What Dougie Hamilton to the Flames Means for Calgary and Boston

If you can't spot the sucker after one month on the job as an NHL general manager, then you are the sucker.

Don Sweeney—hired on May 20 to replace the jettisoned Peter Chiarelli—continued a time-honored Boston Bruins tradition on Friday afternoon by trading restricted free-agent defenseman Dougie Hamilton to the Calgary Flames for the 15th, 45th and 52nd picks in this year's draft, which begins at 7 p.m. ET in Sunrise, Florida.

The 22-year-old Hamilton emerged as a top-pairing defenseman last season with 10 goals, 42 points and puck-possession numbers that say he wasn't being carried by future Hall of Famer Zdeno Chara.

So, of course, it was time to get rid of the blossoming Hamilton.

Jeff Gross/Getty Images

It was two years ago when the Bruins sent 21-year-old Tyler Seguin to the Dallas Stars for a package of players that included Loui Eriksson and Reilly Smith. In 2009, the Bruins shipped 21-year-old Phil Kessel to Toronto for three picks, two of which became Seguin and Hamilton.

The definition of insanity isn't doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results—it's the Boston Bruins.

Of course, the Bruins won a Cup in 2011 and lost in the Final in 2013, which says they must be doing something right. Then again, perhaps it's the verb tense that's off in that sentence. They were doing something right, since Seguin was part of the both runs while Hamilton was a contributor in 2013.

Seguin was traded due to perceived off-ice issues.

Hamilton was traded because...he's a grown man who prefers to go by Dougie instead of Doug or Douglas? Hamilton should have been able to get away with asking to be known as "Lord Vader" after what he showed in 2014-15, which was that he was the future of an aging Bruins defense.

The production was great, but what Hamilton was able to accomplish with his possession game should have resulted in the Bruins paying big money to secure his future—not send him elsewhere.

Player	Minutes	CF%	CF% (together)	CF% (apart)
Zdeno Chara	1083:17	54.2	57.1	49.3
Dougie Hamilton	1196:38	55.0	57.1	52.2

The numbers show that when Chara and Hamilton were together at five-on-five last season, they were a dominant pairing. When separated, each player's possession numbers suffered, but Chara slipped below 50 percent when he wasn't with Hamilton.

That seems like a huge red flag for a team that's...what are the Bruins doing here, anyway? Rebuilding?

The Bruins had 96 points last season, a number that is almost always plenty good enough to reach the playoffs unless there are three or four teams tanking to get the first pick in the draft.

This Hamilton trade is probably more in response to contract demands than a feeling the Bruins need to move in a new direction, but it doesn't make it any less silly.

With Spotrac indicating they had very little salary-cap room, the Bruins had to do something to free money to re-sign Adam McQuaid and their RFAs, but trading Hamilton should have been the doomsday option—not the move made a few hours before the draft.

The move was to dump Milan Lucic for a draft pick, which they did, which makes moving Hamilton all the more difficult to understand.

While the Bruins are left with an aging blue line led by Chara, the Flames suddenly have one of the more formidable top-four groups in the league.

The Flames lucked their way to a playoff berth—their 45.8 Fenwick percentage was the worst of any playoff team since 2007-08—but have given themselves a chance to improve their foundation for next season, which had been destined to be epically disappointing before this deal.

Mark Giordano, TJ Brodie, Hamilton and probably Kris Russell give the Flames a very strong back end, one that was revealed to be fragile when Deryk Engelland was paired with Brodie following Giordano's season-ending shoulder injury in February.

Brodie wore Engelland around his neck like Jacob Marley's chains and still found a way to drag the Flames to the playoffs.

That GM Brad Treliving didn't have to give up a player from his roster to execute this deal makes this a coup for Calgary, which already has a slew of talented young forwards aching to be surrounded by skilled veteran forwards in free agency.

Hamilton not only makes the Flames better, but he makes the Flames a better destination for free agents.

With one move, the Flames have given themselves a chance in 2015-16 to avoid that inevitable crash to reality like Colorado suffered last year and Toronto the year before that following a PDO-fueled wonder of luck and magic.

Maybe you're thinking it's too soon to judge this trade. Maybe you're thinking we need to see what the Bruins do with these draft picks before disparaging Sweeney and team president Cam Neely for ushering another young, gifted player out of town. Maybe they package all these picks and ship them to the Coyotes for the No. 3 pick on Friday night.

But if the Bruins are just going to trade Noah Hanifin three years from now for prospects, does it really matter?

All breaking news courtesy of NHL.com. Advanced statistics courtesy of Stats.HockeyAnalysis.com.

Dave Lozo covers the NHL for Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter @DaveLozo.