The Stars are making trades, and that was always likely to be bad news for one of their depth forwards, with Mavrik Bourque patiently waiting for a roster spot after tearing up the AHL all season. And today, the music stopped, and Ty Dellandrea is off to San Jose.
It’s a shame, in one sense. Dellandrea always felt like he had a bit more to give, and I think it’s fair to say he deserved more ice time this season than he got. But the fact is, he didn’t do enough with the ice he did get to force the Stars’ hand, and with a forward group this loaded, that’s kind of what you have to do, and he didn’t.
Losing a 13th-overall pick in exchange for a fourth-rounder is never ideal, but it’s hard not to feel a little bit like the Stars could have seen this one coming. In fact, if you go back to 2018, you’ll probably find a lot of Stars fans who were cranky about the Ty Dellandrea pick at 13th overall.
Heck, even Dellandrea himself was shocked, as the News reported at the time:
“He looked surprised,” Modano said of Dellandrea. “I think it was unexpected where he was going. He didn’t know what was going to happen. He was certainly surprised.
“Kind of neat to see. At a loss for words. He didn’t know what to say. A lot happening in one second there.”
The NHL Scouting Bureau listed Dellandrea as the No. 25 skater among draft prospects from North America. Stars general manager Jim Nill said the possibility of adding a defensive-minded center influenced the Stars’ choice.
Like the Denis Gurianov and Julius Honka picks in prior years, there was a bit of a “reach” feel to this one, with Nill even saying that the Stars knew they would have to “step up” to get a defensive centerman like Dellandrea. And that rankled just a bit.
The Riley Tufte pick two years prior (late though it was) already felt unlikely to pay off, and with players like Joe Veleno and Ty Smith still on the board in 2018 when Jamie Benn and Mike Modano took the stage, it seemed like Jim Nill had once again turned down high-ceiling players in favor of a Cody Eakin replacement, at best. Even David Castillo’s fairly generous pre-draft profile could only come up with “well-rounded” as a compliment for Dellandrea, and unfortunately, even that attribute faded as Dellandrea turned from prospect into Energy Guy into 13th forward, taking bad penalties and failing to capitalize on enough scoring chances to warrant a consistent place in the lineup.
In retrospect, the Dellandrea pick doesn’t seem that bad. A lot of players taken in the 13-20 range haven’t blown the doors off their teams, and you know, Jim Nill can’t hit home runs every time.
Still, Dellandrea had (and has) a lot going for him. Dellandrea’s junior career was marked by leadership, particularly during a tough time in Flint. It’s worth reading about some of the recognition he got as a 19-year-old when you put his Stars career in context. There’s a reason the team was high on him for a while, and you can bet it’s a tough pill to swallow to see him shipped out now.
There’s no denying that Dellandrea was a useful asset, as cheap forwards who can play defensively responsible games are always valued by NHL coaches. So it all begs the question: Why did the Stars get rid of Dellandrea now?
Bourque is part of the answer, sure. Dallas knows he’s going to be good (and cheap), so they want to make sure they’ll have room for Bourque after never really finding anything but a courtesy contest for him last year.
Unloading the pricier contract of Radek Faksa (who is himself a success story as a fellow 13th-overall Defensively Responsible Centerman) was always going to be tough. Besides, I think the Stars would prefer to have Faksa (who is more defensively valuable) over Dellandrea in that 12th/13th forward role, which was pretty clearly signaled with some healthy scratches for Faksa as the year went along. Dallas was content to carry fewer than 23 skaters for a lot of the year in order to accrue more cap space, and that made one of Faksa and Dellandrea superfluous. Dellandrea was easier to move at a younger age and cheaper contract, so boom goes the dynamite.
Secondarily, I think Nill genuinely hoped to give Dellandrea a shot to succeed elsewhere, and San Jose is certainly going to give him all the ice time he can earn. It reminds me a bit of Devin Shore in 2018 being traded to Anaheim for Andrew Cogliano. It was about Dallas’s needs first, but it worked out all right for Shore, who played healthy chunks of NHL hockey for another five years afterward rather than being immediately waived by a good team without room for him.
Finally, I always expected the Stars to do something to start fixing the below situation. (The Winnipeg pick is the one they just acquired from San Jose):
The Stars have a dearth of draft picks in the first four rounds over the next three years. In fact, before today’s trade, the Stars had only half of their picks in those rounds. Why don’t the Stars have all of those picks? Well, for a lot of little reasons, and some bigger ones.
*Deep breath*
This year’s 2nd-rounder and the 2026 4th-rounder both were shipped out for Chris Tanev (to Calgary and New Jersey to make the cap room work).
Next year’s 2nd-rounder was packaged with Anton Khudobin for Max Domi at last year’s deadline, and the Stars’ 4th-round pick this year? Well….
Next year’s 4th-round pick was the conditional part of the Nils Lundkvist trade, which did not turn into a 3rd-round pick thanks(?) to Lundkvist’s offensive struggles.
Oh, and for all you prospect nerds out there, this year’s 3rd-rounder was packaged with this year’s 6th-rounder to trade up in last year’s draft to get Brad Gardiner, who is definitely a 19-year-old OHL player, I can confirm that.
So, why did the Stars trade Ty Dellandrea? I guess you’d mash all of this up into one short sentence like this: To make room for better players while helping recoup a draft pick for the near future and putting Dellandrea in a position to get his career going, if he’s able to.
Now, why didn’t I just type that one sentence up top and save us both all the time of reading this? Well, that’s a good question. Better yet, why did I type like six one-sentence paragraphs instead of just drawing this thing?
What was I thinking? Why isn’t my editor stopping me from doing this? Why don’t I have an editor? All of those questions are ones you can ask for days without ever getting answers. Ty Dellandrea will have a chance, next season, to once again start answering for himself.
Addendum: Here are some Ty Dellandrea memories for you.
Stars Thoughts: Robert Tiffin's attempt to understand the Dallas Stars and everything else 
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