A Vegas fan floated a Dylan Larkin trade Sunday morning, and the Red Wings should hang up before the second sentence.
The pitch came from @KnightsMuse_ and has already pulled 16.1K views. People clearly want to talk about it.
Detroit gets William Karlsson and Nic Dowd, both listed as pending UFAs. It also gets a Vegas 2028 first and a conditional 2028 first from the Rangers.
Vegas gets the captain. That's the whole deal.
Two players who could walk next summer. Two picks that won't turn into NHL help for years. And nothing that replaces a first-line center.
Larkin scored 34 goals and 67 points in 74 games last season. He finished a +3 on a team that doesn't hand those out easily.
Steve Yzerman has no reason to sell his captain for rentals
His cap hit sits at $8,700,000 through 2030-31. For a No. 1 center, that's cost certainty, and cost certainty is exactly what a rebuild is supposed to buy.
Vegas already pays Jack Eichel $13,500,000 and Mitch Marner $12,000,000.
Slotting the Detroit captain behind Eichel would give Ryan Craig a ridiculous pair of centers. It would also leave Kelly McCrimmon doing cap math with a calculator and a prayer.
The Vegas side of the offer isn't nothing. Karlsson logged 18:55 in Saturday night's home loss to San Jose, with three shots and a -1 rating.
Dowd scored in that same game in 11:18 of ice time. Useful? Sure. But Detroit isn't shopping for depth in September.
Think of it like selling your house for two month-to-month leases and a couple of scratch tickets. You might hit. You'll definitely need somewhere to live.
And Detroit's footing is already shaky. The Red Wings dropped Saturday's exhibition to Columbus on home ice, and the regular season is days away.
Todd McLellan opens the real schedule Friday, Oct. 2, at home against the Rangers. Yes, the same Rangers whose conditional first sits in this package.
Who takes the opening draw that night if Larkin is gone? Marco Kasper and J.T. Compher both dressed Saturday. Neither is replacing 643 career points.
Detroit drafted Larkin 15th overall in 2014. A Waterford, Michigan kid wearing the C in his home state. You don't flip that for picks unless the building is on fire.
One number cuts the other way, though. He has five career playoff games, all back in 2015-16, and the window hasn't opened around him since.
That's the nerve Vegas fans are poking. Vegas visits Detroit on Nov. 5, and the noise won't get quieter.
If the Red Wings stall again, nobody will ask whether a pitch like this is fair. They'll ask how long Larkin is willing to wait.
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Should the Red Wings even listen if Vegas calls about Dylan Larkin?
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