I had this weird thought the other day and I couldn't quite wrap my head around it. I found it to be a most perplexing question that despite my best efforts, I could not answer. I decided it was a question that required an immediate answer.

So what does one do when they have an unanswerable question? They take it to the Internet and let strangers argue it out and hope that a semblance of rationale thought appears and that a vague impression of an answer appears.

Here's my question to the readers. Now follow me closely on this one. Ready?

Imagine Dany Heatley is not an Ottawa Senator. Pretend he has never been one. Imagine he plays on a team that is identical to the current makeup of the Ottawa Senators as we know them today. We will call this the Clone Team just to keep things clear. The Senators have the exact same lineup, just with no Dany Heatley and no Dany Heatley cap hit. Are we all still on board and following along? Good. So we have the Clone Team Dany plays for and the Ottawa Senators. The exact same situation arises where Dany requests a trade from the Clone Team. The Ottawa Senators are interested in acquiring him from the Clones. Now, what would the Ottawa Senators have to give up in order to land Dany Heatley?

Hopefully that was clear enough and the context of this situation is easily grasped. I think it would be interesting to see what worth Senators fans place on Dany Heatley, and his trade value by using our other Senators players as a determinant of what he's worth.The best package I could come up with for Heatley is Foligno, Fisher and Picard or Schubert. Seems to fit the mold of what Murray is after, but I'm curious if my assumptions are completely off base.

I realize that many of you are sick of hearing his name and speculating and waiting day in and day out for a resolution. I figured I would test your patience and look at this trade from a new angle. Hopefully some of you are more creative than me. Let's see what you've got.

Comments (25)

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written by Lewy , August 20, 2009

Smith, Schubert and a 7th.

Seriously, I don't think we would be willing to take on Clone-Heatley without getting rid of an overpaid player and we have way too many fourth-line pluggers. So I'd offer something along the lines of Fisher, Winchester and either Lee or Picard.

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written by Chris Robinson , August 20, 2009

Considering we gave up Hossa to get him--and that was before back to back 50 goal seasons --- buy... yeah... I'd say Fisher, Kelly, Lee and either a prospect (Regin or Zubov) or 2nd round pick.

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written by Derrick , August 20, 2009

Interesting reversal, Tim.

If the GM on the Clone team were as shrewd as Murray, I suspect that Fisher, Foligno, and Picard/Schubert would not be enough. Presumably, the Clone team would not be getting a lot of offense in return. If a team were an almost exact Clone of the Senators, they would probably want Karlsson in a deal to provide them with offense from the back end. But, again, they'd probably have someone like Karlsson in the system. It would be hard to deal with a clone.

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written by Rob R. , August 20, 2009

Kelly, Schubert, Smith & 2nd rnd. pick - is par with the supposed "offers" out there right now that are being sent to the real-life Bryan Murray.

However, if you are looking for a value for value trade, I think it would look something like this.
Foligno, Fisher & either our 2010 first-round pick

While it would hurt to give up a guy like Foligno, the Clones are going to need to replace the firepower left behind by Heater. While Nick's not going to hit 50 goals this year, I don't think it's impossible to imagine him potting 30-35, if given the proper playmaking centre. The fans wouldn't like giving Fisher away either, but 50 goals in return would probably settle their frayed nerves a bit.

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written by eli , August 20, 2009

Fisher, Foligno, but what if the clone GM also wanted either Karlsson or Cowen, and a first? Don`t think BM would go for that.

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written by Bnert , August 20, 2009

Schubert or Picard are rubbish. I'd say Foligno, Kelly, Lee and a 2nd

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written by Tim6thSens , August 20, 2009

See, these are all fascinating proposals in my mind. The most interesting thing is how no one has mentioned Spezza. I think had I posed this same question as soon as the trade request became public we would have seen Jason Spezza or Karlsson and Cowen's names all over this. I think Senators fans have collectively lowered their standards.

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written by Rob R. , August 20, 2009

Tim - I think it's more like Spezza, Alfie and the soon-to-be superstars (Cowen, Karlsson) have become Ottawa's new untouchables.

I can honestly say that there are only three or four players in the entire league who I would swap Spezza for.
A.O., Crosby, Malkin, Iggy, and maybe Nash. I can't see anyone else realistically putting up the number of assists (or goals, for that matter) that Spezza will get this year.

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written by Rob R. , August 20, 2009

Also, I should note that if we were the ones trading Heatley to the sans-Heatley Clones, you'd see those names popping up. They're just not names that we feel comfortable giving up... at least, I sure don't.

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written by Tim6thSens , August 20, 2009

Rob - I think you may be right. I think I could add a few players to your list of players I would swap Spezza for (Luongo, Zetterberg, Getzlaf etc.) but I agree with the untouchable tag.

What comes out of this though, is when did Dany Heatley fall out of this group of untouchable players?

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written by Jacques King , August 20, 2009

Heatley for Kovalev and Kuba

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written by Bnert , August 20, 2009

Heatley become 'touchable' when he requested a trade! I don't think we would be having discussions about Heatley's value if he hadn't requested it. He would be happy, and we would probably be spending more time talking about Pascal Leclaire's health and how to improve the defense (Karlsson, Picard shcubert etc..) this speculation was brought on bty heatley himself.

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written by Rob R. , August 20, 2009

I think Heatley fell out of the untouchable group the minute he requested the trade. It's not even so much that he asked for a trade, it's the way he and his agents went about it that (I think) really cheesed off Sens fans.

