Trading Seth Jones might not be easy for the Blackhawks

Chicago Blackhawks defenseman Seth Jones told Chicago Sun-Times beat reporter Ben Pope that he’s working with the Blackhawks to facilitate a trade, now leaving many wondering if we could potentially see him moved at the trade deadline in just a couple of weeks.

However, considering Jones’ contract, no-trade clause, and the fact that he wants to play for a contender, it’s easier said than done. Frank Seravalli and Tyler Yaremchuk talked about how this recent news changes their outlook on how soon Jones gets traded on Daily Faceoff Live.

Frank Seravalli: We still need other teams to be interested, and to my knowledge, I don’t think Kyle Davidson’s phone has been ringing off the hook to try and move him. And we’ve known for a while that Seth Jones is, not that he’s not happy, but just wants a chance to win. So he verbalizes and vocalizes it. It’s still an incredibly difficult contract to move with a $9.5 million cap hit.

And for a team acquiring him, the biggest question that the Blackhawks need to ask themselves is, how much should they retain? What’s a fair number and how can they find a way if they’re going to do this to get a significant return back in order to justify that retainment?

And then from Jones’ perspective, he needs to present to them teams that he wants to go to. He has the full no-trade clause. He is in complete control. And since he wants to go to a place that has a chance to win, those are the teams that usually have the biggest cap issues.

So this is not an easy deal to pull off. I know everyone wants to say, “does this ramp it up or change the complexion of it all”? Aside from Jones saying publicly what we already do know, I don’t know that we necessarily learned a ton.

Tyler Yaremchuk: I know there are behind the scenes factors that can play into this stuff sometimes when it comes to retaining money and all of that. If I’m Chicago, don’t be half pregnant. Keep half of this thing, and sit there and get the best return you can.

If you’re sitting there going, “Oh, I don’t want 4-point-whatever million of dead money on my books, it might hurt our ability to be competitive”, I would say look in your own division. The Minnesota Wild made a tough call they bought out Zach Parise and Ryan Suter, and then had all of that dead money, but they said “it’s the right thing for us to do for our culture”.

The right thing to do here is to maximize the return you get for Seth Jones. Will the dead money suck? Sure. But if you get an extra piece of value in return, that could work out for you, more than just keeping $2 million and getting a mid-round pick.

Frank Seravalli: And I think to support your point, the Blackhawks have a ton of money to spend. They have very few guys under contract beyond next season. Yes, Connor Bedard needs a new deal. Yes, they’re going to go out and try and chase some big name players this summer. But it’s not like, if your Kyle Davidson, that you’re going through the McDonald’s drive-thru line and you can just order a top-end player like it’s chicken nuggets on the menu. That’s not how it works.

So they’ve got $63 million to spend three years from now just to get to the salary cap floor. So retaining that much for that length of time isn’t going to be problematic. But it’s “can you get enough return to justify that much money”. You’re also asking your owner to pay that much money for a player to not play for you. That’s the other part of the equation that I think is lost on people. Yeah, retaining is great, but you’re paying that money for him to play somewhere else.

You can watch the full episode here…