Conclusion
There’s no other way to put it, the seven teams that failed to qualify for this year’s historically large post-season are bad. That doesn’t mean that they don’t have talent though, as shown by the six targets mentioned in this piece.
Part of a rebuild is finding value in unexpected places, and few places are as unexpected as the bottom of the barrel in the NHL. As an added bonus, these teams are allowed to start trading right now, so it’s possible one of these happens sooner than you think.