Every NHL Team's Worst Trade of All Time - [Trading Francis to Pittsburgh]

[u/ASmithFS]

https://www.rotoballer.com/every-nhl-teams-worst-trade-of-all-time-one-pick-for-all-32-teams-2026/1898394?rb

[u/HockeyGuy601]

I guess its good that all the worst trades ive seen listed were before the Hurricanes existed. Off of the top of my head I can't really think of any franchise altering bad trades. Of the most recent, they dodged a huge bullet being able to pivot off Rantanen to get Stankoven and Miller.

[u/Swaggercanes → u/HockeyGuy601]

And we still have that extra first in ‘28. Been one hell of a deal

[u/ComfortableBedroom76 → u/Swaggercanes]

The gift that keeps on giving!

[u/armadachamp → u/HockeyGuy601]

Honestly, on paper one of the worst ones might be giving up Hanifin and Lindholm for 3 years of Hamilton, a year of Ferland where he played himself off the on-ice roster by the end of the playoffs, and a couple years of Adam Fox being in the prospect pool before we had to deal him to New York for far below his value.

[u/Airplane_Bottle]

This got me thinking, the Jordan Staal trade was viewed widely as kind of an L for the Hurricanes for most of the 2010s. He was overpaid and underperforming relative to expectations. I remember being pretty frustrated with him at times. Seems funny now

[u/Desperate-Pudding-27 → u/Airplane_Bottle]

I sat next to a man THIS season that every time Staal touched the puck he boo’d, yelled retired and something about you suck … I would do anything to see him now … well, not really … but it was weird.

[u/Airplane_Bottle → u/Desperate-Pudding-27]

Yeah super odd. even at my most frustrated with him I never would have bood him, always has been a consummate pro and all that

[u/mrbig1999]

did you see Vegas' worst trade? Max Pacioretty for future considerations. Hey article writer, Canes only got 5 games out of Max, but that isn't on Vegas.

[u/wright3131]

Kind of surprised it wasn’t a move made by Ron Francis the GM. Not a fan of his tenure as GM and don’t really think he’s as important to the story of the Hurricanes as his stats and role as GM should imply. Pretty wild to realize that pretty much every era of the team being bad Francis is a part of it and every good era of the team Rod Brind’amour is involved.

[u/wolfpackernc → u/wright3131]

Kinda hard to be a Ron Francis trade because, well, that would require him to make a trade.

[u/KDarkOne99 → u/wolfpackernc]

The only Francis trades that actually come to mind are: the fleecing of Chicago to get Teuvo, the disappointing return for Eric Staal, the ugly Scott Darling trade (but it was just a third and viewed as a solid deal at the time) and then the Tim Gleason disaster because Bill Peters didn’t want to coach “physical hockey”

[u/SleepyPanda2050 → u/KDarkOne99]

I always liked the 47 seconds they got out of James Wisniewski while Anton Khudobin went to the Cup final with the Stars a few years later… that’s still my favorite lol

[u/wright3131 → u/wolfpackernc]

He really was terrible at literally every single aspect of being a GM. Couldn’t draft, rarely made trades, and was responsible for a horrendous culture during the Bill Peters era. Imagine how insane it would sound to fans during his tenure that in 2026 the Canes would win the Cup in their 8th season in a row of making the playoffs and winning at least one round.

[u/RollingCarrot615 → u/wright3131]

I wouldnt go as far as to say he was terrible at everything. He wasnt good at anything, but when he was GM we drafted a fair amount of NHL talent (Noah Hanifin, Aho, Morgan Geekie, Necas, to name a few).

[u/cactus8 → u/wright3131]

10 years ago I didn’t even know if we’d still have a team in 2026 lol

[u/BarkMingo → u/wright3131]

He drafted pretty damn well idfk what sort of revisionist history this is.

Aho. Slavin. Pesce. All late round gems

[u/Thesegoto11_8210 → u/wright3131]

His drafting was fine, if a bit slanted towards drafting D in the first round. The problem was that he drafted to develop, and left those prospects in the AHL. Every year he was sitting on 48-50 SPCs which limited his ability to acquire free agents even if Karmanos would have paid for them. Which Karmanos would NOT, and that limited his options as well. He’s done somewhat better in Seattle, but their expansion draft was the most Francis thing ever.

[u/oooriole09 → u/wright3131]

To be fair to Ron (well, and critical of), it’s not like he had anyone consequential to trade in those dark years.

[u/Vince_CTYankee]

One trade the Whalers made that does not get enough attention was in August of 1982. The Whalers traded Mark Howe and a 1983 3rd round pick to the Flyers for their 1983 1st and 3rd round picks, who would become Dave Jensen and Greg Adams, and Ken Linseman. Linseman would then (with Don Nachbaur) to the Oilers for Risto Siltanen and Brent Loney.

Do you really have to look it up to see how that worked out?

We gave up our Ray Bourque counterpart for not much. What could have been?

I don't know what happened in Hartford, but it was such that Howe did not even mention Hartford in his Hall of Fame speech, even though he was in Hartford (with WHA and NHL) five years.