Armchair GM Mode Engaged: Let's fix these Dallas Stars. Without sacrificing Jason Robertson of course.

If I were Jim Nill...

What’s great about being an armchair GM is that nothing’s at stake. Typos, mediocre writing, and Substack’s CMS are all I have to worry about. Otherwise I don’t have to deal with the interpersonal relationships that inform traditional decision-making, nor do I have to deal with stubborn GMs who don’t know the concept of value. Believe me, they’re out there.

I’m lucky. I get to focus on a single exercise with one purpose: making Dallas better. The good news is that there is a clear path. In this offseason writing we’ve focused on a lot of different things that matter. The lack of chemistry among the forward trios. The lack of mobility on the blueline. We’ll get to special teams and goaltending later this week. Now this is the part where we focus on fixing these things while keeping the core intact.

One thing that I would argue is key here is that this is not a team that needs to reconfigure its core. Any notion on the contrary is just…wrong. Consider Toronto. There’s a team that is consistently one of the top teams in the division, and yet they have less postseason series wins since 2004 than the Buffalo Sabres — the team that famously hasn’t even made the playoffs in 14 years. There’s a reason for that, and I made the case here: their core lacks diversity. The Stars, conversely, don’t have that problem.

Sure, we’ve seen some disappearing acts from key players. But three Western Conference Finals appearances tells me that the roster isn’t enough — not that the core isn’t. There’s a key difference. So I’m approaching this exercise with that assumption; that the core is worth preserving. Before digging in I want to shoutout where this exercise template comes from: Detroit writer, Prashanth Iyer. This will be the offbrand version of his work, granted.

Beyond that, I don’t have the normal sales pitch. Just…you know, subscribe. That’s it. Don’t let the Substack prompts fool you into spending money you don’t have, or don’t want to give up. This little place is officially #37 in Rising Sports. If you like it here, subscribe. Anything to boost the signal of our operation helps me and thus, the Stars community. You don’t have to check every email. You don’t have to comment or join the Discord. But every subscription helps forge solidarity in this little hockey community and makes us stronger in the face of whatever jamoke thinks we like hockey because we “don’t know” other sports as if we’re only ever supposed to choose vanilla and not chocolate.

Prospects, potential graduates, and the 2025 NHL Draft

To recap the prospect pool real quick, Dallas’ strengths right now are on defense, and right wing. Led by Emil Hemming (RW), Tristan Bertucci (LHD), and Aram Minnetian (RHD), there is a non-zero chance that one of these faces will graduate at some point. All of them are playing major roles for their respective teams. Although I had my own personal concerns about Hemming’s development early, in the end I came away very impressed. Likewise for the defenders. They are long shots, but they are good players right now.

My personal approach here would be the Ivan Drago routine. The core is already here. This doesn’t mean trading them away for nothing, but it does mean you can stand to live with an empty pool for 2-3 years if it means a Cup.

With only three picks in the 2025 draft, beginning in the third round at 94th overall, Dallas obviously won’t have the pick of the litter. I’ll be writing about the draft in more detail later, but if I’m GM I’m asking my amateur scouts about big, rangy, right-shot defender David Bedhowski from Owen Sound, Carson Cameron from Petersborough, and wondering why 40-goal scorer Philippe Veilleux is projected to be available at where I’m picking. Is it possible that Ivan Ryabkin — consensus top five pick to start the season after breaking Matvei Michkov’s U17, MHL scoring record — falls this low after his disastrous draft year? The available names may not be as exciting as the ones we talked about in August, but there’s potential.

RFAs

While Dallas has five RFAs, there are only two worth discussing: Mavrik Bourque and Nils Lundkvist. It’s tough to assess their respective futures in some ways. Both had good years as good young players, all things considered. Bourque was yo-yoed up and down the lineup, never really given a chance to establish a semblance of consistency, and still came away with 25 points in 73 games in limited minutes. Lundkvist ostensibly achieved the impossible: earning Pete DeBoer’s trust. Primarily paired with Esa Lindell for the year, everything seemed to be going great until season-ending shoulder surgery erased all the goodwill.

In evaluating these two players, while it’s easy to envision them in bigger roles, I’m also not sure how convinced I am that they’re necessary. Lundkvist only earned DeBoer’s trust on the surface. He still played less minutes per game than Matt Dumba and Ilya Lyubushkin. Beyond that, he’s not a puck mover, which Dallas needs. I don’t think it’s being pedantic to say that a player who can’t move the puck out of the defensive zone is not a puck mover. He can’t. My opinion of Bourque is still high, on the other hand. He’s looked really good in the top six, and while he’s not secretly Dylan Holloway, he’s Dallas’ rare depth forward that can play up the lineup. There’s a 45 percent chance based on Evolving-Hockey’s parameters (age, position, priors, time-on-ice, points, etc) that he gets two years at two million AAV. Lundkvist is projected at two years, $1.4 million each. Dallas can’t afford — literally and figuratively — to bring in a veteran stopgap who costs more. So these two seem like players you need to bring back.

On the other hand, Dallas needs to get better, with high priority going to the blueline. Can these players be potential pieces? Maybe. It’s a weird paradox where you need cheap players to add value and yet you may need to leverage these cheap players as trade pieces to add value elsewhere. I would argue that there is a way.

UFAs

My opinion hasn’t changed. Mikael Granlund, Matt Duchene, Cody Ceci, Evgenii Dadonov, etc — thank you. But it’s time. It’s the point I always go back to, and something I get. If you’ve heard it before you might be wondering “is he really babbling on about this again?” Trying to convey the importance of analytics, and why looking beyond production is something I try not to take for granted, especially as new readers and new fans roll in. If the cost is that I repeat myself, than so be it. To me, Duchene and Granlund less interesting than players who fit in proportion to cap.