Up until the end of last season, I was deep in man-love with Heatley. I'm no homer... I realized his lack of a two-way game, and that he was basically a floater with a lethal one-timer, but it's hard to dislike a guy who can put up so many goals, especially during such a disastrous season. However, when I heard that interview when he said it was a decent season (39 goals X-number of points) that made me realize his "me-first and the gimme gimmes" attitude. Cockiness, I can handle (hell, I was an Emery fan, even after the shit hit the fan) but at least Emery was (at least somewhat) a team player. And in Emery's defense, he was young and stupid. Heatley has been around long enough that he should have known better than to answer a question like that.

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Nope
written by BeJamin , August 20, 2009

Alright I'm going to imagine this.

[x] Heatley has requested a trade
[x] Hossa is still a member of the Senators
[x] There is quite a bit of risk because of Heatley issues. Namely the eye injury and the drunk driving. Lots of uncertainty around how he will recover from it all. It was probably a bigger risk to acquire him then than it is now by the way.

Okay so wait? You're asking us to imagine how we would acquire Heatley? Well I don't have to imagine it's already happened. We traded our only high value asset in Hossa for him. I'd do the exact same trade again. You have to presume if we didn't have Heater that we would still have Hossa. Done and done? lol

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written by Oman , August 20, 2009

Alfie, Spezza and Cowen/Karlsson + first round picks for the next 10 years. No more, no less. No if ands or buts. If Murray can't get that kind of return, fire him immediately and promote Clouston to GM/Coach! No messin around here. This is "The Show"!

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Missing
written by RTWAP , August 20, 2009

The problem is, the Sens are missing good young established players. For a trade to work, it should be relatively salary neutral, and the players should be signed for a few years. And given that it's not likely to be a 1-for-1 swap, that generally means a couple of young but established 2nd liners for an elite top liner.

The Sens don't have any good young 2nd liners that really fit that mold. Fisher is close enough to count, I guess. But Foligno isn't there yet. If we had a Foligno from, say, 2 years from now, with a $3mil contract and a 50-55 point season under his belt then I'd say sure.

This conversation really exposes the weak drafting Ottawa had for the first handful of seasons this decade. Aside from the Spezza pick, we weren't able to get any first or second line talent in those 5 drafts. Vermette could never solidify a 2nd line role. Our last hope from that group is Peter Regin (2004). Hopefully he'll excel and earn a spot on the 2nd line in the next year or two.

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ugh
written by DABC , August 20, 2009

... a bag of pucks

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written by Shakes , August 20, 2009

most of the trades are not good enough. Kelly???? Kelly can't come close to a proven top 6 forward. unfortunately, neither can Fisher.

The trade would likely have to look like this, according to the formula we are asking other teams to pay.

Top 6 = Foligno (believe he will excel this year)
Top 4 D = Volchenkov (Cowen is coming up, and so is Weircoch)
prospect = Zubov
Pick = 2nd 2010

But wait, that doesn't address cap. we have 7.5 coming in, and half that or less going out.

Alfie, and Spezza are core, and Kovalev was just signed.

Yikes.

We probably wouldn't be in the Heatley sweeps.

KJ

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written by Matt Segal , August 20, 2009

Foligno, Kuba, and a 1st

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The flaw
written by TKI , August 20, 2009

The flaw in this scenario is that without Heatley in the roster, his cap impact is nil. This means that the Senators could take him on for nothing but 10 years worth of prospects. They don't need to given any current roster palyers up to bring him on board.

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written by cas , August 20, 2009

Quite simply, the only reason this team has a shot at being a contender is because of the top 5 of Heatley, Spezza, Alfredsson, Kovalev, and (a hopefully productive) Fisher. We've got a nice mixture of youth and experience throughout the lineup, but the question marks on defense and in goal are huge. Take out Heatley and then ask us to sacrifice more off the roster in order to get him, and we're not looking so good.

If it takes Fisher, Foligno and Lee/Picard to get him, then we're sacrificing the future (which should be bright with a maturing Spezza, big-3 D prospects, and three young goalies) for the shot at making us a borderline contender.

Long story short: No thanks to acquiring Heatley. I offer Kelly, Lee, Zubov, and a 1st (pretty much the same thing ATL received for Hossa) and walk if they balk.

Pretty much, I would do just what every other GM has done, to date.

p.s. when did Heatley stop being untouchable? Roughly, when he started playing the last 18 months of lacklustre hockey, but specifically, when he spent the entire last game of the season waiving his stick in the air trying to get to 40.

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Never understood this about Foligno
written by Burgundy , August 20, 2009

Its probably because of where he was drafted... but why does everyone think Foligno is a legitimate top 6 forward? I think he can get 20-25 goals this season, but not consistently.

Problem with every trade offer/rumour is never fair value for the Sens. Heatley's a high end player. A Heatley-Brent Burns trade is reasonable. I'm tired of seeing trades where one team is sending 3 or 4 players for one. I'd like to see trade one star for another. Like how Heatley got to Ottawa.

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written by cas , August 20, 2009

So TKI, is your proposal to completely undo all of what Murray has done for the farm just so we can take on this selfish, spoiled douchebag?

With any concern whatsoever given to the cap, trading prospects for Heatley without giving up any salary would be franchise suicide.

As it stands, the Sens desperately need to shed Heatley's salary prior to the 2010 UFA season.

Here's the real flaw in this scenario: Who says Heatley would even waive to go to Ottawa He wants to play for a contender, remember?

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To Cas
written by TKI , August 21, 2009

Just commenting on the fictional scenario of a Heatleyless Sens team trying to bring him on. If all other aspects of the roster are identical, then Ottawa has $7.5M in available cap space and does not need to trade any current players to acquire Heatley. In the real world, from the perspective of other teams thinking of acquring Heatley, the proposed scenario does not exist therefore it is a flawed exercise.
As a GM, I can keep ALL of my current guys. As a "thought exercise", it falls short.

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written by cas , August 22, 2009

Fair enough, TKI; fair enough.

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