Back when the Sharks traded a pair of second rounders and Raffi Torres to the Toronto Maple Leafs for Nick Spaling and Roman Polak I offered this post equivalent of the shrug emoji. After watching Spaling and Polak play for the Sharks for half a season, my take would have been a bit stronger.
The trade was bad for a couple reasons. First, Polak was decidedly not an upgrade over Dylan DeMelo, which I imagine many people smarter (and not smarter) than me said at the time of the move. Heck, I’m not convinced Spaling was an upgrade over Mike Brown.