[Ready to grade - 1508 words]

Let me throw in a very important preface: I’m not nearly as good as @"luketd".  This is not going to be a 4,000 word breakdown of a massive trade tree.  Perhaps, in due time when all the dust has settled, this trade will deserve the full Luke treatment, especially if you follow its roots - which I will touch on briefly.  

I’m also not writing this to tout it as one of the best, most lopsided, or pivotal trades in league history.  I don’t have the knowledge of the league’s scope to make that claim (although I do think you’d be hard-pressed to find a trade that worked out in such a one-sided manner with the benefit of hindsight).  

It’s simply a trade that shaped my first SHL player’s career dramatically before he had ever been drafted.  It’s something we (by which I mean people with the Winnipeg Jets while I was there) had discussed privately at times, or commented on in media articles, but really hadn’t discussed in-depth.  

Now, with Luke’s trade history generating more conversation about past trades, as well as Evans’ somewhat recent retirement, the time is right.  So let’s go back in time to August 17, 2016.

To Portland (since I guess we've scrubbed their avatar from existence?)
D Johnny Cahill

To
D Andris Bukšs
Highest pick between S31 TEX 1st/S31 EDM 1st
S31 POR 3rd

Johnny Cahill (@JLysohirka)  is in his third season with the Winnipeg Jets when this trade takes place near the Season 30 trade deadline.  Cahill was an S25 draftee, taken in the fifth round with a pick acquired from Hamilton.  Despite being a defensive defenseman, Cahill had scored 22 points in Season 29, and would finish Season 30 with 29 points.

He was also on an expiring contract, which, well...



You’ll notice the distinct lack of Admirals logos in that list.  After the split season between Winnipeg and Portland in Season 30 that resulted from this trade, Cahill went to free agency and took his talents to Los Angeles, citing the opportunity to join “Scarebro” Chris Crutchfield as a primary reason for the move.  Perfectly understandable, @ligma  is a cool dude, and I’m not just saying that because we’re teammates in Montreal now.

In other words, Portland’s return on this trade was 12 games of Johnny Cahill.  Ouch.

Let’s now examine Winnipeg’s end of the trade.  First, we’ll start with the known commodity, Andris Bukss.  You may remember Bukss from such hits as getting banned from the league after he recreated and said many terrible, awful things.  But before that, he had a player who simply did terrible, awful things on the ice.



Check out those PIMs, boys!  Bukss was a brutal, brutal player.  He was on his best behavior during his Winnipeg years, but he also saw his least amount of ice time, behind the likes of Big Manious, Connor O’Reilly, Scott Robertson, and Rembrandt Q. Einstein on the defensive depth chart.

Bukss was later involved in a trade out of Winnipeg as well, as he - along with a then-unheralded prospect with a physical presence for the Kelowna Knights named Vasily Horvat - went to Texas for Yuri Boyka.  Texas won that trade, but we’re not talking about that trade right now.  I still love you @Slowpoke .

Now, for the two draft picks.  Little did we know this would be one of the last, if not THE last, trade @Leafs4ever  made as General Manager of the Winnipeg Jets (there were two Winnipeg trades on August 17, 2016, the other bringing in the aforementioned O’Reilly in exchange for Marc-Andre Malkin and a pile of three draft picks that amounted for two prospects that never really panned out (Ieuan Llewellyn and Stephen Harris) and the wrong Vlad McZehrl.

Thus, Leafs would not get to use these two draft picks.  Instead, @Atlas and @Nereus would take over the helm by the time the Season 31 SHL Entry Draft rolled around.  With their first pick, at fifth overall, they drafted some fuckstick named Zach Evans from the Detroit Falcons.  He had an okay career.



The “highest pick” condition proved to be eighth overall.  Edmonton finished ahead of Texas in the Western Conference and then defeated the Renegades in their first-round playoff series in an interesting twist on the condition of the trade.  With a winger who ended up spending a ton of time at center for the future already nabbed, the Jets used this pick to take one of the two intriguing centers from St. Louis in the draft class, Jason Visser.



