So today, the long-awaited trade where the Coyotes send one of their defenseman to another team happened, a true blockbuster that will shake the trade market to it's core and cause teams to quiver in their boots - Dysin Mayo was traded to Vegas for a fifth round pick and an LTIR contract.

So my immediate thoughts when I saw this was that this was a very even trade - Dysin Mayo... isn't very good, Weber ensures we are above the cap floor depending on who we sell, and the 5th is just a throw-in. After more research, I really like the ramifications of this trade for the Coyotes - IF they do one thing, which I will discuss down below.

So Shea Weber's contract runs until the end of the 25-26 season worth 7.857M per year AAV wise - in actual salary, it is a measly 1 million dollars for the next 3 seasons plus whatever remains for this season. Since the NHL focuses on AAV when calculating cap hit, it makes perfect sense for a team who wants to hit the floor without having to pay top dollar to do so. Contrary to popular belief, the Coyotes have an owner who does spend money - ask our GM about the revamped scouting department that he can hire whoever for and gets whatever resources he wants from ownership for it. In fact, this contract is exactly the same salary as Dysin Mayo so when it comes to actual money spent it doesnt make a difference at all. The main thing is that this allows us to sell more than Chychrun. Arizona is currently 5.4M above the cap floor, so selling Chychrun will keep us above it but barely. Shea Weber gives us a lot more room to sell more pieces if the Coyotes want to. Overall a very easy LTIR contract to acquire which has been the team's bread and butter for the past several seasons (which I am actually a huge fan of and don't understand why more teams do this).

As for Dysin Mayo ... a 2023 5th is a good return for him. His ceiling at this point is just a 7th defenseman, so we aren't really losing anything. This allows us to give AHL top pairing minutes to more valuable prospects while also opening up another slot down in Tucson. I mean, he was on the opening roster and played fine last year, but when you get outplayed by Patrik Nemeth, Josh Brown and Troy Stecher then you really shouldn't be in the NHL at all. If he proves people wrong then we honestly aren't losing much because he never would have done anything on this team regardless of what opportunities he got. As for the pick itself, it honestly is just another player to grab. Bill Armstrong has said he likes a lot of the later picks in this draft because of the depth, but most GMs say that so I won't take it at face value.

The thing I dislike about this trade is that we gave away a defenseman, which is the position this organization most desperately needs. If this team sells Chychrun and Gostisbehere as well then we have basically nothing in the pipeline and it desperately needs to be restocked. The only D prospects we have that actually may become something are Vladislav Kolyachonok who has gotten playing time but needs more development time down in Tucson and Maveric Lamoureux, who has a lot of promise and was a massive project to begin with but is a few years away from the big leagues. If this team trades for young D players with term or on an ELC or just D prospects in general then this point can be completely disregarded; however, I do think it is a big concern down the line. This team does have 3 third round picks this year (the Islanders one doesn't show on Capfriendly due to being a conditional pick), so you could easily grab 2 or 3 within the top 100 draft slots this year but it absolutely needs to be addressed.

Overall, Vegas gets a depth piece while Arizona gets long-term cap flexibility at deadlines if they ever have to sell, a late pick in a draft with lots of depth and more time down in Tucson for more worthwhile prospects to develop. I'm a big fan of this trade and expect more down the line with all of this extra AAV to keep us at the floor.