Connor McDavid trade talk is creeping back into Edmonton Oilers conversation, and Tyler Yaremchuk drew a hard line on it this week.
On the ON Everyday Podcast, Yaremchuk played out the nightmare version: things go south, and McDavid doesn't want to re-sign in Edmonton.
Then he built the offer himself. Three first-round picks, two really good prospects, and even a young roster player.
His verdict? "I would rather have one more chance."
It's a heartfelt answer. It's also the wrong one, and it's the kind of thinking that leaves a franchise holding an empty bag.
The clip has Yaremchuk stacking the hypothetical package piece by piece, counting it out like a trade deadline shopping list, before brushing all of it aside for one more shot.
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Leon Draisaitl already out-earns McDavid on the Oilers cap
The money matters here. McDavid carries a $12,500,000 cap hit, ninth-highest in the league.
Leon Draisaitl sits at $14,000,000. Evan Bouchard adds another $10,500,000 on the blue line.
That's a heavy chunk of cap parked on three players. Stan Bowman has to build a contender around it no matter how this ends.
So what exactly does one more chance buy?
It buys one more spring, maybe a long one. It also buys the risk of watching the best player on the planet leave with nothing coming back.
Turning down that package would be like refusing to cash a winning lottery ticket because you're attached to the paper it's printed on.
Three firsts, two blue-chip prospects and a young roster player can reshape a franchise for a decade. Rejecting that on principle is how general managers lose their jobs.
Mike Babcock gets a front-row seat to all of it. His Oilers opened the preseason with a 5-2 win over Winnipeg on Saturday.
Next up is a trip to Vancouver on Thursday. The same rival then visits Edmonton for the regular-season opener September 29, before the teams flip rinks October 1.
Yaremchuk framed the whole thing as a what-if. But when Edmonton voices start pricing out McDavid packages in September, the mood around this team isn't exactly calm.
Every slow start will pour fuel on it. And if the what-if ever turns real, Bowman won't be choosing between a haul and one more chance, because McDavid will be the one making that call.
Should the Oilers take a massive haul for Connor McDavid if he won't re-sign?
Also read on Markerzone.com:
Connor McDavid addresses whether he would intervene if Mike Babcock goes too far