The third-round pick was 30th overall in the draft.  By this point, the Jets had also added Niklas Flower and Colton Hagan to the cupboard, two players who would combine for 50 SHL games Flower played a season for Texas in S38, Hagan would retire, recreate as, well, Colton Hagan, and ironically get called up to Texas in S38 before playing seven seasons there.

Nonetheless, this was a deep draft, one of the deepest ever at the time after a successful summer Reddit recruiting campaign, and there was still a chance to grab talent late in the going.  

With 30th overall, the Winnipeg Jets selected Corey Bearss.  At the time, Bearss wasn’t a sexy pick.  People familiar of him from Vancouver knew he was a great locker-room guy, but he was not a guy who sought attention or put himself out there publicly on the forums.  Combined with a later creation, putting him behind many in his draft class in terms of TPE, and he was the very definition of “diamond in the rough.”



Bearss and Visser are still key parts of the Winnipeg Jets to this day, with Visser becoming arguably one of the best players in SHL history.  Bearss, to his own credit, developed into one of the top defensive forwards of his era, as well as a clutch playoff performer in many of the Jets’ deep postseason runs.  Together, they have combined for the following accolades.

4x 1st All-Star Team (S38, S41 x2, S43)
2x 2nd All-Star Team (S36, S37)
1x 3rd All-Star Team (S38, S43)
2x Sarmad Khan Trophy (S37, S41)
2x Sergei Karpotsov Trophy (S41, S43)
2x Jay McDonald Trophy (S41, S43)
2x Ron Mexico Trophy (S41, S43)
1x Anton Razov Trophy (S37)
1x Anton Razov Nominee (S44)
2x Challenge Cup (S37, S44)
1x Jeff Dar Trophy (S41)
2x Jeff Dar Nominee (S37, S38)
Aidan Richan Nominee (S37)
1x Ron Mexico Nominee (S41)

Add in Evans, and you have the following honors for what would come to be known affectionately as Winnipeg’s “S31 Boys” (nobody accused us of being creative), and you get this list.

5x 1st All-Star Team (S38 2x, S41 2x, S43)
3x 2nd All-Star Team (S36 2x, S37)
1x 3rd All-Star Team (S38, S43)
3x Sarmad Khan Trophy (S37, S38, S41)
3x Sergei Karpotsov Trophy (S38, S41, S43)
2x Jay McDonald Trophy (S41, S43)
2x Ron Mexico Trophy (S41, S43)
1x Anton Razov Trophy (S37)
3x Anton Razov Nominee (S37, S44 2x)
2x Challenge Cup (S37, S44)
2x Jeff Dar Trophy (S38, S41)
2x Jeff Dar Nominee (S37, S38)
Aidan Richan Nominee (S37)
2x Ron Mexico Nominee (S38, S41)

As it stands now, the trio sit first, third, and fifth in career scoring for the Jets, with Visser undoubtedly going to extend his franchise scoring lead to some other stratosphere.  Bearss passed Einstein to move into fifth during Season 45, while Evans surpassed Luke Fleming for third during his final season.  

Simply put, one of Leafs’ final acts as Winnipeg Jets General Manager shaped the franchise for the next 15 seasons, building the foundation for the “next generation” of Jets.  Perhaps more importantly, it gave me two awesome teammates who were also pretty damn good at fake hockey.

Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.  Come back next time, when I’ll discuss why pineapple doesn’t belong on pizza.

Shoutouts (or at least the ones I didn’t already tag):
@ToeDragon84 and @CBear, the other “S31 Boys”
@Flowseidon and @CampinKiller, the lost Jets who have since recreated and rejoined us in the SHL.  
@Bojo and @ArGarBarGar as always for their work in preserving and curating the history of the league so I can write shit like this when the muse strikes.