to St. Louis for Bernie Federko. Can you imagine if the Red Wings had kept Oates? The Wings would have had Steve Yzerman, Sergei Fedorov, and Oates skating down the middle for over a decade.

Federko scored 57 points for the Red Wings that year (89-90), then promptly retired. Oates scored 102 points the year he went to St. Louis (89-90), then went on to score 1,420 points in his career. Clearly this was one bad trade for the Wings.

4. Kris Draper is traded by the Winnipeg Jets to the Detroit Red Wings for a dollar! No need to get into details here; Draper has a few Stanley Cup rings, and the Jets are defunct! End of story.....

5. The Toronto Maple Leafs trade their third overall Draft pick to the New Jersey Devils for defenseman Tom Kurvers. Kurvers had 55 points in 89 games with the Leafs—not bad.

That 3rd overall pick? Yeah, that turned out to be Scott Neidermayer, one of the games top 10 defensemen of all time. This trade absolutely killed the Leafs...just imagine!

6. The New York Islanders trade Roberto Luongo and Olli Jokinen for Mark Parrish and Oleg Kvasha. Luongo and Jokinen are perennial All-Stars; Parrish and Kvasha...are not! Ahhhh, if only Mike Milbury had called the Leafs.....

7. The Chicago Blackhawks trade Dominik Hasek to the Buffalo Sabres for Stephane Beauregard and a fifth round draft choice. Dominik Hasek went on to become one of the best goalies of all-time, earning the nickname the “Dominator.”

Beauregard never played a game for the Hawks. That trade is uglier than Rick James in the morning!

8. In 1986, the Vancouver Canucks traded Cam Neely and a first round draft pick (Glen Wesley- Defenseman), to the Boston Bruins for Barry Pederson. Wesley for Pederson may have been a steal; Neely was a legend while he played, quite possibly the best power forward ever? The Canucks got shagged, baby!

9. The Chicago Blackhawks traded Phil Esposito, Ken Hodge and Fred Stanfield to the Boston Bruins for Pit Martin, Jack Norris and Giles Marotte. Fred Stanfield had six consecutive 20-goal seasons for the Bruins; Ken Hodge played nine seasons for the Bruins, scoring 25 goals or more 7 times and 50 goals in 1973-74.

Esposito was the best scorer of his time, the first NHL player to score 100 points, and the leader of Canada’s 1972 Team—not to mention a key member of Boston’s Stanley Cup Championships.

Martin, Norris and Marotte? Not so good; Martin was a good player, scoring 20 goals or more in 7 of the 11 seasons he spent in Chicago; Jack Norris had a grand total of three wins for the Blackhawks, and Marotte had a total of 10 goals over three seasons for Chi-Town. And you wonder why Chicago hasn’t won the Cup in decades?

10. The Montreal Canadiens traded Patrick Roy and Mike Keane to the Colorado Avalanche for Andrei Kovalenko, Jocelyn Thibault, and Martin Rucinsky. Roy and Keane were the final pieces in Colorado’s Stanley Cup championship. Kovalenko, Thibault and Rucinsky did next to nothing for the Habs.

See? Even the great teams screw up once and a while.

11. The Calgary Flames trade Doug Gilmour, Jaime Macoun, Rick Walmsley, Ric Natress, and Kent Manderville to Toronto for Michel Petit, Gary Leeman, Jeff Reese, Alexander Godynyuk and Craig Berube.

This trade kinda reminds you of the first time you said “I promise I won’t cum”, doesn’t it? Fletcher pulled a fast one on the former Calgary GM,  then young and innocent Doug Riesborough. Gilmour went on to become a legend in Toronto and damn near willed the Toronto Maple Leafs to the Stanley Cup. Damn you Gretzky!

12. In 1993, the Philadelphia Flyers traded Peter Forsberg, Ron Hextall, Chris Simon, Mike Ricci, Kerry Huffman, Steve Duchesne, two first round draft picks, and $15,000,000 dollars cash to the Quebec Nordiques for Eric Lindros and his annoying parents!

The trade couldn’t save the Nordiques from becoming the Colorado Avalanche, but the Avs would go on to win two Stanley Cups on the backs of many of the above noted players backs. In the end, Forsberg alone may have been too much for Lindros; that said, Lindros was a great player. If not hampered by injuries, he could have been one of the best players of all-time.

Hindsight, as they say, is everything, isn’t it???

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Until next time,

Peace!