Besides. Forward trios should be hydras, not rattlesnakes.

Panther’s forward Eetu Luostarinen scored 24 points in 80 games this year. That’s 58 less points than Duchene. And yet Luostarinen is a key piece in one of the most dominant lines this postseason. Outscoring opponents 13-3 with them on the ice, this is the template. To mangle the Moneyball quote, the goal here shouldn’t be to buy players. It should be to buy wins. And in order to buy wins, you need to buy possession. If Dallas can find players that can help the core win possession, the offense — and defense — will take care of itself.

The 2025-2026 Roster

Now let’s dig in. To recap, Dallas needs to upgrade its blueline as priority number one, and find good territorial wingers for the top two lines.

Obviously, this means clearing out a lot of space. As of right now, the Stars have $4,955,084 in cap space. They can free up an additional $7 million by getting rid of Dumba and Lyubushkin. The only genuinely tradeable contract is Mason Marchment. So the potential cap space if Dallas gets super aggressive is an additional $11.5 million. When you look at what Edmonton has managed to accomplish with Kasperi Kapanen, Vasily Podkolzin, Evander Kane, and Connor Brown, it illustrates the broad philosophy here: trade for high value, low profile players who can fit into the lineup. Except for Brown and Reilly Smith, the UFA class is either uninteresting in terms of fit, or the Stars can’t afford them. So trade is key here for building next season’s roster.

Three teams look like prime candidates to help with the three keys:

• Shed cap now and in preparation for 2026-2027

• Find two RHD below the top pair

• Find a forward fit or two in the top six

Here I’m calling L.A., Philadelphia, and San Jose. The hope is that Mike Grier is in a ‘grateful’ mood (having done great with the deadline deal) and that one year of Dumba at almost four million won’t be a big deal. For the Kings, maybe Ken Holland can help nourish two birds with one stone, and for Daniel Briere, the focus is on getting that right-shot defender. So here are the following proposals.

Trading Marchment for Warren Foegele might seem kind of odd, but the main thing for the purpose of the cap is that Foegele has two years left. Jordan Spence adds actual puck-moving ability next to Lian Bichsel, which makes giving up Bertucci worth it. He’s also explicitly available. As for Philly, the package speaks for itself. A first-rounder and a quality prospect is exactly what the Flyers are looking for in a package for Rasmus Ristolainen. I think that qualifies. Add Connor Brown — projected at two years, $2.1 million per Evolving-Hockey — and the end result is a roster that is under the cap with $460,084 to spare.

On the surface, it doesn’t look like much, but it hits all the right notes (theoretically): a top four defender is added, allowing Miro Heiskanen and Thomas Harley to run their own pairs, Bichsel gets a mobile partner, and the top six gets an influx of speed to compliment Jason Robertson and Mikko Rantanen. Speaking of which, let’s talk about these additions. I’ve always liked Foegele, and it seems bizarre that Edmonton let him go just to bring in Dudes With Resumes. While a forty-point forward may not seem like much to pair next to Roope Hintz and Rantanen, he adds size, speed, a heavy forecheck, and he can work from the defensive zone.

Need an explainer card for these? I got you covered here.

He’s not a playmaker, but he can finish well enough, and finding a quality playmaker would be too costly anyway. Similar things can be said about Brown, who adds speed, defensive responsibility, and adds to a rush attack that really seemed to wither on the proverbial vine for Dallas in the playoffs.

Need an explainer card for these? I got you covered here.

While you always want to be careful with smaller defenders posting sterling numbers in a sheltered role (see Julius Honka), Spence won’t be asked to do the heavy lifting. Not only is he someone that adds movement on the backend, but he adds some playmaking too (Lundkvist rates horribly in every defensive category that Spence does not)¹.

Need an explainer card for this? I got you covered here.

Ristolainen doesn’t necessarily add mobility (although I wouldn’t call him slow for a player his size) but he throw bombs at the net, and despite being an analytics thud for so long — his career has really blossomed. He’s not young but he’s not old either, at just 30.

Need an explainer card for this? I got you covered here.

While adding Ristolainen goes against the “add mobility” principle, the key here is that it allows Harley to run his own ship, and keeps Esa Lindell away from having to run his own. Lindell is a quality defender, but as we’ve seen time and time again, you can’t just pair him with anyone. Bringing in John Klingberg (getting scratched for Troy Stetcher right now) or a very declining Rasmus Andersson to pair next to Lindell just feels like old hat.

Roster Breakdown: According to the fancy stats

Here was Dallas’ playoff roster. (Ignore the Ilya Lyubushkin placement. Alex Petrovic didn’t have enough data for me to put him there.)

A roster mathematically considered a playoff lock worth 103 points in the standings built by offensive depth. Now here’s the new one (Ignore Brandon Tanev and Joel Armia — although they would be fine adds — for the same reason as above).

Worth the exact same amount of points with the difference being that what they sacrifice in offensive value, they gain on the backend. It’s also worth noting Foegele’s numbers actually boost the top line more than Granlund. Also, 103 points is the same amount as the Florida Panthers. Just saying.

As reported in February, the league announced its salary cap estimates. $104 million is the projected cap ceiling for the 2026-2027 season. That’s important to Dallas for two reasons: Robertson and Harley. Per Evolving-Hockey, their predicted contracts are $10,940,000 and $9,629,000, respectively. The new cap ceiling essentially covers their raises, allowing them to make the above trades/additions without having to worry about a cap crunch. Is any of this perfect? No. Does it guarantee that Dallas gets over the hump? Nothing ever does. Are these even the best names? Maybe not. But it’s a roster that fills in the margins just the right ways IMO. It’s a base, built around a core I believe is capable of winning a Cup.

1. Darryl Belfry has a really good, quick breakdown on his transition defending.